Review by Robyn Robo
Back in 2014, a new independent developer in Finland by the name of Bugbyte started making mobile space combat games called Battlestation. Now, they’ve made their first PC release on Steam with Battlestation: Harbinger. This game has obvious mobile roots, but makes for a fun, affordable and instantly gratifying desktop game. Written in Java, the game runs on Windows, Linux and OSX. I tested on Windows and Ubuntu 14.04, and I had no issues with it. In fact, it should run on any machine with a GPU built in the last decade.
Bugbyte has had an interesting history. The company is a tiny one, with the only 3 staff being the founder and his brothers. They went nearly bankrupt in the current mobile games market and pulled through via a Reddit AMA, Kickstarter, and other new funding and social sites to make it to their Steam release of Battlestation: Harbinger (simply referred to as Battlestation for the rest of this article). There, Battlestation is currently available for ten dollars, with 20% for its launch week. Assuming it takes off, all is financially well that ends well.
Battlestation is an interesting game, combining select 4X elements to deepen a Rogue-like (permanent death and random levels) space combat game. The battles involve small to midsized fleets with careful, pause-able, real time maneuvering. The closest analogy I could think of to this game specifically is a 1990 release by the name of Star Control, also known in its open source incarnation as Ur-Quan Masters. You can also customize your ships with new items you build, buy or loot as you make your away across the map, jumping from system to system
It’s really *not* a 4X game!
