The Last Federation

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The Last Federation review
Matt Porter

Review

You are in for a long ride

Mixture of styles (cntd)


When the action unpauses, all hell breaks loose for a couple of seconds, then it’s back to decision making based on your new circumstances. Care is necessary too, as dying in combat means game over, and you will have to reload a save.

Both aspects of the game are executed well. The combat is smart, and the strategy is remarkably in depth. You can spend months of in game time helping out a planet with its health problem, or you might go somewhere else and help boost the economy, or try and colonise one of its moons. You could try raiding a pirate outpost for some new technology. This tech might give you a bargaining chip in a political situation, or could just act as a nice gift to get a reputation boost with a certain faction.

Complexities


Winning a campaign could take anywhere from a few, to a few dozen hours, depending on your choices and the way the other factions interact with each other. You might have two planets who adore you, but if they don’t like each other than the whole alliance deal is going to fall apart. You’re going to have to spend some time building trust between the two peoples, or you could be more ruthless and simply plot to take one of them out. Things might progress without you even taking part. I barely interacted with the Burlust people, but they got taken out by the Acutians within the first ten years of the campaign.

There are plenty of tutorials to give you an introduction to the many systems at work in The Last Federation, but it’s still easy to feel lost, especially at the start. You’re told what your ultimate goal is, but you are never really told what the best way to go about it is. Enough playtime will get you used to the complexities, and you will be able to figure out what the exact consequences of your actions will be, but getting there takes a more time than I’d like.

Impressive and deep


It’s the overall polish that stops the game from being great. There is nothing wrong with it visually, it’s just a little bland. During combat there is a lot going on, and it looks chaotic, but you only really have to worry about your immediate vicinity. There are images showing you who you are interacting with when you delve deep into the menus for each planet, but it would be nicer if these were a bit more accessible. I still don’t really know what an Andorian looks like - all I know is they’re not particularly warmongering. The sound design is fairly basic too. There is a bit of voice over for some elements of the campaign. It sways towards almost being humourous, but it’s not quite there, and it begs the question why voice isn’t used elsewhere.

That said, it is still a very impressive, and very deep product. You can spend just a few minutes going through years of in game time, and as such you always feel as though there is progress, at least a little bit. The combat adds a new layer to the game, and is quite engaging where other games trying to pull off a combination of two strategy styles often fail. It’s tough to get into, as many games like this are, but if you are willing to put in the initial work, you are in for a long ride.

7.9

fun score

Pros

Good mix of grand strategy and turn based combat.

Cons

Lacking presentational polish, very complex at the outset.