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Will Cataclysm spark the
same feelings of pure joy you felt when you
played original Homeworld?
Review By: Paul Cotroneo
Unmatched
Beauty
 We
at GameAtosis have played a tremendous amount of computer games in
our collective lifetimes, and we have had the honor to watch the
gaming industry grow and become more talented in various fields. In
game Graphics are perhaps one of the most changed characteristics of
games, and I'm sure all of us can recall ourselves believing we had
seen the most beautiful gaming back in the days of Warcraft 2 or
Quake. But, to even begin to describe the awe-inspiring beauty and
brilliance in Homeworld: Cataclysm would be a useless endeavor. All
I can manage to say is, that Cataclysm should be put on the same
pedestal of the before mentioned games and be remembered for all
eternity.
The in-game graphics are
very customizable, and such allows the player to use any 3D card
available, turn off or on every single special affect, and increase
the screen revolution to unheard of numbers. With this amount of
customization and command, players who are not ‘blessed’ with
high end machines can still take part in one the best gaming
experiences out there.
The game’s story or
computer driven cinematics are preformed directly with the in-game
engine or through beautifully crafted hand drawn animations
sequences. Although this technique was pioneered by Relic in
original Homeworld, Barking Dog did a successful job of emulating
and improving the sequences with a bit of dark and mysterious flavor
only Barking Dog could do so well.
It is important to note
though, that the initially shipped product does have an occasional
tendency not to ‘remember’ any graphical changes you make on the
option menus. But, fear not, the ‘bug’ will be taken care of
with the first patch.
Commanding
the Fleet
 One
of the most fundamental challenges for new 3D strategy developers is
the proper installment of easy to use control interfaces. Relic’s
Homeworld was given high marks for its functional controls and easy
to use interface screens. Barking Dog, followed the old phrase,
‘If it’s not broken, don’t fix it’, has had great success
with the proven original Homeworld method. However, even though they
wanted to keep many of the controls the same, they were not
unwilling to change things or make player requested corrections.
First you will notice,
that absolutely all commands are easily accessible via right click
menu interfaces. But, any fool knows that you can’t be right
clicking through menus during battle and thankfully, Barking Dog has
hot keyed every single game command option available to the player.
Heck, if you forget a certain command, just hit the ‘end’ button
to bring up the quick look hotkey menu.
Also, to let players
concentrate on the battle going on around them, most of the critical
information such as RU amounts and Fleet Research as been moved to
easy observable panels on the main game window. Don’t worry; they
have been inserted correctly to not take away from the viewable game
area. Actually, at higher resolutions, you may not even notice them.
Perhaps, the best way to
describe the functionality of the interface is to say: The simple
fact that you don’t even realize that you are actually working
within the limits of an interface at all. Barking Dog did a great
job of listening to gamers and adding in such particulars as
on-screen resource/support/research interfaces, hotkeys and easy
access to various data.
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