Star Trucker review - Investment Policy

As a seasoned gamer with a penchant for high-octane action and adrenaline-fueled adventures, I must admit that Star Trucker took me by surprise. Coming from the fast-paced world of Soulslikes and space combat simulators, I found myself drawn into this slow, meditative universe where patience and caution reign supreme.

In essence, I don’t have much patience, typically. I can resemble a dog tethered to a window, waiting for a package for days on end. I’ve been known to hurl an IKEA flat-pack in frustration, and my text exchanges with Adam during Soulslike gameplay could fill volumes. That’s why it came as a surprise when I found the Star Trucker demo this year to be soothing, calm, and incredibly meditative. It was almost as if I had been unconsciously breathing paint fumes or encountered a friendly canine on my way home from work that day, making me unusually tranquil.

Since the tale of my journey back to Star Trucker was filled with peril, close calls, hull ruptures, collisions with asteroids, and an unnerving cargo container incident that I can only hope disintegrated upon re-entry, sparing a nation from destruction.

In essence, Star Trucker reflects your state of mind: if you approach it with positivity and comfort, it’s enjoyable; but if you pick it up on a challenging day, your experience may not be as pleasant.

Star Trucker isn’t a challenging game with high-intensity action. Instead, it has a subtle level of danger that’s more like missing your partner’s new haircut – you might not even realize you’re in trouble most of the time. The gentle alarm about a hull breach is often overshadowed by the captivating Country soundtrack, and those custard creams won’t eat themselves, so you’ve got to keep eating them!

This game shares several similarities with Spacebreaker: Hardship. It’s a part-time game, and much like many real-world jobs, it involves a fair share of monotonous tasks. The main loop revolves around journeying to space stations to gather cargo, then delivering that cargo safely to its destination without any mishaps en route, such as dropping it on an unintended moon. Along the way, there are various additional aspects to manage, such as maintaining your vehicle. The level of involvement for these secondary tasks can be customized in the settings, but at default settings, they keep you actively engaged.

All equipment within the spacecraft has both a power supply and control interface. The oxygen, gravity, and energy systems need to be activated, while your vehicle requires fuel. A collision with too many asteroids could damage the hull, requiring you to repair it outside using your spacesuit. This can be incredibly frustrating if you’re in a hurry. Similarly, forgetting to switch off components before removing a fuse or power cell can cause a system-wide shutdown – hardly a relaxing experience as you float aimlessly, dodging cargo boxes and trying to reset the circuit breakers. The thrill of these challenges is what makes Star Trucker so engaging, unless you’re counting the time spent trying to reattach a detached trailer before it veers towards the nearest star.

It’s the controls I struggled with most. Switching out of cockpit view reverses some of the controls, while the external view feels weirdly detached. Hooking onto trailers or docking stations was fiddly for the first few hours until I started to get my head around it, and leveling up the rig for any reason is an exercise in attrition.

In this game, there are appealing aspects that catch my attention. One of them is the CB radio feature, which allows you to interact with numerous truckers on the road. They might offer guidance for jobs, share stories, and add depth to the narrative. You get a few options to respond, although they don’t significantly alter the course of events.

You can spend your hard-earned cash on making your rig look better, but you’ll mostly need it for new power cells and parts. Rigzilla (what I named my truck, unofficially) is a thirsty mistress, and you’ll need to keep her purring if you want to make that next long-haul delivery.

As a gamer myself, I’d put it this way: Star Trucker is a great space driving sim, but Hardspace has got the laughs. The radio chatter on the CB is pretty fun, but what I find surprising is that the contracts you get to take jobs feel too serious. It’s a bit strange because when you’re hauling “medical gel” across two little blobby planets that look like they could be cousins of Earth, you’d think there would be more humor injected into the gameplay.

Star Trucker might not be everyone’s first pick, but it offers an unique blend of truck simulator and space smuggling elements. If you’re accustomed to intense action like Elite: Dangerous or prefer more realistic trucking simulations, this game may fall short on either front. However, when it shines, Star Trucker delivers stunning visuals of outer space and intriguing concepts that set it apart. To fully enjoy its potential, a touch of patience is required.

2024-09-03 17:22

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