Gratuitous Space Battles

By: Derek Yu

On: November 18th, 2009

In Positech’s Gratuitous Space Battles you design ships, place them, give them vague orders, and then… watch. At that point, the battle is out of your control – as the big man with the plan, you merely watch your cruisers, frigates, and fighters duke it out to the last crew member. If you lose, you go back and redesign either your ships or your placement of them. If you win, you gain honor that can be used to buy new ships, components, and even alien races to play.

Watching the battles can be quite enjoyable – the graphics are gorgeous and do a great job of capturing the look and sound of any epic space melee I’ve ever seen on television or the movies. Giant cruisers crawl slowly across the screen but are armed with powerful weapons and shields, while tiny fighters dart around them going pew pew! By the end of each battle space is littered with the burning wreckage of destroyed ships.

But even though they look and sound good, the battles in GSB are really lacking the impetus of the ones in the movies. Mostly because there’s no context to the fighting, not even the thinnest story or briefest of mission briefings before each battle. Comm-chatter displayed at the top of the screen is funny but very repetitive – and besides, it’s just text. Where’s the heated exchange on the viewscreen before the battle begins? Or the cadet in uniform nervously awaiting your orders? These are neat space battles, but it’s hardly a space opera, and as such, I didn’t have a lot of incentive to see the next level.

The other problem I had was that the strategy felt shallow to me. Most of my battles ended up in a giant ball of ships in the middle of the screen – pretty, but uninteresting. Also, even though there are dozens of ship types, weapons, shields, engines, and other components, many of them are simply upgrades of each other, or have barely noticeable differences. Ultimately, it’s easy to find a winning strategy through trial-and-error. “Oh, their fighters nailed me that time – I’ll add some of my own fighters, or I’ll add anti-fighter guns.” “Their shields are strong, I’ll go for strong shield penetration.” Find the antidote, and win. Harder difficulty? Add more ships. It worked for me.

I very much enjoy the idea behind Gratuitous Space Battles – that you spend a lot of time setting up and then just watching a marvelous space battle unfold. And I liked tinkering with ship designs. The fact that it’s so easily moddable is awesome, too. But in my opinion the game is suffering from what a lot of casual games suffer from – it lacks depth.

TIGdb: Entry for Gratuitous Space Battles

Posted in Strategy, Windows | Tags: PositechGames

The Monster King

It looks like a prettier battleships forever. Looks a little less customisable, but more balanced? Well, the easily moddable part makes the customisation probably equal. So yeah, it’d be an upgrade of Battleships forever? That game was pretty neat
Surtur

Yeah, you get tired of it pretty fast. There’s just not enough content in it. Too little maps, too little options, too little ship parts, too little orders… And a stupid AI which is horrible for a game with indirect control. Definitely not enough for what it’s worth. It gets so boring that 4x speed in battles becomes not enough for you – you want to get 8x or better 16x. Oh, and design of ships is horrible. Alliance is fine, but federation & rebels are so-o-o unimaginative and empire looks all the same – a fleet of black bagels which are hard to discern one from other.
The Monster King

oh right i forgot you control ships in battleships forever, a world of difference
doctorfrog

This is completely different from the “FUCK YEAH SPACE LASERS PEW PEW” comments I’ve been seeing about this game. Nice, balanced review. I tried out the demo, and was bored stiff. I just didn’t have any reason to care about what was going on in the battle. FWIW, Strange Adventures In Infinite Space could have a mod that makes use of massive flotillas instead of 2-3 ships and beat the hell out of this game.
Paul Eres

this review is also what i thought of the game when i playtested it — i wished for some sort of story and some reason to play besides watching pretty battles. still, if casual players seem to like it, i can’t say it’s a bad game, just that it’s not for me.

although in theory is this game really any different than ogre battle for the snes? in that game, you set up parties, and then watched them battle. i wonder what that game had that this one didn’t that made me like that more. perhaps just more complexity?
Alex May

I’ve enjoyed the 2 hours or so I’ve put into this so far. I like the unlockable upgrades and the difficulty settings. I haven’t had a chance to try out some of the more exotic orders, but they seem like they could add some depth.

I’d like it if I could set up splines to send my ships on a course so that I could arrange pincer manoeuvres and such.
Alex May

Oh and kudos (ahaaa) for the Star Wars-style screen wipe.
Dodger

I tried making a suggestion a while ago regarding what kind of orders you could give that would actually have a more transparent affect on gameplay. I thought having an “order” system in place that worked kind of like the Gambit system in Final Fantasy XII would be workable and in fact far more intuitive than the ordering system that’s already in place. Obviously there wouldn’t be any health potions involved ;) But I thought that a simple system of orders that mimicked the Gambit system would have greatly benefited the strategic side of gameplay (even though you still don’t have control over the ships once they’ve been deployed, at least you have a real idea of how they will act in general). I think a feature such as this would have greatly benefited the strategic element of game play and I don’t think it would have been extremely hard to add such an intuitive “ordering” system. Alas, my suggestions fell on deaf ears. Of course, my idea might also be dumb… I don’t know though. Perhaps the majority of people that would play GSB haven’t tried FF XII, or any FF for that matter. I’m not sure, but i truly believe it would have added extra value to the game and made the experience a little more engrossing from a strategic point of view, without becoming over-complicated of course. Now that I think about it, having a gambit system (acting and coordinating like a group of intelligent officers and commanders) would have increased (or decreased) the value of ship design, weapon and shield choice, and affect ship deployment to an even greater degree… The more I think about it, the more I think its a great idea and it makes me wish that the mechanic actually existed in GSB. Anyone else think this might have been a good idea? Or does it just sound like it would flop?

I like the idea of GSB and I really want to like the game. Unfortunately, like Derek and Paul have mentioned, once the fireworks are done I’m left feeling that the experience is somewhat shallow. As is, the game is a mixed bag between good looking (certainly captures the essence), but lacking in any real game play value. It’s a little frustrating because I really want to like this game more.
bateleur

@Dodger – Interesting suggestion. Another possibility you may have overlooked is that some of us hated the gambits system with a passion and are likely to stab, mangle and set on fire anything that vaguely resembles it! Strategy?! I’ve played games of rock, paper, scissors with more strategic depth than that system!
bagels

A lot of the enjoyment you get from it i think is just trying to improve upon your own score and set challenges. The actual difficulty of each level is next to nothing even if its on ‘expert’ is it? I beat every level on the hardest difficulty just spamming the tutorial preset ships. I could see people having competitions seeing if they could beat this level using only this many points or pilots or with only a certain type of ship or no shields and so on.
Dodger

@bateleur,

I appreciate your opinion, but, isn’t Tower Defense style game play the epitome of Rock, Paper, Scissors type strategy? That’s an exaggerating obviously but I didn’t mean that a Gambit system would make it a better “Strategy Game”, because as it stands, GSB has only a slight hint of strategy to it. I just thought that having a simple system for making orders, such as the gambit system was in Final Fantasy XII, would have added something to the game. It might not make for a deeply engrossing strategy game, but that’s not what GSB is anyway and it was never meant to be quite that deep. The problem I’m having is, while not meant to be a deeply involving game, the casual elements are too shallow.

There’s a comparison I’d like to make. Someone mentioned Strange Adventures in Infinite Space earlier. Okay, I have both SAIS, and Weird Worlds: Return to Infinite Space. Both of those games are neither complex nor are they deep in strategy, but they aren’t shallow either. I paid $20 dollars for Weird Worlds and it has been one of the best indie game purchases I have EVER made. I still play the game every couple of weeks and every time I play I’m impressed. It’s a couple years old but it has depth that you don’t find in a lot of casual games (like Derek had mentioned about most casual games of today).

GSB is not the same game and it doesn’t set out to do the same thing but its shallowness leaves such an impression that I cannot see myself coming back to the experience more than a few times and I certainly don’t know if I’ll be going back to it in the years to come, and finally, I paid $20 dollars for it as well. I think this is because the decision making, in regards making choices in the game, is too brief and ends far too abruptly. I can’t speak for everyone, but there’s something missing. Now, the whole reason I mentioned the Gambit system is because it is NOT a strategy heavy system or game mechanic, meaning it could fit well into a casual game experience such as GSB, if made right. And I think it would enhance the game play enough that you’re not left feeling that even though you’ve designed and placed ships, they’re always going to make the same decisions over and over. The slider bar order system that’s in place now is really just a thin shell that seems like more of an illusion of decision making in terms of adding “strategy” and while better than nothing, it really leaves a lot to be desired. I hate even having to refer to it as “The Gambit System” but because of it’s simplicity but the fact that its mechanics are more transparent and influential on outcome, I thought it would have been a nice little addition and could have perhaps prolonged the experience while adding just a little bit of depth but keeping the games core a casual experience.

Lets face it, if you wanted a much deeper strategy game set in space you’d get Galactic Civilizations 2 or something along those lines. My point was, I just wanted to enjoy GSB more than I do. I want to like this game more because of the awesomeness that it does have, but I’m left feeling disappointed.
CT

I was really excited about GSB, but as mentioned before, I felt it just a bit too shallow. Proper terrain usage and choke points are key features in tower defense type games (ie. Defense Grid did an AWESOME job of it), which this completely lacked. The ship building and weapons were pretty sweet, but the battles themselves really were quite boring as there was no real interaction. It felt like I was playing a really slow RTS. I wanted to micro my men, but couldn’t in any meaningful way.

That said for 10$ I probably would’ve picked it up just because the ship building/tweaking was engrossing, and the battles were quite pretty.
Craig Stern

This is a good review–I appreciate getting such a balanced look at the game.

I can’t help but wonder, though, if the multiplayer works better? I didn’t notice it being discussed. In multiplayer, at least, you’re not up against a predictable AI, right? It sounds like it might play like a game of RPS-101: a rock paper scissors game with a huge number of possibilities that you can choose once, in a double-blind fashion, at the outset of the battle. Maybe not everyone’s cup of tea, but perhaps still sort of engaging against actual human opponents.
Dan MacDonald

That’s interesting, I’ve herd other people complain that there are too many variables and too many things to manage when building out your ships. Some people would say that all that complexity is “deep”, is it possible that you didn’t find it that engaging? Or was it really overly simple?
Dodger

@Craig Stern,

The “Multiplayer” is actually non-existent. Instead what you’re given is the ability to setup a layout of your own ship deployment (including the equipment you give each ship) and then set it up as a Challenge that anyone can take. So basically it’s like having a level editor in which everyone can try out the levels that were made by everyone else… unfortunately since you’re not actually creating levels and you have no real control as to how your ships behave (on top of what you’ve equipped them with) you’re stuck basically playing rehashes of almost any given level. The ships placement might be slightly different, the amount of ships and their equipment might be different than that of the campaign, but the it still falls into the same problem area, a dreadfully shallow experience that seems alright the first time you try it but after that it’s becomes very redundant. So the multiplayer isn’t actually multiplayer at all (not in real time, nor is it turn based). Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad the feature is available, but it’s potential hasn’t been fully realized yet.

It’s like I said in my previous posts, if you aren’t going to engage the player, you should at least give the player the ability to have a set of commands to follow.

I mentioned the “Gambit” System before, and really all it is is a set of True / False statements. “If x is y, then z”… or — “if shields go offline, then flee – if another ships shields go down, then guard that ship”.

There are a lot of different examples that could be used, and if you could have some sort of control (even orders that might be potentially more dangerous to your fleet but rewarding if those orders are successfully pulled off). Again, if you’re not sure of what the Gambit system is, it’s a game mechanic that was used in Final Fantasy XII and although some people loved it while others hated it, I think this is a perfect example of where a mechanic such as it could have greatly enhanced the GSB gameplay experience by giving the player a little more control, adding a little more depth, and remaining entirely casual while retaining an entertaining experience.
Paul Eres

” I think a feature such as this would have greatly benefited the strategic element of game play and I donâ€™t think it would have been extremely hard to add such an intuitive â€œorderingâ€ system. ”

you’ve never coded / finished an indie game before, have you? that feature is really a month-long project, especially when you take in having to build a gui around it, test it, balance it, tweak it till it works okay with the rest of the game — and i’m sure cliffski wouldn’t want to spend an extra month coding just for something which may just confuse people due to its seeming complexity. i liked the gambit system myself, but a lot of people didn’t, a ‘build your own ai’ system is really something that only programming nerds can appreciate, not causal players.
scottyG73

I was excited about this game when I first saw it, but when it was finally released on steam and I took a look at the gameplay videos it just didn’t look like fun.

Watching the battles looked kind of boring unfortunately. So that’s a no-buy from me.
Derek

@DMac: Initially the number of components is overwhelming, but it actually starts to feel pretty limited the more you play. Here’s a more detailed reason why:

1. The number of slots on each ship is pretty limited and hardpoints are the only places you can put weapons.

2. You pretty much always need armor, shields, crew, and engines. And there’s never any reason to use more crew and engines than you need or use less armor/shields than you can afford.

3. The majority of the weapon variables are not useful to think about. Generally, you just want the most power and penetration you can afford.

4. Weight/speed is more or less inconsequential for anything other than fighters. Which only have like 3-4 slots on them, anyway…
Farmergnome

I really wanted to like this game but just couldn’t get into it, sorry.

Great graphics though.
Dodger

@Paul,

Perhaps you’re right, but I’m convinced that something is definitely missing from the game-“play”. I mean if you cut to the chase, it’s more a tech demo than it is an actual game. I don’t want to sound too harsh, perhaps closer to a laser light show… It’s missing some fundamental elements though. Once you’re through designing your ships everything else seems tacked on. Even ship deployment and placement is a little unnecessary since I could basically cluster a huge force together on pretty much every single level and win. I don’t think that the gambit system mechanic would have been for programming nerds only, you’re right that it might be a little too complex for the most casual of gamers I have to agree with you there, but it’s the only solution I could really think of. The included mechanic of giving orders to your ships is currently flawed and tedious. Not to mention that the function isn’t really that transparent and intuitive for gamers of any kind. It’s more or less a flimsy tack on (that probably involved a decent amount of math anyway… so why not make it good if you’re going to put work into it – however, that’s an opinionated view on my part but by the comments made in the forums, it’s not just a problem that I’m having alone). Again, there’s no better way to describe my experience than as something that I wanted to enjoy much more than I did and things just felt missing from the gameplay.
Paul Eres

i agree with that, but i don’t think what’s missing is ‘build your own ai’, i think what’s missing is more variety — derek listed a few problems above. it’d be interesting just to have a much more varied set of ship modules, and more slots per ship. instead of just mandatory ones like crew or whatever, add interesting ones like various shield effects, gravity effects, speed boosters, anti-missles, effects that slow enemies, aura effects that increase the power of nearby ships, and various other modules.
KNau

Correct me if I’m wrong but I seem to recall that Positech has a good history of updating his games. Could be more refinements are in the works.
Dacke

I bought the game and had much fun with it while beating the campaign levels. It does lack depth and does get repetitive, after a while. Adding a StarCraft-style campaign would make a huge difference for me.

But if you look at what the game costs, I think it still is a good buy. I had 12-or-so hours of fun with it and it also gave me lots of inspiration. For the same amount of money, I would get far less entertainment in the form of (for example) space battle movies.
Matzerath

I like this game a lot, myself, and have sunk more time into it than many other ‘casual’ games. The development is definitely continuing — the main thing Cliffski was making sure of was that the core game was solid and 99.9 percent bug-free, which I applaud from having experienced the opposite with so many other released games. I’ll be very interested in where it ultimately ends up.
Take this as good or ill, but there aren’t many games that already have a Star Wars mod before even leaving Beta.
Dodger

Has nobody else here even played Weird Worlds: Return to Infinite Space?? There’s really no other game like it. It’s prequel is now FREE of charge called Strange Adventures in Infinite Space. SAIS isn’t as good nor is it as polished as Weird Worlds, but considering it is now FREE you can get a taste of some of the goodness found in Weird Worlds.

Why bring this up when we’re talking about GSB? Well because Weird Worlds is engaging, deep, and a casual experience all at once. For exampe, when you equip your ship with an item, be it a weapon, engine, etc., you notice the affects almost immediately and there are simple explanations to almost every artifact, item, piece of hardware, and alien life form found in the game. It’s all so simple, yet so deeply engrossing. I wish that their was a level of transparency with regards to equipment in GSB. Although GSB is also meant to be a casual affair, there are quite a few hurdles that diminish the enjoyment of what looks like a beautiful adaptation of our favorite space battles from Star Wars, Star Trek, Babylon 5, TV shows, movies, etc. etc. The unfortunate part is walking away feeling like something is overtly missing. Again, GSB shines with potential but doesn’t hold my attention for very long. It’s really too broad a discussion to talk about just 2 games in regards to pricing and value, but the best I can do is give the example that I still play Weird Worlds Regularly, playing anywhere from 5 mins – 1 hour at a time and always enjoying it. GSB is a game that I want to give my attention to but for the lack of a better explanation than it lacks depth, I don’t want to spend too much time re-equipping my ships over and over just to retry a specific stage or level. I’ve finished most of the missions (and will eventually finish all of them) but the game doesn’t hold me long enough to care that I finish them all at once or that I finish them one at a time. I occasionally get the urge to delve into one of those big space battles but I also find going back and adjusting equipment and weapon load-out tedious or perhaps a better word might be monotonous. I don’t want to bash the game because I love the idea behind GSB and the great big space battles (which gamer in their right mind wouldn’t really??), I also want to feel like I really enjoy the game and that it’s not all about style and very little substance, but that’s what I’m left with.
Barfus

I have the shortest comment.
Orkie

No you don’t.
Ez0045

Beat u.
Homer J Momer

Yo!
Chris.R

I also love Weird Worlds, but I’m not sure it’s a fair comparison.

Weird words is fun because of the short games combined with exploration and randomness. It’s great to find a timeless bauble or hyperdrive early in a game and know you’ll be able to beat your high score. (Or will you? Randomness works both ways.)

To my mind, it has more in common with Spelunky than with GSB.
Paul Eres

If you love Weird Worlds so much why don’t you play it and quit bitching about GSB.

[editor’s note: impersonator, this not really me]
Dodger

@Paul

Already have done. Deleting GSB till it has been refined. You’re right, why not just play Weird Worlds… or as Chris R. said, Spelunky (which is kind of a weird recommendation, but damn it’s a good game as well). They’re both better games than GSB though. One can be purchased for basically the same price, the other, well it’s totally free. Though it’s a completely different game GSB or WW, at least Spelunky is full of depth, value, fun when compared to GSB, and even with all of the work Derek’s put into it, it’s still FREE. I’ll recommend those games instead to people. Thanks for bringing me to my senses.
Dodger

Oscar Mike ;P
Paul Eres

that wasn’t me above btw, it was an impersonator — you know that cause i don’t curse and i don’t type in capitals
Dodger

@The Real Paul Eres,

People are goofs sometimes. I didn’t think it was you, that’s why I made the snarky comment, but after that I also said “Oscar Mike” (Moving On) because I’ve already stated how I feel and don’t need to comment further really. I think the last 4 or 5 comments were made by the same person anyway.
Paul Eres

yeah, was one ip address with like 7 names recently; i think i just blacklisted it so it can’t post again (without a proxy, anyway)

anyway, i agree with the general sentiment here that this game was *almost* great, and might be if he adds more depth, but is only lukewarm as is. still, perhaps that’s best for cliffski’s audience, which tends to like simpler fare, i’ve the feeling he knows what he’s doing and more variation would reduce sales
Dodger

Yeah, you’re right. He must know his audience and trying to appeal to the casual gamer is kind of a precarious task when trying to please as many people as possible so that a larger amount of people can play and be entertained. In that regard I have the utmost respect for Cliffski and all Indie developers who must find a balance to maintain integrity (and personal satisfaction in whatever they’re developing) while trying to turn a profit and make a living. Not really knowing what people will like and whether or not people will even care but putting your work and heart into a project anyway does deserve credit. Still, I’m sure GSB will be updated and enhanced with more features so I’m hopeful because there is a lot of potential for a game like GSB.
Dacke

I don’t think the game is made “shallow” on purpose to please a certain crowd. I can’t think of a way to add depth or context in any easy way. Any fundamental change would probably require months of work.

I think Cliffski simply has done what most proper nerds want to do: he has built an awesome engine. If a good game should come out of it, that would simply be a lucky coincidence.
Dodger

@Dacke,

That doesn’t sound right to me. You say he has built an engine yet he’s released it as a game. I think he’s put quite a bit of work into it so to simply call it an engine makes it sound like he didn’t even know where he wanted to go with the project. I also don’t think he was just trying to gear it towards “proper nerds” since it’s a casual game. “Proper nerds” might be a little put off that you have little control over how your ships follow instructions, or that you can’t collect and use left over space scrap and debris to build a mass driver or flux capacitor to turn the tide of battle. ;-) I believe the experience was meant to be a casual affair so that everyone could enjoy watching spaceships being blown to bits. Again, I think the ideas and the structure of it are all intact. Paul and Derek mentioned a couple of ways to enhance the experience, my only wish on top of those would be the ability to have a little more control over your ships behavior even if that control remains subtle. I don’t like the set of orders you can give nor do I enjoy tweaking them the whole slider bar thing is rudimentary in a way that takes away from the fun of it (for me anyway). I do wish I could think of a quick and easy way for something like this to be fixed though, but I can’t.
Dacke

I think that he is having all the nerd-fun, creating the game.

For me (as a programmer) creating simulations and engines and artificial intelligence is superfun. Then, to show off, I try to put these things into games. But the end product (the games) aren’t nessecarily made for the nerd in me; I’d rather create something anyone can access.

I think that creating an advanced simulator can be more nerdy-fun than designing a game that is fun for other nerds. And it makes sense that he would create a fairly simplistic game on top of it, if it means he gets more time to work on the simulator. (Well, that’s how I work, at least :) )
chrknudsen

Using another posters name. So macho.
Ray

I couldn’t get the game to run, so I can’t even be disappointed with the rest of you. Something about a 3D engine failing?
Dodger

@Ray,

Only suggestion I can make is to update your video card drivers. Vista is finicky and Windows 7 is buggy… while Windows XP is… well it’s always been buggy but it’s probably as good as it’s going to get. Of course, if you’re on a Mac then I couldn’t recommend anything aside from that anyway. Just update your drivers and if it still doesn’t work head over to the Positech forums. If there’s one person that definitely wants you to like the game it’s Cliffski. Indie Devs in general are pretty helpful when it comes to tech support.
Dodger

@Poster a.k.a. Jeffrey Holdenburg,

I think you’d probably find the answer to your own question if you actually read some of your own posts before clicking the “submit” button. I haven’t been rude in my comments. On top of that, I haven’t tried impersonating another user, it’s just wrong to do that especially if you actually want to participate in a discussion or you would just like to leave comments with your opinion. On top of that you decided to impersonate a person who could actually moderate and delete your comments. Paul wouldn’t delete or moderate your comments unless he believed you were intentionally trying to be abusive in regards to other users or the system that allows us to leave comments. Last, but not least, if you want to be heard why not try being polite instead of trying to appeal to the moderators by insulting them. If you felt there may have been a misunderstanding then state that, but don’t continue to be a jerk when it was for that very reason that your comments were were modified or deleted in the first place… It’s immature.
Dodger

That last post wasnâ€™t me.

Yet again all you prove is how childish you are. I guess your life is so full of boredom you have nothing to do but linger around the user comment areas of websites and message boards so that you can get your messages deleted and end up being banned from those sites. I donâ€™t want to insult you or continue what you see as a game. You do have my sympathy though if thatâ€™s what itâ€™s all about for you, since it is a sad thing to have to do in order to get peoples attention, itâ€™s also completely unnecessary. Must be kind of lonely. All you have to do is participate without the intention of being a jerk or a nuisance and your comments might actually have some gravity to them and maybe people would actually be interested in something you have to say.
Paul Eres

exactly â€“ if he picked a unique name and stuck to it, i wouldnâ€™t delete his comments, if someone posts 10 times with 10 different names, many of those names of other users (derek, cactus, etc., are also frequent targets of impersonation), itâ€™s not really conversation anymore, itâ€™s just an attempt at confusion

although i suppose it can be thought of as an â€˜art commentâ€™ by analogy to â€˜art gameâ€™ to impersonate other usersâ€¦ hmmâ€¦