I've been keeping an eye on that because it sounds cool. Does the fact you have to pay for everything and are essentially in debt slavery drag down the enjoyment at all or is it just a way to keep you thinking about optimizing your work?
I've gone back and forth about grabbing it on steam sale while it's discounted.
No the debt thing really isn't something I personally pay any attention to. To me, it's just the framework for why you are out there cutting up ships. It starts at 1billion dollar debt, and while that seems like a lot, the value of the ships you are cutting up, START at around 3-4 million credits (assuming you maximize your salvaging). You really just use the days income as a measure of success. "Alright! I did a $2 million cut job shift today! My old record was 1.3 million in a single shift! I'm really getting the hang of this Mackerel class hull! I wonder if I should upgrade to the next class of ship, which will mean a loss at first as I learn the new layout, or stick with this one a bit more, and see if I can get it down to full salvage in a single shift? I mean I just unlocked some new upgrades to my gear, so I can really speed up some of the stages of the salvage job. Hmmm" That's all the really runs through my head. The question of "how much of my debt did I work off?" Just really is the last thing on my mind.
Yes you do have to pay for things like oxygen refills, and fuel refills, and repairs, but the amount they charge is really pocket change, compared to the amounts you are dealing with. Also, it's VERY common to find containers of emergency oxygen and/or fuel in the ships, and you can harvest them mid-shift to save yourself some money. There are also repair/health kits that you can harvest, and use them back at base between shift, to again save yourself money. But seriously, the cost for mid-shift refills is neglible. The biggest downside to going to buy O2 refills and fuel, is you have to fly over to the station terminal, which means valuable salvage time lost going back and forth.
But yeah I'm really enjoying the hell out of it so far. I just upgraded to a new class of ship, and it's way more layered and complicated to figure out how to initially crack it. There are things like dealing with ship pressurization. Do you vent everything so you can safely move in and out of space? Or do you keep sections atmo'd so that your suit upgrade that siphons O2 from the environment means you don't have to worry about O2 refills? But beware if you accidentally open a section to space, it will violently vent, flinging objects around, causing damage to the resources you can salvage, and also possibly hurting/killing you. Also it might cause a massive chain reaction of systems exploding, causing the entire ship to go boom, thus wasting money.
It's a REALLY complex puzzle game of Space Jenga, and I'm REALLY enjoying it. My one complaint right now is I wish there was more of a narrative structure to it. Again, it's Early Access so I get it, but the little audio/text logs you can find in the hulls hint at a much bigger world going on in the space around your floating scrapyard. And I'd like to see more development there in the future.
But for now, the "here's a ship, find the best way to quickly carve it up into bits, and salvage those bits, while listening to Firefly-esque space/country music" is really damn engaging. It's equal parts mentally challenging in the puzzle-solving aspect, but also really chill and zen in the "you're going at your own pace."
Some people have complained in reviews about the timed shifts, but it makes sense. If you don't like that, there is a Free Play mode, which I assume just removes the timer and let's you do things at your own pace for the fun of it. But there is Career Mode, which is the default way to play it, and that replicates you actually working a shift per day. Personally I don't find it all that bad, the timer. You get 15 minutes per shift, and once you get the hang of the hull type, that's usually more than enough to seriously carve it up. Plus you often are given multiple days per hull to fully salvage it. That's part of the difficulty spike as you progress up the hull tree. You might only have 1 day to salvage this one ship, but the other ship option is a 3 day job. Probably worth less overall, but if you aren't confident you can salvage enough in 1 shift to make it profitable, it's the better option.
And you will notice in all that wall of text, the fact that I have a $1 billion debt was pretty much never mentioned.
The graphics are really damn good for EA, the physics are solid as hell, and you can find really fun and cool ways to exploit the physics systems to your advantage, the music is really good (if a little short on the repeat cycle, I'd like a larger playlist, but that's minor). The setup and mood is really enthralling, the humor is really good, the pace is your own, just, all kinds of good things about this game. I don't do EA games all that often, but this is probably one of the more polished ones I've seen to date.
Also the introduction cinematic when you first pick the career mode is fucking awesome for setting the mood. Not the trailer, but the actual opening cinematic. So damn good.
*Edit*
Also, as a frame of reference, I'm not a huge puzzle/building kind of gamer. Things like Minecraft or Factorio and all that type of game, really aren't my cup of tea. But this game really hits a sweet spot for me. So for someone that REALLY enjoys those kinds of games, playing this, where it's pretty much that concept but in reverse, will probably be highly enjoyable.
