Game Reviews

Space Pioneer review - A simple top-down shooter with a lot going for it

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| Space Pioneer
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Space Pioneer review - A simple top-down shooter with a lot going for it
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| Space Pioneer

When it comes down to it, Space Pioneer gets pretty much everything it does right. It's tight, taut, and its free to play mechanics never get in the way if the action.

It might not be the meatiest experience the world has ever seen, and there are certainly more innovative top-down shooters out there, but there's a rich compulsion that pushes you to shoot more, earn more, and see what else the game has to offer.

Twins

The game is a single stick shooter. The stick lets you run around, and there's a button to fire. You lock onto targets automatically, your shots hitting the foes around you so long as you're in range.

You've also got a bunch of interchangeable skills on cool downs. These let you chuck grenades, launch orbital strikes, drop turrets, and heal yourself.

You get cards as you play, which you can use to upgrade your skills, weapons, and stats. It adds a dense progression to the game as you figure out what to spend your coins on to get the best rewards.

Space Pioneer iOS review screenshot - A battle against murderous Dave

Levels are short and sharp. You've usually got three or four objectives, but most of them involve standing in a cirlce while a bar ticks down. Often you're swarmed by monsters while you're doing that though. There are additional objectives that get you more gold and gems as well.

And you've got a robot who follows you about offering quotes from famous action movies as well as fire support. A base on the home screen allows you to earn more cash and toughen up your robo-friends and more.

You've got giant boss fights to contend with as well, and extra achievements to earn by killing them within strict time limits and in specific ways.

Shoot u me up

But above and beyond all of that, Space Pioneer is just an awful lot of fun. It gets its violence, its progression, and its timing just right. It sucks you in with its simple but engaging gunplay, and forces you on to see what's coming next.

Sure what's coming next might be remarkably similar to what's come before, but when it's as entertaing as this, you're not really going to mind that much.

Space Pioneer review - A simple top-down shooter with a lot going for it

It might be simple, buy boy oh boy is Space Pioneer effective
Score
Harry Slater
Harry Slater
Harry used to be really good at Snake on the Nokia 5110. Apparently though, digital snake wrangling isn't a proper job, so now he writes words about games instead.