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I was always a fan of "cell" games, but unfortunately this one has too many flaws to enjoy.
First and foremost are the control mechanics. The level of control that the slider gives is simply unnecessary and, as a result, unwieldy. The keypad controls are useless: I either have to click A seven times to go from 100% to 30%, or use really annoying number system to adjust that. If there was a way to quickly use most "expressive" combinations - like "send all, send 20%, send 80%" etc, with maybe the a-d functionality to adjust it further from there.
Another really annoying feature is how the enemy fights till the end. I know that theoretically it could be used for storytelling as showing the enemy that doesn't give up, but in the end gives a classical game flaw (try playing Monopoly!) - that when a winner of the game is already decided, the game continues way too longer than it should. In effect it gives a feeling of tediousness to wrap up something that was already done.
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At first, I was actually a bit annoyed at this game - it seemed to be just a pretty Galcon clone. But since I like Galcon a lot, and this is much prettier, I decided to play some anyway.
Boy am I glad I did. This game has a pile of interested gameplay additions that make Galcon look kind of boring in retrospect. And I really enjoy how you told the story without a single word spoken or written. The last fight was really satisfying to finally beat.
5/5
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@kasual: there is a slider which you can drag and control with your keyboard (a - d, or 1 to 0) indicating which percentage of your fleet you want to send.
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Somehow I played the entire game without noticing the move % slider. Probably would have set it to 80-90%. It was still a fun experience despite my oversight.
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Interesting, if you get every star then you end up with 108.
Which is a special number in Buddhism as it represent all 108 Earthly Desires.
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There should be a longer cooldown before ships in combat can retreat. That way, a losing player can't drag out the game running between planets. I also miss the ability to send partial fleets so key planets aren't left defenseless and large fleets can leave a token force to finish capturing a world. One solution I've seen is to accumulate forces while pressing, so a short press sends less ships than a long one. You could base the size of the fleet on how long the target planet is held.
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I spend most of the time owning all planets and chasing the AI fleet. It's far too easy to abandon a disputed planet! AI moves from planet to planet with his entire fleet, and I cannot progress because he hardly loose any ships.
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This game deserves 10/5 stars. In the mid 30's level this game blew my mind, I was able to craft a story for all of the events and the epic battles between alien races. I will be playing this game for MONTHS and even after recommend it to every man, women, and child I know.
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I loved this game, and I feel like it would of been cooler if we had stuff like.. maybe one time use items we could randomly collect or something oir buy at a shop.
It would also be nice if we could bigger maps with a lot more going on for an all out war.
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OMG, I loved this game. I beat it all and I want to play more!
I would add like 9999 more levels and play this all day , every day!
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Feels like 2 things are missing: a tutorial (it's really difficult at the beginning to know how things work and I'm still puzzled about some stuff) and upgrades.
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You know what? Y played solarmax 2 BEFORE the first solarmax, what I would say is...The first was nooob, I hate it....But This game, the second, was SOOO GooOOood, really, I mean... the musics, the graphics and the story with the parasite was so coool!!! Good, the second Solarmax is HOT man! So...where is the third already?...
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Telling a story with points and circles (lvl 32 and up) - is just awesome! Hardly thinking of making a clone of this game :))
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Brilliant game, loved the AI but I found that on level 23 if you both go to the same planet and stay there then both your forces get destroyed and the game just sits there with nothing happening.
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Hotkeys for game speed, please. With how quickly outnumbered forces die out combined with the instantaneous reaction speed of the AI, you need to have it on the slowest setting to micromanage, but then capturing planets becomes a tedious chore. I'd rather toggle speeds with Q/W/E or something, than waste mouse time and effort clicking the arrows every time.
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Seems like some people having trouble with black AI.
Trick is to gather all ur force, chase it and grind it down. Once u have a force of 100+, capturing is only matter of seconds.
And as for last level, "Backdoor" is the key. Once I figure out how it works, I finished hard difficulty in one go. Won't spoil too much or ruins the fun.
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The black AI is just frustrating to play against. I know it's supposed to add an additional challenge, but when it's impossible to complete a level on easy, you know there are some balance issues. They play too fast for me to understand what's going on even on normal speed, and the lack of unit number markers makes it so there is too much to keep track of. Fun game except for that part. 3/5