KickStarter Homeworld 3 from Blackbird Interactive

[Dayyālu]

i agree that cataclysm is the *real* homeworld 2, and that 2's story is absolutely horrid (although 2's great modding community saved the game and gave it a lasting legacy), but i'd argue that saying that 1 is a fluke is just being contrarian for the sake of being so

HW2's gameplay is fine. Modders did indeed a great job out of it. More correctly, the basics are decent despite being less experimental than HW1, even if the implementation was clumsy and often broken (the difficulty autobalancing was borderline retarded and there were legit mistakes in the unit stats, causing some categories to be useless at release, for example frigates). The writing being utter dogshit - and being far worse if you bothered like me to hunt down the game guide that explained the horrible "backstory" full of senseless retcons - I could have explained as difficulties caused by the terrible development.

However, it has been years. DoK has been out, a further proof of lack of talent. HW1 had a lot of great setpieces and avoided explaining too much. As usual, you filled in the blanks, the lack of detail gave you more depth. HW2 started the Karan s'jet fetishism - anyone cared for Fleet Command in HW1? It's simply because it's a woman or something? The tragedy was for an entire people, and I'm still puzzled why the fuck they felt the need to make her an immortal special snowflake. In Cataclysm she gets disconnected and the Mothership is a orbital construction facility cranking out ships for the fledging new nation, simple and reasonable. Forced mysticism and forced melodrama for characters I don't care about rarely work.

Cata has problems and its plot is B-movie tier (I still love it). It managed find to ape HW1 telling a smaller, more cynical story, and the character work is better than in HW2 despite the characters being entire races (The Bentusi as the arrogant and scared precursors, the Empire remnants as desperate, the Beast as the Beast and the Somtaaw as the protagonist out of its depth that grows in time). Simple, functional, with horror trappings. No melodrama, no mysticism, no CHOSEN ONES. I'd say it's the opposite of a chosen one story, it's a bunch of miners and engineers taking the lid off a Great Evil and building a fuckhuge cannon to kill it while the Professionals mostly fail.

Cataclysm isn't a Homeworld game.

This is being contrarian.

 

[Keshik]

Cataclysm isn't a Homeworld game.

Why not?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Cataclysm isn't a Homeworld game.

Why not?

It's actually good.

 

[Zibniyat]

Cataclysm isn't a Homeworld game.

Why not?

In short, like I said before:

Cataclysm didn't even feel like a Homeworld game, so this point is moot. It had uglier graphics, uglier art direction, soundtrack unbefitting of Homeworld, and generally played like some offshoot that tried to use the fame and prestige of Homeworld for marketing purposes.

 

[Dayyālu]

Cataclysm didn't even feel like a Homeworld game, so this point is moot. It had uglier graphics, uglier art direction, soundtrack unbefitting of Homeworld, and generally played like some offshoot that tried to use the fame and prestige of Homeworld for marketing purposes.

I'll admit, you made me laugh.

It's a great bait, particularly after we got HW2 and DoK out. DoK in particular was the most mediocre RTS I could think of - if I dimly remember, not even a HW game originally - dressed up and paraded as a HW pre-sequel.

Hey, at least you made me laugh.

 

[underground nymph]

Watch me: every pre 2002 hit a.k.a. a cult game was a fluke.

On a serious note, the worst thing in the HW1 was that while being able to combine research labs into a mega station there‘s really zero point in doing that since you can take as much time as it is needed researching techs and gathering resources after a main goal of a mission has been achieved. Which is shame, since mega research labs look ace.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

the decision to make whatsherface the main face of the series made it clear that the series is dead

 

[underground nymph]

Cataclysm didn't even feel like a Homeworld game, so this point is moot. It had uglier graphics, uglier art direction, soundtrack unbefitting of Homeworld, and generally played like some offshoot that tried to use the fame and prestige of Homeworld for marketing purposes.

I'll admit, you made me laugh.

It's a great bait, particularly after we got HW2 and DoK out. DoK in particular was the most mediocre RTS I could think of - if I dimly remember, not even a HW game originally - dressed up and paraded as a HW pre-sequel.

Hey, at least you made me laugh.

DoK was nice. Yep nothing tremendously groundbreaking, but it succeeded scratching that HW itch. I remember it being gorgeous visually (played it on a projector) and it sounded good. As an RTS it was pretty mediocre. Story was engaging and the short animations were a neat touch. It’s a strong 8 out of 10 for me.

 

[Corbin Dallas Multipass]

Cataclysm didn't even feel like a Homeworld game, so this point is moot. It had uglier graphics, uglier art direction, soundtrack unbefitting of Homeworld, and generally played like some offshoot that tried to use the fame and prestige of Homeworld for marketing purposes.

I'll admit, you made me laugh.

It's a great bait, particularly after we got HW2 and DoK out. DoK in particular was the most mediocre RTS I could think of - if I dimly remember, not even a HW game originally - dressed up and paraded as a HW pre-sequel.

Hey, at least you made me laugh.

DoK was nice. Yep nothing tremendously groundbreaking, but it succeeded scratching that HW itch. I remember it being gorgeous visually (played it on a projector) and it sounded good. As an RTS it was pretty mediocre. Story was engaging and the short animations were a neat touch. It’s a strong 8 out of 10 for me.

So... it's a good game, if you care about visuals, sound, and story, but the gameplay was mediocre.

That's interesting, because to me, who cares about the visuals, sound, and story of a game if the gameplay isn't good? If that's an 8/10 for you how bad does something have to suck to be a 6/10? Can you even imagine the game that you'd rate 2/10?

 

[hello friend]

RTS games actually having any kind of fucking soul in this day and age is so rare that Deserts of Kharak was a pleasant surprise despite being a pretty bad RTS. DoK is lush.

 

[Corbin Dallas Multipass]

RTS games actually having any kind of fucking soul in this day and age is so rare that Deserts of Kharak was a pleasant surprise despite being a pretty bad RTS. DoK is lush.

I get that but how on earth do you rate a bad RTS 8/10. Is it a logarithmic scale where 1/10 literally wipes out all life in the universe with its terribleness?

 

[hello friend]

idd

A fairer score would undersell how nicely done the presentation is by a lot I think, but 8/10 is way too much. I'd definitely recommend the campaign to anyone who enjoys rts, but the skirmish or multiplayer not even a little - strange as that may sound.

 

[underground nymph]

ok, maybe 8/10 is too much… 7/10, but no less. Hell, maybe I enjoyed it a little bit too much than I should

how on earth do you rate a bad RTS 8/10

BTW how on earth have you misread mediocre as bad? I mean there was nothing groundbreaking in the RTS genre for the last 10-15 years except maybe for some specific cases that reside mostly in the simulation-heavy sub genre. DoK hasn’t introduced anything outstanding, which makes it mediocre gameplay-vise, but doubtfully a bad game.

If that's an 8/10 for you how bad does something have to suck to be a 6/10? Can you even imagine the game that you'd rate 2/10?

Oh c’mon, as if there was some tangible, quantifiable difference between 3/10 and 4/10. It’s a subjective abstraction. Or are you suggesting I’ve violated any methodology associated with this… method?

 

[Storyfag]

RTS games actually existing in this day and age is so rare

FTFY

 

[Infinitron]

 

[Grotesque]

these ships begin to grow on me

 

[gerey]

I do not like how the Fleet Intelligence guy sounds, he injects far too much emotion into his lines, compared to FI from HW1 and 2, where he was professional and matter of fact and rarely let emotions show, and when he did it was only in the way he used specific phrases.

FI from previous games would never have called the destruction of the enemy carrier "beautiful".

these ships begin to grow on me

Dunno, the frigate looks to have a lot of wasted space on top, and not enough turrets to justify how broad it is.

I do like how the fighters and bombers look.

 

[RobotSquirrel]

the decision to make whatsherface the main face of the series made it clear that the series is dead

The hero of the story was always space banana. Its what you first saw on the box. Once Karen was on the box art we then anthropomorphized the space banana, now there was a clear "you're playing as this person" rather than a community of people trying to survive the apocalypse. I think they went too overly literal with the fact that Karen is the Mother in Mothership. She is actually insignificant compared to the space banana itself.

 

[Grotesque]

 

[DesolationStone]

The hero of the story was always space banana. Its what you first saw on the box. Once Karen was on the box art we then anthropomorphized the space banana, now there was a clear "you're playing as this person" rather than a community of people trying to survive the apocalypse. I think they went too overly literal with the fact that Karen is the Mother in Mothership. She is actually insignificant compared to the space banana itself.

Indeed it seems that we are no longer part of the 'final hope' of People X but only of a small fleet of a larger empire. I don't think this will be a problem because after Homeworld 2 Hiigara is now a galactic empire with no real competitors against its hegemony. Some will disagree with me, but I hope that with this game they finally expand the lore and create the pillars of a larger and more wider franchise, Homeworld deserves it.

 

[Parsimonious cook]

New video:

 

[DesolationStone]

New video:

No it's the same of yesterday

 

[Grotesque]

 

[Carpalone]

 

[RobotSquirrel]

Really bad texture work, that carrier at the end especially. Really devs you're just gonna slap a normal map on the top with some noise and call it a day? You didn't even bother to paint the decals on the ship properly! they just threw it on top didn't even scale it properly and where the heck is the interior textures on the hangars? (looking at the A-roll, the interiors are just normal mapped in and there's no detail on them at all, no emission maps used at all for the smaller lights LAME)

Otherwise oh look its Homeworld 2 again. meh I'll buy it on sale.