Strike Suit Zero is an odd game for me, as I'm neither familiar with
the history of the game nor am I familiar with any other game in the genre. So,
naturally, that means I'll be woefully incompetent and die horribly about every
five minutes much to the displeasure of my monitor. Therefore, any and all
insight from below is from the perspective of a complete idiot, and if you are
not willing to tolerate that (quite understandably), then feel free to read one
of those gilded reviews at Gamespot instead. Anyway, here's insight to
what I think of Strike Suit Zero from the perspective of a complete rookie.The greatest strength of Strike Suit Zero and the aspect that makes me soil my pants with utter otaku glee is its massive scale. The game boasts gigantic and cluttered battlefields filled to the brim with enemies to the point where it almost rivals the traffic in my hometown during rush hour. In a sense, you feel like you're part of a larger scale war with set-piece battles, rather than a set of isolated skirmishes with a few foes that are all too common in modern games.
As for the dogfights themselves, you'll be engaging in multiple foes at once, and you have a repertoire of abilities at your disposal, from lock-on missiles to defensive EMP blasts, to light machine guns, and even the much touted mecha mode (because, why not?) so quick wits are needed in order to properly dispatch all of your foes and not die constantly like me, although this is ameliorated to an extent as (rather dim-witted) NPCs will be in the background to aid you. Admittedly, aiming your primary weapon can be tricky at times, as it often feels like a ferret is clawing your leg, so aiming is a bit…jumpy, to say the least, so slowing down your ship to increase accuracy at times is a must. And pertaining to the topic of weapons, they feel a tad weak. The visual impact and the audio feedback from firing your armaments aren’t quite up to snuff and at times, it can feel like you are firing a peashooter rather than hot fiery death .
As for the controls, I've only played it with a 360 pad and I've yet to try
it on a keyboard and mouse, but they feel rather good, for the most part that
is. The controls feel a bit awkward at first, and controlling your ship can be like
trying to ride a blind three legged mule, but this can be ameliorated by going
into the options menu and heavily tweaking your controls to your heart's
content. Once you get some progress into the game, the controls start to grow
on you, and the game feels quite comfortable to play.From a graphical standpoint, the game looks great, as the technical graphics are quite competent, especially for an in-house engine from an indie developer, and it serves to highlight the great artistic direction which blends elements of eastern and western culture. The game also runs fairly well, as my shrine built to the PC gaming gods powered by the endless torment of console gamer souls (otherwise known as a Radeon 7970) runs it at a smooth 67 FPS.
Finally, special mention has to be made for the soundtrack, which is utterly
fantastic, to say the least. The music perfectly complements the chaotic nature
of the combat and provides an even greater sense of adrenaline to the player.
However, I’m really not qualified to speak, as I’ll listen to pretty much anything
with a catchy beat and a singer that doesn’t sound androgynous. Sadly, while the core game is fun, there are several petulant gripes I do have with it. To put it quite bluntly, the entire story is rubbish. The plot is thinly spread and uninteresting, the characters are dull, and the voice acting can be quite rudimentary. I’ve had more enjoyment reading the encyclopedia than with Strike Suit Zero’s story. Overall, it's just better to skip the cut scenes and dive straight into the action. The game lacks multiplayer of any sort, which is a shame, since co-op and competitive multiplayer could have greatly added to the enjoyability of this title, and saved my monitor from abuse, since I know that many other people would be just as bad as me at this game. The scope of this game (not to be confused with the scale) also feels rather limited. Blandy McJoe is stuck in his ship constantly and can’t really explore space, dock at space stations, or do anything in space outside of aiming his crosshairs on enemy bogies.
Overall, despite my incompetence and impatience, I’ve enjoyed Strike Suit Zero, but it’s not perfect (although, to be fair, what is outside of myself?)
