A Frustrating Space – Galak-Z: The Dimensional Review

<p><em>Galak-Z&colon; The Dimensional<&sol;em> is a troublesome game for me to review &&num;8212&semi; Troublesome because all the while I was playing&comma; I could really see why so many people love these kinds of games&period; I could appreciate the amount of care that went into its creation and I could understand how people might have a lot of fun with it&period; The troublesome part is that I&comma; myself&comma; had none of that elusive fun&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><em>Galak-Z<&sol;em> comes roaring through the stratosphere courtesy of the good people at 17-BIT&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s another timed exclusive indie in the PS4&&num;8217&semi;s hat&comma; and it brings something to the table for those players who miss the kind of dog-fighting space battles that used to devour quarters back in the arcade days of yore&period; The set up is all pretty simple&colon; you play as the last hope for all of humanity as you zip around space in your spaceship&comma; shooting bad guys and collecting stuff floating around&period; It sounds simple enough&comma; but there&&num;8217&semi;s actually a lot more to it&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;88792" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-88792" style&equals;"width&colon; 780px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;frustrating-space-galak-z-review&sol;galakz&lowbar;fly&lowbar;to&lowbar;explosion&sol;" rel&equals;"attachment wp-att-88792"><img class&equals;"wp-image-88792" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;08&sol;04192739&sol;GALAKZ&lowbar;fly&lowbar;to&lowbar;explosion-1024x576&period;png" alt&equals;"GALAKZ&lowbar;fly&lowbar;to&lowbar;explosion" width&equals;"780" height&equals;"439" &sol;><&sol;a><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-88792" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;Galak-Z&comma; 17-bit&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>Your ship is actually the main star of the show here &lpar;although it has no speaking lines&rpar;&comma; and you will need to learn everything there is to learn about how to handle it if you&&num;8217&semi;re going to survive&period; The ship controls extremely well and while the controls take a while to master &lpar;I never did&rpar;&comma; they are tight and responsive&period; Survive is kind of a throw away word to describe what you&&num;8217&semi;re doing though&comma; because you will die often and repeatedly&period; The game was designed with the idea that you will die often and if the thought of seeing your little spaceship explode on screen hundreds of times doesn&&num;8217&semi;t appeal to you&comma; then this isn&&num;8217&semi;t the game for you&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>You do get help in the way of upgrades&comma; however&period; You can find space junk floating around and in turn&comma; use it to upgrade your ship in terms of damage resistance&comma; firepower&comma; etc&period; It really does make the growing challenges somewhat more bearable&period; Unfortunately&comma; upon death you will lose almost all of your cash and upgrades&comma; and have to start over from scratch&period; Well&comma; to be fair&comma; not <em>completely<&sol;em> from scratch&comma; but close enough to have made me want to bite down on something to keep from screaming&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s these elements that kept me from enjoying this game as much as I wanted to&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Again&comma; this kind of review troubles me&comma; because I know a lot of people like the whole &&num;8216&semi;rouge-like&&num;8217&semi; element&period; I&&num;8217&semi;m not one of those people&period; For me&comma; it was extremely difficult to enjoy buying an upgrade since I knew that as soon as I got blown up &lpar;which happens a lot&rpar; I was going to lose it&period; I didn&&num;8217&semi;t even get sense of satisfaction of knowing that I could better learn the level layout and enemy placement on repeat playthroughs to better ready myself&comma; because everything is randomly generated&semi; another gameplay aspect I don&&num;8217&semi;t care for&period; Not only that&comma; but the missions themselves change upon death&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s hard for me to get a sense of story&comma; narrative&comma; or even why I should care when my mission objective changes every time I die&period; It made me feel that no matter how good I might have done&comma; I wasn&&num;8217&semi;t really progressing in any sort of meaningful way&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Upgrades aren&&num;8217&semi;t all you lose upon death&semi; you also lose progression&period; The game is split into several different &&num;8220&semi;seasons&&num;8221&semi; and each season has five chapters&period; If you are on chapter five of season one and you suddenly get killed&comma; then you have to start over not from season one chapter five&comma; but from season one chapter one&period; All the way&period; At&period; The&period; Beginning&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;88793" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-88793" style&equals;"width&colon; 814px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;frustrating-space-galak-z-review&sol;galakz&lowbar;menu&lowbar;cic&sol;" rel&equals;"attachment wp-att-88793"><img class&equals;" wp-image-88793" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;08&sol;04192716&sol;GALAKZ&lowbar;menu&lowbar;cic-1024x576&period;png" alt&equals;"His pants look uncomfortably tight" width&equals;"814" height&equals;"458" &sol;><&sol;a><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-88793" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">His pants look uncomfortably tight &lpar;Galak-Z&comma; 17-bit&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>I don&&num;8217&semi;t mean to sound like a downy-clowny though&semi; it&&num;8217&semi;s not all frustrating stuff&period; The voice acting is quite good&comma; and even pretty funny in some spots&period; The graphics are also beautiful&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s an extremely nice game to look at and I sometimes found myself continuing to play just so I could watch it a little bit more&period; Your spaceship can also turn into a robot&semi; that&&num;8217&semi;s almost worth the price of admission alone&period; Gameplay is also super tight&period; It takes a while to get used to the controls&comma; but once you do it can be a lot of fun zipping around the galaxy and fighting off evil imperials&period; That is&comma; until you die&period; Which you will&period; A lot&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><em>Galak-Z&colon; The Dimensional <&sol;em>was just not for me&comma; but I know that a lot of people are loving it and I hope a lot more people play it&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s a super polished game with a great presentation and a rock solid control scheme&period; Lots of players are going to love the space themed grind that it offers&comma; but unfortunately&comma; I&&num;8217&semi;m just not one of those people<&sol;p>&NewLine;<hr &sol;>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; center&semi;"><em><strong>A PS4 code for Galak-Z was provided by 17-bit for the purpose of this review<&sol;strong><&sol;em><&sol;p>&NewLine;