While this encouraged fleet diversity, it also had the unpleasant side-effect of forcing me to micromanage every single one of my units almost constantly. I could have 12 ships with no damage bonus against Medium targets, and they would take far longer to kill a single Medium enemy than one friendly ship that did have such a bonus. There are no generalists, and upgrades only play to bolstering the strengths of a given ship type-never shoring up its weaknesses. Most ships’ weapons can only damage two or three of these, and plink almost entirely harmlessly off of all others. Combat uses a rigid rock-paper-scissors formula based on the type of a ship’s hull-Small, Medium, Large, Extra Large, and Buildings. Unfortunately, these choices didn’t have much of an impact in the inconsistently paced real-time battles ahead of me. Each ship type has three upgrade slots for damage, armor, and speed, and my primary carrier was eventually able to earn several tiers of progressively powerful perks, adding up to a satisfying supply of fleet customization. Joining them along the way were just over a dozen gradually-unlocked constructible ships, ranging from small, scrappy fighter squadrons to impressive, photon cannon-equipped bruisers that stood as near equals with my heroes. The fleet I was to command through this narrative was anchored by persistent hero-unit capital ships, complete with voice-acted captains (including those mentioned above) and a host of potent special abilities. Plot details were mostly delivered Captain’s Log-style, with disconnected monologues between missions, stymying chances for character interaction and making the story feel less alive and personal. Starship Troopers alum Dina Meyer gave a respectable, grounded performance as the expedition’s de facto leader, but most of the rest of the cast (including Firefly’s Ron Glass and Battlestar’s Aaron Douglas) sounded like they just came out of hypersleep and weren’t entirely aware of what was going on. Across 15 missions, I was treated to a moderately engaging story with some cool twists, but no especially outstanding or memorable characters. The 20-hour campaign launched me into orbit around an Event Horizon-esque expedition exploring a mysterious area of space called The Black Zone, on the trail of a supercarrier that went missing while investigating a possible alien threat.
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