izigame.me

Finished this Sunday. Some thoughts.
Single Player difficulty on Hard is quite good. First Homeworld game where I had to switch the difficulty down a step midway through (excluding Homeworld 2's autoscaling difficulty... Balcora Gate spawns so much enemies attacking the defense targets that 1 is destroyed before anything larger than fighters can reach it).
The campaign is good, if a bit short (about 11 hours on medium difficulty). They did a good job of making it more human. Cinematics are more than a mission briefing with a few emotional likes; they tell a story, with full character personalities, conversations, and fears. The main villian is has (a bit) more depth the Emperor and Makaan had, and is definitely a lot more present and intimidating.
Combat (except for bombers and corvettes, more on that later) is satisfying. The old rock-paper-lazers is still there, with units generally capable in their roles, and amazing effects with it (love the point defense guns on assault frigs, carriers, the mothership). Every unit has some ability, and the abilities generally make sense. Some offer high single-target damage, others give a buff in exchange for a debuff, the bomber has a cloak.
Graphics are great, though I suspect not fully optimised. I have a RTX 4070, Ryzen 7 5700X, 32GB 3600 MHz RAM, and I have to use medium graphics for 90 fps @ 1440p (raytracing off). No frame generation options like DLSS3 / FSR3 available at the moment. For perspective, in Darktide (granted, with DLSS 3) I get 120 fps on high.
I focus mostly on single player and PVE. For that reason the Wargames mode is a definite bonus for me. Rogue-like RTS with randomised boons/artifacts? Different preselected fleet configurations? Gimme. All of the DLCs, paid and free, add some sort of content to Wargames (the paid ones add to Skirmish too). You should be able to get tons of replayability in Wargames.
The cover system is interesting, but still needs some work. I had a carrier get stuck in a channel in one of the SP missions... Its last order was to follow a battlecruiser... Other than that, units that can use it (strikecraft, frigates) do try to automatically use cover. I saw a ion frigate doing a peekaboo during combat.
They massively improved the rough edges the game had at the free demo a few months back. Units actually respond to movement commands now and decently pathfind around the terrain (minor exceptions for super capitals). The modern, classic or hybrid control schemes work well. I personally prefer hybrid, with most of my settings set to the classic HW settings.
They performed a lot of quality of life improvements compared to previous games. You can select only damaged units out of your selection (good for getting strikecraft to dock, or retreating damaged frigates). Support frigates now automatically heal anything nearby (including fighters), very little micro required there. Ships try to stay within optimal range of their weapons, and automatically kite if an enemy closes further. This is especially good for snipers. You can rotate the mothership to vertical if you preferred the banana orientation :P (this is also beneficial in combat. Allows both sides of the mothership's guns to face an enemy fleet).
With some the units they made baffling and annoying design decisions. The Fleet Bomber and Railgun Corvettes have great damage, but are squishy as hell and take almost no evasive maneuvers. First Homeworld game where my corvettes die to fighters more than my fighters do. Bombers just die when anything looks at them funny.
This is an odd departure from what HW1, HW2 and HW Remaster had for this role, those units at least survived basic combat missions (unless you sent fighters into flack...).
The reason this is extra annoying is that 2 out of the 3 combat strikecraft, which are the ships most intended to use the much lauded cover system, are so fragile that it is almost never worth it to actually use them to attack through the tunnels. Why would I send my max pop strikecraft fleet (35 interceptors, 35 bombers, 25 corvettes) at a target if 75% of them won't survive the first pass? The resistance was only only 20 fighters, 2 frigates, and the unarmed objective.
This means the only real way to ensure objectives get done economically is with frigates and larger, which entirely defeats the purpose of the narrower cover and of half of the unit categories.
I would be totally happy with a balance change where bombers are similar to HW 2; reasonably maneuverable, okay health, good damage against their targets. Point is they can do their job while staying alive. The HW 3 bombers do destroy or cripple a destroyer on the first or second pass, but by then half of the bombers are dead, even with interceptor escort.
Overall, the game still has some rough edges, but it is much better than it was at the free demo a few months ago. The quality of life improvements over HW remastered are amazing.
Heartily recommend it.