izigame.me

Warning this review will likely spoil parts of every other Homeworld game, including HW3.

So. *Long deep breath* I'm writing this of a fan of every Homeworld game. Unfortunately not this one.
Is this a Homeworld game? No. Not by a hyperspace jump.
Let's start with the big part, the core soul of the game. The story.
The story isn't Homeworld. It's got a Homeworld skin on it, but it isn't. In the deep, rich yet open, story they could have pulled from any of the previous titles, they decided to go with. *Checks notes* Hyperspace wizards and witches somehow have power over hyperspace jump portals. So some long living Progenitor takes control of hyperspace though.... means. Okay…how? There is no ‘how’ other than BBEG has the ‘power and technology’. Not some new lore or new expansion to the existing lore? Anything?! No reason for BBEG being the BBEG other than “I want that thing cause I’m powerful”. I seriously got more excited thinking Karen went mad, or taken over by some lost Progenitor AI or even some version of the Beast.
That didn't happen, we have typical villain model #230, and a "let's pull from all the interesting missions from past games" to make missions format. The campaign has only one direction and it's so, so boring. Nothing exciting, nothing unexpected. Hell I didn't even feel like this was a huge galactic threat when all we see of the 'galactic ending' events happening is in cutscenes. Where's the Hiigarin fleet you're fighting with getting atomized by a Hyperspace beam? Where's a notable planet like maybe one of the Taidani Republic worlds getting hit with the stuff from the cutscenes? No you don't feel or see any of it in game, and it's such a huge blow to the series. There was nothing in the game that felt like it was just more than just a threat from the local pirate lord who found a nice big toy.
Every Homeworld story had some sort of punch to it.

Homeworld 1: "Kharak, is burning"
Homeworld Emergence: From zeros to absolute heros and Just the entire game, like seriously the entire game.
Homeworld 2: Oh man, Hiigara is under siege. Home fleet is struggling, and our foe is digging up deadly as hell technology. The Bentusi are gone. We gotta keep going, we gotta get to the gate first!
Deserts of Kharak: The best crew we can assemble, an ally behind us, a last desperate hope of a solution in a world of spreading sand. Oh man, so many relics, so many questions we already know the answer to. Some we don't!
Homeworld 3: Karen is lost in space, let's go find her. Hmmm could Karen be behind this new threat? Oh wait nope, darn.

I wish I could find anything good about this story, but I can't. Shallow characters, the cutscenes. Ugh they sucked. The simplicity of the previous game's cutscenes had such a charm. There's so many plot holes "That's not possible to jump through solid objects" Literally have proof of it happening in the first game in the timeline! Then you do it without any clear explanation on how in the second to last mission? Come on guys.
Gameplay.
It's not homeworld. You blob assault frigates in front of everything and just ram your whole fleet into theirs. There's no strategy. So many ship classes including all of the strike craft are just useless combat wise, and started being just fodder for my capture ships to get in. Stopped using them after like mission 4-5? The 'space cover' and ruins you fly though are a very weak gimmick. That's it. It harms the game so bad it's not worth it. It limits the sizes of the maps and instead of a very wide and open you know...space? The nebula clouds in the other games did a 10x better job of effecting the map than the physical masses. You feel like your in a box with a bunch of loose cardboard floating in it.
The AI pathing with the new objects in space. Oh my god they can't handle it. Just no, fly 10k above anything and hope your units don't blob on the scenery. Not to mention any fleet engagement doesn't separate out like the other games did. It's all one, uncontrollable blob of units.
Edit: Forgot to mention. There's no fleet building or breathing room. Kill the last enemy and your fleet is in tatters? OH WELL next mission. There's no breathing room, no time to re-arrange your fleet for the next mission. No time to go "Oh I don't need these units anymore, time to decom them." It's gone, not a single point do you get to breath in this game and fix your fleet!
Side tangent: Deserts of Kharak made our main mothership/carrier a beast. You could bring it into combat and It could be useful. A big tank to soak up damage, powerhouse with weapons to eat away the enemy, front line repair unit. You made it what you wanted using a heat system. It had such a good change in pace for the lead unit I thought for sure they'd bring those elements in to make the new mothership a powerhouse and not just a backline factory worker. Nope, wasted mechanic option that was one of highlights of a past game.
The controls are such a freaking mess. We need a total rebound option. It's just near unplayable if you want to actually strategize with 3D space. But if you do that you lose any sensible control over using the new gimmicks.
I have no idea how multiplayer is, cause I was so fed up with the controls I stopped playing after one round.
I'm sorry guys, this isn't the Homeworld 3 we were expecting. I can't recommend this to anyone.
It's clear now you rushed your dev teams, rushed your writers, and rushed yet another game. This pattern happening to our beloved franchises is really, really getting sand cursed old.