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Homeworld: Cataclysm
A Review
By: Jester
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| Category: |
Strategy |
| C&G Rating: |
4/5 Swords |
| Developer: |
Barking Dog Studios |
| Publisher: |
Sierra |
| Posted: |
Nov. 04, 2000 |
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"Superbly done real-time space strategy"
Rating: Four Swords 
What do you get when you
combine a beautiful 3D engine, cool spaceships, and the traditional Real Time
Strategy formula (harvest, research, build, destroy) with a good story and some
nice art? Cataclysm, friends. It's a love-or-hate kind of game. You'll either
adore controlling a horde of spaceships, accomplishing a number of mission goals,
all while trying to maintain a coherent strategy, or you'll just think it's
dumb. Or it'll overload your nervous system and you'll blow out a lobe, which
is not easily replaced, except at your local Pep Boys.
We'll begin with Raider
Retreat, a nice little CD that you can pick up in finer stores everywhere (which
means "I don't know where, Sierra sent it to me, but I'm pretty sure it
is purchasable"). Raider Retreat comes with the first few missions from
the original Homeworld, which won Game of the Year honors from pretty much every
publication known to man. In fact, new magazines and websites were started,
just to give Homeworld more awards. It sold, and I quote, "trillions and
quadrillions" of copies and was much-loved by all. Raider Retreat was released,
presumably, as sort of a sample, with an extra bonus mission thrown in for fun
and, as I didn't play the original, it gave me an idea of what I was getting
into.
Lemme say this, any time
a "sampler" CD-ROM has 130 pages worth of background and manual, I
have a feeling that it's going to be good. Homeworld created this incredibly
detailed society and backstory, not to mentioned some very nice ships and designs
that made it a true joy to play. I called it "Ground Control in SPAAAAAAAAAAACCCCCCCCEEEEEE"
in my notes (Imagine a lot of echo on that "space"), and that's pretty
much what it is. For those of you who don't know my feelings on Ground Control,
go here and
be enlightened. Anyway, Raider Retreat was a nice experience and, based on it,
I'd have to say Homeworld's reputation was warranted. For those of you who don't
want to spend 50 bucks on the game, just try Raider Retreat, trust me.
I'm not going in to all
the backstory from the original Homeworld. Suffice to say, a bunch of people
left their original planet for their original "Homeworld", encountering
many obstacles along the way, but they eventually made it and settled into this
new society, after causing some upheaval and so forth. In this new episode (Cataclysm),
Kiith Somtaaw has a mining vessel deployed in deep space and it runs into some
bad guys. As these plots always go, Something Larger (not to be confused with
SomethingAwful) is Afoot, and our
mining chappies soon run into this evil bio-mechanical organism called, appropriately
enough, "The Beast". The Beast is some sort of trillion-year-old evil
organism beast thing and, as with most trillion-year-old evil organism beast
things, it is not planning on coming over for tea. It wants flesh, it wants
ships, it wants to grow. This requires, of course, that you and your soljuhs
smack it down, put it in its place, and make it get back in the kitchen and
make you some pie!
And so the story of Cataclysm
is the great battle pitting the mining vessel and some homeys against The Beast
and its posse, with lots of explosions and spaceships and harvesting in between
plot moments. Plot events occur both in-game (not quite as jarring as they could
be, thankfully) and outside the game, and Sierra did a superb job with the between-mission
cutscenes. They use a simple line-drawing type art to illustrate the events,
which is very minimalist, and very effective, considering the full-motion-video-THX-surround-sound
most games employ. It's different, but it's really nice, as it lets your imagination
fill in the details. Just enough info to be effective. Props for that, Sierra.
Configuration and setup
is a breeze, without the video-card appeasing voodoo usually required with modern
games. Some customization is possible, meaning it's very easy to give your ships
a very ugly custom color scheme. Mmm, day glo yellow with purple. Nothing says
lovin' quite like blindingly-colored space fighters. There's only one single-player
campaign, and it'll only take a couple evenings, if you tend to marathon gaming
sessions. The problem, I find, with stopping RTS games in mid-mission (or even
between them) is you have to plan so much in advance that you don't remember
half of it when you restart the game. Maybe it's just me.. And also, the missions
tend to be very fast-paced (aside from the "collect all the resources you
can" in the endgame), so there's almost no break in the mayhem, especially
if you use the "increase game speed" button.
Fortunately, Sierra is not
one to scrimp when it comes to fun, and it delivers, and delivers NICELY in
a very good skirmish mode. Rather than your usual random map, there are a number
of scenarios designed for 3-8 players, with a number of different game types
for your space-flying pleasure. There's the traditional "blow up the enemy
command ship". In one of the best-ever steps for harvest-haters there is
an "I hate harvesting" mode, where everybody gets resource injections,
and there's no need for harvesting. This adds an interesting dimension to the
game, as it becomes about combat rather than who can race and build the biggest
and baddest ships. It also becomes a pain to win, because you can't just blow
up enemy workers until they run out of RUs. There's a bounty hunter mode, where
blowing up ships is rewarded with RU injections, and a number of other twists
on the traditional game. In other words, it'll live on your hard drive long
after The Beast is space particles on an alien's butt.
The ships are probably the
best thought out units in a real-time strategy game in a LONG time. Oh, there
are the usual suspects, little fighters and recon units, and big bruising capital
ships. But some of the ships have BRITISH voice actors! I say we need more British
people involved in our military games, and what kind of fleet game wouldn't
give props to Her Majesty's Royal Navy? Nice to see the Empire extended its
reach even to fictional planets in fictional games. Seriously though, British
accents are cool. Other nice features include Sentinels. With enough upgrades,
these bad boys can throw a massive shield around the ship of your choice, and
it is REAL hard to crack through them, unless you follow my patented "Big
Ol' Nasty Horde of Cap Ships" approach. Workers can be upgraded to salvage
(read "capture") damaged enemy ships and, let me assure you, they
just HATE when a fleet of Workers appears and makes off with their cap ships.
Hee hee hee!
Another sometimes-fun, sometimes-frustrating
ship is the Ramming Frigate. This bad boy will run right up to an enemy ship
and start pushing it. I mean, it'll push until you tell it to stop. So you can
use it, say, to push an enemy Dreadnought to some isolated corner of space,
bomb the hell out of it, then salvage it with your workers. It takes a bit of
work to use correctly, and can only really be employed in certain situations...but
it's a lot of fun. A lot of these ships exist, seemingly, more for the fun factor
than for any real combat usage. Chances are, you'll find a ship-or combination
thereof-that'll fit your favorite combat strategy.
I personally liked to use
mixed fleets of multi-beam Frigates, mixed with a Destroyer or two. For RIF
(Recon In Force) groups, I'd send a couple Multi-beamers with an escort of Acolytes
(fighters), which could handle anything short of an enemy command ship or heavy
cruiser. These groups were also quite handy when an enemy fleet would appear
out of nowhere, and backup was needed. Just a hint.
Also, be aware! The siege
cannon is a great toy, but potentially hazardous to your own ships! Yes, friendly
fire is a bit of a problem, and when a big ol' ball of plasma explodes, your
ships aren't safe. I learned this the hard way when a 50-Acolyte-strong strike
group just disappeared off radar. It's clinically proven that nothing causes
more obscenities than a strike group exploding due to wayward Siege Cannon fire.
You've been warned.
While I'm giving out warnings,
let me share this from my notes (Yes, I have notes, I keep a notebook handy
for reviews, I'm so high-tech). "Losing half your ships in a frantic bid
to escape a superior force sucks!" This is in reference to one of the later
missions, where you have to retreat in a hasty manner, as a large Beast offensive
force is coming your way. Docking your smaller ships takes a LOT of time, and
so it becomes a matter of 1. Stay and get all your ships, and get pounded or
2. Save the mothership and lose most of your fleet. You can guess which one
I chose. Trust me, rebuilding an entire fleet is NOT fun.
As for the graphics, it's
beautiful, but there's not enough of them. This isn't really the game's fault,
but most of the time, keeping a handle on the situation requires using the sensors
screen. This is essentially a black box, with colored blips representing various
things. While it would be nice to work in close, it's usually not feasible,
as the real-time nature of the game keeps several things happening at once,
and moving the camera around isn't really feasible in miles and miles of open
space. Also, the colorful backgrounds (and distances involved) make controlling
your forces based on visuals near impossible, as smaller ships will blend right
in. And, towards the end, fleets get really, really big, and controlling one
ship (or even one group) at a time isn't efficient. If I could think of a solution,
I'd offer one.
Some micromanagement is
required, however, and this is one of the major reasons for Cataclysm only scoring
a 4 on our rating system. Some of the ships have special attacks (EMP Blast,
missile volley, so forth) that they don't use automatically. Instead, it requires
that, in addition to managing resources and military forces, you zoom into the
middle of the battle, select the ships you want to use, click, and, if the enemy
ship hasn't moved to much, click on the target. However, in a battle of this
sort, ships tend to move (shocking, I know), so sometimes it's simply a hassle
to even think of employing the special attacks, though they are quite handy.
Even with the pause feature, force management can be a bit of a problem. It's
fine to have a special ability when you only have, say, 12 squads (Ground Control!),
but it's quite a different story when you're commanding a full on attack fleet
in three dimensions. It's a bit overwhelming. In fact, Cataclysm can be downright
exhausting, at points, because there's just SO MUCH to keep track of.
To be honest, if any game
could benefit from a Ground Control-style squad-based control system, it's Cataclysm.
Grouping is possible but chances are, you'll want to use parts of a group at
a time (such as sending 2 Acolytes over to investigate, rather than the entire
fleet). Some sort of "voluntary" squad system, perhaps, so instead
of looking at Group 1, I can look at, say, First Acolyte Wing or Third Dreadnought
Fleet. And while I'm dreaming, how about namable groups, like in wargames? Many
are the happy memories of the Mighty Tank Army descending on my hapless foes.
The lamentations of their women and children still ring in my ears. This is
because, usually, I'd pick some patently unfair matchup, like five German panzer
divisions versus Two French Guys With Really Sharp Sticks. But their women lamented,
oh yes, they did!
The battles in Cataclysm
(getting back on track) are actually very exciting and can be quite suspenseful.
Nothing's as much of a rush as trying to control one fleet, trying to build
a replacement one, and keep an eye on the mothership, in case any bad guys arrive.
It gets very intense, especially in a tight battle, with ships swirling around,
things blowing up, shrieks of pain on the radio, and the constant drive to research
and reinforce. The zoom and pilot's view features are quite entertaining, as
buzzing around an enemy fleet in a recon fighter, watching ships blow up, is
quite a thrill. Pity you have to monitor the 8,000 other things on the sensor
screen for most of the fight, rather than enjoying the savage, brutal pleasure
as two enemies tear each other apart for your personal amusement. Some ambient
noise would be nice, such as metal screeching as ships collapse, but in space
no one can hear you kicking the hell out of The Beast.
Multiplayer, meanwhile,
is very entertaining, and setting up an account on Sierra's service is about
as painless as can be imagined. None of this "go to eight different websites,
find the Necronomicon, get Bruce Campbell to sign it, then offer us a goat sacrifice
when the moon is in the seventh house" nonsense. I love multiplayer, but
I have to be honest, disclosing all my personal data and life history so I can
play a video game I paid 40 bucks for is just plain ANNOYING, not to mention
an invasion of PRIVACY. Why does a game company need to know my phone number?
Are they gonna CALL me? Siera.com...no nonsense, give us your email address...you
can be zooming around space in about a minute.
And, shocker, it's fairly
lag free on a 56k modem! While lag is a hassle anyone without a T1 is used to,
in a Real-Time Strategy game, badly timed lag can screw up hours worth of planning
and preparation. Most of the time it actually plays like a single-player game,
with the added benefits of smack-talking opponents and human interaction. Surprisingly,
the fourteen-year-old-hax0r-boy contingent was virtually nonexistent during
my time in the lobbies. While this may change as they discover new ways to ruin
everyone's fun, it was refreshing to play someplace where people have learned
to speak in complete sentences. Horrors, it could spread!
While I'm on the topic,
I have more props to dish out. In my first multiplayer game, I had an astonishingly
good time sending fleets here and there and blowing stuff up. There was a magnificent
person who sided with me to smite all comers and then, regrettably, the "Allies
Win" setting wasn't on, so we were forced to turn on each other. And I'm
not gonna lie, I was soundly stomped by a mighty force of Destroyers. At least
100 of them! 50? No? Ok, 10! But that's a lot! Anyway, this chap (or chapette)
gave me a good, sound battle before sending me packing, so I'm giving a hearty
Cloak and Gamer shoutout to Episiarch, whom I dub Destroyerman! Good game, yo.
And the rest of you, do NOT let Epi build! Attack, attack, attack!
Yes, the remains of my fleet
were destroyed making a futile, glorious final charge into the vicious, gnashing
teeth of my opponent, but hey, the British accents inspired me to stupid, glorious
feats.
In summary, if you like
real-time strategy and enjoy adrenaline-charged romps that'll take away many,
many hours of your time, buy Cataclysm. If yer heart ain't poundin', ya must
be dead!
Care for some Screenshots?
The Scoop and the Skinny:
Requirements:
Pentium 166 Windows 95,
98, or NT 4.0 with Service Pack 4 16 MB RAM 4x CD-ROM drive
Buy Stuff (All Buy Stuff
links go through Amazon.com, unless otherwise noted):
Cataclysm:
Homeworld
Cataclysm
Homeworld
Cataclysm--The Strategy Guide
Note: I read Amazon's editorial
reviews, and major things are just plain WRONG. Be warned.
The Original Homeworld:
Homeworld:
Game of the Year Edition
Homeworld--The
Strategy Guide
Links:
Sierra
Barking
Dog Studios
Homeworld.net
Homeworld
Shipyards--Get all the info on the fly g-rides!
Homeworld
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