ForceUser

VoidExpanse is a pure sandbox, 2D top-down, space shooter. It combines elements of Trading, Fighting, Mining, Exploration and Character/Ship Progression with an amazing aesthetic that oozes charm. The map is randomly generated and various difficulty levels means the game can be as punishing or not as you want. It contains a single player campaign that after completing you can restart the game on the same character and has no character level cap. It also has decent Multiplayer options that allows you to both fight with and against other players depending on the server settings. You an also set up your own private or public servers. It's strongest point is in it's developer interaction with it's user base. Suggestions and ideas are listened to and if you do find a glaring issue like a big imbalance in the mining mechanic they are very quick fix it and work with the community to find solutions. They are not so attached to their own idea of the game that they are not willing to listen and implement user suggestions that will improve the game. Currently their weakest point is not so much lack of content, as there are a lot of skills, weapons, ships and equipment but that there isn't a stronger single player experience. However due to how solid their base sandbox experience is this can become an amazing player driven experience. You have to go into the game knowing that this is a sandbox game, not an on rials shooter. The fact that all the mechanics are relatively fleshed out most importantly fully functional and fully viable, adding the feel of a living breathing environment should be relatively easy. Hopefully this will also increase the exploration aspect of the game. An interesting thing to note is that, especially with the recent (if minor) player driven improvements to an already innovating twist on the old 'shooting at space rocks' mechanic, mining is rewarding and a fully viable way to both make money and gain experience to equal the Fighting or Trading aspects of the game. The fighting too is very well done and very fluid and responsive. Skill as a player can have as big or even bigger influence on fights as how many skill points you have in your in game character. As with most modern releases, modding is strongly supported with the ability to add entirely new models, changes or add to existing ones and a host of other changes. An honorable mention goes to the Skill tree that is actually quite intricate and big, containing 4 separate tabs with dozens of skills to affect the way your ship flies, how effective trading and questing is, how each separate weapons system works, improving mining and consumables and the defensive properties of your ships. At lv 65, about 20h of gameplay, I have only put a few points into the weapon systems, just enough to unlock Tier 2 weapons and I still haven't maxed out all of the economic or piloting skills. This game has a LOT of potential, on top of what is already there so if you enjoy sandbox games at all, then this is a no-brainer.