Developer: Blue Manchu
Publisher: Humble Bundle
Rrp: £24.99 (Gog.com, Humble Bundle and Steam)
Released: 29th May 2019
Available on: Gog.com, Humble Bundle and Steam
Played Using: Mouse and Keyboard
Approximate game length: 15 hours
In space no one can hear you panic, or your screams of frustration from having to work with a overly polite yet overbearing AI that keeps sending you on quest after quest after quest… that may have been ever so slightly specific. Well at least you aren’t powder now, thank heavens for small mercies.
Void Bastards is a First Person Shooter Roguelite in which you have to gather up scrap and components in order to build the items to survive and eventually escape the nebula that the ship you’re on is stuck inside. You play as a client… actually more than likely over the course of the game you’ll play as several clients. Of course, when the AI calls you a client what they really mean is convict, one that has been dehydrated to the point of a powder for transport and now rehydrated so that the ship can leave the nebula.
Now a moment ago I said you’d likely play as several clients. This is because permadeath is a thing in this game, however when one client dies another is rehydrated to replace them. All the items and materials that you have crafted and gathered in the previous runs remains so it’s not a complete restart.
Each client comes with a trait or two which can either help or hinder you. For example; In one of my first runs the client had a trait that would cause them to cough at odd intervals which would alert citizens to your presence. Another I had later made the client half the height which was actually oddly helpful. You can attain more traits by finding gene clinics aboard certain ships or by stumbling into a genetic scrambler in the depths of space. You can only have three traits at a time but they can be immensely useful in the right combination.
All the of the enemies in this game are classed as ‘citizens’ regardless of how mutated they are… this doesn’t mean that they won’t attack you though. These citizens have been warped by the energies of the nebula and to be quite honest have lost their grip on reality. Then again I can’t imagine its too easy to remain entirely sane when you’ve been mutated into an ambulatory blob of goo that explodes when hurt or excited.
It’s got to be said that this game is very very British and has a dark sardonic humour to go with it.
Examples of it are everywhere for those that know much of British culture, like when your character dies a P-45 is filled in. Anyone who has lost a job in the UK would know this as the ‘you are now unemployed’ form. There are many other examples of it around but I’d rather you find them for yourself, most of the time I was playing this game with a wry smile on my face because of it.
The artstyle is cel shaded and puts me in mind of the game XIII. It even uses some similar conventions that XIII had such as seeing the footfalls (although some citizens hover in which case it says ‘hover’) of those on the other side of doors giving you some indication of what to expect. I have to say I wish more games would embrace this look.
Between ships you are taken to a crafting screen that is separated into two sections the items screen and the components screen. As you explore the various derelict ships that fill the nebula you’ll be searching for the components you need to escape and also improve your equipment. You’ll also be wanting to look for food and fuel because each time you travel to a ship you consume one of each. You’ll also end up picking up a lot of scrap that can be recycled into components. I quite like this as a mechanic because it means you can occasionally skip a step in looking for a component and instead make it for yourself.
On board these defunct vessels you’ll find that you’re on a timer as the oxygen you have is limited and once you run out you start to choke which eats away at your health. Thankfully all ships come with an Atmo room so you can refill your tanks but even those have a limited number of uses so you can’t spend too long on any given ship. That being said, even the largest of ships should take no more than ten minutes to explore to the point of exhaustion. In honesty the main issue you’ll have won’t be oxygen, though that will be something to keep an eye on, it’ll be the other denizens of the ship. The citizens aboard a ship all have different abilities depending on their type and seniority (a citizen that is classed as senior is basically an elite version). Some can fade away and will reappear behind you, others will simply explode when shot or excited. What makes things a bit more stressful is that you can never fully clear a ship of citizens, as they periodically respawn in ‘rifts’ that you find. To make matters worse these ships often come with traits of their own and again they can be quite beneficial, hugely detrimental or mildly inconvenient. These traits can range from the mini map no longer working through to an inordinate amount of hazards populating the map.
As is the case with any roguelite sometimes a run can be ruined from the very start and there really very little you can do to change that, some of your equipment later in the game can help to mitigate it a bit but sometimes you just have to know when a ship just isn’t worth exploring.
I really enjoyed my time with this game and loved its dark sense of humour. But I must admit that toward the end the main gameplay loop of ‘go find the thing’ got a bit on the repetitive side. However for those of you who enjoy a challenge you’ll be pleased to hear that once you complete the story mode a challenge mode called ‘workplace challenges’ opens up.
If this appeals to you perhaps try;
Crying Suns
XIII
Prey
