You Can Make It So: Flagship On Kickstarter

Both! Both is good. Lime IN the coconut. Peanut butter AND chocolate spread. First-person and RTS, only in space rather than on the lame-o ground. That's the concept of Flagship, which Graham rightly dubbed an Admiral Ackbar simulator back in May. It's a brilliant idea, though the implementation has a lot of challenges--most notably making it significantly different from a standard RTS. Urban Logic Games have detailed some of their plans in the newly released Kickstarter pitch, looking for £95,000 to blast off with.

I'd really recommend the game's first trailer. the ending of which is one of best bits of game footage I've seen in a while. The immediate silence as the alien ship jumps in, its geographical structure being so different and so much bigger than anything around. At the very least, the change in perspective of Flagship will be incredible for immersion and atmosphere.

It also shows what may be one of the games problems: it's likely to be far more spectacular when losing. Watching your fleet decimate an inferior foe from a distance isn't going to have that "oh shit" moment that playing in first person is so good at. The middle of the fighting will be great, but watching explosions rock an enemy carrier won't be half as exciting as half your own hull drifting off into space.

The pitch speaks more about how Flagship won't just be an RTS with a very pretty but basic interface. Being located on the most powerful and important ship in the fleet means you'll be controlling battles that aren't local to your system. Equally, you'll be able to influence them by warping to their location, but obviously you can only be in one place at once. You won't have as much direct control over battles further afield either.

It's certainly a game I want to see made, even if it can't live up to the marvellous promise we can build in our heads. £15 will get you the game at the early bird tier, £20 if those run out, and they're planning on a finished version at the end of 2016.