When I first started playing Terraria, friends told me I should look into a game that was going to be released soon called ‘Starbound’. It focuses on the same basic concepts, a survival type game where you can craft and create in order to ensure you survive, but the game also has a story and quest system behind it, in other words, it’s a sandbox game with themepark aspects for those who get lost in a sandbox.
You start off on a spaceship, lost in space. You can fly around to other planets but eventually you’ll run out of fuel. Before any of that you get to pick a race, I went with a plant type (pictured above). The tutorial teaches you the basics, how to maneuver around, feeding yourself, and the basics to crafting (which I still didn’t pick up on right away). You’re given a few pieces of gear in order to live long enough to get yourself settled. One of my favorite features is the flashlight, go and take that object into a dark cave and shine it around, it’s awesome.
You’re also given an item that lets you interact with the trees and terrain all around you, a manipulator of sorts. You can see me using it above to chop down a tree so that I can create a craft table. Once you’ve got the craft table created, you’re asked to hunt down some of the creatures of the world you happen to be on, and then cook a meal.
I haven’t played very far into the game yet (it did just release yesterday) but so far I can already tell it’s going to be a lot of fun (that’s easy to say, I adore Terraria). I like that there are quests and ‘things to do’ for the times that I’m feeling lost. On that same note, I like the vast openness of the world, and exploring.
There are a lot of these ‘types’ of games coming out lately, but it’s important to note that they also all have their differences. Unlike Trove or Cube World, Starbound and Terraria are 2D and not 3D. Some people are OK with this, others are not. You’ll also have to keep in mind that the game is still in beta, there are patches, bugs, and issues with connecting. It took me two tries to get the game working and each time it hung waiting to work. Still, compared to some betas I’ve participated in, it’s very well done.
Interested in giving it a try? You can purchase access on steam, or on humble bundle. It’s the sort of game you need more than 10 minutes to play, so I’ll be posting in-depth on it another time. If you’re curious about how my first 30 minutes went, you can find it on my twitch channel (warning, I did not learn how to cut anything down, and I died a lot. My second play was much better).
Watch live video from Stargrace on TwitchTV
I had my son, the one who’s addicted to Minecraft and the one all the kids go to for Minecraft help, sitting beside me when I started playing. I didn’t realize I was cutting a tree down at first. I only kept at it because I thought it was funny the way the matter tool was making the tree shake. Dumb luck!
Still haven’t built anything and the monkeys kill me a lot. Having a lot of fun, though.