Flotilla 2

For me this is both a step down from the previous game and doesn't make good use of VR. There's no campaign, just lots of individual preset missions you can choose from. There are a LOT of missions (100 I think) but the previous game had a campaign to link the fights together and made you more attached to your ships as they had to survive between fights. The controls aren't clear - maybe there was a tutorial I missed but it looks like to give movement orders you click or hold (it doesn't seem consistent EDIT2: was a bug which occurred when using a Rift, now fixed) but all ships must target the same enemy per turn, at least that's what it looks like when you click an enemy. I can't even find a way to leave a mission except by winning or losing it. There doesn't appear to be any options menu or in-combat menu in the game. EDIT2: There's also no manual to explain how to play or what each ship type does. The use of VR controllers makes it easier to position and orient your ships which i...

If you played the first Flotilla and really enjoyed the combat mechanics this will totally be your jam. This is Flotilla, sans fleetbuilding and campaign. Instead we are presented with a good selection of pre-made scenarios and a scenario editor. Being in VR adds a new dimension to this game and as a package it works really well. The mechanics are so simple to pick up that the game only needs one controller with one button to play and literally being able to walk through the combat area provides a whole new level of situational awareness. If you're looking for story or some of the classic Blendo Games worldbuilding they've been come to be known for, you won't find much of it here. However, you will find a simple to learn yet complex to master tactical space combat simulator set to classical piano music. If that's your speed, you need to pick this up. I have, and I haven't regretted it for one second!

I see a lot of potential in this game honestly. It really does give you the Ender's Game-type of feeling I was hoping for but it feels really empty right now in terms of content. It has a lot of pre-made missions but it gets old after probably the 10th. When and if workshop creators get on this game, then it will worth the price they are asking.

Voting this down as I did not like the VR implementation, though it might be OK if it were not VR. There are issues with the mission selection menu having strange cartridges you have to reach for, and you need to insert them in a system behind you to play. This is cumbersome. There are limitations to movement while in-game that make it very difficult, requiring you to always physically face in the direction you are making strategic moves without turning the camera perspective. Otherwise, it has similar simplified game mechanics as the first Flotilla, so if you liked the first one and don't mind some VR limitations, this is fine.

For me it's a step up over Flotilla 1, yeah you loose the FTL-like narrative, but you get many new types of ships, with abilities etc. Overall it's way more tactical than the first one (granted I played <1 hour for now). Pros : It works waaayyyy better in VR, in fact this type of games (like Lazerbait) is absolutely perfect for VR. Well priced (for the content). I feel it could have been priced higher with more content or a more polished interface, but : Workshop support, yay ! Classical music in spaaaaceeee. Cons : It feels a little like a demo I guess ? I mean there is a hundred levels, so at least 5h of gameplay, probably 8. And it feels like the kind of game you launch once in a while and play a level at random. But the interface/polish feels a bit demo-y. Multiplayer would have been cool (even asynchronous!) But I understand it's hard to implement. Overall, if you got a vive or rift and like space or tactical games, buy it !

Seems like a good concept that fits VR well and can be fun, however unfortunately it appears minimal effort was put into development. The good: -Can be quite fun, the gameplay fits VR very well. -quite intuitive to just use your controller to adjust ship position in 3D as if you were placing toys -No alternative in this VR niche that I am aware of -Menu is nice and tactile The bad: -You can't move sideways in the map/main menu only up and down. If some button / ship / menu item happens to be outside your available play area, your only options are to recenter your play area in the steam options or move some furniture around. -No tutorial -Does not look nice. I do not understand why space is brown for example. However to be fair it looks a lot better in VR than on a flat screen, so this ends up being only a minor issue.

I'd gladly give this a positive review if a few things were fixed. I like the concept of positioning spaceships to protect weak points, and when the game works it's fun. Unfortunately, it sometimes doesn't. The game was built with room-scale in mind, so your ships will always start off near you. However, your ships can be blasted out of range, putting them through your wall and impossible to command. You can adjust your view vertically, but, bizarrely, not horizontally. So that's a dead run. But you can't leave the mission, because there's no pause screen. So... Exit VR I guess. Game says no. A few other questionable choices are: Ship ability buttons can be similarly placed inside your walls even if the ship itself isn't. Adjusting your view vertically hides entities that aren't directly in your eye-line (not great for when you're TRYING to get a better view) Touching (not pressing) the Index controller counting as an input, making managing abilities difficult. ... Minor-key classica...

Really enjoying it so far. Bite sized battles that force you to think spatially in a way that I'm not used to in tactics games. It's so satisfying to watch a battle play out around you.

Eh, feels like a good start but abandoned :( Visuals are great and a good throw-back to Homeworld. Ship positioning is good and intuitive but selecting special abilities feels odd. Camera control bad to non-existing: you can only move up or down or wonky-teleport, making it impossible to play in standing area only. For example, some ships got catapulted *really* far away, probably due to a physics bug, and I was unable to reach them because they were located past the walls of my room. There is also no menu or options to leave a mission. I don't get it, the VR controllers have a dozen buttons or so on them and displaying a menu on top of them is de-facto standard. This would solve all issues. There are a 100 missions in this game and they seem well designed. However, this is more of a tactical puzzle game with only 2-5 ships per side. No campaign or similar.

A fun little puzzle-strategy game! Very charming graphically, with a minimalist but pleasing presentation; and your typical "Blendo games style." While it's not terribly deep, it is deceptively simple, each mission is it's own puzzle that must be solved with a limited fleet of ships, and they continue to mix it up and present you with unique challenges and maps; watching ships duke it out in the void never got old. That said, you're probably gonna play through all the missions once and never touch it again, so replay value is limited; but it's worth grabbing on a good sale.