Infinite Space

Infinite Space is hands down the single best RPG adventure on the Nintendo DS. It's possibly the best game to arrive on Nintendo's dual screened moneymaker.

It's got almost everything you could want in such a game. An epic, galaxy spanning plot. A huge cast of memorable characters that really grow on you as the game stretches onwards. An amazingly huge world that will have you exploring for hours on end! And the game itself is incredibly long! Expect to spend over 60 hours on the game unless you're skipping everything to race for the end.

What the game doesn't have is a decent in-game tutorial, and it shows in a lot of the reviews you read here, and even in the professional gaming media.

Lots of frustrated gamers and reviewers complaining about the game's steep difficulty, how even the random encounters on the way between planets wind up being grueling. People claiming that battles rely too much on luck, with most of their shots missing entirely. Many people don't know about the fatigue bar, individual weapon ranges, character skills, fleet formations, and everything else that the battle system is built on. Crucial information if you want to get very far in the game.

To be fair, all that information is in the instruction manual, and in tutorial trailers released by Sega prior to the game's release, but let's be honest. Most people don't read the manual, and most people who get frustrated aren't going to go looking for a YouTube tutorial video. They're just going to assume that the game is insanely difficult. The game would be receiving much higher review scores if it had a proper in-game tutorial to explain everything you need to know.

The reality is that the game actually isn't that difficult at all, once you understand the basic gameplay mechanics. If you own the game, and gave up in frustration I'd recommend searching YouTube for those tutorial trailers. If you don't own the game, and epic space adventure sounds right up your alley, then I'd highly recommend Infinite Space. Aside from the lack of a tutorial, it's the best game to land on the DS in years.

I blame the manual for the difficulty issue. You should not always focus fire on the first ship. Thinking that this is always the proper thing to do would give one the impression that the game has thrown you into unwinnable circumstances by the time you get to the second system. All ships in the fleet contribute to overall performance including evasion. If you can hardly land any hits on the big tough ship in front, focus on any disposable peons behind it first. Then it will typically be much easier to deal with. Most early battles are all about dodging, waiting for the enemy to fire a barrage rather than a normal shot and then following up with your own and backing off until you can get dodge back up.

Anyway, I'll kick the review off with what I didn't like: Space battles are ugly. I mean real ugly. They should have gone with 2D here rather than opt for polygons since battles are quite literally one dimensional anyway. You still get that Front Mission sense of satisfaction watching your attacks initiate and seeing them smack into the enemy but focusing on 2D with a pleasing aesthetic rather than 3D on the DS would have made for a much more satisfying experience I think. Especially since the game is technically one-dimensional.

Yes, 1D. The only thing that you really control spatially is the distance between two fleets composed of up to 5 capital ships each (if you have the speed advantage). The 1D factor is actually not really a negative. It really doesn't need to be more complicated since much of the game is prep and strategy anyway. Tactics are more about when to come out of your dodge status to open fire and at what range so far (I'm not up to fighters or the need to really kill off the other guy's crew yet).

Like most ginoromous galaxy games, planets are by and large not very interesting outside of the conversations to be had at the bar and the inventory at any shops that may or may not be present. Some planets are completely pointless beyond being a place to rest your crew and repair all damage. It's more of a system-to-system game than planet-to-planet game.

I'm about 10 hours in and the story shows promise, but the itch that this game really scratches for me is the slow build to ultimate power factor. I compare it to Suikoden not just because there are 100 characters you can find (who all contribute to your fleet of up to five capital ships in various ways but also because the fleet itself is much like the castle that slowly grows and evolves in Suikoden only minus all the store conveniences and Iron Chef-style competitions.

It's like Front Mission in the sense that the battles are a fairly similar although typically less complex experience and you really spend a lot of time tweaking and configuring the ships in your fleet. You actually build out the interior with modules that serve both strategic and tactical roles and weapons, fighters and boarding actions are all possibilities.

I pretty much bought this one just looking at the box. I got the sense that it wasn't a real high-budget experience but that I was going to dig the strategy/build-your-own-fleet factor of it and I wasn't disappointed.

I give IS a 4 star rating because its strengths have hooked me enough to overlook its weaknesses to the point where I am having fun with the game. Make no mistake, there is plenty to both like and dislike about this game. I typically do not like JRPG games but this one is ok with me. I think the space theme connects better with me than the typical JRPG fantasy theme.

What I Like: The game is about stat building. You upgrade your ships. You buy new ships. You buy more ships. You get better technology. You get more crew. You level up your crew. All of these occur through random encounters and scripted missions. This means that if you are willing to grind (patrol the space lanes and fight random pirates) you can get ahead of the game difficulty curve. I love being able to get to the point where I can totally outclass my enemies just by milking the game design. Also, I've come to enjoy the tactical space battles. The game system seems to reward good tactical thinking to point where an enemy can be out maneuvered (or at least it feels like it). The graphics are good and the ship designs are visually interesting. The ship building process is an interesting mini puzzle game in an of itself.

What I Like/Dislike: You can free roam - to a point, only in areas which you've unlocked. The firing sequences in the tactical space battles contain breathtaking strings of techno-babble. At first I laughed, now I just skip them. When your ships are destroyed, they miraculously reconstitute at the next port as long as at least one ship survives.

What I Dislike: The melee system is terrible. As near as I can tell, it is simply a guessing game against the AI. I hate it passionately. Some of the design choices are frustrating. For example, in tactical space battles, your default target is the first enemy ship on the list - always the one that is at the back of the formation and the most difficult target to hit. Why not set the nearest enemy ship (the easiest to hit - by far) as your default target? To make matters worse, it always resets to that first ship after you kill an enemy ship. I fought many frustrating battles until I learned to always check and reset my targets. Even now, I mess up every now and then. Side quests are few and are strictly "fed ex" quests. Documentation/tutorials are useless. You learn nearly everything by trial and error.

This game does have serious flaws. Buy Infinite Space if you like the space theme, enjoy level grinding and can tolerate a bit of frustration as you learn the game. Once you learn the game's quirks, it becomes quite enjoyable.