Quick Look: FTL

This game is seriously fantastic :D

@Brad Hey when Jeff said this isn't the first Kickstarter game to come out, he meant that there were games on Kickstarter BEFORE the Double Fine thing, back in late 2010 - early 2011.

Cthulu Saves The World and my game both came out after they were kickstarted, and like a few others. Not AS FAMOUS, but yea, Kickstarter games have been coming out, and people have been playing them.

You can't take the sky from me.

Played a good handful of hours of the game a few days back, it's fun and all but really lacks real randomization. With the Kestler you can basically get through the first 3+ systems by just auto-firing your laser on the weapons of your opponents, and then at a certain point it's just a matter of how lucky you've been with getting scrap.

They should've probably excluded weapons and drone systems from ship upgrades. That way getting stronger or different weapons and drones would really feel like a big bonus, and it wouldn't all just boil down to if you get the scrap to support it or not. Too often you find some cool weapon or drone and end up just selling it because you won't be able to support it and the scrap is more important to you.

This looks awesome. iPad version would be cool.

@csl316 said:

You can't take the sky from me.

It's as if the Browncoats won and the heroes of "Firefly" are the last Alliance ship ... the "Battlestar Galactica" of their universe, as it were. Anyway, fun looking game. Last part of this quick look really cracked me up.

So glad to hear this game is being well-received. I played a bunch of it over the weekend and thought it was great. Still haven't been able to complete a run though...

FTL is so rad. It's been keeping my attention way longer then I thought it would initially. I love it.

Bought this game right after the QL. I played binding of Issac ~70 hours and this seems similar in the fact that I can play it while listening to the bombcast!

Silly Brad. You DON'T want to make a bee-line for the exit, unless the rebels are catching up. If you do, you'll not have your ship upgraded enough to survive the later sectors.

Also, nebulas are GREAT. Yes, they disable your sensors, but that's only occasionally a problem. What they do that's good, though, is slow down the pursuit. Essentially, they give you a free "turn", without the rebels advancing. Very helpful for, say0, getting back to that store you passed earlier once you've found scrap to sell.

@thebigJ_A: But if you get a nebula that drains your power you're EFFED.

@VibratingDonkey said:

@beard_of_zeus said:

@VibratingDonkey: That's a pretty funny little Easter Egg, especially being a "Rockman" species. I wonder why he's in the game - maybe he donated a bunch to the Kickstarter, or something like that?

Oh right, that was a thing.

Pledge $100 or more

100 BackersSold out

Receive the above rewards, a limited edition poster and your name will placed in the crew rosters so that players can hire you on their ship.

Mystery solved! I did start noticing that some of the crew had very normal sounding names, and that would explain it.

Very cool that the first of the wave of recent Kickstarter games launched without major hitches and is actually quite awesome. Only quibble is that there is no adjusting the resolution (besides screwing around with the .ini file).

I am impressed. I do think this would work better on a touch screen. Wii U ?...Sorry had to make that joke.

love brad dumping all his missiles on useless thingies

also i thought of an apt genre name , RINO (roguelike in name only)

This looks pretty cool.

@Wizzleteats: This is also VERY reminiscent of Sundog: Frozen Legacy from FTL games. I played that game until my fingers bled on my Atari 1040ST. I wonder if there is any relation/influence here?

I'm glad you guys made this QL, I've tried the game and really liked it. It's really addictive, more indie game should be like that.

@Zanien: I also played Binding of Isaac for almost 70 hours and loved the hell out of it. That game was brutal but FTL seems even more insane in a lot of ways. In Binding of Isaac you can sometimes overcome impossible odds, but in FTL you have to just RUN. It's great.

This looks boring to me. Which is good, because Brad tends to... well, die a lot in games that are more action packed, shall we say. He should be fine here...

Hey don't diss on Brad the game is hard as hell I've trying to play very carefully and haven't gotten past the 3rd sector , but I'm not looking any guides either so maybe is that.

This quicklook convince me to buy it. It certainly is punishing, but in a fun way.

This looks very interesting, although I will prob wait for it to be in an indie bundle.

Well, that's what you get for naming the ship The Kessler.

Im kind of in love with this game right now.

Bought it and played it for several hours last night. It initially hit me as a great game, but after a few hours of playing it kind of lost its shine. It doesn't quite have as many tricks up its sleeve as I initially thought it would; there are very few weapons and there aren't THAT many random encounters. During my second play through about 50% of the random events I had already seen, some from that very same session.

That being said, combat can get real hectic and fun, especially during the latter sectors. One fight I was absolutely sure I was a straight goner as some ship invaders were just wrecking through my ship, but one of their lasers set fire to a room the invaders were in, damaging them enough so that my last 2 crew members could kill them. After that I diverted all power to my weapons and just barely made it through.

It's a cool game, but it's not particularly rich or deep and it does actually make me wonder where this $200,000 Kickstarter money went (I haven't looked it up yet, there could genuinely be $200,000+ of costs that went into making this game).

somehow reminds me of battlestar galactica

Wasn't sure about this, but might have to pick it up after this QL.

Oh no! There's a rock in my ship.

repair your shields.! always have people on your shield

That appeared a lot more fun than the descriptions I've heard have lead me to believe.

Wow, this looks fun. I've been looking at it on Steam, but wasn't all that interested. Now I'm interested.

There really isnt a lot too this game, but it is pretty fun, and very addicting in a aggravating way.

Great Quick Look guys, thanks. It convinced me to get the game from the developers site last night & I am loving it so far & the soundtrack is amazing

@gladspooky said:

Brad: "People keep calling this a Roguelike. I don't have much experience with that, beyond something like Spelunky..."

Uh, Spelunky isn't a Roguelike. It doesn't even describe itself as a Roguelike. Where do you guys get this shit? This isn't one, either.

Roguelike has sort of become a term to describe difficult games with permadeath. Yeah, it's dumb. Binding of Issac isn't a really a roguelike. Spelunky isn't really a roguelike. FTL isn't really a roguelike. But people describe them as such.

This Game looks so damn cool. Soundtrack is lovely also.

@Rox360 said:

@MattyFTM said:

@gladspooky said:

Brad: "People keep calling this a Roguelike. I don't have much experience with that, beyond something like Spelunky..."

Uh, Spelunky isn't a Roguelike. It doesn't even describe itself as a Roguelike. Where do you guys get this shit? This isn't one, either.

Roguelike has sort of become a term to describe difficult games with permadeath. Yeah, it's dumb. Binding of Issac isn't a really a roguelike. Spelunky isn't really a roguelike. FTL isn't really a roguelike. But people describe them as such.

Very unforgiving games with permadeath, randomized levels and encounters, a focus on getting as far as you can before dying an inevitable death, until the metagame (whether it's on your own expanding knowledge of the game or unlocking additional tools to use in subsequent playthroughs) allows you to reach some kind of ending, which usually turns out not to be the ending at all and just opens up an even greater challenge for those with the patience to keep at it, as opposed to the very standard grind of starting a game at the start and ending a game at the end that one playthrough representing the entire experience. Actually pretty specific. Specific enough to warrant a term to describe it. Roguelike-like.

You know what game fits all of those criteria? (except randomized levels, but not all Roguelikes have randomized levels)

Pac-Man.

This is pretty much the greatest game ever. You're also practically starting out with the Defiant of DS9 fame, and one of it's achievements is "tough little ship" which insane DS9 fans will recognize from that show. I kinda see it as the best non-Star Trek Star Trek game ever too! I really hope the game gets updates and more content because I don't ever want to stop playing it. I've also not noticed any technical problems but I've only played it on a 1080p monitor and no issues in fullscreen or windowed mode.

@Robaota: They only asked for $10,000 in the Kickstarter, so you should expect a quality/content level closer than that. They received $200k, which gives them freedom to do more; but they had no obligation to build the game out further.

And actually, it's probably because they've kept the game focused on their original design goal that it's 1) out and 2) good. I imagine it's easy to 'feature creep' and try to add more and more as they had more money, but that could quickly lead to things getting out of control and either nothing coming out, or it being an over-complicated, crappy game.

So far, this one worked out well.

@Ontheocho: Did you watch the Idle Thumbs stream of FTL? It was a good watch and worth checking out.

• I have read all the comments with the search term "Brad" in them.
• It might be a good strategy not to shoot further with your missles (or any weapons) on things that are already red?

*cough* .......... ;-)

Cool game

@Rox360 said:

Very unforgiving games with permadeath, randomized levels and encounters, a focus on getting as far as you can before dying an inevitable death, until the metagame (whether it's on your own expanding knowledge of the game or unlocking additional tools to use in subsequent playthroughs) allows you to reach some kind of ending, which usually turns out not to be the ending at all and just opens up an even greater challenge for those with the patience to keep at it, as opposed to the very standard grind of starting a game at the start and ending a game at the end that one playthrough representing the entire experience. Actually pretty specific. Specific enough to warrant a term to describe it. Roguelike-like.

You know what game fits all of those criteria? (except randomized levels, but not all Roguelikes have randomized levels)

Pac-Man.

@Rox360 said:

@gladspooky said:

@Rox360 said:

Very unforgiving games with permadeath, randomized levels and encounters, a focus on getting as far as you can before dying an inevitable death, until the metagame (whether it's on your own expanding knowledge of the game or unlocking additional tools to use in subsequent playthroughs) allows you to reach some kind of ending, which usually turns out not to be the ending at all and just opens up an even greater challenge for those with the patience to keep at it, as opposed to the very standard grind of starting a game at the start and ending a game at the end that one playthrough representing the entire experience. Actually pretty specific. Specific enough to warrant a term to describe it. Roguelike-like.

You know what game fits all of those criteria? (except randomized levels, but not all Roguelikes have randomized levels)

Pac-Man.

And if you remove the "inevitable death" part, you get Torchlight on hardcore! And if you remove randomized + permadeath, you get Super Meat Boy? Anyway, I'm not sure what your point is. Pac-Man, being a high score game, doesn't have an intended ending, and the randomized aspect makes up about half of what constitutes a roguelike-like.

Oh, so now you're changing your definition, eh? This argument is over. If you're not going to be consistent, why bother? Some people these days. Tsk, tsk, tsk.

I keep seeing the Ship Flipping Me The Bird now. Damn it.

Great game! Looking forward to picking it up next time the paycheck rolls in.

@spiketail said:

@Majkiboy said:

This is like Space Alert, it is just as hectic, or maybe more so because you can't pause, it is in real time! :) you should really try it out if you like board games !

Very nice comparison! Only played Space Alert once or twice, but I totally see it. Could play FTL just like it too, if you don't pause.

As for other game comparisons, reminded me of Flotilla by Blendo Games. One focuses more on the combat, the other more on the management of your crew/ship.

Would be playing more of FTL, but... Borderlands 2. Least I can come back to it or use it to take a break from BL2.

Will check those out! :) And I guess that the pause function is very needed, it looks pretty hard even with it!

@TheeGravedigger said:

@Majkiboy: It reminds me of Red November, but I haven't played Space Alert yet. Is that one any good?

My biggest issue with Red November is that the mechanics and rules in the initial version felt confusing and clunky. Supposedly that was fixed in the re-release.

I really enjoy this game, and I've been recommending it to people who enjoy BSG and other co-operative board games.

I'd really love a multiplayer mode for this, either with everyone getting their own crew members, or a small fleet working together.

Actually, I kinda like the idea of playing this multiplayer on the big tv just by letting people pick their crew member and declaring the tasks they're doing. Could be a fun party game.

Oh I think that our group actually looked into that, but no one ever got it, maybe we should give it another try!

And yeah, Space alert is cool with the right group of people, but it almost needs someone who has played it before. It is really hard the first time and it can be discouraging. But it takes only 20 minutes to play so you can easily have another go at it! It is a cool setting and a cool hectic social experiment of sorts, you really have to cooperate to manage :). It is not fun when you roflstomp it, but there are lots of missions, also missions that can be downloaded!

@KirePDX: You're absolutely right. I suppose that's the problem with kickstarter as a whole, not these guys. They don't have an obligation to make 20 times the game if they get 20 times the money, though that money is still in their pockets. I suppose it's not an issue if the game is like this and is good. But man, could you imagine if and when a kickstarter funded game comes out and is terrible? And if that game got a ton more funding than they asked for also? That's a shitshow waiting to happen.

Wow, looks pretty interesting.