Star Control 3
review by Axel Andersson
 So, yet another sci-fi game? Yet another save-the-universe game? Seems so, judging from the screenshots on the box... But, not prejudices.
I install it only to find my hard drive full of tiny little text files with various name such as F13A112.MID, you can tell that this is a Windows port. I go for the one with the coloured icon. The intro starts up, some game company logos and then... the story! Here's the deal: Mankind have learned to travel in space at the speed of light. We have met alien races, and made some intergalactic friends. Now the universe is threatened and unfortunately about to collapse. This is where you the player steps in, your mission (if you choose to accept it) will be to travel between the planets and save the approximately 24 alien races that lives in over 30 colonies. By some unknown reason you can't use the speed of light overdrive on any of your space vessels. But, you have invented another method of interstellar travel, the "Warp Bubbles", to transport people between the planets. The bad side with this bubble travel thing is that it is a bit unstable, and sometimes takes you to the backwaters of the solar system.  There's a lot of work to do. Some of the things on the allround hero to-do-list is to save the universe and find out why the speed of light overdrive isn't working.
The story is quite confusing, but would surely be a lot more understandable if you have played the other Star Control games. And that the manual is written in an unreadable font (aka Terminator style) isn't of much help, as you sometimes must consult it. As for graphic and sound matters, I'd rather not comment. But if I have to, one word: GameBoy. Frankly, it's ugly and could even scare away a PC web designer. Yep, that ugly. I like one thing about it: when you go to meet the aliens, they're in video! With sound! I almost fell out of my chair laughing at it. I really thought the art directors from the original Star Trek had passed off, but boy, was I wrong.  There's one more function to mention, the two-player function. You can play against each other, but wait! I didn't say network two-player function. You use the same computer, the same keyboard, and, most likely, the same chair. The two-player function is simply the battle mode from the game against each other. Choose a ship and waste an hour. Boooriiing...
I can't quite see who would buy this. I mean, real sci-fi fantasts go for something totally different. Shoot 'em up players would enjoy pinball more, I believe. Adventure players, hey, do I have to comment there? It's obvious, this game has no genre. This game is totally pointless, a waste of money and just simply bad. Frankly, it sucks. There's no other way I could put it, it's the truth. If you want a space adventure, go for something that lasts more than 15 minutes, need I say that this don't? |
| + | - |
| Nothing | Everything |
| Test Computer | Requirements | Price |
|
PowerMac 7200/90 48 MB RAM |
PowerMac MacOS 7.5.3+ 12 MB RAM CD-ROM Drive |
(approximately) 45$ 430 SEK |
| URL | Rating |
| http://www.wizworks.com/macsoft/starcon3/sc3_01.html |
"Frankly, it sucks." |