Everspace 2

Everspace 2 tells an interesting story in a massive galaxy that's worth exploring, even if the limitations of its scope creep in from time to time.

Everspace 2 is a single-player flight sim that feels like The Witcher 3 in space.

Some fans will surely miss the roguelike structure of the original, but for fans looking to further explore its world or to spend more time in the game’s splendid combat, Everspace 2 delivers in spades.

No foolin’, back in April of this year I reviewed the PC release of Everspace 2. Spoiler: It was a great sequel to one of my favorite games. The original Everspace in 2017 was a roguelike and had a fair amount of procedural generation. Everspace 2 jettisons that formula for something akin to a hack-and-slash RPG, with fast-moving spacecraft taking the place of terra firma-bound characters.

The spirit of Freelancer lives on.

I started Everspace 2 deeply unsure about a space looter shooter. Tens of hours later I don’t want to play anything else. Everspace 2 is a towering achievement of space-based thrills and spills. It absolutely deserves your attention.

A phenomenal space combat game has a new sequel and although it's more structured, EVERSPACE 2 knocks it out of the stratosphere.

Everspace 2’s early access version is off to a great start, with enough mostly-polished content to allow for at least a dozen or so hours of gleeful blasting, puzzle-solving, and looting in space. Dropping its predecessor’s roguelike format feels like a good decision thanks to a promising story and a good amount of hand-built content. It’s just not all there yet, so when the story cuts off so does...

After a couple of years in early access, can Everspace 2 live up to its promise?

Everspace 2 brings gorgeously rendered ships and a middling story, but can't quite make up its mind about being a space sim or a loot shooter RPG. Visually impressive, narratively and mechanically constrained, it could have been so much better.

A classic arcade space shooter with an action RPG twist, Everspace 2 could have dropped out of a wormhole to the early noughties.

Despite the frustration of the level system, and the repetitiveness of some of the side content, I had a good time with the combat and flying at the heart of Everspace 2. This feels like a return to an older style of game, and I’d recommend it if you like spaceship games.