Side note, someone IS making Euro Truck Sim in space!!!
SO EXCITED.
And Taxinaut doesn’t have any business elements to it, you’re just a driver making money, which is all I want, but yeah, you gotta ask for directions, be prepared for where you’re going and so on. IT IS A DELIGHT.
So I’ve got a fairly sluggish laptop. AMD Ryzen 5, 8GB, platter HD, so it can be really slow.
Taxinaut runs like a champ on it.
Gosh I love this game.
Thanks for mentioning this game! I think I’ll wait until it’s out of early access, but I’ll keep it on a Steam list until then!
It’s out of early access, I’m fairly sure, no? I thought it finally hit 1.0 if I understood right during the SGJ Podcast the other day.
Taxinaut? Oh nonoon it finally just moved from Itch to Steam. It’ll be in early access for a little while longer.
I will say that for a game about being a taxi driver it’s weirdly difficult to find fares.
I can’t imagine future taxis randomly driving around an entire planet trying to find someone with their hand in the air. Don’t you guys have space phones?
It’s not THAT bad, you’re flying around for a minute or two at most. Also some bars and hotels have people looking for rides if you talk to the proprietor and look for “job” in the list. While you’re looking for fares, fly over every building so they get added to your location list.
I legit just went an entire day cycle without finding a fare.
Created a thread:
That sounds like a bug. I’ll let the dev know.
If it’s not a bug then the dude needs to add a pity timer and make fares appear right in front of you if it has been too long.
Next morning I found a fare pretty early, but it was for somewhere I didn’t know and the passenger didn’t know where it was either.
Was it on the same planet? If so you can stop at places and ask around. Someone will know where it is.
If it’s on a different planet in the same system, don’t take it unless you have an anti-graviton charge, so you can get off a planet that might not have a spaceport, or if its at a space station. Otherwise dump the fare and find another one.
If its on another planet in another system, avoid entirely for now.
Just saw this game Cosmoteer, where it looks like you build ships and send them into battle with automated crew members running around operating your ship.
It just launched into early access but appears to have been developed for several years as a free game. According to the Steam page, it seems to be fairly popular. Overwhelmingly Positive with 799 reviews, and there are already 100k+ owners with lots of people playing.
Anyone try this out recently? Brian?
It was a free game for a while and I played it ages ago and really enjoyed it. It’ll be a spell before I get to this new version but so far all I’m hearing is good things.
I’ve had my eye on Star Dynasties for a while and I think that I would enjoy it. One reviewer said, “Star Dynasties is the only game that currently combines Crusader Kings and Dune in an interesting way.” And that has my interest.
What I don’t like about too many space 4x games is that I am supposed to be this omniscient ruler but I have to tell everyone every little thing that they must do. Abstracting that level of decision making and allowing me to delegate it to folks that I hope that I can trust so that I can act more like a ruler of an empire is more what I am looking for. Palace intrigue, robust negotiations with other factions/houses, big picture scheming, etc. There are plenty of other games out there where I can have space battles and pew pew.
So, now that the game has been out of early access for a while and gotten some updates and DLC, what do folks like about the game and why would you recommend it?
I played it when it came out but don’t know how it’s changed since then.
It’s definitely the closest thing to a Crusader Kings in space that I’ve seen. And it does some cool stuff that Crusader Kings could learn from – the crime and punishment system for characters is great.
For issues: the balance was off, with diplomacy being so powerful that it didn’t make sense to use the war or intrigue systems. The AI wasn’t great at responding to threats. You know you’ve won hours before the game acknowledges it. And I got bored for the same reason I get bored in Crusader Kings, I was spending too much of my time sorting menus to find stuff like dissatisfied vassals or good suitors.
It kept my attention for a while but at full price I don’t know if it’s worth it. Hopefully somebody who’s played more recently and with the DLC can comment, though.
Thanks DoubleG
Thanks, Brian. It seems that Cosmoteer had a pretty decent niche following already before its Steam release.
I watched a couple of gameplay videos on Youtube. The combat seems pretty simple, where people mostly seemed to stand face to face with the enemy and target points to attack. However that’s probably good for me since I couldn’t even handle Starsector’s combat during its tutorial. The ship building aspect looks really fun though.
edit: Check out the game’s twitter for the ship of the day posts. People have created some cool looking ships.
@BrianRubin What’s the best 2D or top-down space trucker game? Ideally something with controller support for Steam Deck playability.
3030 Deathwar Redux comes to mind immediately.
That looks perfect. SCUMM + top-down space sim is my jam. Thanks!
