Dubious Quality

It's old-school, but with new school conveniences. It's huge, but it also has large amounts of detail on the micro scale. It has a storyline, but there's an enormous amount of freedom to do whatever the hell you want. 

Here are a few tips that can make your first couple of hours a bit easier. I think the flow state of this game is better than almost any space game I've ever played, but onboarding for new players can be a little intimidating, so here are a few hints to help. 

Before the more detailed info, here's a quick one: play pool at the bars. Besides being a nice little pool simulator (hold down left trigger to assist in small movements of the cue), it's also a great way in the early game to win pieces of equipment for your ship. So play a few games to practice, then visit the bar whenever you're at a new space station.

The most challenging concept for me, when beginning the game, was information acquisition. I didn't conceptually grasp how it worked, so I was confused, but I do understand it now, and here's the explanation.

First, think of internal information versus external information. Internal information is data about the status of your ship, the missions, etc. This is all accessed by pressing the menu button (on an Xbox controller--it's the tiny button just to the of the bit Xbox button). This is a menu that is navigated in a left-right manner, and it helps me to think of it as the engineering/captain menu. 

For external information, while you're in the cockpit, press the "Y" button. This brings up a radial menu, and there are a ton of functions:

Targeting mode

Local Map

Power transfer (from shields to power and vice versa)

Sector Maps

Closest Station

Closest Mission

Scan Area

Each of these functions has an icon, and you'll also see text when you select that icon, so it's easy to follow. I think of this as the navigator menu, because it's where you find system maps, etc. Also, and this is VERY important, it's where you'll find targeting mode, which you can access during battles to target individual ships, or even to find a path to get the hell out of there if things get to hot. 

Which is going to happen. A lot. Shit goes sideways all the time, particularly in the early game, and trying to fight to the death just means you're going to die a lot. 

When you select a target, holding down the left trigger initiates auto-pursue, and don't even think about not using it. For one, it's entirely consistent to the game world, to have such a feature on your ship, and two, it absolutely doesn't make the game too easy. It's incredibly useful. 

Okay, I forgot one other thing, so I'm just going to jam it in here at the bottom: mining lasers are not only useful for mining, but also as a very decent weapon in combat. 

That should help you in the first few hours, and after that, it's all going to flow so naturally that it becomes a stunning game experience, Which is no surprise, because Travis has never made anything less than an excellent game (this is his fifth, I think, and how many designers/developers have that level of consistently high quality product?).

Here's the purchase link one more time: Rebel Galaxy Outlaw. Get flying!