Recs.
Updated
FTL: Faster Than Light is an indie space simulation roguelike game.
The gameplay consists of a top down space simulation where the player must control the crew of the craft as well as all of the resources needed to run it. Much like a roguelike game the world is randomly generated in eight different sectors of space. The goal for the layer is to make it through these sectors without dying as there are enemies that will be attacking.
SpecsUpdate
Pros
Pro Has modding support
There are multiple mods available for FTL that can greatly change up the gameplay and looks of the game. This adds a lot of replayability to the title.
Pro Morality based decisions
The game works a lot like a text adventure in a roguelike wrapper. The decisions asked of the player during this adventure can affect much of the stories plot, making for an interactive story through choices such as telling aliens you are a god in order to potentially receive less trouble in your encounter with them, to abducting aliens in order to sell them for a profit. One choice may appeal to the player more than another, it also provides a way to role play as a morally bankrupt space captain. All in all though this is all up to the player, which can be really fun to see what may happen.
Pro Great touch controls
Even though the game was designed to be played with a keyboard and mouse originally the touch controls work exceptional well. Some could argue better that keyboard and mouse. The gameplay and design lends itself very well to the touch screen, which makes playing the game a joy on iOS.
Cons
Con Slightly repetitive
After a few playthroughs you'll be seeing the same dialogue over and over, it's to be expected and in a way, you can learn from previous playthroughs to make better choices but it does take the mystery away which is unfortunate because mystery is one of the better aspects of this game.
Con Too dependent on random weapons
Survivability in any particular run is entirely dependent on random weapon drops. Virtually all good runs require randomly finding good lasers, as missiles (and all ammo-based weapons) just can't sustain your ship through a run. The same thing applies with certain secondary systems, e.g. anti-missile drones, which is almost essential to survive through the end game. If you don't find lasers and anti-missile drones, that's game over. It gets extremely frustrating since the player can't do anything to affect the item drops or store stocks, which turns many otherwise solid runs into auto-lose, because you never get a change for good weapons.
Con Can be pretty difficult
The amount of choices to be made (many not being good ones) and the randomization of the game makes for a situation that may be too difficult for some. This is not a game that you will beat in one play session nor 10, it takes a lot of time to get in a good run that results in winning, which some people may not have patience for.
Con Wide variance in usefulness of weapons
While this is a typical caveat of the roguelike genre, there still is an issue with some runs just falling flat due to constant bad luck, getting mediocre weapon after mediocre weapon, while some end up incredibly overpowered because you get 2 halberd beams and a weapons pre-igniter when you're halfway through the game.
Con Late game battles are long and boring
In the later parts of the game battles are very long which can make for a bit of a boring experience, especially for those that would rather be exploring than spending so much time on battles.
Recommendations
Comments
Flagged Pros + Cons
Pro Has modding support
There are multiple mods available for FTL that can greatly change up the gameplay and looks of the game. This adds a lot of replayability to the title.
Pro Allows for highly strategic gameplay
The rougelike game design combined with the huge amount of choices that can be made in both encounters as well as ship management makes FTL a highly strategic game as you never quite know what the game is going to throw at you.
There are many decisions that can be made in the game, such as what parts of an enemy ship to target (their shields, their weapons) or where to concentrate your defensive strategies, such as powering up an ion engine to run, or powering up ones shields to stay and fight. These choices can all effect the final outcome of the game, so it is up to the player to make the best decisions at their disposal.
There are also many choices of ships to use and equipment layouts for each that can be tweaked. Depending on the ship used and what equipment is used or where it is place can greatly affect how the game will play out as well as how the game will need to be played. If choosing a fast ship with low shield power, it will be best to outrun a lot of encounters. Where as if choosing a slow ship with good gun capabilities and a high shield power, a good strategy would be to go in guns blazing for each encounter.