eXoSpace Combat Engineer Review Summary

Excellent, addictive ship-building and roguelike progression shine, but permanent loss of ships and blueprints, bullet-sponge bosses, and building misalignments and connection issues frustrate.

Excellent Ship Building Mechanics: The ship building system is frequently praised as fun, deep, and innovative, with a gridless editor that allows snapping parts at any angle. Players can build anything from tiny drones to massive dreadnoughts, and the mechanics are considered damn near perfect.

Fun and Addictive Gameplay: Many find the game very fun, addictive, and enjoyable, with a solid gameplay loop. It scratches the itch for building spaceships to blow up other spaceships.

Roguelike Progression and Structure: The roguelike loop of increasing ship size and unlocking components is well-received, with structured progression similar to Reassembly. Progression persists between runs, allowing players to keep ships and resources, and the sense of advancement from drone to dreadnought is satisfying.

Responsive Developer and Updates: The developer is open, vocal, and responsive to feedback, pushing great updates and bugfixes. The Persistence Update was particularly praised for allowing players to keep ships and resources, which prevented refunds for some.

Engaging Combat and Boss Fights: Combat is described as fun and arcade-like, with boost abilities for dodging and hitting weak spots. Boss fights are a highlight, featuring special abilities, multiple phases, and invulnerable parts, and they don't tank the game's performance.

Permanent loss of ship and blueprints: After completing a bounty, all unlocked blocks, uniques, and the entire ship design are lost, making hours of work pointless. This restart gimmick is seen as a game killer and makes saving designs meaningless.

Bosses are tedious bullet sponges: Both the first and final bosses are criticized as insane bullet sponges with massive point defense. Players find themselves holding right-click AFK watching an HP bar tick down slowly over 20 minutes, and killing the core takes forever even after destroying weak points.

Building misalignments and connection issues: Parts constantly slightly misalign when building complex ships, and pieces sometimes show incorrect disconnections even when one of two connections remains. One armor piece can make you lose everything attached to it when it looks like certain parts should be connecting it back, causing weird disconnects that split your ship into pieces.

Small enemies are frustrating and unrewarding: Small enemy ships are fast and tiny, causing guns to miss about 50% of ammo, and clearing masses of them is tedious. In bounty mode, fighting them is unnecessary and worthless, making them a major nuisance.

Repetitive gameplay with little diversity: The core gameplay is Reassembly, sometimes to a fault, with a disjointed set of shapes that is disappointing. There isn't enough diversity in building efficient designs, and only two weapon types were found in a full bounty run.

Roguelite Progression with Bounties: Each run is structured as a bounty hunting mission culminating in a boss fight, with incremental progression and persistent elements between runs. This roguelite loop keeps gameplay fresh and challenging.

Spaceship Building and Combat: Players highlight the core loop of building custom spaceships and engaging in combat as the game's primary appeal. The combination of engineering and action creates a unique experience.

Faction Reputation and Encounters: A faction reputation system influences interactions, and players encounter various factions during playthroughs, each with unique tech trees and crew. These dynamics add depth to the game world.

Gridless Intuitive Ship Editor: The gridless building system with snap-and-rotate quality-of-life features allows for flexible and precise ship design. This stands out as a key differentiator from other games in the genre.

Persistent Progression Issues: Many players note that progress resets after each bounty, including ships and unlocks, which can feel punishing. Only cash and some resources carry over between runs.

Controller and Steam Deck input issues: Reviewers report that controller input does not function properly, and the same problem appears on Steam Deck controls. Both standard gamepads and the handheld's built-in controls fail to work as expected.

Runs on low-end hardware: Players report that the game runs smoothly even on very weak, low-spec hardware. This suggests strong performance optimization and broad compatibility across modest PCs.

Worth the price: Multiple reviewers consider the game well worth its price, with some describing it as highly recommended. This indicates strong overall value and satisfaction.

Positive Early Access approach: One reviewer appreciates the proper use of Early Access and would not mind paid DLC if it supports ongoing development. This reflects a favorable view of the developers' engagement.

Recommended despite boss issues: A reviewer recommends the game overall even though there is a problem with a boss. This suggests the issue is notable but not game-breaking for some.

Wait before buying: A reviewer suggests waiting for improvements before purchasing. This implies the game may currently have shortcomings that could be addressed later.

Avoid missiles: One reviewer advises new players not to use missiles. This may indicate a balance issue or a suboptimal strategy.

Session length: 2.0h.

Endgame: 27.0h.

Players report that enjoyment comes from the restructured, roguelite incremental progression with goals and bossfights, while free-form ship building and tedious small-enemy clearing create friction. The evidence does not specify when this improvement occurs.

Friction: Free-form block-by-block ship building feels poorly suited to the roguelike format.; Clearing masses of small enemies is tedious..

Unlock drivers: Developer listened and changed how progression works.; Roguelite incremental progression with a goal and bossfights.; New progression structure..

Spaceship Sandbox Engineer: Iterative shipbuilding, optimization, and sandbox experimentation. Motivation: Perfecting custom spaceship designs and testing strategies in sandbox. Stance: buy.

Open-World Faction Strategist: Strategic sector progression, faction building, and comparative genre analysis. Motivation: Finding a persistent open-world faction and ship-building experience within the genre. Stance: buy.

Campaign Boss Challenger: Mission-based progression, bounty hunting, and boss fights. Motivation: Progressing through campaign sectors and defeating boss challenges. Stance: buy.

Linux and Proton: Only one relevant Linux/Proton review was found for Reassembly. It recommends Proton 10.0-4 for Steam Deck and reports flawless operation under Linux with no bugs or crashes. This suggests very low Linux/Proton friction.

Frequent comparisons to Reassembly: Many reviewers compare the game to Reassembly, noting it as a spiritual successor, bigger, with more structured progression, and similar disjointed shape sets. It is often described as an evolution of Reassembly.

Early access release status: Multiple clusters discuss that the game is in early access, having just left early access or being in early access on day one. This is a recurring point across reviews.

Ship count and community designs: The game features over 600 ship designs, including many community works, and has over 200 ship parts. Players share neat ships on Discord and forums.

Comparison to Cosmoteer: Reviewers compare the game to Cosmoteer, noting more intuitive direct control and more objective-oriented gameplay rather than sandbox. It is also compared to Cosmoteer without the lag.

Comparison to multiple space games: Reviewers compare the game to Reassembly, Nova Drift, FTL, Slay the Spire, SPAZ, Star Valor, Drox, and Avorion, noting it fills a gap between those styles and is less needlessly complicated than Avorion.