I'll start my review by simply saying I've already own and played the Steam version. Having seen it evolves from it's earliest day to it's current update, I'm thinking of using the recent discount on GoG.com to give gift this game to friends too. Which says a lot. I'll add I'm a fan of both 2D platformers and sandbox games, but specifically those allowing me to build large towns and villages that look good to me. But I'm a picky player as I dislike of building something if it is only to sit empty without a massive multiplayer server to populate it, and Starbound serves me better than others when it comes to populating my creation with NPCs. And then it goes out of it's way to even provide me with more. Building stuff is very -nicely- streamlined currently. Background/foreground blocks are just a matter of left or right click when placing a block. And with a now universal(and upgradable) matter manipulator it is the same thing when removing blocks, without any fumbling trying to recall the "proper tool for the task". It's very easy to eventually build literal towns of your own. And like said, recent updates even allow you to populate them with your own NPCs which, being generated, means you will never run "out" of NPCs or wonder which NPC you need to relocate to a new outpost away from the main town to "populate" it. Plus, those NPCs not only pay you rent. A recent update even make them able to give you procedural quests! You creations feels much more lively. Combat used to be a "stiff" experience with often similar "generated" monsters, but they are now joined by a lot of much more diverse "handcrafted" monsters with much more interesting combat styles. Weapons also got a LOT of new special attacks ontop of the likes of new guided rocket launchers. Adding a sense of purpose are also new handcrafted dungeon "instances", populated with unique monsters and literal "boss rooms" challenges now. This is all CURRENTLY there. And more is coming.
