Space Empires: Starfury Review

Space Empires: Starfury

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Publisher: Shrapnel Games

Developer: Malfador Machinations

# of Players: 1

Category: Action

Release Dates

Online - 10/02/2003

Official Game Website

Space Empires: Starfury Review

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Spaceship command simulations have been a popular genre for many years, building on the success of such science fiction shows as Star Trek, Star Wars, and the fiction of Heinlen, Asimov, Clarke and many others. The Space Empires saga has been framing a universe populated with the usual human race and 3-4 alien races that are either friend or foe. Previous episodes of the series have been empire building turn-based strategy games, where sacrificing a ship to achieve a strategic objective is perfectly acceptable. Now, in Starfury, you take command of a single ship, and that strategic sacrifice is much more personal.

The basic idea of the game is sound, but unless you are a dedicated Space Empires fan, you will come away thinking that you played this same game back in 1995. The gameplay is your straightforward dock at a planet, take on various missions, navigate to warp jump points, and repeat. There are a fair number of ship styles open to you as you progress through the game, and the availability of separate fighters and an interesting array of weaponry keeps you looking for credits to afford that new point defense cannon that will keep the torpedoes off your flanks.

At first glance, the 3-D graphics of the game are gorgeous, with nebula, realistic-looking planets, etc. The problem is, then you have to move, and you suddenly realize that you are only able to move in two dimensions. This quickly reminds you that you are simply playing on a 2-D gameboard with 3-D pieces.

I enjoyed playing this game for a while, because I also loaded it on my new Tablet PC and could run everything with the pen. This might make Starfury an interesting play for Tablet PC owners as well as fans of the Space Empire series. Since the hardware requirements of the game are fairly low (P3-500, 3D card), owners of older PC's may also be interested.

If you enjoy space-based trading, exploration, and combat, with a healthy number of ways to customize your ride, then check out Starfury. If you are looking for a new gaming experience, since Starfury breaks no new ground in gameplay or graphics, you may wish to look elsewhere.

Reviewer's Scoring Details

Gameplay: 7.1
The gameplay is straightforward, but uninspired. The authors of the game tout how easily it is modded, which is a good thing, but not enough to create a sense that the game is breaking any new ground.

Graphics: 7.2
The game looks gorgeous, with 3D planets, nebula, etc and plays well on lower-end systems, but the 2D aspect of the game means that everything comes out a little flat from the graphics perspective.

Sound: 6.5
The music track for the game became rather monotonous, and the sound effects themselves didn't add too much to the experience.

Difficulty: Easy
Patience, planning, and a bit of experience with space trading games, and you should have no problem.

Concept: 6.5
A straight-forward space trading/combat sim that has been set in the Space Empire universe. It follows a tried and true formula and is obviously aimed at a group of fans who wish to command one of the ships that they have to date been able to command only from a fleet perspective

Overall: 7.0
As a homage and extension to the Space Empires universe, Starfury puts players in the captains chair and lets them set course through the stars. If you are not already a fan of the Space Empires series, though, there are many options for this type of game that include more gameplay depth.