The game is old, but the story and concepts of this game remain fresh. When I first played this game (way back when it first came out) I thought I was primarily interested in playing as a warrior. I didn't realize I was putting equal amounts of energy into my character's dialogue abilities until, in the final boss confrontation, I managed to actually talk him down from his evil ways and convince him to give up his fight ... my warrior was a warrior-diplomat and I ended the game peacefully. Absolutely floored me how much the decisions you make in the game influence the possibilities you could go down. The factions you can join and the end stories you generate are reflected by your gameplay. Still one of the most satisfying game experiences I've ever had.
Ambiance, gameplay, overall theme are all great. The puzzles, however, go from engaging and fun to just mystifying and frustrating. I got fairly far along, but after running through some inscrutable puzzles, looking up their solutions on YouTube and determining "I would *never* have figured that one out" I lose interest. I may not be a puzzles savant, but I'm a reasonably intelligent and analytical guy. Some of this game's puzzles are just badly done. I don't regret the money spent. The first (probably more than half) of the game I got through was great. And if you don't begrudge using walkthroughs for the really tough parts maybe the whole thing is great for you. Just not for me.
There are no real game mechanics here - this is a universe simulator, and it is glorious. Development may be somewhat slow (it's a tiny team that, until recently, was just 1 programmer) but even in its development state this program is absolutely worth its cost as an educational tool, for meditative relaxation, or for a mind-expanding experince. Download the game, learn how to navigate, find the moon, and head over to it, zoom around and see the familiar terrain we know from telescopes (don't bother landing on our solar system bodies. They don't have the same procedural landscape generation that makes other solar bodies more interesting to land on). Now pick another start to navigate to, ramp up your movement speed to the speed of light. Hrm ... nothing's happening. Oh, yeah, the universe is fricking huge. Let's go 2x. Still nothing ... 10x? The game simulates all the actual known universe, and procedurally generates the rest at 1:1 scale. If you've ever had trouble understanding the vastness of everything, Space Engine will help you come to grips with it. Billions and billions of stars in our galaxy. Billions and billions of galaxies. All here in this modestly priced gem of a "game". It is beautiful and awesome.
