Solar 2 for Linux Review

Solar 2 is described by its developers as a sandbox universe, but that doesn't quite cover it. And when you're having a problem describing the gameplay, you know that you have some something special.

A lot of games today mention this word in their description, sandbox, but not all of them have a clear meaning for it. In some cases, it's meant to describe an open world game in which you can do anything you want, in others that there is no gameplay per say, just total freedom for the users. This is just the case with Garry's Mod, which is physics sandbox, but with no gameplay or story.

As it turns out, you can have a game that has gameplay, and it's a physics sandbox, and what better sandbox out there than the entire Universe. In this case it's an everlasting, procedurally generated Universe, but it's infinite for all intents and purposes.

There is a browser game that's making waves these days and it's called Agar.io. I know, it's not the most attractive title, but it's based on the same idea: to take a small object and to move around absorbing everything that is smaller than you until you get too big to be defeated by anyone. It's online and it's really easy to play, but it's very hard to master.

Solar 2 follows the same principle, but only on a much larger scale and with some gameplay elements. It's not about just become the biggest, which is not even all the important. It's about surviving in a deadly environment that wants nothing more than to end your existence.

Story and Gameplay

The story is the same as it ever was. You start as a lone asteroid, and you want to become bigger, to become someone in the Universe. This can only happen by colliding with other asteroids until you're big enough to be called yourself a planet (sorry Pluto fans, but that's not big enough). After you become a planet, things change. You no longer want to collide with other planets or asteroid; you want to trap them in your gravity wall and absorb them peacefully.

It takes a while, but after a while you get life on your planet, and you can choose to continue to develop as a planet. The life that you’re hosting is going to get into battles with other civilization on other planets, and they will get better at it or die. The more kills wrap up, the better you are at it.

If you become bored of just being a planet, you can continue to absorb asteroids until you become a small sun. Now things have changed, and you want to be a solar system. You can carry a few planets around you, each with its own civilization. You can absorb the planets and become an even bigger star, and then a neutron start and eventually reach the stage of a black hole.

The only thing that can destroy a black hole is another bigger black hole. So now, your goal is to stay away from other black holes, but keep eating solar systems. You will eventually trigger a big crunch and a big bang and end up an asteroid again.

It might seem really boring, but all this gameplay is actually littered with all sorts of missions that differ depending on your development stage. You might be tasked with getting rid of some aliens, escape from raider attacks, or just clean up a solar system from asteroids. Everything is done with tongue in cheek comments so that you don't take your job too seriously.

The only problem I had with the game is that the difficulty of some of the mission is downright brutal. Some missions I had to start at least a dozen times until I managed to get it right, but the good news is that you never see the end game screen, you always return somewhere close to where you failed.

The Good

The Bad

Conclusion