INTRO:
Blackbird Interactive (BBI) had a great debut with the successful integration of Deserts of Kharak into the Homeworld franchise (under the oversight of Gearbox Interactive). For better or worse, it is not about to let go of the “Shipbreaker” copyright. Thus, they had turned their attention to a game that is about shipbreaking, albeit of the sci-fi sort.
Unfortunately, after some troubled development, it soon becomes obvious that whoever tied up loose ends and finished the game are not the most talented or skilled among BBI’s staff.
PREMISE:
Hardspace: Shipbreaker’s story was purportedly conceived late during the development of the game. The hastiness of this design decision would show all too much in the presentation of the story.
Anyway, the game takes place in a far-flung sci-fi future. Humanity has achieved faster-than-light travel; even cloning and memory transfer technologies have been perfected. However, Earth’s value has long been eroded from years of pollution. Much of humanity live elsewhere if they have the wealth to do so, while everyone else who remained on Earth are all too vulnerable to exploitation due to their desire to get a better life elsewhere.
LYNX Corporation (somehow) has a monopoly on this exploitation (despite their really poor managerial decisions). Their main means of doing this is the shipbreaking industry; they employ people from Earth who are desperate for any means to leave Earth.
Unfortunately, the employment contract comes with considerable clauses that put them deeply in debt. The worst of these is the imposition of the aforementioned cloning and memory transfer technology – called “Spares” – on the pretext that their jobs are dangerous. However, immense fees are charged for these, effectively putting employees in debt indefinitely; even the half-percent daily interest rate would lead to interest accumulation in the millions. Stack equipment rental charges onto these, and it would be obvious that LYNX does not care much for the welfare of its employees.
The player character is a person that happens to have been caught in LYNX’s hooks. The player character has been assigned to one of the salvage yards in Earth’s orbit. However, the player character has not joined the company at its most stable of times. There are rumblings of dissatisfaction and talk of union action. Things would only get worse from here.
SLAP-DASH STORY-TELLING – OVERVIEW:
Unfortunately, the storytelling is perhaps the worst part of the game.
NO SKIPPING:
At this time of writing, story-related moments cannot be skipped; even if the player is not interested, the player has to wait for these skits to end before being able to progress.
TEXT AND PORTRAITS ONLY:
The unskippable storytelling would have been bearable if the storytelling is entertainingly varied, but it is not. Other than a handful of cutscenes that are practically slide-shows of graphic novel art, the most that the player would get are portraits with dialogue boxes.
The portraits are very small, which makes appreciation of the different facial expressions difficult. Furthermore, the clarity of the text is dependent on the texture settings for the game.
ONE-WAY CONVERSATIONS:
Ultimately, the player character has absolutely nothing to say. Any character that talks to the player character only ever talks about what they are going through; they do not bother to ask anything about the player character. Granted, this is not the first video game where there are only one-way conversations, but there is a lost opportunity to make a player character that is more memorable.
NOT MANY VOICE ACTORS:
There are not many voice-actors and –actresses either. That some voice-overs are the actors and actresses straining their voices would seem obvious, especially after a certain bungling administrator arrives at the yard.
VERY UNWISE INDUSTRIAL MANAGEMENT:
The means by which the gameplay is worked into the story would seem awful to a player that is educated and/or experienced in industrial workings. Many of LYNX’s policies would seem ridiculous to an industrialist who prizes productivity over everything else.
There is the quarter-hour work shift per day in the standard gameplay mode. This would have been understandable if each salvage bay is used by more than one employee, i.e. a ship is worked on by a sequence of employees working different consecutive shifts. However, this is not the case. Outside of that quarter-hour, the ship that is being salvaged languishes in the bay. This combination of policies lead to a low output of salvage per day, which is unbelievable and stupid.
As the story progresses, there would be even more decisions on the part of LYNX’s management that seem even stupider to a real-world industrialist. Administrators who know next to nothing about what underlings have to do for their jobs are the least egregious, for one. Having no on-site security monitoring employees to prevent theft and to put down violent protests is among the worst, especially considering that LYNX’s management knows that it is exploiting workers.
All these flaws strongly suggest that those who came up with the story and finished the game have not much experience in making believable stories about working people and labour exploitation. The sci-fi setting could not even be utilized for hand-waving excuses.
THE CABIN AND WORKDAYS – OVERVIEW:
The cabin is where the player decides what to kit the player character with, as well as – for better or worse – advance the story. Like the story, this part of the game is not particularly well done.
SHIFTING LOCATIONS:
The player cannot have the player character moving freely about the cabin. Rather, the player has to shift from location to location within the cabin, via the directional control inputs. This would have been bearable, if the cabin is large – but it is not. In fact, it is small. More notably, the player character actually does not have a physical presence in the cabin; there is no model for the player character when he/she is outside of the space-suit.
POSTERS & MANY UNUSABLE THINGS:
The player can collect posters to have them displayed on certain walls of the cabin. Ultimately though, these have no effect on the gameplay and there are not many of them to provide satisfactory variation.
There are also many things that are not usable in the cabin, such as the dispenser that dispenses nutrient paste and the shower. There could have been gameplay content involving these, but since there are not any, they are little more than props.
One side of the cabin shows the view of the salvage yard; the player can see the other bays in the distance. This could have been a wondrous sight, if not for the fact that for each bay, there is only one employee. This further reinforces the notion that LYNX’s industrial operations are just unbelievable, even discounting the sci-fi setting.
EMPLOYEE TERMINAL:
Some things in the cabin can be interacted with. However, not all of these are involved in the gameplay. Even those that are happen to be not convincingly satisfactory. The employee terminal is one of the latter.
This terminal lets the player read the messages that are sent by people in the story. They are ultimately optional reads; the bulk of them can be outright ignored. The player character will never send any messages.
DATA-MINER:
The data-miner is a software that is soon installed on the employee terminal (whether the player wants to or not). It is intended to decrypt recordings in data storage devices that have been left behind in the ships. This is intended to be part of the world-building content, but ultimately most of them are forgettable.
Even those that are not, such as the recordings of the last crewman of an AI-afflicted ship, serve as a reminder of how much wasted potential that this game has. Aside from the story, these recordings are the only other bits in the game that have voice-overs.
SHIP DOCTOR:
The Ship Doctor is another software. It is needed for the conclusion of the story in the game.
Throughout the game, the player would come across small parts that are needed for the refurbishing of a ship that would be bequeathed on the player character. The acquisition of these parts will be described later.
Anyway, the player installs these parts into the ship through the use of the Ship Doctor software; it is unclear how this software implements the procedures to do so. That said, it tracks how close the ship is to being refurbished, and what parts are needed.
There is little satisfaction that can be had from accumulating progress on this matter. Any changes to the ship is subtle, and the ship will never be used in the gameplay in any way.
SHIPBREAKER’S PRIORITIES – OVERVIEW:
The eponymous shipbreaking is the main draw of the game. For the most part, it would be entertaining, at least until the player realizes that there is a lot of grinding involved and a limited number of ships.
The factors that are important to the shipbreaker as a player character will be described first.
SHIFTS:
For better or worse, shifts of very limited duration are imposed on every LYNX shipbreaker, despite each shipbreaker having been assigned to a salvage bay entirely for their own use.
This element of the story has been contrived in order to fit the intended gameplay of the game, which is that the player has only a quarter of an hour to work on a ship. This was the intended gameplay; it has been implemented with the goal of driving the player to adopt efficient strategies, and not for a believable story.
LACK OF IDEAS FOR ALTERNATIVES TO SHIFTS:
Yet, there really could have been better mechanisms for limiting the durations of shifts, specifically with risk versus reward design policies.
Working in space entails exposure to space radiation which can accumulate in the human body; this could have been used to have the player character return for detoxing, or otherwise work in the interior of the ship as long as possible. Alternatively, the company could increase the prices of oxygen and fuel with every purchase, if only to emphasize how scurrilous the company can be.
SHIFT ACCOUNT:
In every shift, the player character is assigned a temporary monetary account. This account is represented as a meter that is filled from either its right end or left end. The meter is filled as things are removed from the ship and disposed of.
If the things are disposed of properly, the meter fills from the left end with an ochre hue. This represents the cut of the revenue that the player character gets – but only after the shift ends.
If the things are disposed of improperly, the meter fills from the right end with a red hue. This represents the penalties that the player character accumulates; they will be applied at the end of the shift, generally cutting into the aforementioned revenue.
The meter also has notches that represent the thresholds that yield bonuses when they are breached. The bonuses are repair kits for the player character’s gear, as well as LYNX tokens. These will be described later.
COMPANY KIOSK:
At the fore of the salvage bay, there is the habitation pod of the player character. The company kiosk is also built into the pod; it functions as a vending machine that somehow works in the void of space. It can dispense replacement oxygen and fuel, as well as supply solid items like explosives, of all things. The replenishment process is instantaneous and is never seen in-game in any way.
Generally, it is not in the player’s interest to return to the kiosk too often. The purchases cut into the player character’s revenues, and the kiosk is often a considerable distance from the ship.
BOUNDARIES:
Although the gameplay takes place out in space, there are boundaries that the player character cannot move past. Doing so starts a countdown towards the player character’s suit being shut down and the shift ended.
This is perhaps an understandable gameplay limitation. It also means that most of the faraway things that the player could see are skybox textures.
HEALTH:
As uncaring as LYNX is, it does warn employees that shipbreaking is a dangerous job that involves many risks of injuries. The player character’s ability to withstand them is represented as a meter.
The player character’s performance is not impaired as the meter depletes, i.e. the “critical existence failure” trope applies here. However, the player will want to have a buffer of health, because getting healed is not an act that can be immediately carried out and certain sources of harm can continue to inflict damage until they are dealt with.
Curiously, health is completely restored for free in between shifts.
SUIT INTEGRITY:
The integrity of the player character’s suit is practically yet another health bar. The player character does not die immediately if this meter hits zero, but he/she will soon be.
The meter has two portions: one that shows how much integrity has been unlocked for the suit, and how much remains to be unlocked, i.e. the player can see the extent of the upgrades that can be had, though exact amounts in terms of numbers are not shown.
That said, as suit integrity depletes, the player suffers from more incidents of oxygen leaks. At low suit integrity, oxygen runs out very quickly. Furthermore, the player character’s resistance to various sources of harm diminishes, i.e. the player character suffers more damage to health from injuries.
Like health, suit integrity is restored in between shifts; presumably the player character is fixing it. However, the player can also purchase instant suit repairs from the kiosk. They are quite expensive, however.
OXYGEN:
The suit’s oxygen supplies always start full at every shift. Diminishing oxygen supplies will not reduce the player character’s performance. However, the edges of the screen will dim ominously and an urgent music tracks plays as oxygen runs out. Completely running out of oxygen will not kill the player character immediately, though his/her health dwindles very quickly.
Refilling the suit’s oxygen supplies often requires the player character to the company kiosk. However, some ships also have oxygen bottles here and there that can be used on the spot to refill the suit.
Alternatively, the player character could mingle about in pressurised compartments. However, there is generally not much that can be done in such places and most scrapping maneuvers will have to be done in vacuum. There will be elaboration on this later.
JETPACK:
The jetpack is the player character’s main means of moving about, considering that there is no gravity for the purpose of walking.
The jetpack can be used to move forward, including for acceleration. It is also used for arresting speed, for the purpose of slowing down safely.
The jetpack has limited fuel, however. Although it has to be refuelled periodically, diminishing fuel will not reduce its performance. The player character usually has to return to the company kiosk to refill its fuel, but there are also bottles of thruster fuel in some ships that can be consumed on the spot. There are otherwise no other means of refuelling.
Running out of fuel will not strand the player character. The grapple gun that is issued to the player character can be used for locomotion. Likewise, the jetpack is not necessarily the only means to reduce movement speed; as long as the player is aware of basic physics, the grapple gun can be used to arrest motion. Alternatively, the player character can hold out his/her hand to grab something if he/she is not moving too fast.
REACHING OUT:
Speaking of which, there is a control input that has the player character reaching out with a hand (usually the left). If there is anything heavy, large and solid within reach, the player character automatically catches it or braces against it (in the case of moving into a wall).
Whether this would arrest the player character’s speed depends on the mass of the object and the player character’s speed; if the player character is already being hurtled around, this is not likely to work.
Interestingly, if the player repeatedly taps the control input for reaching while already on a large surface, the player character would move across the surface in the direction that the player is looking. This is a convenient way of scooting across a hull without using fuel.
DEATH & SPARES:
Oddly enough, dying does not immediately end the shift. The player character simply returns to a “spare” that emerges from the habitation module. The corpse of the previous incarnation is nowhere to be found.
Depending on the difficulty setting that has been used for the playthrough, there may be charges levied on the player upon death, or there is a limited number of spares. Certain difficulty settings remove the spares entirely, effectively causing a disconnect between the gameplay and narrative.
PHYSICS – OVERVIEW:
As with all video games that are set in space, the physics that govern the motion of things including the player character have been designed to accommodate the player instead of being believable.
The physics that are associated with the Grappler, the Tethers and the salvage receptacles will be described later.
EVENTUAL STOP:
Certain massive objects, especially the main bodies of the ships, will eventually slow down to a halt. This happens despite being in the void of space, which should not have much aerodynamic friction. On the other hand, this does prevent a ship from simply drifting out into space.
SMALL OBJECTS KEEP MOVING:
The same does not apply for smaller objects, especially the things that the player would want the player character to personally collect. Given enough momentum, they will eventually drift out into space. Thus, there is a need to prevent smaller objects from moving further than necessary, such as having them hit walls or more often than not, catching them with the Grappler.
OBJECT MOTIONS:
Objects will rotate, gyrate and translate through space, as to be expected of objects in video-game zero-gravity. The player does not need to worry about such motions when handling small objects. However, large objects like entire sections of the hull may be moving in ways that can threaten other objects or the player character with dangerous collisions. Indeed, I have had a few occasions where large pieces of hull rotate as they move and hitting the player character in the back of the head.
SALVAGE RECEPTACLES – OVERVIEW:
The inner faces of the salvage bay, i.e. the sections that are facing the ship that is being broken, have facilities built into them. These facilities have orifices that are big enough to accept pieces of a ship of just about any size, except perhaps the entirety of the ship itself. These facilities presumably render down anything that they receive. In addition there is also a barge below the yard; the barge is intended to receive parts that could be refurbished or reused.
SORTING:
Considering the different types of receptacles for ship salvage, the player has to do sorting as much as ship-breaking. Fortunately, looking at any part of a ship will show which receptacle that the part should go into. The outline of the part is also shown, which is helpful for knowing how much to cut the ship apart (more on this later).
That said, sending the salvage to the right receptacle is a simple matter. Indeed, the player can hurl the stuff at high speeds; all of the receptacles can receive them safely and reliably as long as they have entered into their zones of suction.
SUCTION:
Speaking of which, the receptacles happen to have a pull of some kind; anything too close to them will get sucked in. There is no explanation for how this works, but it does make it more convenient to dispose of things. However, they also pose a hazard to the player character, who can well be sucked in if the player is not careful.
In the case of the barge, the player can still have the player character jetpack or grapple his/her way out if he/she gets sucked in, but this takes some effort and considerable time. In the case of the processor and furnace, he/she would be killed.
NO TAKE-BACKS, MOST OF THE TIME:
Things that have been sucked into the barge can still be dragged out, albeit this takes considerable effort and time. However, if the player does this, he/she will not be penalized for any inappropriate materials that ended up in the barge. (Ending the shift with these in the barge will inflict the penalties, by the way.)
Things that have been placed in the furnace and processor will be gone forever. Therefore, the player will have to be mindful about things that are drifting near the apertures of the processors and furnaces.
ELECTRICITY – OVERVIEW:
The ships that are sent for salvaging may have been decommissioned, but they still have functioning systems. This also means that they still have electricity running through them, together with the risks that are associated with electricity.
ROOM CONNECTIONS:
Electricity is apparently transmitted through the spine of the ship. If any section of the ship is isolated from the others through severing of the spinal structures, they will no longer be supplied with electricity. Most systems, especially doors and air regulation, will not work in this section.
BATTERIES AND CELLS:
The only exception are computer systems or living spaces that have power cells or batteries; they continue working even if the section of the ship that they are on is completely cut away from the rest.
These devices pose electrical hazards of their own. Specifically, attempting to remove what they are powering will cause electrical damage. Of course, damaging the batteries and cells will also cause damage. The electrical arcs will damage any other nearby things (including the player character) and may also start fires (especially in things that are meant to go into the furnace).
Looking for these can be challenging. Power cells are often mounted on the spine outside rooms. Batteries are often tucked behind computer screens and furniture.
Peculiarly though, these should be small enough for the player character to carry on his/her person. However, the player has to dispose of them by chucking them onto the barge.
REACTORS:
The bigger ships have reactors, which provide most of the electricity for the major systems in the ships. (Players who are educated in engineering would know that reactors themselves do not generate electricity.)
Reactors do not cause electrical arcs when they are removed – but they begin melting down. If the meltdown completes, they explode. (Again, educated players would know that reactors do not explode on meltdown – but video-game reactors tend to do just that.) Tossing them into the barge stops the slowdown, but reactors are heavy things. They might not reach the barge in time if the player does not make haste.
There are two types of reactors. The smaller type is simply detached and chucked into the barge. The bigger type has a detachment process that takes a while, but following the process gives the player much more time to dispose of the reactor. Bypassing the process has the reactor melting down rapidly.
Reactors on meltdown are major radiation hazards, though their range of effect is peculiarly short. As long as the player keeps them at further than arm’s length, the player character should be okay. However, the reactors may irradiate and damage other devices in range.
AIR PRESSURIZATION & DEPRESSURIZATION – OVERVIEW:
Most ships come with at least one room that is pressurized. These generally pose hazards.
Cutting into these rooms and exposing the cuts to unpressurized rooms or the void of space will cause an explosive decompression. This damages the walls that have been cut; if there is a lot of pressurized air that would escape, the wall will be torn apart into pieces that are a hassle to manipulate.
There is a better alternative for decompression. This involves opening the doors between pressurized rooms and unpressurized rooms that are otherwise sealed from the void. This still causes an onrushing wave that will hurl objects from the pressurized rooms into the unpressurized ones. This is still better than the previous method, if only because the small objects would not get sucked out into space.
AIR REGULATORS:
Indubitably, all ships have to be depressurized before they can be reliably broken down. The safest method of depressurization is to use functional air regulators to remove the air from the rooms that the regulators govern. Conveniently, if these rooms are connected to other rooms or cavities via portals that cannot be shut, the regulators will suck away the air from these adjacent rooms too.
Not every room would have air regulators, however. In such cases, the player would have to cut barriers or open doors into rooms that already been evacuated; the latter method is more reliable.
These devices are also among the weakest; the player should expect them to be dislodged and then damaged during decompression, if they are close to any portals.
One of the quirks of air regulators is that their function is tied to any doors that are on the faces of the room that they are in. These doors must be intact in order for the air regulators for work; damaging them will disable the air regulators. Removing or damaging the switches that are associated with the doors will also disable the regulators. Learning about this quirk first-hand can be unpleasant.
DOORS:
Doors are mainly there for the purpose of air regulation. Inevitably, all of them will have to be opened or otherwise cut open during the shipbreaking. Until the player deems it convenient or necessary to remove them, doors will be a minor impediment. This is due to the need to interact with the airlock switches that control them. There is also the need to wait for the depressurization.
Doors are also among the ship parts that have the least values. Considering the hassle of removing them from their doorways (which are made of materials that go into a different receptacle) and the low returns, most players are likely to just forfeit them. (Indeed, one of the characters in the story will scoff at salvaging doors.)
AIRLOCK SWITCHES:
Every functional door has an airlock switch. Most switches are only connected to their doors, but some, such as the doors at the faces of a room, are connected to each other and will activate simultaneously when interacted with.
SHIP STRUCTURE – OVERVIEW:
The spine of a ship and its hull are the main hurdles in shipbreaking. They have considerable inertia and will get in the way. Their momentum is also more difficult to manage than other parts of the ship.
Yet, these are also the most consistently valuable parts of a ship, so the player will need to consider the risks and trouble of handling them versus the rewards from getting huge unwieldy pieces of hull into where they should go.
HULL:
The hull is the shell of the ship, for lack of a better word to describe it. Most hulls envelope the ship, so the player cannot get parts like system devices to the salvage receptacle without these getting in the way if they have yet to be peeled off the ship.
Hull pieces are usually made of materials that go into the processors. Incidentally, these materials are impossible to cut with the laser-cutter, so they cannot be removed by simply cutting into the ship from the outside.
CONNECTORS:
Instead, the player has to go into the ship, specifically the spaces between the exterior hull and the spine. The player then has to look for the “connectors”. These are conveniently gaudy yellow, with black stripes to make them even more noticeable. They connect the hull pieces together, and to the spine too.
These are meant to be outright destroyed. Indeed, most connectors would simply vaporize when zapped. (Again, engineering-centric players would be aghast at how flimsy these are.) They also have no value whatsoever.
OTHER HULL-SPINE CONNECTIONS:
In the case of some ship models, the hull is connected to the spine with hard joints. Separating them requires the cutting of these joints, meaning that some salvage value would be lost. Typically, these joints are made of materials that would go into the furnace. They are intended to test the player’s skill at cutting things efficiently.
SPINE:
The rooms within the ship are built around its spine. The spine is the most troublesome part of a ship to salvage; it will also likely to be the last to be salvaged.
Fortunately, the spine can be cut almost anywhere. It also wholly made of materials that can be tossed into the furnace. Wiser players would place the player character such that any portion of the spine that has been cut can be conveniently chucked into the furnace without having to turn the player character.
ILLUMINATION – OVERVIEW:
As mentioned earlier, some of the functions in the ship are still operating. These include the lights on the ship. They generally do not pose safety risks; plucking them – even those that are still lit – will not cause electrical arcs to occur.
LED LIGHTS:
Every ship will have small dome lights that flesh red or green, depending on the status of what they are connected to. These are mainly there to inform the player about when it is appropriate to remove whatever that they are connected to. Otherwise, they have value of nil and are not worth the bother of salvaging them.
LIGHT TUBES:
Next, there are the tubes that emit light. Most of them remain so until they are detached, or the section of the ship that they are in is detached. They have significant value and are easy to pluck off.
DEVICE LIGHTS:
The devices on the ship also have lights, mainly to indicate their status. Typically, when they go out, it means that they are safe to remove. Certain devices have different statuses and thus different colours. The airlock switches are notable examples: they have three different colours to indicate how safe it is to open them.
FUEL TANKS AND ENGINES - OVERVIEW:
Space ships may be sci-fi things, but at least whoever conceived of them have at least thought of the need for propulsion and the fuel for that.
Incidentally, the systems that allow for their safe disposal require electricity to work. Therefore, reaching and using these systems should be the first thing that the player performs before anything else. This is easier said than done, of course, because these systems are often located in cramped regions of the ships.
THRUSTERS:
Every ship has a set of main thrusters. Most ships have just one, but some others have more. These are usually situated at the rear of the ship, specifically the engineering section. The engineering section often does not have any air regulators. This means that depressurization is often a problem that the player would have to deal with when removing the thrusters.
More advanced ships require the player to throw switches that detach the main thrusters from their fuel lines. Without doing this, the thrusters have to be cut away; this is something that is dangerous to perform.
Some ships have secondary engines; these are usually mounted on the exterior of the ship. They are big and ungainly things, so they are often salvaged first in order to make space for salvaging everything else.
FUEL TANKS:
Small fuel tanks may be attached to the hull, close to the engineering section. Large fuel tanks are located somewhere in the superstructure of the ship, visible from the exterior.
Wherever they are though, the player would have to be careful about where to fire the laser cutter; they readily explode when they are damaged. Explosions will shatter the affected portions of the ship, greatly diminishing their value. The remaining portions of the ship may also drift about, further complicating attempts to corral them for disposal.
The large fuel tanks are much more problematic than the small ones, due to how they are secured to the ship in a scaffold that has to be cut before they can be reliably removed. There happen to be ships with large fuel tanks that are conjoined; these can be particularly frustrating to deal with.
FUEL LINES:
There is also piping that connects fuel tanks to thrusters. While they are still connected, the pipes have fuel in them and are thus flammable. Fortunately, most ships have systems that can flush the fuel from the pipes and disconnect them from the tanks.
FIRES:
For whatever reason, the flammables in this game can catch fire even while in space. The reason for this is not clear.
That said, fire is usually caused by fuel tanks exploding or electrical arcs setting things on fire. Depressurization will not put out a fire. Rather, a fire will burn itself out after running out of things that can catch fire. Speaking of which, these are usually the things in the living spaces of the ship, such as the beds and furnishings. Incidentally, these do fetch good prices when deposited in the barge, so the player will want to avoid starting fires in these rooms.
CRYO SYSTEMS – OVERVIEW:
For possibly the purpose of putting out fires or cooling down overheating systems, some ships have tanks of cryogenic liquid stowed away.
CRYO TANKS:
Some of these tanks are attached to the hull. The placement of these does not make sense, though they do fulfil the purpose of being a hazard that the player will want to watch out when cutting things inside the ship.
That said, like fuel tanks, these will explode when damaged. They are intended to be salvaged, but players can also fling these at things that are on fire to put them out.
If the cryogenic freezing is not nullified by fires, the freezing will render many things brittle or useless. In the case of devices, they are simply damaged useless, but are otherwise still intact. In the case of the hull and spine, they become brittle, making them easier to smash or cut.
CRYO CAPSULES:
Capsules of cryogenic liquid appear exclusively in the coolant chamber of Class 2 reactors. These have to be plucked out with the grappler before they can be retrieved. Until they are retrieved by the player character, they function much like cryo tanks, albeit with less inertia and smaller size.
HAND TOOLS – OVERVIEW:
Having just one person salvage an entire space ship would have been a daunting task. However, the sci-fi setting allows for ludicrous tools for this purpose.
Gameplay-wise, the player has to learn how to use these tools to best effect, namely reducing time spent doing anything other than breaking the ship apart.
GRAPPLER:
The Grappler is the first tool to be introduced. It lets the player character latch onto something with an energy beam, not unlike the sort that has been introduced into video games by Half-Life 2.
If the other thing has less inertia than the player character, it can be reeled in, swung around or launched away quite readily. If the other thing has more inertia than the player character, the player character can reel in himself/herself towards the object, but otherwise cannot do much of anything else.
In the case of launching things away, the momentum that would be imparted greatly depends on the weight of the object. Furthermore, the momentum would be imparted at the spot where the grappling beam contacts the object, or where the Grappler is targeted at. This might cause the object to spin and rotate, possibly hitting other things in the way.
The Grappler can eventually be upgraded to handle heavier things; its effect on smaller things also become more pronounced. This is an overall improvement, but it also comes with greater risks, namely things having more momentum when handled.
LASER CUTTER:
The Laser Cutter is the next device to be described. Indubitably, every ship will have to be cut in one way or another to separate the salvageable materials.
The Laser Cutter cannot cut everything, however. In particular, it can only cut things that are meant to go into the furnace. Not all of these things respond well to cutting either. In particular, any devices or furniture are simply damaged outright when hit with the laser.
There are two modes for the Laser Cutter. The first mode is a heating beam, which is intended to simply vaporize things. Ultimately, this is not favoured by most players, due to the time that is needed to heat things.
The second mode splays the cutting beam, causing it to cut a line across and into whatever that is being targeted. The player is shown the expected cutting line, which will change depending on what is within range of the Cutter. Getting this line right can take time.
Connectors will be what the Cutter is used on the most. Specifically, the second mode can remove them quickly. It may even be possible to line up multiple connectors to be cut with a single firing of the second mode.
The Cutter can overheat when it is used too much. If it overheats, it suffers damage and will inflict harm on the player character too.
Upgrading the Laser Cutter is a double-edged sword. It can be upgraded with greater range, which also widens the cutting line of the second mode. If the player wants to cut less, the player has to get closer to the thing that is to be cut. It can be upgraded to overheat slower, but it is a reckless player indeed who keeps firing the cutter for a long time.
DEMOLITION CHARGES:
Demolition charges are introduced late into the game. The charges can slice into anything, including things that the Laser Cutter cannot cut. They are not meant to be used lightly. In fact, they are meant to be used on high-grade connectors, which appear on the exterior structure of advanced ships.
When the charges are triggered, all of them are detonated, starting with the charges that are placed earliest. This sequence of detonations is generally too fast for the player to pull off tricky moves that hurl things at specific directions.
Upgrading the charges makes them more likely to detonate when triggered. Their area of effect can also be reduced in order to prevent them from slicing into things that they are not supposed to.
TETHERS:
One of the characters would say that tethers are one’s best friends. This is quite true, gameplay-wise.
Tethers are applied via the Grappler. The player is shown the link that can happen as the player moves the Grappler around, which is convenient.
After they have been applied between two objects, the object that has less inertia will be drawn towards the other object. If one of the objects is the orifices for the processors and furnaces, or the barge, the other object will be drawn into the receptacles. If the objects have little inertia, they will be drawn towards each other.
The player can apply more than one Tether in order to speed up the motions. This is especially useful for moving large pieces of hull. The Tethers can be applied at exactly the same spots too, though applying them with such accuracy can be time-consuming (assuming that the player is not using an aim-bot).
The Tethers will eventually dissipate. The player can trigger their dissipation earlier, if the player so wishes, but all extant Tethers will be removed.
DEGRADATION:
All of the player character’s gear will degrade from continued use. They have to be completely degraded in order to be rendered non-functional. However, as they get closer to breaking down, they suffer faults that become more frequent. The faults can be disastrous if the player is handling volatile stuff.
REPAIR KITS:
Thus, the player needs to keep them in good condition. The only way to do so is to apply repair kits on them. This can only be done when the player character is in the habitation pod, i.e. the player has to end the current shift if a device has gotten dangerously degraded.
Repair kits can be purchased at the company kiosk. This option can be expensive, so there happen to be an alternative: some ships have repair kits that are secured to racks. These can be retrieved and added to the player’s reserves.
UPGRADES & LYNX TOKENS:
The progress meter for each shift has notches that represent the milestones of the progress in breaking down the ship. Reaching these milestones yields rewards in the form of repair kits and LYNX tokens. LYNX tokens can be used to upgrade the player character’s equipment. Upgrade options become available as the player character raises his/her rank, typically by completing salvage jobs.
However, upgrades will also increase the rental costs of the gear. That will be so, until the player gains the job perks of waiving the rental fees.
DEBT:
Every day has cumulative interest charged to the player character’s account. One of the player’s goals is to pay off the massive debt. There are no other means to do so other than to break ships, however. There is a lost opportunity to implement moonlighting work.
VISUAL DESIGNS:
The visual designs of this game is a somewhat clumsy blend of voxel-based models and models with greater detail. The latter are used for objects that cannot be taken apart, such as the player character and his/her tools. The former are used for the ship parts that have to be broken down and things with considerable surface areas, such as the salvage yard and the habitation pod.
The application of textures on these two categories of models are particularly different, almost to the point of stark dissonance.
As mentioned already, voxels are used to simulate the disintegration of the ships. This happens when the ships are cut – or exploded, if mishaps happened. Looking for small pieces of the ships is not easy; this is made even more difficult if the pieces are drifting around.
Unfortunately, there is little more than these models. The player will never see models of other humans. The player will not even see space ships moving around, not even them being brought into the yard.
Furthermore, explosions are not rendered well in this game. They cause the game to stutter, even on a computer that is above the recommended requirements.
Considering that this game has been made by people who made the Homeworld games, the looks of this game can be disappointing.
SOUND DESIGNS:
Fortunately, the game has impressive sound designs. The most notable of these are its music tracks, which are quite memorable. These are a fusion of country and spaghetti western. The slow ones play at the beginning of shifts, but as the ships are broken down and sent to the salvage receptacles, the more energetic ones begin to play. If the player is in danger of being harmed by hazards, such as a fire that has just broken out, the more urgent and ominous ones play.
The voice-overs would have been more than decent, if not for the ham-fisted storytelling and there being more characters than voice-actors and –actresses. Still, the deliveries are convincing, even those that are just one-way conversations with the player character.
Although space should stifle all noises, a sci-fi excuse was used for sounds of things nearby being audible. For example, the player can hear the hissing of vapour from leaking containers. Otherwise, most sound effects are muffled, heard through the player character’s suit.
SUMMARY:
This game had so much promise. Breaking down things for salvage is not new in video game history, but games with this are rare. Doing so in zero-G and the void of space is even rarer. Unfortunately, BBI has wasted the opportunity to break new ground.
The introduction of gameplay elements and content ends quickly, eventually leading the player into a near-endless loop of doing the same ship-breaking procedures over and over. Furthermore, the story is told in a ham-fisted manner and becomes overbearing when the player would rather skip to the next gameplay sequence.
This game sorely needs further development, something that those who supposedly finished this game at BBI lack the ability and resources to carry out. Hardspace: Shipbreaker is a disappointment, one that does bode well for the fledgling developers’ future.