FTL: Advanced Edition

The more I play this game the less I like it

After 150 hours in this game I've won maybe 5 times, including once on hard! There are a lot of cool ships and strategies you can take to get to the end and fight the final boss, but it only takes one bad situation to screw it all up. For some reason I never minded starting over again. The game was good before advanced edition came out, now it's a classic without question.

FTL is a strategy roguelike set in space. To simplify it, your goal is to destroy the main bad guy’s ship. This sort of setup is very generic and for most games would be a negative, but FTL has a very specific focus. FTL only really cares about the journey, not the destination. While your overall goal is to be the hero, along the way you have complete freedom to craft your own story. Most playthroughs you won’t even get close to beating the game before you die to a pretty average, unremarkable ship. It gives the game a sense of realism, in that your character/ship isn’t special. You don’t have any unique advantages or anything like that, you are just an average guy. On the strategy side of things, FTL usually succeeds. It’s got a very solid gameplay loop in which you and the other ship trade blows while attempting to make the right choices when it comes to which area of the ship to target. The wide variety of weapons and crew members means that you wind up with a new ship everytime you play. The first and only misstep FTL makes is the balancing. There are a number of builds that are significantly better than some of the worst ones. Usually, it isn’t too glaring, but it can be hard for some players to resist the urge to min-max their ship. Presentation-wise, FTL has visuals that can be a bit basic, but they work very well with the overall vibe of the game. The ship designs all have a cohesive theme that differentiates each group of ships from each other. It feels great to recognize a ship type just from its shape or colors, and being able to use that information to guess what tactics the ship might use. The soundtrack fits the game and is much better than your typical background music... Due to GOG's character limit, this is the end of our review. Check out our website (https://www.mmmreviews.com/ftl-faster-than-light-review/) for the full review. TLDR: 10/10 (with Captain's Edition mod)

- There are different luck variables which does not mean your play depends totally on lucks. They appear to make the game unpredictable and more interesting like an adventure. - If you want a quick win play, then you will not enjoy this game, or even hate it. This game is hardcore, don't start the game with normal difficulty. Easy is already challenging. - To enjoy this game, you should play your ship as you're experiencing an adventure. Also it's a turn-based like, so "PAUSE" is essential in battle. You pause, you plan, you fight, then pause, then plan and fight, repeat. You can enter battle without pause but it's, of course, much more challenging. So if you're real time action player, you should know this rule or you may lose your patience.

This little gem of a game is something I and many like me would've dreamt about while reading sci-fi books or watching Star Trek. This is a game that allows you to actually manage a little toy spaceship, set up your weapons, crew etc, and develop your own tactics to win through numerous encounters and space adventures. I fell in love with this game once I've realized you can vent the air out of specific rooms to fight fires or enemy boarders. Wow.