ong before Babylon 5 went on the air, long before Ender's
Game was published, science fiction fans were dreaming of commanding
armadas of star ships that clashed in space as the fate of worlds hung in the
balance. It took about five minutes from the time the computer was invented
for a programmer to write a space-combat game. One of the best is Sierra
Studios' Homeworld, and now there is a sequel, Homeworld:
Cataclysm. Set 15 years after the events of the first game,
H:C forces players to face off against a brand-new threat.
The new opponent is called the Beast, and it has no ships of its own.
Instead, it captures and takes over the ships of other races. Thus, the ships
of the opponents from the first game make a return appearance, but they now
have new abilities and are controlled by a malevolent new intelligence. The
power and danger of Beast fleets is demonstrated by the fact that the
majority of players in network and Internet play are running them.
What makes H:C different from a lot of other real-time strategy
games and different from lots of other space games is that it is played in
three dimensions. The point-of-view camera rotates all the way around and
up and down, allowing players to view the action from every side. Ships
deploy and fight on different levels and at different angles. At the same
time, the Sensor Manage view (which keeps a tactical view of the battle) is
two-dimensional so that players don't become hopelessly disoriented.
All the ships have various capabilities. Among the new ship technologies
for H:C are leeches and mimics. Leeches are spy craft that can either
broadcast an enemy ship's position or quietly destroy it by
slowly stripping it of its resources. Mimics use holographic technology to
appear to be different ships entirely. Mimics can also dock with one another
and use their combined generators to appear to be a larger ship.
Stalking the Beast through space
Homeworld: Cataclysm is a real-time strategy game, so it is as much
about scouting for resources and managing those resources between building,
researching and maintaining as it is about commanding the ships in battle.
Mining ships collect dust, asteroids and the brand-new crystals (chock-full
of resources, explosively dangerous to handle) which are then brought to the
command ship to be turned into more and better ships. In an interesting
twist, the Beast can't develop its own technologies. It can only steal
those possessed by ships it assimilates. Yet another reason for players not
to let the Beast fleet capture their ships.
Given its setting and mechanics, H:C's interface has a surprisingly
shallow learning curve, particularly if players take the time to complete
the thorough and user-friendly tutorial. Manipulating the view and the ships
is extremely easy, particularly if using a wheel
mouse. Less easy is
figuring out the best strategies to employ while fighting each of the
17 single-player missions. The setup for these is good, as the
computer gives players detailed and limited objectives that expand and
become more general as the game goes along. The early missions teach
players the skills they need to win the later challenges.
There are about 60 ship types in H:C, and honestly, they don't all
look that different. Fortunately, all 60 are never on the screen at once,
and every time a player clicks on one, it is identified. And by the time
players have fought their way through all 17 missions, they will have
no trouble matching the names with the ship types and capabilities.
