Shattered Galaxy – PC – Review

Shattered Galaxy
is a unique online only gaming experience where players become military
tacticians trying to secure their dominance throughout the massive persistent
universe.

Engage opponents
in frenzied tactical struggles. Unite with allies to contest enemy nations’
territorial claims. Customize your units with equipment best suited for your
objectives. Achieve promotions for yourself and new upgrades for your war
machines. Research new technologies to devastate the opposition, and enter the
world of Shattered Galaxy, where battles last minutes and wars span months

There are 4
combat unit types and varieties of each. You have Infantry, which are the
cheapest but easiest to kill. Mobile units are a bit stronger and move faster
and pack more of a punch (Tanks, hover crafts etc., you get the idea).
Aviation units rock, quick and mobile, packing a wallop but fairly easy to
kill. The key to winning battles is capturing the Points of Contention (POC),
which these cannot accomplish without ground control, but more on that later.
Last but not least is organic. These units consist of aliens bred in captivity
to serve humans.  This division has the greatest diversity. Both aerial and
ground units exist.  These units cannot be customized, but they do evolve into
more powerful forms as they progress through higher levels.

Ok big deal you
cannot customize the organic units.  Because the other units can be, Shattered
Galaxy will probably boast the most unique units in any game.  After about
two-dozen battles, I can honestly say I have encountered a plethora of
different units.  I would say with all the different combinations that are
available, you will not find any battle to be the exact same. The number of
units you can control is based on your experience.  Starting at 6 controlling
up to 48.

Speaking of
battles, this is where SG will truly shine!  Taking advantage of new server
technology, SG boasts 100,000-player capability.  That’s not to say that you
will have 100k in one single battle, but you can have up to 30 players
controlling over 400 units in one given battle.  There are tons of heroes
doing other things as well besides battles, Such as buying, repairing
customizing units. You can test your new units at the zoo to take on some
aliens and gain experience or battle in the Simulation center where you will
not suffer nor gain. Just practice. There are plenty of battles to go around
too.  What’s awesome about this is that you can see a battle and jump in to
help out your Teammates.  You may log off thinking wow we are kicking a lot of
butt, just to find the next time you log on that the tide has changed and your
team is pinned against the wall…Real Time at its best!!!

During combat
the object is to either capture or defend the POC and obtain XP, valuable
resources, and lands for their faction. The POC’s are the basic objective of
the battleground. The attacker needs to stand on these round objectives, which
are divided in slices like a pie. The longer one of the attacking units stands
on the POC without dying, the more slices light up. Once all the POC’s are
captured, the attacking faction wins. On the other hand, if you are defending,
you have to keep the attacking side from gaining all the POC’s. Like
attacking, they can be re-captured in the same fashion. If you can do that,
you win and the land and all the resources remain yours. The newbies should
start out fighting aliens to get a basic feel for the game. Check out the zoo,
which is a good place to gather your first XPs before you try and take on
another faction. Once you get the basic concept of battle, move on to what the
game is really about…CONQUER THE WEAK!

The interface
though customizable is a bear at first.  Thankfully there is a tutorial that
can guide you through.  A couple of attempts at this should get you through it
to get a good understanding of the game.  The chat feature is a great way to
get some added info and strategies that will aid you in play.

Does all this
sound great?  Well here is the catch.  30 bucks for the game and you get to
experience the game for 30 days.  If you get a hooked, it’s going to cost ya
10 bucks a month or you can get it for a year for $60.  If the servers never
go down and lots of people buy into this…its not a bad deal, but if you have
server problems it will be the demise of the game, just ask the allegiance
team at Microsoft…another great idea gone bad. Though because of the disaster
on September 11, 2001, Nexon in donating 5% off all September subscriptions to
the disaster relief fund. HATS OFF NEXON!!!

To get the full
scoop and grab a lot of good strategies from the site check out

http://www.sgalaxy.com/

Installation
is a snap

Gameplay: 8
Though lots
of fun, has a bit of a learning curve.

Graphics: 7

Not exactly eye candy, but not too shabby either

Sound: 7

Sound effects and music were decent 

Difficulty:
8
I would give the basics about an hour learning curve just for the basics, many
hours to be racked up to be competitive.  I would strongly advise to read the
manual to get a good grasp of what is involved.

Concept: 9

RTS meets RPG in a Massive Multiplayer world…TOO COOL

Multiplayer:
10
Its what makes the game…At time of review not even a single hiccup or
disconnection from their servers.  Keeping fingers crossed that this doesn’t
change

Overall: 8

A great idea but the whole paying to play thing just doesn’t sit well with
most gamers.  To pay 30 bucks for a game and then expect to gather up monthly
fees to play just seems a bit much for the novice gamer.  If Nexon keeps up on
the promises to update the game and we don’t see many problems, it very well
could be money well spent.