INTRO:
When this game was announced, there was a dearth of space combat titles. Although this was perhaps understandable for more complex titles such as those that call themselves “space flight simulators”, more simplified titles such as the Wing Commander games were rare just as well.
This rareness was perhaps due to the difficulty of having to work with physics-scripting in virtual environments where movement in all six axes of motion is possible, as well as perhaps difficulty on the part of the new player at absorbing lessons on such motion.
Not to be daunted by the difficult marketability of such games, Born Ready Games had resorted to crowd-funding to overcome its issues of funding. It succeeded at this, as well as succeeded at producing a generally workable space combat game and also implemented its ideas on transmutable space vehicles.
However, Born Ready Games only managed to exhibit its technical brilliance. In aspects of story-writing, gameplay pacing and even user-friendliness, it faltered.
PREMISE:
Humanity has obtained the means to venture to the stars, out in search of more worlds to make new homes with. These means, which are transmissions of the knowledge necessary to understand space travel, came from extraterrestrial sources. Ever the curious creatures, humanity have made seeking out the source one of their goals too.
However, that goal did not come by early enough before humanity reverted to its bad habit of warring on themselves. Soon after humans have created colonies away from Earth, the colonies yearn for independence and the authorities on Earth, of course, would not grant that.
Things only became worse after the source of the transmissions has been found – on a colonial world. An agreement was achieved between Earth and the Colonies, in which the former gets the rights to examine the alien technology that had been found in return for granting independence to the latter.
Of course, this agreement would not hold. It was inevitable that the civil war would continue; only this time it would be waged with devastating technology derived– directly or indirectly – from the alien source.
One example of such technology is the titular Strike Suit, which would go on to fight in many pivotal battles in the civil war.
MISSION SELECTION:
Strike Suit Zero’s main game mode involves going through the latest campaign of war between the Earth Defense Fleet and the Colonial Fleet. The player can see a brief but mostly inconsequential description of the mission within the first page of the mission selection screens. The other details of a mission are only visible after the player checks the other pages.
The other pages show more pertinent information on a mission, such as the player’s main objective and the special challenge that is associated with it. There will be more elaboration on special challenges later, but it has to be said here that the description of the special challenge of a mission may give away certain events that would occur during the associated mission.
The later pages bring a list of options for the choice of vessel to use in the mission and its load-outs.
The user interface that is used for mission selection and other menus that branch off from the main one has visual designs that are arguably appropriate for them, but unfortunately, the visual designs are used for the heads-up-display (HUD) in actual gameplay too.
HUD:
The next thing that the player would notice after void space and gorgeous celestial bodies upon starting the first mission is the HUD; it is crude.
Of course, one could argue that it is perfectly functional, is of satisfactory visual contrast and does not take up too much space on-screen. Indeed it is, but if Strike Suit Zero is supposed to pay tribute to earlier space combat games, then it is not doing an entirely good job. Compared to the HUDs that were seen in those earlier titles, Strike Suit Zero’s is drab.
This is of course just a minor complaint.
MOTION IN SPACE:
After a story-oriented cutscene with a minor secondary plot-line that ultimately goes nowhere, the player gets to hop in a fighter craft, which starts out moving already.
Indeed, all space vessels will start off moving, and true to Newton’s Laws, they will continue moving until they hit something or are otherwise blocked from continuing in their direction. Even cutting off a ship’s thrusters does not stop it from continuing to move in space.
This means that the player must ensure that the player does not crash his/her ship into something. Crashing immediately removes all of its shields; any further collision, or scraping, with other objects damages its integrity at an alarming rate.
Relatively large and slow vessels such as capital ships pose as much collision hazard as relatively static installations, such as space stations. This is another important consideration to remember, because the player will be facing many such massive objects a lot.
TURNING AND AIMING:
The acts of aiming and turning are one and the same. With the mouse and keyboard set-up, wiggling the mouse a bit shifts the direction that the guns of the player’s ship are pointing at. This allows the player to follow a target that is relatively in-line with the vector of the player’s own vehicle, but it is of course inadequate for chasing targets that are actively trying to shake off the player.
Moving the mouse any further steers the player’s vehicle, as well as alter the aim of its guns. Getting used to such controls can take a while, but eventually a skilled player would be using it to chase a fleeing target efficiently. For other players with poorer hand-eye coordination, this is still perhaps a lot more forgiving than controls that set aiming and turning apart.
An important thing that the player must learn is that the player’s vehicle will approach its target eventually if it is slower or is relatively static. This means that the player must learn when to pull away to avoid crashing during fly-bys. This is especially crucial when attacking capital ships.
SHOOTING & AUTO-TRACKING:
A veteran of space combat games may notice that the targeting reticule for the player’s vehicle is large. This is not indicative of the spread of the player’s shots. Rather, the reticule shows the region in which the player’s main guns can shoot at targets automatically.
This can seem rather generous – perhaps too much so – for veterans of the genre. Still, the developers have mentioned that such convenience was intended to make the game less frustrating to newcomers.
Different weapons happen to have reticules of different size. Generally, weapons with longer range have smaller reticules, while weapons with shorter range have larger ones. This is appropriate balancing.
In addition to what are essentially aim-bot scripts, there is a feature that tracks a target’s possible movement in order to display an icon that helps the player lead targets. All the player needs to do to hit a moving target with the player’s main guns is to have it within range and having the icon within the targeting reticule. Any shot that the player fires is more than likely to hit the target.
Increasing the difficulty setting for missions does not appear to remove these conveniences. However, the player can turn off these features, if he/she has hardcore inclinations.
WEAPON RANGE:
Speaking of weapon ranges, there are visual indicators that show when the target is within the range of the weapons on the player’s vehicle. For one, the targeting reticule will turn red when the target (or the leading icon) is within range.
However, there do not seem to be particularly overt visual indicators for when the player’s missiles are within range. The player will have to gauge for himself/herself when his/her missiles are within range.
SHIP TYPE SELECTION:
When attempting missions that have not been completed at least once before, the player is shoehorned into just one type of vehicle. This is usually the Strike Suit (when it has been introduced), but it may be another type of vehicle when the story decides for whatever reason that the player should use something else.
Most of the reasons are acceptable, such as the ones that are used for the mission when the player character is assigned bomber detail instead of the Strike Suit. However, another mission puts the player in the Interceptor for no strong reason.
After completing a mission successfully, the player can replay it with another vehicle. Indeed, there is a mission with a special challenge (more on this later) that requires the player to use specific vehicle types, and there are yet others that are a lot easier with vehicle types other than the default one.
In fact, if the player wants to rack up high scores, the Strike Suit is practically the only one that is capable of decimating large numbers of enemies efficiently. (How it can do is described later.)
SHIP TYPES:
There are four ship types in the game, though only one of them (a fighter craft) is available at the start. The player will unlock more as the story progresses. Typically, when the player unlocks a new ship type, he/she is forced into using it when doing the associated mission for the first time.
Generally, all ship types, including the fighter mode of the Strike Suit, have primary weapons (a.k.a. main guns) and secondary weapons (which are generally missiles/rockets). Like ship types, the player also has limited options for weapons at first; there will be more on weapons later.
Two of the ship types and the Strike Suit’s fighter mode are practically variants of each other. The default fighter craft and the fighter mode of the Strike Suit have comparably similar mobility, while the Interceptor is a lot nimbler than either. However, the Interceptor only has one slot for missiles, whereas the Strike Suit has two and the default fighter has a generous three.
The Bomber has only one slot for main guns compared to the pair for each of the others. Furthermore, this slot is only for energy weapons. Moreover, the Bomber is very clumsy. However, the Bomber has access to unbelievably unlimited supplies of torpedoes – something that the Strike Suit does not even have – as well as four slots for missiles.
WEAPON TYPES:
This section is for weapons other than the one borne by the Strike mode of the Strike Suit; the latter are too sophisticated to be lumped here.
With that said, the player has a selection of weapons that can be fitted on his/her ship of choice. The selection is actually quite limited, unfortunately, and would not impress particularly experienced veterans of space combat games.
As the player progresses in the story, more types of weapons are unlocked. These can be used in replays of earlier missions, if the player fancies trying to rack up higher scores. However, newer is not always better; each type of weapon is generally balanced against the rest, so equipping which on which ship is a matter of choice and strategy.
MAIN GUNS:
For each ship type except the Bomber (which only has energy-based main guns, as mentioned earlier), there are two slots for primary weapons. The first slot is always for energy-based weapons, which draw their “ammunition” from the energy reserves of the player’s vehicle. Energy weapons with higher damage output drain the reserves a lot faster.
However, to Born Ready’s credit, the developers are aware that such weapon designs have been done many times before and have included more refreshing designs.
There is an option to twin-link the energy guns’ dual barrels together, resulting in shots that do considerably more damage than just two individual shots. In fact, energy weapons with greater ratings do exponentially even more damage with twin-linked shots. However, as a balancing design, the energy consumption of twin-linked shots also becomes exponentially more demanding.
The other slot for main guns is for machineguns. Against the armor plating of most space vessels, the bullets fired by these weapons are almost useless. However, they are effective against shields (for reasons that are not clear, other than sci-fi suppositions that volume of fire is a factor). Moreover, they have a generously large targeting reticule.
(There will be more elaboration on shields and armor later.)
Understandably, higher calibres of autocannons carry fewer rounds, but in return for considerably greater damage. In fact, using higher calibre autocannons is perhaps the best way to deal with certain targets - especially volleys of torpedoes.
MISSILES:
There are a few missile types, with one of them having a few variants.
The most familiar missile type is the one that can be used to lock onto a single target before being launched. The missile will chase the target for a considerable distance before fizzling out, assuming that the target is nimble enough to dodge it (and there certainly are A.I.-controlled enemies that can do just that). The variants of these exchange damage with missile capacity.
The swarm missile type allows the player to lock onto multiple targets before launching missiles. For this convenience, the swarm missile type has a lot shorter range. However, an astute player may have the impression that swarm missiles are little more than a learning tool to prepare the player for the Strike mode’s missile capabilities (more on these later).
Interestingly, there does not appear to be a limit for the number of lock-ons that the player can have with swarm missiles. However, far from being exploitable, this feature requires the player to spend precious time searching for targets.
Next, there are fire-and-forget missiles, which do not need lock-on times but automatically chases the nearest target instead. This type of missile is perhaps intended for players that do not like to spend time tracking targets for missile-firing.
All homing missiles can be fooled with flares, which are energy bursts that draw from a ship’s thruster fuel reserves. With good timing, a single release of flares can even fool multiple missiles. Considering that thruster fuel reserves can never run out, there is no guarantee that any missile can hit a target.
The player can increase the chances of hitting a target with missiles by being a lot closer to it before launching a missile or after the target has spent a lot of thruster fuel evading an earlier missile. On the other hand, the player is probably better off attempting to shoot down the target with main guns.
Finally, there are dumbfire rockets. These do not have homing capabilities whatsoever, but their value is greater than one would expect; there are plenty of enemies that are too slow to avoid dumbfire rockets. The considerable damage and rate of fire of these rockets also make them far more efficient at bringing down such targets, and the generous capacity for them also happens to bolster this advantage.
TORPEDOES:
Torpedoes are weaponry that is a class of their own, due to their devastating damage and vulnerability to being shot down.
Unlike missiles, torpedoes do not appear to have any limitation to their range. Technically, if the player is using the Bomber, he/she can saturate a target with torpedoes from long range. They can be shot down with anti-fighter weaponry, of course, but for whatever reason, ships that are armed with torpedoes do not appear to have a limited capacity of them.
In other words, the player can rain torpedoes away at a target until it is overwhelmed through sheer volume alone.
Of course, torpedoes are not intended to be used against mobile targets, but there are plenty of static or big and slow targets such as capital ships in the game.
SHIELDS & ARMOR:
Most ships have energy-based shielding that blocks damage, at least until it is overwhelmed. All shields eventually recharge, so staying away from battle or dodging shots to recharge shields apply to both the player and his/her enemies (and the enemies in this game are certainly smart enough to know this).
Armor is practically the hitpoints of a ship. Once it goes out, the ship explodes in a fiery conflagration.
It is worth noting here that the explosions of dying ships do not appear to damage anything around it. However, in the case of capital ships, they leave behind wreckage that acts as collision hazards.
The missions in the game have special challenges that give armor and shield upgrades as rewards for completing them. There will be more on special challenges later.
STRIKE MODE & FLUX:
The main reason that the player would want to use the Strike Suit is its Strike mode. As befitting the titular object of interest in the game, the Strike mode of this craft is terrifically devastating. However, it may take a while for the player to learn about its quirks, because it works very differently from the usual ways that other crafts work.
Firstly, Strike mode cannot be activated without the Strike Suit having built up the necessary stores of “flux”, which is the energy that is needed for what passes for hyperspace jumps in this game. The Strike suit can automatically build up flux itself, but this takes a long time.
To build up flux faster, the player can destroy enemies and even wreckages of capital ships so that they release energy that the Strike Suit can absorb. The reasoning behind this convenience is a bit macabre, but it should still be acceptable.
The player does not need to have a full store of flux to trigger Strike mode, but having more flux is always better. Conveniently, the flux meter flashes when it is completely full and cannot absorb any more flux.
Idling during Strike mode does not deplete flux, but the Strike Suit loses the ability to generate flux automatically as it feeds on its own by-product. As for flux actually depleting, this happens when the player fires or primes the Strike mode’s weapons (more elaboration on this later). Getting hit also reduces flux.
When the Strike Suit runs out of flux, the player has only several seconds before it switches out of Strike mode. This is quite a generous grace period, but during this period, the Strike Suit is only able to use its main guns.
STRIKE MODE SIZE & MOBILITY:
A caveat of the Strike Suit’s Strike mode is that it can becomes a much bigger target with lousier top speed. Of course, it is very hard to notice these disadvantages when the Strike Suit turns into a devastatingly powerful robot.
The Strike mode does not benefit from thrusters as much as the fighter mode of the Strike Suit. Moreover, it cannot produce flares to evade missiles. However, the Strike mode has an uncanny ability to shift in space in the cardinal directions, as well as forwards and backwards, in a heartbeat. This is its means of dodging missiles at the last moment before impact.
Moreover, the Strike mode does not continue moving forward like any other vessels. It can hover at a fixed point in space without moving, which certainly comes in handy when targeting multiple enemy targets, be it a wing of fighter craft coming in or a capital ship that needs to be pounded.
STRIKE MODE WEAPONS:
The Strike mode’s weapons are the most potent assets of the Strike Suit.
When in Strike mode, the Strike Suit’s main guns are replaced by flux-based autocannons that can hit targets in a wide area, as depicted by its generously massive targeting reticule. Targets that are close to the centre of the reticule get the bulk of the shots that are fired. These main guns are intended to be used against more mobile targets, and indeed, they can eradicate entire squads of enemy fighters quickly.
However, they are inefficient against larger targets. For these, the player requires the Strike mode’s energy-based missiles.
With a full flux meter to create the missiles, the player can string up to 40 targets, which need not be different objects; any one object can be locked-on more than once to send more missiles to it.
When the player can launch a lot of missiles, the results are gleeful to behold. The missiles cannot be evaded easily and are immune to flares, so the player can expect nimble craft to pop one after another if the player had targeted a squadron of them. The missiles are also just as useful against capital ships; the player can concentrate the missiles on their hulls or, perhaps more efficiently, distribute them among the many turrets on a capital ship.
There is a problem with the Strike mode’s missiles though. Flux is not reduced upon firing missiles, but upon having a target selected. However, if the player switches out of Strike mode before launching the missiles, all that spent flux is wasted. Therefore, the player cannot lock-on and pop off missiles before changing to fighter mode to run away so easily.
ENEMIES – INDICATORS:
Strike Suit Zero uses the most rudimentary of means to inform the player of the whereabouts of enemy vessels: red arrow labels. These change in size according to the distance between the player’s ship and enemy vessels, so there is at least that visual convenience. Meanwhile, the enemy that the player is targeting is enclosed in red brackets. Also, as a reminder, there is an icon that appears next to the targeted enemy that helps the player lead his/her shots.
The red colour for most visual indicators for enemies is usually of high contrast against the darkness of space, but there are levels that are set against the red of red suns and other celestial bodies with red as their primary colours.
Enemy capital ships have their own set of indicators. These are mainly used for their turrets. The roles of the turrets are denoted by their icons. For example, beam turrets have the largest of these icons and have a lot more ominous chevrons.
However, the problem with the icons for the turrets is that they are small – so small that differentiating between different icons for turrets with different roles is quite difficult. The small sizes of the icons also make it difficult to appreciate the visual modifications of the icons for turrets that are obscured from view.
ENEMIES – ASSAULT CRAFT:
The most common enemies that the player would face are fighters, bombers and heavy fighters. These are relatively nimble enemies that the player has to chase down and destroy. Those in the first few missions are easy pickings, because they do not appear to put much effort into dodging chasers and launching flares to evade missiles. In fact, the player could get away simply letting allied fighters knock them out.
The later ones are a lot more skilled though, and can put up quite a lot of resistance. In particular, fighters have jinking manoeuvres that make them quite difficult to shoot down with the small reticules that energy weapons have.
ENEMIES – CORVETTES:
Oddly, the corvettes in this game are not so much escort vessels as they are artillery ships. Perhaps the game’s designers are not aware of this contradiction.
Anyway, the corvettes that the player would encounter are mainly on the side of the Colonials, and they are certainly pesky things that enter battle at the fringes. They often appear when there are allied capital ships that need protection from torpedoes, of which they can fire endless volleys of until the player puts them out.
Corvettes are used as an introduction to slow and ungainly ships. They are targets that are so big that they are hard to miss with main guns and the first easy targets for dumbfire rockets.
Interestingly, corvettes are still too nimble to hit with torpedoes at anything but (dangerously) close ranges.
ENEMIES – CAPITAL SHIPS:
The game does not give the player a kind introduction to capital ships that are on the other side. The first few enemy capital ships that the player meets are cruisers, and these are terrifying bruisers. (Pardon the alliteration.)
When the player does get the chance to properly pound a capital ship, it is a frigate that the player has to take down. It is a good depiction of what the player can expect about capital ships: they have plenty of turrets and a tough hull.
Indeed, taking down a capital ship alone is a tall task in Strike Suit Zero. However, it has to be said here that this is perhaps refreshing, because other space combat games trivializes such combat encounters or makes them so easy.
The difficulty of taking down a capital ship is made all the more believable by the need to have either friendly bombers or capital ships focusing their considerable power on it. Unless the player is using the Bomber himself/herself, their help is certainly required.
Indeed, many of the secondary objectives in the game involve knocking out the nastiest turrets on enemy capital ships so that their threat to the player’s own allied forces is reduced. They can get tiresome at times.
The Strike Suit’s Strike mode is the most efficient means to eliminate a capital ship’s assets. A capital ship has plenty of turrets on any of its facings that are just begging for missiles. However, knocking out turrets this way is hampered by a visual issue, as mentioned earlier.
ALLIES:
The player is never alone in her/his battle against the Colonials. He/she is always inserted into an ad-hoc taskforce. The game happens to remind the player of this very often through the imposition of objectives that require the player to protect allied ships.
As overbearing as the objectives can be, the game still does a good job on creating the impression that the player is part of a larger whole.
The most common of the player’s allies are other fighter craft. The EDF’s fighters are either more advanced or their pilots are more experienced; this impression would come about after seeing how well they can hold off their Colonial counterparts, including even the smarter ones that appear later in the game.
Allied bombers do not have the same prowess though. More often than not, they appear as secondary objectives that need to be protected, and they happen to be quite vulnerable compared to other allied assault craft.
Among the allied capital ships, the most important is the Carrier, of which there is only one in the story that is on the side of the player. This one will send out replacement assault craft as needed to keep the enemy occupied, so it is fitting that there are secondary objectives that require its protection.
The other allied capital ships are mainly there are as muscle, especially against other capital ships, as mentioned earlier.
Interestingly, EDF capital ships do not appear to have the same system of turrets that Colonial capital ships do not have. This is to their detriment, because all damage that allied capital ships suffer is completely applied to their hull. This unfortunately means that equivalent capital ships on the EDF side are weaker when they trade damage with their Colonial counterparts. (However, they do not suffer the embarrassment of being shorn of turrets.)
Unfortunately, there is a lost opportunity for gameplay involving the command of other allied ships. The player character is only ever a mere pilot, albeit a special one that has been marked as the sole user of the Strike Suit. There is no scenario or gameplay system that allows for the direction of wings of fellow pilots, much less ordering around the considerable firepower of capital ships.
Indeed, the game may give the impression that the player is just a lackey in the greater scheme of things at times.
SPECIAL CHALLENGES:
Every mission comes with a special challenge. This challenge may sometimes involve the completion of objectives in exemplary manners. For example, in one mission, the player has the secondary objective of protecting an allied vessel. Its destruction will not doom the mission and lead to a straight game over, but in this scenario, the allied vessel is tremendously outgunned. Only timely intervention from the player can save it.
If the player completes a challenge in a mission, he/she is rewarded with upgrades that apply to every vessel that the player uses. These upgrades increase the statistics of the vessel that the player uses for any mission that he/she plays later. The upgrades are generally applied across all four vessels, with the exception of the “Strike” upgrade which increases the firepower of the Strike mode of the Strike Suit vessel.
Most of these challenges are appropriately difficult and can be completed at the “Normal” difficulty, but some can only be reasonably achieved at “Easy” difficulty. For example, there is one level where the challenge is to assist allied capital ships in holding against other capital ships. At “Normal”, the opposition puts out too much damage for the player to destroy the opposing ships in time to save the last capital ship. At “Easy”, this is so much easier to achieve.
That the game does not discriminate against the player’s use of different difficulty settings may seem to make it convenient for players with completionists streaks, but for players who want challenges to be actually challenges, this may seem like too much leeway.
Some challenges can be performed throughout a mission, such as challenges that require the player to knock out enemy vessels in specific ways. Other challenges can only be completed in certain points in the missions. For example, there is a challenge that requires the player to save a cruiser during the midsection of a mission. This cruiser only appears during this part of the mission.
This is where one of the problems about the game’s saving system rears its proverbial ugly head. There will be more elaboration on this later.
CHECKPOINTS:
For better or worse, Strike Suit Zero uses a system of one-off checkpoints instead of freer game-saving systems. When the player reaches certain points within a mission, the game saves the session into the game’s single auto-save slot, overwriting any earlier saved-games.
This would not have been an issue if not for the relatively small number of checkpoints in any mission and the relatively long lengths of the missions. Some stretches between a couple of checkpoints in some missions can be very long, such as in a certain mission where the player must assault and disable a particularly large enemy installation. Mission finales can be made to feel too long too because of the rarity of checkpoints.
A checkpoint does not retain the status and conditions of the player’s vehicle. Instead, each checkpoint, upon being reloaded, imposes specific and consistent conditions on the vessels that are involved in the mission, including the player’s own.
For example, a checkpoint in a mission in which the player must protect a capital ship throughout the duration of the mission may set the hitpoints of the capital ship at specific levels at certain checkpoints.
However, reloading a checkpoint resets the status of the player’s vehicle; any damage is removed and all of its ammo is restored.
That the game makes use of reset values for these checkpoints makes the lack of any feature to reload a game at specific checkpoints all the more glaring. Perhaps the score system, which tracks the player’s performance in a mission from start to end, is the reason for this, but this should not have taken precedence over user-friendliness.
(The lack of this feature also hinders the player from achieving the aforementioned special objectives that occur at specific points in a mission.)
SCORES & ENDINGS:
Strike Suit Zero was supposed to have endings that depend on the player’s actions, such as saving certain ships during certain missions and completing as many optional objectives as possible.
Unfortunately, this would not be implemented. Instead, the game’s system of mission scores is used as a factor in what endings that the player would get.
The player racks up points for her/his score by knocking out targets; even wreckages contribute scores. The player is not given many points for completing objectives. Instead, completing objectives simply reduces the player’s opportunities at racking up scores.
In other words, the endings that the player would get depend on whether he/she has been efficiently achieving objectives or had been murderously dilly-dallying; the player is rewarded with a better ending for doing the latter.
Playing at a higher difficulty grants the player a modifier to the total scores, which means that the player may potentially get a higher score from daring the higher difficulty settings (which mainly change the ratio of damage that enemies can take and dish out.)
However, this potential is only available in missions where the player fights a small and finite number of enemies. In missions where the player fight unending streams of enemies while limited by time, going for volume, i.e. playing at the “Easy” difficulty setting, is a wiser decision.
The worst designs in the endings for the game come in the form of its final mission. To elaborate on it would be to invite spoilers into this review, but it has to be said here that it is completely different from the other missions.
In other missions, the player is part of taskforces that are completing objectives while out in the open void of space. In contrast, the final mission is practically an obstacle course that happens to shoehorn the player into using the Strike Suit. Moreover, the “enemies” in the final mission are a lot less challenging; any challenge in this mission is provided by said obstacle course.
Coupled with exposition that attempts to tie up the story in a profound but likely uninspiring manner, the final mission gives the impression that Born Ready has not refined its story to be thorough in its thematic suggestions and pacing.
Even if the player perseveres with all of the aforementioned complications, the endings are not really epic enough to satisfy. The player is rewarded with what are practically static artwork with narration that states the aftermath of the war between the Colonials and the EDF.
VISUAL DESIGNS:
Being made for the computer platform at a time when many once-new graphical generation techniques have been made more efficient and easier to implement than they were during their debut, Strike Suit Zero benefits from an array of graphical options.
Top of the line machines can produce pizzazz that would outshine earlier space combat games. Of course, one can argue that Strike Suit Zero is relatively new compared to others in its genre. Still, that Born Ready could make sure that its game has plenty of bling is appreciated.
Even on low-end machines, Strike Suit Zero’s graphical stability at this time of writing is commendable. Even in missions where there are plenty of objects on-screen, the game can retain a reasonable frame-rate when played at the recommended settings.
Lower settings also do not diminish the effort that went into the less tech-intensive aspects of the artwork for this game, such as the sleek silhouettes of ships and the skyboxes that show brilliant nebulae and verdant worlds.
Some graphical effects are notable for not being done a lot in space combat games. One of these is the warping of space when ships jump into the battlefield. Other examples include the brilliant trails that torpedoes and missiles leave behind them.
The Strike Suit is fittingly the most visually appealing object in the game. As to be expected of a machine that is inspired by mecha-anime, its Strike mode is impressively sleek. However, the player should not expect the kind of ludicrous agility that is seen in mecha-anime, and certainly not any massive laser swords.
SOUND DESIGNS:
The musical soundtracks are the most imposing of Strike Suit Zero’s generally excellent sound designs, and for the better too.
Perhaps in an attempt to pay tribute to the Homeworld IP that is now in limbo, Born Ready has hired Paul Ruskay, who had worked on the soundtracks for Homeworld, to compose the music for the game. Then, perhaps in a tribute to anime, Born Ready hired Akiko Yoshida, a.k.a. KOKIA, who has an impressive discography.
Last (and unfortunately least, because this is not a well-known fact), most of the authentic instrumental music that is heard in the game is provided by MIDIval Punditz (which did not seem to have included the game in its own official discography).
The main theme track for the game is none other than the one that is used when the Strike Suit makes its debut in the story. Listening to it while the player eradicates powerless enemy fighters with the devastating Strike mode of the special vessel is likely to be a goosebump-raising experience.
The other soundtracks do not benefit from such a dramatic turn in the story, but they are still commendable nonetheless.
Interestingly, Ruskay had Kokia singing lyrics in Hindi. Perhaps this was an overture to MIDIval Punditz, or (more likely) Ruskay decided that lyrics in this language would match the modern South Asian music in the game.
Fortunately, the soundtracks are not so overbearing as to drown out Strike Suit Zero’s other sound designs.
Most of the sound effects that are heard in the game would seem plenty familiar to those that already have plenty of experience with sci-fi space combat titles and even more so to those who are also familiar with space strategy titles. The most common-sounding of these would be the pew-pew noises that accompany low-output energy weapons and the whooshes of missiles.
(Like most other space combat games, Strike Suit Zero requires the player to disregard the scientific belief that sound cannot travel through the vacuum of void space.)
However, there are some notable sound effects. An example of these is the ominous, pitched noise that accompany flux-powered jumps. Another example is the distinctive noise of the Strike Suit transforming into its vaunted Strike mode, as well as the barks of the Strike mode’s main guns.
The weakest sound designs in the game are the voice-overs, unfortunately. They are average at best, with just enough empathy without sounding too cheesy or blandly delivered. Considering that the other sound designs in the game are arguably splendid, that the voice-overs could not match them is a bit of a disappointment.
CONCLUSION:
Strike Suit Zero’s gameplay fundamentals and visual and aural designs are almost flawless, as well as quite refreshing at a time when the space combat genre was (and sadly may still be) losing traction in video games. Unfortunately, they could not overshadow the underwhelming story, loosely designed challenge and barely decent user-friendliness of the game.