The first time I played the demo of Homeworld 2, I knew I had something
great on my hands. It felt like nothing I had ever seen before and it
looked awesome. That lead me to buy Homeworld: Cataclysm and the
original Homeworld since I decided I wanted to start at the beginning,
not at the end.
So here I am, reviewing Homeworld.
The story in Homeworld is interesting. You are the Kushans (or the
Taiidan, you can choose but both stories are strangely the same. In
regard to Homeworld continuity though, the real story is the Kushans),
a species of human beings living on a very harsh planet. Eventually,
someone on the planet finds an artifact on which is written "Hiigara,
our home", which throws the whole population of the planet in a quest
to find the place where they were born, hoping that life would be
easier there than on the desert world they're living on currently. So
for 60 years they build this huge mothership, and finally, they are
ready. Thus starts the game. It's an hollywood movie type story and it
is very well told, one of the best parts in the game. It really keeps
you moving.
This game was released in May of 2000 and it STILL looks totally
amazing, especially at high resolution with 6x Anti-Aliasing. Space
battles can be breathtaking, with huge ships exchanging shots and
smaller fighters circling in space. It's a sight to behold.
The most interesting thing in this game is the gameplay. It is a
strategy game, but in full 3D. Indeed, you never fight on the ground,
you're always in space, so you can control your ships on all three
planes. This can get pretty darn confusing and does require a lot of
practice, but once you get the hang of it it`s a piece of cake really.
Moving, that is. Fighting is HARD, with a capital H. Homeworld has to
be one of the toughest games i've ever played. They could have included
a difficulty level slider or something, this really isn't a game for
novice strategy gamers.
Also, another interesting thing is that you keep your units from one
level to the next. Now that might sound totally awesome, and in a way
it is, but it adds to the difficulty. After all, in a typical strategy
game, if you BARELY pass a mission, it's no big deal right? There is no
difference between barely passing a mission or slaughtering it. But in
Homeworld, you absolutely need to pass every mission with the least
amount of casualties possible, and the game is already hard as hell.
That means that you need to redo the same mission over and over before
finally going through it, but then after that you need to redo the
mission again over and over because you need to pass it with flying
colors. This makes the game very long, very hard, and very annoying if
you ask me.
The voice acting is well done although probably slightly unemotional. I
think the only time they show any emotion is when their desert planet
Kharak has been destroyed in the second level. I guess that highly
trained space military officers don't have a fear of dying or whatever.
No one plays this game on the internet anymore, but it's worth it for
the singleplayer alone. The story is great, the game is lengthy because
of the difficulty and the carry over system. However, I feel like
everyone should try Homeworld at least once, it's that special.
P.S: Homeworld: Cataclysm is the only game in the series to have a
difficulty slider, so that probably makes it the best suited game for
novice homeworld players.
