Space Rangers 2: Rise of the Dominators

"Big fun + big problems = Space Rangers 2..."

I love space games, which was the main reason I picked up SR2. I also wanted to find that elusive space trading freedomish game I've been looking for for years, but still haven't found (thought Freelancer was it, but no). SR2 turned out to be very close to what I wanted, while also having a lot of what I didn't expect. The things I didn't expect I either loved or hated.

It's hard to know where to begin in reviewing this game. I'll start with the basics. You pick a ship, race and trade, then you start flying around from planet to planet, solar system to solar system, looking for opportunities. You can buy goods from one planet and sell them at another, leaving you with profit with which to make more profit, which allows you to upgrade your ship, allowing you to carry more goods, etc. This is what traders do. You can be a pirate, harrassing any ships weaker than yours (not many usually) and bullying them into handing you some cargo just in order to escape with their lives. You can be a police officer, patrolling the solar systems and finding evil-doers to smite, thus winning reputation points with all those money-grabbing traders just trying to get from A to B. More on these occupations later, under problems.

You don't just have to fly around endlessly, there's lots more for you to do. Local governments will often have quests for you to undertake on their planets, and if you complete them you will be rewarded monetarily. These are always text quests, where you have to answer multiple choice questions (broadly) to make your way through the puzzles and riddles and mini-games and emerge victorious on the other side. Some of these are much more interesting than others, and some are extremely, dynamically tough. This is not helped by the fact that these text missions have been poorly translated into English from Russian, presumably by a Venezuelan plate-spinner. More on these text quests later, under problems.

There are also other missions for you to take on, where you are dumped into an RTS environment on an alien planet, and you have to build robots and send them against enemy robots. Take control of more factories while your opponent loses them, and you'll be able to eventually crush your enemies and win more money. These are my favourites, though they can also be very difficult. More on these RTS missions... you get the point.

The fourth main gaming area involves the main premise of the game. The Dominators are attacking the galaxy and it's up to you and the other Rangers to eliminate them once and for all. This is done by first fighting smaller versions, taking their ship parts to research centres, waiting for enough research to be done on the Dominators to allow you to defeat them once and for all (takes a long time), and finally confronting all three of the ringleaders in various ways in order to off them once and for all. This is great fun and the Dominators always seem to have the coolest stuff.

Speaking of stuff, this game is overflowing with ship equipment. You will never have a perfect ship; there will always be a store with another great component which you can't quite afford. Half the enjoyment of earning money in all the aforementioned ways is knowing that soon you will have that amazing gripper which will let you pick up all the really cool items scattered around the solar system the next time you meet those pesky Dominators.

That's about it for the good stuff in this game, and it's a lot of entertainment. Now for those problems I mentioned.

Sooner or later you will realise that this game is very repetitive. So much so that you may even not bother installing it a second time. This sounds drastic but in my experience it's true (though it's not the only reason I don't want to reinstall). You eventually realise that, no matter what occupation you picked when you began your game, and no matter what it says under your name in the Rangers list, you're a trader. You will ALWAYS fall back on trading - taking goods from planet to planet forever - because it's by far the easiest way to make money. You're a trader, face it. Trading unfortunately is as boring as it sounds. Buy here, sell there, repeat. And since making money is the main area of the game, the best way to fill your turns while you wait for another special mission to apear on one of the planets, all you're doing is flying from planet to planet, trying to stay out of trouble.

Of course, the special missions can break this monotony up, but once you've done a text mission once you know how to do it again. It's like re-reading a very short story. Pick these options in this order and it's complete. Not all the text missions are this basic, but many of them are, and there aren't enough interesting ones to keep this aspect of the game alive.

The RTS missions are always fun and always hectic, and in my opinion are the second most fun parts of the game, after fighting the Dominators. Don't disable these (which is an option) if you don't want to get very bored later on in the game. Again, these are not randomly generated and will be the same in every game - if you don't like them the first time you never will.

And when you do get to later on in the game your only purpose will be to engage the Dominators over and over. You've done all you can with the text missions, the RTS bits have run out, you're swimming in money (which you will virtually always be spending in simple repairs - your ship takes insane damage by just flying through a solar system later on, and costs are ludicrous, forcing you to keep trading even when you don't want to). All that's left is working towards finishing the Dominators, which can be done by collecting more and more parts (which means picking fights) and taking them back to be researched (or keeping the best parts for your own ship). Do enough of this and your route to victory is revealed, though I won't put a spoiler here.

All of the above is Space Rangers 2. Oops, nearly forgot. Starforce.

If you enjoy having problems with your optical drives, and maybe even your operating systems, don't install this game. It comes with Starforce "copy protection" which has huge problems and is extremely unpopular with gamers, to the point where they are trying to organise mass boycotts. There are forums devoted to getting rid of Starforce, and I've experienced first-hand the problems that SF can cause. I may never get to play Space Rangers 2 again, not because I don't like it, but because I don't want to risk losing another perfectly good DVD writer. Take the risk if you want, and you will enjoy the game, but don't say you weren't warned. Do some googling on Starforce if you don't believe me.

Anyway, a good, in some people's eyes great game, which has very definite one-more-turn-itis. Just don't fool yourself into believing that you're playing in a hugely dynamic, varied, exciting world. The world may be dynamic, but your purpose in this game really isn't, and that's a big part of SR's problem.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 08/06/07, Updated 08/07/07