StarVaders is a game that pays homage to arcade-like games and mech shooter battles.
StarVaders, developed by a small indie studio in Montreal, consists of three strange creators being “on a cosmic journey.” The name of this small, strange indie studio is simply known as Pengonauts, with their first game offering a combination of card-building mechanics and mech-strategy gameplay.
The studio’s first title is StarVaders, which was published by Joystick Ventures and Playworks, known for games such as Do Not Feed The Monkeys 2099 and Dungeon Crawler, a dungeon-crawling rogue-like, claw machine-style deck builder.
StarVaders is an oddly satisfying blended game of mixed mechanics, ranging from arcade-like battle strategies to deck-building card game mechanics. The game will have you piloting a powerful mech to take part in a full-on fight-off against an alien invasion.
There are quite a few mechanics to keep track of; however, they are really fun and pretty useful in a pinch. The game will have you starting with the first mech, formerly known as a gunner. Besides this mech, there are two concealed mechs, which require you to achieve certain events.
As mentioned earlier, the events that need to be cleared to obtain the other two possible mech options consist of winning on an invasion-level difficulty to unlock and winning on Apocalypse mode with both other mechs, such as the gunner and the other mysterious mechs.
Once the player chooses the only option given to them, they will then have to choose the pilot of the mech. These pilots are as follows: you get the first option, whose difficulty, or rather complexity, Reading ranks at one star. Roxy, the first option, is known as a brazen and radiant trailblazer. She also warned you of her being a fire hazard; however, that explanation comes later in the battle phase.
The second pilot option is Noel, whose complexity rating is 2-star. She is known for being a cool-headed scholar and is obsessed with hot chocolate. These traits are small details of the offered characters that show a unique level of detail; they also hint at the characters’ traits in terms of skills they are efficient in, for example, fire and ice themes.
Besides giving the characters interesting personality traits, each character is also equipped with starting items, two to be exact. For our cool-headed Noel, she is given a glove; this item is registered as an artefact. Its name is the Perma-Frost, allowing her a cool skill affecting your rightmost card.
The counterpart of the cool-headed Noel. Is Roxy’s fire blazer her unique artefact, accurately named fire starter”? This artefact gives you two cards should you overheat for the first time, and another neat trick that I won’t spoil.
Once you have chosen their pilots and mech, they will be shown the difficulty page. In the first setting, titled First Encounter, you must beat that to unlock the others. Entering into the gameplay after selecting the only open difficulty available, you will be taken to what looks like a random yet funky version of Earth, with its first mission bubble.
It’s not really a mission, though; it’s just StarVaders offering two free cards to take with you into battle. In true rogue-like fashion, each run offers different card selections each time, as well as different missions when starting over. Oh, and if you feel like you messed up and would like to reset your fate, you will be able to.
Go to the next mechanic on the bottom left side of your screen, which looks to be a recycling button. This is a powerful button, as it allows you to redo the mission from scratch or reset the world when choosing a mission.
It’s a powerful tool and can help a lot if one strategy doesn’t work; rest yourself and the mission, and try from a different angle. The only downside is that you have a limited number of redos, so use them wisely or start over in a new run.
The game itself feels like something you would get in an arcade, minus the needed coins to play StarVaders, of course. It’s an interesting design, giving the feeling of space battle games where enemies come down towards the end of the platform in different patterns, straight lines, and formations. StarVaders’ objective in using this method is to try to outwit or put pressure on you to keep the invasion from happening.
You will have to try to keep an eye on a few more mechanics, which will determine the flow of success or failure in each challenge. One such mechanic is the burn gauge, which indicates how overheated the character is about to get due to a move or action.
This could have unwanted effects like burning cards, making them pretty useless, or other debuffs. The other gauge is a doom bar, which, if filled, means instant game over. Some things to keep in mind are the card’s effects, the pros and cons, if you will, as well as the play style of your character alongside the relics you will collect with new cards as rewards for beating the levels.
The relics come with another passive that gives the mech and its pilots a bit of an edge in battle. They also stay equipped as you progress in the game. As soon as the game is over, all relics collected during the run are lost and will have to be recollected on the next run if you can find them. They haven’t been shaped for others for other uses and gifts.
It’s an interesting game with cartoon/arcade-style graphics, which could bring a sense of nostalgia to older players who are more familiar with arcade-like games. For the newbies, StarVaders is a nice introduction to the card-building or mech battle genres while maintaining an easy grasp on the mechanics. It’s not overwhelming or complicated; it simply is a great game.
StarVaders’ visuals are soft and cartoonish while still feeling like a respectable arcade game as well. It’s not all over the place with its UI, and everything visually has its place, almost to a satisfying end of design aspects. Gameplay and mechanics are smooth, leaving little room for error unless you don’t pay attention during the tutorial part of StarVaders.
It’s fun and easy, and it allows for creative strategic plays and approaches to each run and scenario. The game requires you to think on your toes and adapt, like a game of fun, chaotic chess.
The only drawback for me personally would have been the music and atmospheric sound building. After a while of playing, it can get a bit much, not too bad, but enough to make you need a break from time to time. This can also get to people around you if they are not wearing headphones.
StarVaders is fun. It’s essentially a brain puzzle that requires planning and strategies with critical thinking. You must consider the outcomes of the cards they play, both good and bad. You also need to keep many things in mind to make sure they play sufficiently and achieve victory in battle, to keep the world safe from invasions.
StarVaders is a unique combination of mechanics and game concepts that, with a touch of roguelite to sweeten the deal, in the end, make StarVaders a game worth playing. It might not be for long periods, but it’s still fun to challenge the game itself and see how far you can get.
