I’ve actually heard of The Precursors before. It was featured in Tehsnakerer’s Playing series. I don’t know what my tolerance of slavjank is. I’ve played Operation Flashpoint a lot when I was a kid. Does that qualify as slavjank?

What about it being a janky MMO takes it away from being your ideal game though?

Quite a bit, I think. It being an MMO has some practical consequences, namely the fact that I can’t play it offline and the monetization of the game. It also influences the game mechanics: For example, STO’s combat uses tabbed targeting¹. I like tabbed targeting² but I don’t think it’s the peak of combat systems; a different combat system could/would make the game more engaging and enjoyable.

I can look at the individual parts of the game. There STO shines. But when I look at STO as a one compact package, it doesn’t.

¹ It also has a shooter mode but I remember it being janky as hell.

² I’d actually love to see a sort of “offline MMO” which would use tabbed targeting.

Ostranauts looks cool as heck! I’ve added it to my wishlist.

Yeah. It had a bad launch. I wish we had gotten the expansion about the Quarian ark.

I often see Star Control 2 mentioned as an inspiration for Mass Effect. How does Star Control compare to Mass Effect? Is there a set story or is it more of an emergent narrative?

Yeah, I’ve heard that it’s a great immersive sim. I wouldn’t call it a big space game™.

Faster Than Light’s my jam! For me, it was dethroned from the throne of roguelite games by Slay the Spire.

Starbound was the first and last game I pre-ordered. I wish they would have stuck to the original vision with the survival mechanics. Thinking about it, Starbound is basically a proto-Starfield. The both promised an experience based on a different game (Terraria in space vs. Skyrim in space) that was undercut by the overuse of procedural generation. (Someone please create an 8 hour video essay about this.)

I have Elite Dangerous on Steam. I have 8 hours of playtime. Alas, without a story to hook me in, space trucking is not for me. :(

I’d say it was a solid 7/10. One of the DLCs (Peril on Gorgon I think) is better than the base game, I’ve heard.

On a good day, Starfield’s a 5/10 in my eyes.

In this genre of “big space games”, The Outer Worlds stands near to Mass effect, because it follows “the Bioware formula” pretty closely: The player and a group of followers visit several semi-open worlds, where they look for a MacGuffin related to the main story while solving local problems. (I’ll write a short essay about the Bioware formula someday…)

The Outer Worlds was a good game (not great) and I look forward to the sequel. I’ve played most Obsidian games and I wish they wrote more sci-fi.

I’ll check out all three of them!

Cowboys in space is not my favourite trope, but I’ve heard good things about the first Rebel Galaxy. How was the switch from 2D combat to 3D combat in the sequel? (And is the story any good?)

I enjoy your optimism. I hope we see Squadron 42 soon and I hope it’s good. (The shitstorm if it isn’t would be huge!)

I’ve had my eyes on the X series for a long time. But they’re “fly around in your ship and do stuff” games and not “fly around and walk around” games, right? I’ve also heard there’s no learning curve, more of a learning wall.

You’re right, Star Trek Online is close to my ideal game. If only it weren’t a janky MMO…

I looked at Derek Smart’s games. I don’t think I’m cut out for this. But they kinda reminded of a GDC talk by Jeff Vogel where he talks about how he makes a living by making these niche isometric RPGs.