Rebel Galaxy

Take the naval combat of Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, transpose the action into space, then add commerce and role-playing features into the mix, and you have a sense of why it’s worth getting excited about Rebel Galaxy. Two co-founders of Runic Games (Torchlight) are ready for a break from swords & sorcery, and their ambitious outer space game looks gorgeous.

Rebel Galaxy is all about controlling a massive ship as it confronts one threat after the next across the vastness of a procedurally generated galaxy. “You don’t engage a single craft here; it’s more about how you engage an entire battlefield,” says Double Damage CEO Travis Baldree. “Having control of a larger vessel with many weapons systems and subsystems, taking care in how you maneuver, switching between combat stations (and manning them) in real time, and assessing threats at different ranges and with different combat effects works very well and is totally different than more traditional cockpit-style, sim gameplay.”

The story follows the relative of an infamous space pirate. “After being out of your life for a decade, she contacts you with the access codes to a beat-up, junker of a ship,” Baldree says. As you set out to a meet-up with your aunt, the adventure takes some unexpected turns. Expect to become an outlaw, mercenary, or trader, encounter aliens, and make choices that shape the politics and stability of entire star systems. “Bribery, persuasion, and intimidation are all workable options,” Baldree says.

Over the course of the game, you gain access to a number of big ships, each catered to different play styles. “There are nimble corvettes with limited weaponry but high maneuverability and lumbering dreadnaughts that are slow, but bristling with turrets and broadside ports,” Baldree says. Players can customize the engines, deflectors, and even internal software of each ship. In between fights and interactions, you can zoom out to a live view of the solar system, and zoom in to look at mining operations, military patrols, or relief vessels. “For longer-distance travel between solar systems, you’ll use jump gates, once you have enough scratch to purchase a jump drive,” Baldree says. Space is anything but empty. Double Damage promises lightning storms, crystalline objects, derelict ships, and dense nebulae to explore.

Some games sound almost too good to be true; if Rebel Galaxy is as engaging as it sounds, this small team could have a big hit on its hands.