The Purge

I got this game from Steam. $20. It's really more of a $10 - $15 title but oh well. I live on the edge.

Single player, although you can play against other player's fleets in an offline sort of way.

This game should appeal to anyone who likes games where you build stuff. Evil Genius, Dungeon Keeper, Dwarf Fortress, Master of Orion, that sort of thing, although it's not nearly as in-depth as any of those.


Basically you have to design some spaceships. You pick an empty hull from a list and then outfit it. Crew compartments, power generators, shields, armor, various weapons, tractor beams, etc. There's a lot of options. Outfit several ships this way and then you put together a fleet.

In the fleet screen you arrange your ships' starting positions and give them some basic orders about their behavior -- what ranges to engage in, how to prioritize targets, etc.

Then you start the fight and just watch it.

There is no player interaction during the fight. You simply have to watch the battle unfold.

It's actually quite good. Amazing, maybe, when you see exactly how much firepower and debris gets thrown around, especially on the bigger maps with bigger budgets. It's fairly "gratuitous".

While watching the battle you're basically trying to see what's working and what's not. Do you need more armor? More DPS? Did your arrangement and priority settings work out like you wanted? You go tweak your settings and let the battle run again. If you think you have a really great setup you can post it online and you can download other people's setups and fight against them (I just spent a good 6 hours trying to beat this one particular arrangement someone had posted).


It downloads from Steam in about 5 minutes but you might do well to order directly:
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Steam is distributing v1.3 but you need 1.4 to download and play online content, and the game's built-in patcher doesn't work well with Steam. (I can post directions for how to patch it if anyone is interested.)



Free demo:
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(I didn't try the demo so I have no idea what's included.)

I like the premise. That's sort of how I was envisioning our theoretical NPC MMOG would function on a basic level, only in real time perpetuity. You sort of build your NPCs up and let them fly and they would react based on faction, build, level, etc. in a world against other player's NPCs. My brain started to melt when I tried to think about balancing something like that though.

Demo was ok, but dont know that i'd buy it without trying multiplayer.

Would be better if you picked your fleet without seeing enemy, and then map is randomly generated ...with more 'space' stuff

nebula, asteroids, planets, etc

There is no multiplayer, really. You save your fleet and then upload it and you can download other people's fleets and try to figure out how to beat them. There's some way you can offer "personal" challenges so I imagine you could go back and forth that way.

Different maps have different effects -- reduced speed or reduced weapon range or no shields, etc -- but otherwise it's pretty straightforward.


Like I said, really more like a $10 - $15 game but it's amusing. I'm a sucker for games that let me build something. I wish there were more "Evil Genius" type titles (they always have such terrible combat, though. I got Tropico 3 recently too and aside from being too easy, the fighting that occurs with rebels is even worse than combat in Evil Genius or Dungeon Keeper).

Hmm, I have v1.3 of the game, and it allows me to download and play online challenges. So, must not need 1.4 to do that. Tried googling for the patch anyway but can't seem to find it.

It sounds to me you guys are desperate for a good game lol. I suppose if you don't try some whacked out title of a game you will never know if you like it or not. Personally I tend to stay away from the 'space' type games, I just don't really like them.

Veraphim Wrote:Hmm, I have v1.3 of the game, and it allows me to download and play online challenges. So, must not need 1.4 to do that. Tried googling for the patch anyway but can't seem to find it.

Patches should download automatically once you've started going online.

It crashes if you try to do a Challenge map that you haven't beaten yet against the computer.

If it does download the patch, make sure you re-direct it to your Steam install rather than the default location. It's like "Program Files(x86)\Steam\steamapps\common". Point it to "common" and notice it will add "Gratuitous Space Battles" to the end. The patch should apply then without any errors.

He said he was going to put v1.5 up on Steam though, which he just released. Mostly bug fixes, although I did notice that the fleet selection screen lets you sort by ship type now.

Apparently he's still developing the game, too.

Hmm, his autopatcher just patched me from 1.32 backwards to 1.26 ...

How do I get 1.5? It apparently doesn't autoupdate.

How many total maps/campaigns are there?

Like....10? Maybe 30 built-in challenges if you count the 3 difficulty settings per map.

Really it's just small, medium and large and then a question of whether the map has any odd effect in it.

He should just let us do a "custom map" where we specify the size and characteristics we want, then make a fleet and upload it so people can play against it.



Downloading people's challenges is a bit hit or miss. Lots of people upload "ultimate cheese" fleets and usually those are the ones that are marked high difficulty and low fun. You basically figure out what cheese they're using, build a fleet specifically to counter that cheese and be done with it. Some people upload some pretty good mixed fleets though that can be interesting to try and find a weakness for.

My parm will disintegrate your cheddar.

Quote:I got this game from Steam. $20. It's really more of a $10 - $15 title but oh well. I live on the edge.

lol

Steam is doing a weekend deal, it's $10 right now.

Is it worth $10? I'd pay $5.99 I think.

Eh. He released an expansion pack that's $6 and really not worth it, so even with the sale the total price is basically $16. I actually think his release of a dinky over-priced expansion pack undermines his ability to sell the game.


I'd love to see inside of the operation at Steam/Valve and see what sales figures are like on all these games. I get the feeling that half the point of these sales is to play with price points and see what price will cause people to give in and buy a game they might not otherwise have bought.

All these old games being sold for cheap seems like a great idea too, and why not? Nobody would be able to find Evil Genius in the store but for $2 they can buy it through Steam, and that was a pretty amusing game (in its day).

I wonder if there's some casual effort to retest or do something to these old games to make sure they still run? I saw X-Com: Terror from the Deep for sale but that's getting so old, I wonder if it would even run. (Not that I have a desire to play TFTD anymore. It was fun but those old turn based games took for-ev-er to play.)

I know the handheld market is exploding. Handhelds run the classics pretty well and devs are porting a lot of old games with success.

I actually bought the X-Com full package for $5 awhile back, but never installed one...and I probably never will. They definitely pluck your emotional heartstrings at Steam and tempt you with games you loved in the past and will buy simply because it is cheap.

Breand Wrote:I actually bought the X-Com full package for $5 awhile back, but never installed one...and I probably never will. They definitely pluck your emotional heartstrings at Steam and tempt you with games you loved in the past and will buy simply because it is cheap.

Goonswarm once did a roleplaying Xcom forum post. 1 guy was playing the game and did very detailed posting debriefing the missions. people could sign up on the post with their names/race/skills etc and he would recruit and put them in the game. It was pretty fun just to read.

Ie....Sgt. Slamz was wounded, Pvt. Flabtar was KIA after he failed to turn his safety off his gun.

Hah that reminds me of my friend who named all the players on his foosball table. One team was the Hatian Refugees and the other was something like the Jewish All-stars. He glued names on the back of the jerseys.