I'm only giving this a positive review because I spiritually cannot give this a negative one. I am extremely f'n grateful this exists at all and it's a miracle, honestly. And, look I know this game is free, 11 years old, and is developed by huge fans of Escape Velocity Nova on a volunteer basis, but there are some aspects of this game that work against itself and kind of disrespect the original title that I just need to point out before others sink hours into this.

Here are some of my sore spots:

- There are WAY too many pirates. It's ridiculous. Even making a trade route in the core of the Republic sphere of influence is so aggravatingly annoying because you are constantly attracting the attention of pirates. I just want to be a space trucker in the early game and there is a literal nonstop sound of the alarm blare because of an omnipresent amount of hostiles in every single occupied system. It's incredibly over tuned and is exceedingly immersion breaking. The game even passive aggressively tells you to stop doing trade routes because "there's so much more beauty to the galaxy than just doing trades" like, dude, I need to get a Falcon just to not get instantly blown up by pirates every 2 screens and this is the only meaningful way in the early game to reasonably afford that! Super annoying but not impossible to work around.
- Fleet management is an absolute nightmare. You will recruit ships that cannot leave systems and they will be on the bottom left of your screen forever until you fly back to them and commit cold murder by blowing them up just so they stop appearing on your hud - just because they don't have enough fuel, or you don't have a fighter bay, and the system doesn't have a shipyard for you to sell them at. EVN fixed this problem two decades ago by overriding their fuel needs and having them fly with you regardless of their resources. Is it less realistic? Yes. Does it play way, WAY better? Absolutely. Fleets need to be completely reworked, I think they're in a really bad state.
- The sound design. Sigh, ok, look I'm a sound designer and I have some thoughts on how it's being implemented and I am incredibly biased but I have to be upfront and just say that so much of it is just Bad. The only things that sound alright are the explosions, the reticle clicks, and the afterburner thrusts. The idle engine noise has an audible loop point, the beam lasers somehow simultaneously sound like wet newspaper and nails on a chalkboard, and the alarm blare has a noise floor with a ton of artifacts in the audio file. I would love to contribute new sound design to the game - just give me the green light.
- The text. Tiny text being forced to the side of the screen is so hard to read, why isn't it in the middle of the screen?! There isn't even anything you can do with the rest of the screen while there's dialog! Just, please, put it in the middle of the screen. I'm begging you. It will make reading the text so much more bearable.
- The perspective. I don't think the game works well in a true overhead view. EVN has a pseudo isometric perspective that gave the ships and other sprites a lot of depth and a skeuomorphic sheen that made the aesthetic of the game really come together. I actually really like a lot of the ship designs in this game but I think they fall a bit flat due to the true top-down nature. Because this game lets you zoom in and out as well, this can really provide some opportunities to make mega structures that make you feel puny in the vastness of space.

There's some other things like the writing that I'm mid about but again, it's a miracle this game exists. I'm frustrated at this game *because* I love the original so much and that this is such a niche genre that I feel like hasn't been done justice yet. It gets so, so, so close but just need a touch more love to really nail it.

I'm only giving this a positive review because I spiritually cannot give this a negative one. I am extremely f'n grateful this exists at all and it's a miracle, honestly. And, look I know this game is free, 11 years old, and is developed by huge fans of Escape Velocity Nova on a volunteer basis, but there are some aspects of this game that work against itself and kind of disrespect the original title that I just need to point out before others sink hours into this. Here are some of my sore spots: - There are WAY too many pirates. It's ridiculous. Even making a trade route in the core of the Republic sphere of influence is so aggravatingly annoying because you are constantly attracting the attention of pirates. I just want to be a space trucker in the early game and there is a literal nonstop sound of the alarm blare because of an omnipresent amount of hostiles in every single occupied system. It's incredibly over tuned and is exceedingly immersion breaking. The game even passive aggressively tells you to stop doing trade routes because "there's so much more beauty to the galaxy than just doing trades" like, dude, I need to get a Falcon just to not get instantly blown up by pirates every 2 screens and this is the only meaningful way in the early game to reasonably afford that! Super annoying but not impossible to work around. - Fleet management is an absolute nightmare. You will recruit ships that cannot leave systems and they will be on the bottom left of your screen forever until you fly back to them and commit cold murder by blowing them up just so they stop appearing on your hud - just because they don't have enough fuel, or you don't have a fighter bay, and the system doesn't have a shipyard for you to sell them at. EVN fixed this problem two decades ago by overriding their fuel needs and having them fly with you regardless of their resources. Is it less realistic? Yes. Does it play way, WAY better? Absolutely. Fleets need to be completely reworked, I think they're in a really bad state. - The sound design. Sigh, ok, look I'm a sound designer and I have some thoughts on how it's being implemented and I am incredibly biased but I have to be upfront and just say that so much of it is just Bad. The only things that sound alright are the explosions, the reticle clicks, and the afterburner thrusts. The idle engine noise has an audible loop point, the beam lasers somehow simultaneously sound like wet newspaper and nails on a chalkboard, and the alarm blare has a noise floor with a ton of artifacts in the audio file. I would love to contribute new sound design to the game - just give me the green light. - The text. Tiny text being forced to the side of the screen is so hard to read, why isn't it in the middle of the screen?! There isn't even anything you can do with the rest of the screen while there's dialog! Just, please, put it in the middle of the screen. I'm begging you. It will make reading the text so much more bearable. - The perspective. I don't think the game works well in a true overhead view. EVN has a pseudo isometric perspective that gave the ships and other sprites a lot of depth and a skeuomorphic sheen that made the aesthetic of the game really come together. I actually really like a lot of the ship designs in this game but I think they fall a bit flat due to the true top-down nature. Because this game lets you zoom in and out as well, this can really provide some opportunities to make mega structures that make you feel puny in the vastness of space. There's some other things like the writing that I'm mid about but again, it's a miracle this game exists. I'm frustrated at this game *because* I love the original so much and that this is such a niche genre that I feel like hasn't been done justice yet. It gets so, so, so close but just need a touch more love to really nail it.