Project Genesis Press Preview Thoughts

Editor’s Note: This is still in the pre-alpha phase.

Project Genesis is a game that is still very much in development, so you will see some bugs/glitches in the paired video. But you know what? For such a small team, it’s absolutely gorgeous, and for the most part, plays mighty smooth. Project Genesis is an upcoming Hero Shooter-style starship game, where teams of players have a goal of obliterating the other team, and/or breaching their starship and blowing it up. There is still definitely some work that needs to go into it, but I had a blast playing it with their development team last week. I had some issues playing, but that was due to it still being early in development, so that is something I totally understand. A good example of that it not being 100% clear which ship I needed to dive into, and then once I finally figured it out, it was bugged on virtually every attempt.

But it will play very similar to a hero shooter in space, and the game I can say it feels the most like is Dreadnought. That is in no way a slight either since I love that damn game. Instead of mostly employing capital ships, it’s a variety of class archetypes. You have the large cruisers/dreadnoughts, down to the tiny, fast fighter ships. In this particular build, the bigger ships did not work, but I had to try one anyway. That’s my preferred way to play, so I couldn’t help but try them (even if they were right, I did get blasted out of the sky since they didn’t work correctly). The ships will have plenty of customization, from the colors of the ship, the pilots’ gear, and most important – the weapons. The best part for me is that each ship doesn’t have guns it “must” have in order to take to the stars. No, you can put whatever guns you want on, but each ship has certain spots to put them.

I had some pretty serious issues aiming and firing (as well as weapon swapping) in the keyboard and mouse version, but as soon as I swapped to my Xbox Controller? I was ready to go. However, aiming was still a little awkward, but that can be fixed by rebinding or some changes to the control scheme on their part. But boy did it feel incredible with a controller in my hand. So your ultimate goal is to destroy the other team’s capital ship, and this is done via the Breach System. Teams work to break down the shields and find one of the many breach points. The player will use a pod to breach into the side or front of the ship and work to sabotage it in any way possible. You can hack systems, lower defenses, shoot players who come to stop you, and ultimately set up the Bomb. Defend it, then get the hell out in time!

The enemy team (or yours, if your team is under attack) can return back to their ship just about instantly, and though you have a rough idea of where they are with a colored icon, you have no minimap/full map (yet). You just kind of had to guess and explore until you find them. This is something I imagine will be changed, once the game has more development time. This was a really cool, and unique system, and was the first game I’ve played with such a cool shift in gameplay dynamics. The change from starship to the first-person shooter was seamless and felt pretty great if I’m honest. Most of the nitpicks I had were things that will no doubt get ironed out as time goes on, but it was just fun to play and to talk to the developers about what random things we went on about. The visuals were gorgeous, and the various areas we fought over were just as beautiful. I have a good feeling about Project Genesis, and I could see this really catching on as a new, unique offering in the hero shooter/multiplayer shooter playscape. There’s a lot of development to go, but I highly recommend you keep an open eye and ear on Project Genesis.