Battlestar Galactica: Deadlock
A sweet spot in space
lure you out to one point on the map and then sucker you from another direction
DEVELOPER BLACK LAB GAMES PUBLISHER SLITHERINE LTD. PRICE $ TBA AVAILABLE AT STEAM slitherine.com
Ireally love the idea of slow-paced, capital ship combat. I love Games Workshop’s take on the genre, with Battlefleet Gothic, but only on the tabletop – the video game version left me cold. I love the books of military sci-fi writer David Weber, especially the Honor Harrington series, which is all space-broadsides and epic fleet actions – but the tabletop game is one of those systems that you almost need a math degree to understand.
Surely there’s a sweet spot - one that doesn’t need legions of fiddly, painted models, but that still has that slowpacing that only a tabletop-style game can deliver.
That sweet spot exists, and it is called Battlestar Galactica: Deadlock.
Based around the gritty, almost realworld military feel of the recent reboot series, Deadlock puts you in command during the First Cylon War, when the great Battlestars are only just coming off their ships and into action – and, despite the name of the game, one of the first events of the game is the Galactica herself going missing. In the game, you play one of Fleet Admiral Cain’s subordinates, and the whole thing is littered with little references to the television series.
And some not so little – the game’s music is straight out of the Bear McCreary music book, and goes a long to establishing the epic feel of the series.
There’s a lot going on in the campaign, and to be honest, it’s the weakest part of the game – you’ve got to gather resources, build ships, unlock blueprints, move your fleet about, avoid Cylon fleets, and keep the government happy, all via a turn- based, strategic overlay. The only issue is, as much as the characters and voicework are solid and immersive, how you actually do a lot of this is a little up in the air. There’s not much in the way of a tutorial, and before long all the training wheels are off - and I have to admit I felt more than a little at sea. Or, at space, I guess...
But while in many other games, that would be a huge problem – seriously, what am I meant to be doing with my giant floating base, because it is stupidly helpless and keeps getting destroyed! – it seems small-beer in Deadlock, because the turn-based ship combat is so damned tight.
The game is played in two-and-a-half dimensions – ships have limited turn circles and move rates, and once you decide where each ship is moving by clicking onto its projection and moving it about, you then get to determine heading and ‘height’. In reality it’s more like what terrestrial dog-fighting would be like, and that third dimension really only comes in when you want to move ships above and below the plane of other vessels - this is no Homeworld - but it looks good at least.
You can also command ships with special orders – you can get them to focus all their turret weapons on one ship, or just to shoot at targets in a particular arc. You can order them to launch missiles, which can really lay on the hurt, but to do that you first need to convert badguys from anonymous
DRADIS contacts into identified ships before you can lock on. Missiles can take more than one turn to reach their target, too, and are limited in terms of supply. Picking the right moment to open up with a missile barrage is a real skill, and co-ordinating an entire fleet barrage can be a game-winning move.
The game wouldn’t be complete without fighters, either, and both ships of a certain size and your giant lumbering base can launch entire squadrons. These can be set to attack a target, defend a friendly, or just patrol about – they’re fast, so really useful for putting a name to those DRADIS contacts.
Damage is quite detailed in the game – you can’t launch missiles or lock on if your fire control has been destroyed or compromised by hacking. You can set each ship to be either more or less defensive or offensive, which affects their effectiveness in different roles.
And the big Battlestars have their own unique ability – a giant disc of flak fire that can be deployed to either flank, which can block incoming munitions and defend against fighter attacks. But it’s a bit indiscriminate, and really warns you when you’ve got your own birds in the air.
The special abilities are cool and flavoursome, but never seem overpowered, which is pretty impressive. What you need to rely upon instead of tricks are clever ship handling, clear target priorities, and… well, a bit of forethought. The game is quite happy to lure you out to one point on the map and then sucker you from another direction. If you’re trailing around with your big base, that can be lethal – lose the base and it’s game over.
And on top of all that, the game looks and sounds great, especially when you switch the UI off during the replay of each turn, and the replays of entire battles make even losing a thrilling spectacle. Deadlock is far from perfect, but it’s still one of the most exciting space combat games we’ve seen in years.