It’s been a few weeks now, and I still don’t know what to say about Killer Ship. I mean… in terms of polish and professionalism, you don’t get much better than this. This game just DEMANDS to be respected, and leaves even great games like Strikers and Kaos seeming amateurish and rough compared with its slick presentation and design. However…the gameplay… I don’t know. On the surface, the gameplay also appears nearly flawless. But it’s…well, kinda stale. I’m not sure why, and I can’t point to any specific ways in which it fails, but somehow it doesn’t end up being nearly as fun as either of the previously-mentioned titles, and nowhere near addicting enough to encourage the kind of lengthy play that its unlockables and achievements suggest.
So, speaking of gameplay...err…let’s talk about the gameplay! (see, it’s those sort of smooth, subtle transitions that separate good critics from godly ones). Killer Ship is, at its heart, a mob-based space shooter (albeit one that appears to take place on white graph paper) with unlockable upgrades and weapons to spice things up. Although that’s not anything too terribly unique, Killer Ship does manage to set itself apart from other games of its type with its magnificent and highly unusual control scheme. You see, in most contemporary space shooters, you control your ship with some variation of the famous “wads” layout, as made popular by first person shooters. I.e, use the w,s,a, and d keys to move your ship, and use the mouse to aim and shoot. It’s a tried-and-true system that nearly always works. Killer Ship, however, utilizes a mouse-only scheme that on paper sounds like a recipe for absolute disaster, but in practice works marvelously. You move the mouse to move your ship around, and the computer takes care of aiming, automatically targeting the nearest enemy ship. As I said, it sounds awful, but trust me—it’s not. Unfortunately, that’s about the only unreserved praise I can give for Killer Ship’s gameplay, because nothing else about it feels particularly unique or special. There aren’t many different types of enemies, upgrades take a long time to unlock and provide little payoff, “special” weapons feel borderline useless, and the scoring/combo system feels arbitrary and inexact. Like with Void Disturbance, Killer Ship’s gameplay is solid but ultimately pretty forgettable.
So let’s not talk about its gameplay anymore. Let’s talk about its other aspects, all of which are magnificent. Graphics, for instance (see, there’s another one of those brilliant transitions!). At first glance, Killer Ship doesn’t look like anything special. Just another game with a quirky art style to hide the designer’s artistic failings (at least, that’s why I always use quirky art styles in my games!). It’s only upon further examination that you realize just how detailed and sophisticated the game’s visuals are. I’ve always spent an inordinate amount of time on my graphical effects (my current project, the next ‘Nurf Nerfus’ game, has 9 different types of smoke, 4 kinds of screen rumble, and upwards of 50 types of debris, among other things), and Killer Ship is the first GMK game I’ve seen that shows a comparable amount of attention in this area. At any given in-game moment you’ll see tight screen rumble (unlike the more loose “shake” in Kaos), motion blur, environmental scorching, shield bloom effects, hyperactive animated “score” announcements, fantastic particle explosions, and more. Style-wise, Killer Ship takes the IMac “white and clinical” approach, consisting mostly of smooth, monochromatic outlines. And it works well, lending the game a “scrawled in a bored highschooler’s notebook” feel. If there’s one bad thing that could be said, visually speaking, it’s that sometimes Killer Ship looks a little TOO simplistic. The game features only one enemy design, and little in the way of color variety beyond white and black. More often than not you won’t notice, but it can seem a little bleak and bland compared to other more visually lush titles.
The sound in Killer Ship is just as wonderfully done as the visuals. There’s not too many sound effects, but they’re all just perfect, from the satisfyingly weak “pop” of your bullets to the juicy, explosive “squelch” of enemy deaths. Nothing sounds engineered or “synthy,” and some sounds have hints of the human voice to them, which adds to the feeling that Killer Ship takes place on the pages of someone’s chemistry notes. The musical track is a little less driving and a little more tense than we’re used to for this sort of game, but it fits well, and sounds very professional. The icing on the cake of Killer Ships presentation.
Overall, Killer Ship is very much like Void Disturbance. It’s got a lot of shine and glaze heaped onto some fairly uninspired gameplay. What sets it apart is the sheer quality of the shine and glaze. Its fantastic presentation and professional polish do a lot to make Killer Ship an attractive title, even if its gameplay isn’t quite as striking. I give it a 4/5
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