Space Siege review (PC)

Not being a games developer (my mum wrote me a sick note the day they came to our school), I can only guess that one of the more difficult things to do is keep a successful franchise fresh while retaining some of the aspects that made it popular in the first place. Getting the correct balance between old and new so as not to alienate loyal fans while drawing in fresh devotees must be trickier than a two-dollar whore at a Sailor's convention. Yet that's exactly what Gas Powered Games has tried to do with Space Siege, a game that's pretty much a continuation to the Dungeon Siege series in all but name.

There's no rooting around dark, dank, earth-bound crannies here though, as the fantasy setting has taken a sabbatical in favor of that other well worn milieu - the post apocalyptic, 'OMG aliens are invading, let's escape on a gargantuan spaceship with labyrinthine corridors' scenario. There's nary a goblin to be seen, yet fantasy fetishists need not worry as at its heart Space Siege is basically the same game that we've all come to love - or hate, depending on your attitude toward action oriented hack-and-slash fare.

Matters kick off aboard the good ship Armstrong, as you escape from an Extra Terrestrial induced cataclysm that sees Planet Earth reduced to a fiery ball of cinders. It's not the kind of global warming that environmentalists had envisioned, but that doesn't concern you as a boarding party of the hostile aliens (known as the Kerak) penetrates the Armstrong's hull during the escape, prompting you into action to save what little remains of humanity.

Oh, the humanity

Speaking of which, from early on in the game you are given the option to sacrifice some of your humanity in order to become a more efficient killing machine. This novel aspect presents you with the conundrum of whether or not you want to lop off bits of your body to be replaced by cybernetic prostheses, all of which is supposed to be detrimental to your standing with the fully human remainder of the crew. In truth, apart from the odd warning from NPCs, the only difference I noticed was in the weapons and skills that became available to me, as some demand, for example, a certain level of humanity while others require a more cybernetic leaning.

Anyway, unless you've been hiding under a rock from an alien invasion for the past few years, you'll know that the signature gameplay of the (insert topical environment of choice here) Siege games is a third person blend of action and role playing. With SS, however, the role playing aspects have been downplayed to bring the action to the fore.

Virtually every single role playing element has been streamlined to minimize those chin stroking moments. You won't find multiple dialog branches here, nor will you be presented with a plethora of exploration options - you pretty much follow a predetermined linear path, with the odd bit of backtracking thrown in. Even the loot aspect of previous games has been turned into a hunt for generic upgrade parts, which you can then use to bolster your character stats or those of your robotic companion, HR-V. Obviously then, if the aforementioned are the meat and veg of your particular action-RPG stew, you might find SS to taste a little bland.

But what of the action?

Since it is skewed towards combat, you might expect SS to use the tried and trusted WASD scheme, with the mouse for aiming. Not so, as the little electronic rodent furnishes both movement and aiming, which can be a bit counter-intuitive. Left clicking directs your character while right clicking fires, but given that half of your enemies' attacks are ranged based and do a fair amount of damage, it's a system that doesn't work too well.

Basically, if you stop moving you become Kerak fodder, yet you cannot fire and move at the same time, so combat devolves into a juddering, stop-start circle strafe. A dodge feature has been implemented, but again you cannot fire while performing this manoeuvre, and if you want to specify the direction of the dodge you need to retrain your reticule away from the enemy and toward the spot you want to dodge to. If you don't, you'll end up dodging forwards, straight into the line of fire.

AI, robot

In some ways, the enemies in SS are a throwback to the original Space Invaders; their attacks are unrelenting and unsophisticated, meaning that as soon as they see you they'll attack in a straightforward A-to-B manner. If you move from side to side they won't attempt to add lead to their projectile attacks, while they possess no evasive tactics of their own. In fact the only time they'll surprise you is when they occasionally drop out of the ceiling or appear behind you, Doom 3 style, and those occurrences are quite rare.

The enemy's lack of combat nous is, at times, welcome, as you'll engage many of them simultaneously, and while their tactics may not vary greatly, their physical form does to a slightly larger extent. Early on, you'll be fighting mainly Kerak drones with infrequent larger boss-style mobs thrown in for good measure. Later on, you find yourself mowing down your own crew members, who have been turned into hostile cybernetic automatons.

Beauty and the beasts

Graphically, the Kerak character models are unlikely to give HR Giger nightmares, but they are undoubtedly the high point of the visuals as the environments are rather samey. You'll see the same tile-set used repeatedly, and even though it may accurately depict the interior of a space-faring vessel, it doesn't exactly entertain the player's eye. More positively, much of the environments are destructible and yield upgrade parts, something which sits very well with the inordinate number of highly explosive barrels and canisters strewn around the Armstrong's decks.

While the visuals don't exactly push the envelope, the audio is one of the better aspects of the game. There's on overarching theme of foreboding to the musical score, while the voice acting seems professional enough, even if the lines that are being delivered seem a bit hackneyed and dull.

Breaking the Siege

If you've even the slightest interest in SS you'll probably be aware that there's quite a maelstrom of negativity surrounding it in the reviews that can be read on-line. To some extent that is justifiable, as the game certainly doesn't approach the lofty peaks of the Diablo series or even measure up to its own forebears. Yet it does possess some intangible quality that kept me playing to the finish, despite the minus points I've raised. And for that reason, plus the fact that it can be bought on-line for around 15 quid, it might just be worth giving a shot.