So I Tried... Rebel Galaxy

In each edition of So I Tried… a member of GameGrin will play a game they have never tried before. The game will be given exactly half an hour to shine, or not, as the case may be. Will I find something worthwhile or just lose 30 minutes of my life I can never get back? This time I played Rebel Galaxy on PC by Double Damage Games.

What I thought it was

A space trading and combat game with a wild west aesthetic. I thought it’d be similar in style to the Starpoint Gemini games but with a heavier story focus.

I have a long running love affair with space games since playing the original Elite on my old Amstrad CPC 464 as a young lad. Anything where I can trade water in exchange for the moral ambiguity of transporting imperial slaves is right up my alley.

What it actually is

An interesting, quirky and fast-paced space combat game that has a great sense of style… Rebel Galaxy opens with its Firefly-inspired nature on its sleeve, a fantastic western tune blaring at you from the moment the title screen appears.

You've inheriting a ship from your Aunt who wants you to meet her at a rough, backwater space station that’s basically a wretched hive of scum and villainy.

You arrive before your Aunt who has asked the Bartender to give you a Specter, some kind of A.I. symbiote. He then says your ship is terrible and needs upgrades that he can, naturally, give you but he wants your assistance first. He’ll then help find your Aunt.

So begins the main quest of the game. Whilst you are docked at the station you can look at a mission board that has a plethora of side-missions available as well as access to the usual assortment of facilities, a shipyard for purchasing new ships, an equipment bay for upgrading your ship and a market for buying and selling goods.

Once back out into the vastness of space you can see markers for any missions you’ve accepted and with a quick press of the command button you can send out a pulse revealing any other signals around you, whether those are enemy ships, distress beacons or asteroids.

After glancing around I pointed my ship towards the main marker and entered warp to speed towards it. Shooting stuff in the game is based on naval combat; Your main weapons fire from the broadsides of your ship, essentially like cannons whilst your secondary weapons (at least to begin with) are turrets above and below your ship.

Lining up your shots from your broadsides makes combat surprisingly strategic, trying to line up shots and recognising which shields are low whilst protecting your own is a lot of fun. Combat is fast and responsive with great control.

In the 30 minutes I played I completed a couple of side missions from the mission board and the first three story missions that led me to hunting down Dead John. As well as being a man with an unfortunately prophetic moniker, he also proved to be a particularly tough fight compared to the pirates I’d taken on up to that point.

Will I keep playing

Absolutely. I love this type of game and whilst Rebel Galaxy is on the simpler, more accessible side of the genre, I don’t think that’s a bad thing. Controlling your ship is straightforward due to your movement being locked to a 2D plane, you can rotate and move forward and back, no tilting up or down.

In the time I played it seemed very combat heavy, almost everywhere I went was interrupted by pirates but it does seem there are more mechanics to investigate. Whilst I didn't see the equipment needed for mining and didn't get to mess with trading, those are definitely activities that are in the game.

I'm looking forward to spending more time with Rebel Galaxy as the western vibe gives it a distinctly unique feel and I really am wondering what’s happened to my Aunt.