{"id":12877,"date":"2020-01-19T00:48:00","date_gmt":"2020-01-19T08:48:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cyberpowergaming.com\/17252-2\/"},"modified":"2024-01-24T17:37:57","modified_gmt":"2024-01-25T01:37:57","slug":"17252-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cyberpowergaming.com\/17252-2\/","title":{"rendered":"SpaceEngine (Early Access) Review \u2013 A Phenomenally-crafted, Spacey Masterpiece"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

SpaceEngine
\nVladimir Romanyuk<\/strong><\/p>\n

I feel small. Very, very small. Not only that but my jaw has been on the floor for over an hour. That\u2019s because I have just been flying through the universe in Vladimir Romanyuk\u2019s space \u201cgame,\u201d SpaceEngine<\/em>. I use quotes because SpaceEngin<\/em>e isn\u2019t really a game, its more than that. It\u2019s more like an Existential Crisis Simulator.<\/p>\n

This definitely isn\u2019t No Man\u2019s Sky.<\/em> There aren\u2019t any alien outposts, cute, cartoonish creatures, gaudily fluorescent flora, or any floral-tinted oceans. There\u2019s also no corporate, triple-A level publisher backing SpaceEngine,<\/em> and it\u2019s only $25. That\u2019s less than half of No Man\u2019s Sky\u2019s<\/em> absurd $60 price point.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

There\u2019s just an astronomer-turned-game developer, Vladimir Romanyuk, and his computer. He\u2019s built an entire universe sandbox simulator that boasts the entire Hipparcos catalog of starts, 10,000 known galaxies, as well as every known celestial body, both big and small.<\/p>\n

SpaceEngine\u2019s<\/em> Steam page, which by the way has achieved an \u201cOverwhelmingly Positive\u201d review rating, boasts: \u201cAll of time and space are yours to explore \u2013 cruise between the stars at a million times the speed of light, and accelerate time to watch the orbital motions of a thousand worlds play out before your eyes.<\/p>\n

Every planet you encounter in your journey will feature procedural 3D terrain with detailed textures. Everything you see in the sky \u2013 stars and galaxies, planets and moons, asteroids and comets, black holes and neutron stars, star clusters and nebulae \u2013 are yours to explore at the press of a button.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

When I read this passage alone, I was already sold. But when I tried this title out and actually saw that if anything, that blurb was almost a disservice to the actual transcendental experience? Stick a fork in me, I\u2019m done.<\/p>\n

One of many things that SpaceEngine<\/em> has over No Man\u2019s Sky<\/em> and other space sandbox games such as Elite: Dangerous<\/em>, is that it\u2019s totally seamless. That\u2019s right, there are no loading screens that you have to sit through. You can fly through space from planet to planet, inspecting each planet\u2019s varied topography, and then off you go to another galaxy while stars whizz by you at breakneck speed.<\/p>\n

SpaceEngine\u2019s<\/em> visual fidelity is frankly phenomenal. As opposed to a more arcade-y look, everything in it looks like NASA-quality photorealism. Float over or through highly-detailed canyons on one planet and skim across vast oceans on another\u2014there is so much to behold that it\u2019ll make your head spin.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

You can fly virtual spaceships in SpaceEngine<\/em> (you can even edit them from Steam\u2019s Workshop). However, this title has a much harder learning curve to grapple with than Elite: Dangerous<\/em> or No Man\u2019s Sky<\/em>. That\u2019s because you have to learn how to factor in such obscure factors as inertia, gravity, and relative velocity.<\/p>\n

And thankfully, Mr. Romanyuk doesn\u2019t plan to dumb things down and make SpaceEngine<\/em> more hand-holdy in the future. He intends to keep things based as much in hard science as possible.<\/p>\n

In all, SpaceEngine<\/em> is highly recommended by those out there who would like a relaxing experience gliding through space, as well as people who have even the slightest interest in astronomy.<\/p>\n

SCORE: 94%<\/strong><\/p>\n

SpaceEngine<\/em> has some pretty good looking graphics that make its science-based gameplay truly shine. However, you want to have a pretty beefy gaming PC or gaming laptop in order to play it at a decent framerate. So, you may just want to invest in a decent gaming rig:<\/p>\n

\"case
CHAMPIONSHIP 2020<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Visit CyberpowerPC\u2019s website<\/a> to check out all of the other great deals as well!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SpaceEngine Vladimir Romanyuk I feel small. Very, very small. Not only that but my jaw has been on the floor for over an hour. That\u2019s because I have just been flying through the universe in Vladimir Romanyuk\u2019s space \u201cgame,\u201d SpaceEngine. I use quotes because SpaceEngine isn\u2019t really a game, its more than that. It\u2019s more… Read More »SpaceEngine (Early Access) Review \u2013 A Phenomenally-crafted, Spacey Masterpiece<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":12873,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2724],"tags":[2520,741,2488,2527,1225,67,2486,2644,2679],"class_list":["post-12877","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-4k-gaming","tag-cyberpower-pc","tag-game-review","tag-game-reviews-2","tag-gaming-laptop","tag-gaming-pc","tag-ian-kane","tag-sandbox-games","tag-space-games"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberpowergaming.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12877","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberpowergaming.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberpowergaming.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberpowergaming.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberpowergaming.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12877"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberpowergaming.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12877\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17195,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberpowergaming.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12877\/revisions\/17195"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberpowergaming.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12873"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberpowergaming.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12877"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberpowergaming.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12877"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyberpowergaming.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12877"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}