Sector Space

Entire game mechanics are basically useless until the late game, despite seeming very useful, such as salvaging. The UI is extremely obtuse and I had to google things every few minutes because the game tells you nothing. Not a case of figuring it out for yourself, I spent over 10 hours trying and it's just opaque. There is so much I wish I could go back in time and tell myself about the game in the form of a text box. That's all it would take, a few helpful in game text boxes to EXPLAIN all this ♥♥♥♥ that you're just left to figure out. Basic game mechanics are so hilariously obtusely designed but so simple when you actually figure them out. I spent hours staring at the screen asking myself "I must be missing something" but no, you're not, there's just massive walls in place to prevent you doing things that are not explained.

This game is only like 20% done, by my subjective judgement. But it's already capable of giving you a lot of fun time. It has huge potential and the dev seems active enough. I cross my fingers hoping it will grow into a gem and that it won't take a decade.

Amazing top down space sandbox game that checks all of the boxes: combat, trade, crafting, fleet management, planet/station management. Still very much in early access but has a huge upside. For $5, this is a steal.

I was really surprised by this game. For 5$, one doesn't expect much. Yet, the content here is substantial. This being a sandbox game, content means - ships, weapons, skills, and mechanics. This game has more than enough toys in the sandbox to stay enjoyable. It has a very classic feel to it, like Escape Velocity from the old days. At 20 hours now, I'm just getting into building stations and colonies and using the crafting system. I could imagine myself playing at least another 10 hours before I've run out of stuff to mess around with. Others might progress faster but if you like old-school styled space sandboxes, you are almost guaranteed to get more than 5$ of playtime out of this highly affordable title. My one gripe: this game needs some serious QOL / UI / UX work. Better organized station inventories, better map features, and other things related to how this game provides information to the player needs some effort. Notably like many other sandbox games, almost every item in the game can be crafted from raw materials, or can be broken down into raw materials. There are some production chains. However, it is arduous to figure out what you need to make what kind of item. There's just no easy way to figure out what you need to craft a specific thing, or what you get out of recycling a specific thing. There are also other issues - there's no way to know at a glance where a particular item is sold, you just have to figure it out over time. There's no way to easily discover where to sell your rare commodities - looking at you space opals! I spent a bunch of time salvaging what looks like really valuable components only to find that no one wants to buy them? I'm typically a big fan of games that don't hold your hand excessively, but at the very least more important information should be available to the player. Regardless of this gripe, I love this game and I'm very happy with my purchase, and I hope to see work continue on this title!

I love these types of games. Start small with a tiny ship. Mine/fight your way to a small fleet of junkers. Finally get your first real ship. Start a small colony and then snowball from there. Can see the direction they're going with this one, and I am for it. A whole lot of content for $5 that makes me feel like it's undervalued.

This Game is amazing, Retro space game enjoyers rejoice ! (still work in progress, but has alot of potential for sure) Definitly worth checking out.

Have not played a "One more hour" game for a while This one caught me off guard and spanked me hard when the ancients came through the portal and graciously ripped me a new one. 10/10 would recommend

[h1]Just Plain Fun![/h1] Honestly, this is some of the most fun I've had in a game, this year. The systems are moderately deep, but not to the point where I find myself feeling like "ugh, I don't WANT to do all of that..." It's very organic in the way you slowly figure things out. That said, there are definitely moments where the answer of how to do what isn't entirely clear. This is a game that could really benefit from a built in wiki feature, because it can be quite easy, at least at the beginning, to not know where one should go to sell certain things, or buy certain things. Still, I have gotten to the point where I can pretty reliably make a decent amount of money in the game, which means my fleet (the player can buy and add quite a few ships to their fleet) is consistently growing and improving. Not only are there fleet mechanics, each ship has a full fitting arrangement, much like one's character in an RPG. Slots for all sorts of different gear on the ship, and further RPG elements with experience points and skill points. It is quite certain that one's "build" will likely be quite specific to their own playthrough, unless they're just following someone else's guide. [h1]Lots of Variety In Gameplay[/h1] I still have a lot I haven't done in the game, you can set up your own stations, colonies on planets, extractors for planetary resources, etc. There's much more than that, and I can see this as being the kind of game where a person can get a LOT of value from it. [h1]Item Modifiers Work Like Crimson Desert's![/h1] Here's another nice feature I really like. If you've played Crimson Desert, you know that that game's "unique item" system isn't the same as all of the others. You can find a weapon that has a really unique effect on it, then have a witch pull that effect off of that weapon before placing it on the weapon of your choice. That's how this one works, too! You get items in the game that can be used to pull modifiers off of one piece of gear, then place it on another piece of gear. This is even better in this game because, whereas in Crimson Desert the difference between one sword and another isn't really significant, aside from the modifiers you choose, in Sector Space you can pull a super powerful modifier from early game equipment and place it on much better stuff. For example, a +templar modifier from your light lasers that you used on your starter craft can be pulled from that equipment, then put on the new heavy laser that you bought. All of the modifiers with a LOT more DPS.. [h1]The Challenge Feels Good![/h1] I also enjoy that the game isn't ridiculously difficult, just for the sake of difficulty. It can become a bit of a power phantasy, what with there not being any real long-term loss in the game. If you lose your ship, you respawn at the closest station. If you lose one of your fleet ships, it'll respawn a couple minutes later, then rejoin your fleet. You will lose the items in your inventory, and a bit of your wealth, but not the gear equipped to the ship, or the ship itself. Personally, I [i]like[/i] this, as I don't want to be punished so severely as to make me feel like I just want to give up. This isn't to say there isn't [i]any[/i] challenge after a couple of hours in the game. The further you get from the starting system, the more well-equipped your enemies will become. There are bandits, pirates, and aggressive factions in the game, so you [i]can[/i] stumble into an area where you'll suddenly be in over your head. And you [i]will[/i] have experiences with them at one point, where you can immediately feel how out of your depth you are, only to come back there some hours later and feel just how MUCH you've improved, now being able to stomp them entirely. [b]The sense of progress is quite fulfilling, and quite apparent. [/b] [h1]So Many Positives, with Very Few Negatives[/h1] There are MANY things I love about this game, and so little I dislike. Sector Space is the kind of game that could benefit a LOT from multiple tutorials, at different points in the game. I would love it if there were missions that asked me to do things involving new features, while also giving me the basic explanation of how to do those things. "Go build a station in this area", then a quick tutorial of how to actually do that, what's needed, and where these things can be acquired. That said, it's a sandbox, it's huge, and if you're taking things a step at a time... Well... If you're like me, even [i]with[/i] how massive the game is, I haven't needed to watch any videos on how to do things, or even read any guides. I faffed about a bit, at times, but once I figured one thing out, it usually explained something else related. Anyway, do I recommend it? Absolutely. If you love the grind, the rewarding type of grind where you can quickly feel your progress amounting to being stronger and stronger, you'll very likely enjoy this game. [b]I [i]highly[/i] recommend Sector Space.[/b]

as is, this game is amazing value. worth way more than five bucks. just check playtimes!

Ah yes, the twin blessing and curse of being featured by indie game reviewers on youtube. Nookrium or Splattercat or even SsethTzeentach do a review on your one-man early access project, and suddenly a slew of gamers show up expecting something a lot closer to 1.0 release than it is; In typical obnoxious gamer fashion, they leave a bad review because bugs/it crashed/I don't like something about the UI. Never mind that it only cost them literally a few bucks, they felt they were entitled to something that they didn't get, so have a thumbs down. Strange that so many people still don't seem to understand what "Early Access" means, despite actively seeking out early access games, so they can...what, exactly? nip them in the bud with negative reviews? Spend twenty minutes with the game and then complain about something that isn't actually a problem, you just didn't play long enough to figure it out? Do their part to personally guarantee that the dev never gets a critical mass of support to fix said bugs and crashes and whatever you don't like about the UI? For the record, I have only encountered a handful of bugs, most of which it seemed the dev was already aware of based on the posts in the community hub forum. I have seen exactly zero crashes, even with extended play sessions of 3-4 hours. And the UI, while complex and overly busy, is functional and IMO works just fine for the moment. Sector space has enormous potential - literally starsector-level potential, if it is handled well and developed thoughtfully. It is granular in all the best ways, and already has a compelling game loop in play, with a combination of mining/trade, exploration, combat, and a system which rewards tinkering and upgrading gear and experimenting with new ship builds. Moreover, it features a real dynamic economy, with all buyable and sellable commodities, as well as equipment and ships, subject to rising and falling market fluctuations in real-time. On top of this, a second layer of mechanics is devoted to construction of player-owned stations and outposts, and an entire resource extraction and production chain with dozens of different compounds, susbtances, and materials with which the player can then construct everything from gear and items to modules and ships, or even focus on producing high-demand items to feed the local NPC station economies. The player can even produce their own jumpgates, to supplement the already-existing jumpgate system, as well as utilize the wormholes scattered around that link the various parts of the galaxy. The galaxy feels oppressively massive - the wormholes are helpful in getting the lay of the land and figuring out which "sectors" are most likely to have high level ores to mine and enemies to fight. Enemies roll around in mobs of varying sizes and types, ranging from pirates and opportunistic miners looking for a quick robbery, to inscrutable alien crystalline vessels, to exotic high-tech drone swarms aimlessly travelling the stars, the remains of some long-dead AI controller. There are also lots of friendlies - traders, miners, local law enforcement/galactic alliance navy, and neutral factions as well. In a max size galaxy, there are hundreds of NPC stations and systems (my current procedurally-generated large galaxy has well over 600 NPC stations) and, in true sandbox fashion, there are no real limits on where you can go from the start....excepting various space hazards of course - solar storms are no joke for early-game ships, and nebulas can hide some nasty surprises.... In its current state, much of the early gameplay revolves around tooling up a ship with multiple mining beams and grinding out some quality ores for money and EXP until you reach the next level cap that opens up the next tier of weapons and gear for purchase. Character skills help a lot here - if you want to make a ton of money, put points into prospector and mining power along with Ore recovery/extraction, save up for a decent freighter, and do mining runs on any belts full of dolomite and pallospar that you find - by the time you hit level 50, you'll be pulling in full loads of around 30-40k tons worth 3-5 million depending on your skills, for about ten minutes of actual in-game mining work. It's tedious at first, but once you get your mining skill up and get heavy/advanced mining lasers, you'll be running around clearing entire asteroid fields in no time - fighting off raiders and pirates and checking out various NPC stations as you make your way to and from the asteroid belts closest to the *ahem* "civilized" systems. On the other hand, combat is fun too, if a tad hands-off - it's essentially a glorified rpg type system where you simply choose a target and your ship auto-attacks based on the weapons you have installed and any other relevant skills/gear. if you take the combat route, there's plenty of money to be made there as well - low level "boss" ships (usually the coloured ones) found leading small mobs can drop a ton of credits when they are destroyed, as well as loot crates of various tiers that can have pretty decent gear, including unique and modified gear. There is a diablo-esque hack-and-slash looter element to the game that is refreshing when you're sick of mining and want to go hunting for a quick bounty or three - if you utilize power-up consumables (shield recharge bonus, attack bonus, etc) and turret platforms (deploy them on combat, they guard the area and auto-attack any enemies) and time your attacks well, you can use a mob fleet of crappy ships to beat much more powerful targets and get away with a ton of money and loot. Beyond that, you have mysterious alien systems, colonization of planets, endless ship-and-player-skills build syneries and combinations with the various "core" player classes (proprietor, inflitrator, sentinel, etc.), and in addition to the procedurally-generated galaxy, there are a number of hand-designed systems that (i believe) are the same in each game, to give the player some consistency and clear access to the gear and ship upgrade path (for the first few tiers, anyways). All in all, it's already a LOT of game for just $6.49, and development continues apace. Current version is 0.5.9.6 as of the writing of this review...which is to say nowhere near a full release, and yet the core gameplay is solid and the game world feels surprisingly fleshed out. I'll probably end up putting 60+ hours into this before I put it down for a year or so, waiting for patches and updates to accumulate (if you're a fan of indie space games, you'll know this method well) before jumping in again. When that time comes, I'll update this review to reflect content updates and other changes. Looking forward to following the development process of this game for many years to come, as I did for literally over a decade with absolute classics like Transcendence and Starsector. I suspect that, like them, if the dev takes a slow-and-steady focused approach, this game will be worth the same wait.