Battlestar Galactica Deadlock Review

Finally, a Battlestar Galactica game worth our time?

Straight off the bat it gets a yes from me. As a big fan of the Battlestar Galactica series I have been hoping and praying that one day someone would do the franchise justice and give it the game that both it and we deserve, and Black Lab Games the developers of Deadlock have done just that. Possibly my favourite thing about this game to start with is that you don’t have to be a fan of or have ever seen the TV show to be able play and enjoy this game because it is set before the series takes place with its own original story to follow meaning you won’t get lost or confused trying to follow the story.

Battlestar Galactica: Deadlock is a game that has you constantly on the edge of your seat whether it’s you hoping that all of your ships will make it safely back from the current battle or that you sit and pray the Cylons won’t make a sudden surprise attack on one of the twelve colonies whilst you are rebuilding your fleet after suffering heavy losses in a recent battle. The game is exciting at every turn giving the player the full experience of being a commander in the colonial fleet.

Going into the game I was already aware that the gameplay system was going to be turn based. However, I was expecting something more like the gameplay design of a Total War game, with the overworld map segment being the turn based system with the battles taking place in an RTS format, so I was quite surprised to find that the whole game including the battles were also done in a turn based format. In most other space combat strategy games I have played the combat system has been in the common RTS style, and having played a lot of Stellaris I was a little unsure about the combat system at first as I was expecting to be doing a lot of micromanaging during the battles and jumping around the battlefield a lot making sure the battle was going in my favour. But after playing the game for a good few hours I started to realise that the turn based style of Deadlock really suits it and is better this way because when you get into some of the larger battles of the game it would be very hard to manage everything if it was all running in real time and would be quite stressful for the player.

The overworld map gameplay segment of the game has a unique style to it because it is laid out on the standard command and control station seen in Battlestar Galactica which the player can not only click on and perform actions using this map but can also walk around the room that it is in and look at the table from different angles and access the different sides of the map with ease by simply walking around to the other side of the console. It is a simple feature in the game, but it adds a sense of freedom for the player which for me made me enjoy these sections of the game a lot more than I would have just being stationary clicking on a map.

The multiplayer aspect of the game adds another level of playability with the 1v1 battle game mode that has been included so you can battle against a real player and not just the AI which can add a whole new twist to the gameplay making it extra enjoyable and another reason to return to the game.

Even though I am a big fan of the game and it has come across well with both fans of the Battlestar Galactica series and just general strategy games fans alike it does have some flaws. From a gameplay perspective some of the battles can become quite repetitive from time to time as you get further into the game with the same enemy ships spawning and doing the same thing as they have in previous battles however this is not a constant problem and the game does still mix up the battles. Another problem I found with the game is that when you first start your playthrough the tutorial stage is little hard to follow as it fills up your screen with pop ups all at once and does look a little messy and confusing and took me a few rereads to be able to grasp what it was trying to tell me, but after you finish the tutorial segment of the game the UI really clears up and becomes a very simple and easy to understand system.

There are a few bugs that I have come across but none of which have really been game breaking they have just been more of an inconvenience. For example, when trying to tell my fleet to jump in the overworld map it would not always register that I was clicking the confirm jump button and I would have to keep trying repeatedly or cancel the jump all together and start the process again. There are other bugs which I have encountered during my playthrough but none of them have ruined my experience with the game and hopefully will soon be fixed by the developers.

To conclude, I think Battlestar Gallactica Deadlock is a very enjoyable experience all around with a good replay value even with the slightly repetitive gameplay and minor bugs. I would recommend this game to anyone who is a fan of the Battlestar Galactica series and anyone who wants a good space strategy experience with a good solid media franchise to back it up. Happy hunting commander.

REVIEW CODE: A complimentary PC code was provided to Bonus Stage for this review. Please send all review code enquiries to press@4gn.co.uk.