Whales in Space: Weird Worlds Review

by Dayv

I've lately become a huge fan of roguelikes, largely thanks to The Binding of Isaac (which if you haven't played I insist you do), and decide to dig around a bit for something new. What I found was Weird Worlds: Return to InfiniteSpace, a rather different take on the roguelike genre created by Digital Eel.

I'm not sure I'd really call Weird Worlds a true roguelike, but it does share some qualities, like that you only have a single life and can't save mid-game, and that the map is randomly generated with each new game. However, where most roguelikes play like fast-paced RPGs, WWRIS feels more along the lines of a space-themed board game. While your
goal is slightly different depending upon what background you choose at the start (pirate, scientist, or military), the game largely consists of you sliding from one star system to the next, all of which seem to have exactly one planet with useful tidbits just lying about, including upgrades for your starship.

A single ray gun floating around an entire star system and I manage to find it...lucky

Second Star to the Right...I Guess

Your goal in Weird Worlds is to take a tour of the galaxy and make it back home in 20 years, hopefully with a significant supply of whatever you were asked to pick-up (valuable commodities, new alien species, or foreign dignitaries). As far as I could tell, picking which stars to visit was little more than random selection, except perhaps that you may wish to visit the nearest ones first. While you could view the star before embarking and get a hint as to what sorts of planet might circle it, the actual planet didn't seem to really follow those rules. I once visited a hot, volatile star that the game said was impossible for its planets to harbor life, but the planet was a lush jungle. Besides that, the type of planet didn't seem to have a major impact on what I found there anyway, at least not a noticeable enough affect for me to bother worrying about it.

The feeling of randomly floating about space never seemed to change either. Even after I had explored half the map I still had no bearing as to where I should be heading next. You just sort of deal with each random event at each star and then head home, and the random events were all basically “find stuff”, “don't find stuff but something weird occurred”, “fight aliens”, or “trade with aliens”.

Also: Space Whales

Though it's hard to compare Weird Worlds to other roguelikes, it does remind me a little of the game Star Control 2, which has a similar roam-around-space-and-see-what-you-can-find feel. SC2 is admittedly a much longer and more complex game, but at the core the concept is pretty similar:search through space for resources while trying to upgrade your ship and make allies. The difference, though, and the reason I managed to spend days playing SC2 and lose interest after about 10 minutes of Weird Worlds was that Star Control 2 kept slipping you breadcrumbs, tasty little hints of where you might explore next. Weird Worlds on the other hand leaves you adrift.

Gratuitous Space Battles

As you wander the galaxy, you'll periodically come across ships from other races. Sometimes they're friendly and open to trade, but generally they'll ask you to go away, or just attack you like the bastards they are. If you come across a hostile species, or refuse to leave someone's space, you'll jump into battle mode. Here you command your ship, along with any ships that have joined you, against the enemy fleet in a real-time battle, though you can pause it whenever you like.

While the battles seemed like they'd be an exciting part to an otherwise lackluster game, I found them to be rather frustrating, at least until I realized I could simply avoid them altogether. For some reason, with all the upgrades I managed to find throughout the star-systems, I never seemed to find anything that got my ship moving faster than a jettisoned cheese wedge. While I admit I very well may have just been terrible at the combat, even with a decent sized fleet and advanced weaponry I never stood a chance, except for the time I managed to find a cloaking device, and then it just felt like cheating.

But this seems fair

But frustration turned again to malaise when I realized how easy it was to just avoid combat. So long as you hit Retreat within the first 10 or 15 seconds of the fight, you ships would just turn around and leave, even if you were surrounded by enemy spacecraft. Now you may be saying “well sure Dayv, running away is easy if you're a coward and have no desire for treasure and glory”, to which I would respond a) “screw you” and b) “what treasure/glory?” The only thing defeating enemies seemed to win me was access to the system they controlled, which, surprise, was just another randomly generated star, planet and event/item. And since my goal was just to gather a bunch of stuff in Category X, I never really saw the point in risking (or more accurately, throwing away) my space-ass just to explore a few more stars.

Uneventful Horizon

Most roguelikes are heavy in replayability, but after about 10 runs of Weird Worlds I had started to lose interest. While the concept of a space-exploration roguelike intrigued me, the execution seemed much too randomized and often felt like I was just scratching off a space lottery ticket. I sometimes found the best items in the first few star systems and gained little from later trips, and also had rather regular run-ins with a race of aliens that would trade any item for any other item, regardless of value, so it was basically free upgrades. There never seemed to be any real challenge, just random luck.

Weird Worlds: Return to Infinite Space is basically the Monopoly Junior of Star Control 2. While sure, Junior is much shorter and easier for children and simpletons, it also lacks some of the depth and strategy. In the end, you may not waste an entire evening playing (and likely want to flip the board/computer), but Junior just feels like it's missing some things.

Although there is no fun version of Monopoly

With overly randomized events and items, an almost complete lack of motivation, and a tone that seems like it wants to be funny but never really manages, Weird Worlds: Return to Infinite Space is one you can probably pass-up. Especially when a classic like Star Control 2 does everything better, and is now old enough that you can download it for free (though do make sure you leave your weekend free).

Fun: 2

While not completely uneventful, there was never a moment when I felt particularly intrigued or even overly interested in what was going on. I even finally managed to jump into a blackhole, arguably the most exciting thing imaginable, and all it did was jump me to another random spot on the map...was hoping I'd find another dimension.

Making Space Boring: 4

Seriously, space is too cool for this.

Quests/Breadcrumbs/Some Hint of Where I Should Be Going: 1/2

I almost thought I had a quest once, when an alien told me I was his friend and I should visit his homeworld. Unfortunately, he only gave me the name of the planet, and all the map displays is the names of the stars...ass.

Originality: 3

Though I couldn't help but compare it to Star Control 2, there aren't a lot of space-exploration roguelikes, so I do have to give some credit to Digital Eel for trying something a bit different.