Void Crew Review (Annalog)
ABSOLUTELY RECOMMEND THIS GAME.
I've always had difficulty finding a balance of "obnoxious to repair and manage a ship" because you never get to do the fighting and flying, or games where you want to fight and fly but never do more than hit "repair" a bunch of times.
Void Crew nails it. The small ship is just big enough that as you trip breakers, need to empty your gravity scoop, repair some random defect, or get to a gun, it's all there. It's a great balance of depth of mechanics without over-complicating them.
There are four character trees to build into, and my buddies and I all took one. Oh but don't worry, while the primary skill is locked to 1, you can build attributes in any tree after you pick your skill. AND you can reset your skill points at any time, meaning experimenting is encouraged.
Managing the engineering part of the ship has some real meat to it, as I said, without being stupid difficult. Use your trim panels to keep the engine running the best it can. Charge boosters for your pilot. Repair the ship as it falls apart around you because your gunner and pilot INSIST they're doing everything they can.
The facilities you have to get out and explore have been rather sparse once you explore them, but that's okay. As I go out on a space walk to get the Quantum Data Pads we need, my allies can fly away as they're being chased, and come pick me up in a couple minutes. Even though it's just moving basic cargo in my slow space suit, the coordination with your allies for "Get me in 30 seconds" as you're trudging outside with that stupid data pad makes it so much fun.
Gunning feels great. The default feels meaty, and you quickly get some additional options to pick from. Plenty to choose from, and since position of the module matters (right gun no shoot left enemy), there is a bit of strategy to how you build your battleship. You also get HUD elements to show you where to shoot, which enhances it further.
And as the pilot, you're talking to gunners, trying to figure out where they need to be, telling people to empty the scoop, asking for the shields to be diverted to another side, telling people to plot exit vectors...
EVERY job keeps you busy in this game in a really great way. Nobody is left twiddling thumbs (except for the start of the mission when your engineer and scavenger run outside to fix the breaches from last level real quick).
Power management feels REALLY well done in this game. You CAN exceed consumption, long as you want to keep running back to your circuit breakers every 30 seconds to reset them (sorry engineer, but please go get it, we need it).
I loaded this up with a couple buddies, had such a blast in the first two missions we immediately got another friend to buy it, and then proceeded to play 5 hours before we even knew what happened.
I'm incredibly excited to keep coming back to this game with buddies. Phenomenal game, top to bottom. I hope the player lobby gets expanded, cause some of the bigger ships could absolutely be run with 6 people (or even 8 if you want to be menaces).
There are some bugs, no lies there. I've gotten stuck in geometry, had my hands "full" despite nothing being in them. In that case, hit Esc, "Quit to Menu", and tell your buddy for another invite before you leave. You can drop back in mid-mission and get right back to it. Is that a great solution? No. But it's the fastest quit/rejoin I've experienced in any game. So despite getting 1 game-breaking bug that wasn't related to grappling through walls, and grappling through walls so I can't escape like 4 or 5 times.... I had so much stinking fun I don't care.
Super recommend Void Crew, but definitely get some homies to help.