Spaceteam

Spaceteam

The Short

Pros
- Frantic multiplayer game where you are a SPACE TEAM
- Free
- Can be played 2-4 people and game adjust difficulty accordingly
- This game is an absolutely hilarious, insane good time
- Cleverly written and designed, with no two games the same
- Did I mention it's free?

Cons
- Some of the "disabilities" are much, much worse than others
- Might make your friends hate you if you play really bad
- No advanced options (team switching)
- Can't have more than four people...though that might be a pro
- Not available on Android. Since it uses local Wifi, I'd love to see cross-OS play here

It's time to form a team. A Spaceteam. 

The Long

I heard a lot about this game over the holiday from the various gaming blogs and podcasts I listen too, with several even considering it in their Game of the Year deliberations. It made me curious about it, but the screenshots didn't look particularly enthralling. Yeah, it's a space game. Yeah, you hit buttons and turn dials. And yeah, it's multiplayer only and is free. So..?

I had these reservations, sure. Until I played it.

Spaceteam is one of the best things you can get on your iOS device at this given moment. Assuming you have friends (local ones, mind) that own iOS devices as well. 

This game is so frantic, it's absurd. 

Spaceteam is incredibly simple, yet incredible in what it does. Essentially, you and up to three other people are...well, a Space Team. You are all part of a ship that is running from an exploding sun, and it's your job to keep the ship up and running to avoid getting blown up. How this is done is through a variety of random, menial tasks. For example, you might have a dial called the "Zaxon Zapper," and you'll need to turn it to 3 and then to 5 when the game tells you to, before the time runs out. Simple, yes?

Well...no. Because sometimes, instructions for your screen appear on your friends' devices. And sometimes instructions for their screen is on yours. Because everybody gets a completely different set of controls on their various iPhone/iPad/iPod Touch, you have to yell it out to them to do what is needed ("Flip the Dekadatter!" "Eject the Metapods!") before time runs up. Get enough right and you'll jump to hyperspace for a brief breather before it continues. Screw up enough, and you explode and your team dies. Your space team. That's not a good thing.

The magic of Spaceteam is the absolutely frantic co-op, and the absurd things the game makes you say. With four people, you have all four of you yelling commands, hoping that the right owner will catch their needed maneuver through the din. Not to mention asteroid fields (everybody has to shake their devices at the same time) and wormholes (everybody has to flip their devices at the same time) can mess up your controls. Screw up a lot and bits of your controls fall off, slime covers buttons, or (the worst), your translation machine fails, turning button names into nonsense. It only gets harder and harder until you die, with the challenge being to get as many warps as possible.

Sometimes they turn to random symbols. Because Spaceteam hates you.

Without a doubt, this game is some of the best fun I've had with a group of friends owning iOS devices. We played with two iPhones, and iPad, and an iPod Touch. There was no lag (minus our own yelling and misinterpretation), the yelling escalated quickly, and there's the awful sense of embarrassment when you issue a command and then realize it was on your button set to begin with. The game is chock-full of near-misses and awesome feats of teamwork, and when you fail you just want to start the whole frantic, yell-fest again.

By not being "just" a touch-screen game and incorporating real-world cooperation, Spaceteam succeeds in a way I wouldn't have imagined from a simple phone game. Yes, I could critique the graphics (which are charming but hardly pushing the envelope) or the lack of group options (I'd love to see it make two groups of three, then have people swap groups during hyperspace. That would be insane) or more than four players, but for what it does...it does it perfectly. For a frantic yell-fest that hooks your team and sends you into elated hysterics when you just make that hyperspace jump together, Spaceteam is something else. 

Unfortunately, this game is not available on Android (yet). It is free on iOS, with a few very minor in-app purchases available (none of which are necessary to enjoy the game; they simply make it a bit better). It requires everybody be on the same local Wifi (which makes sense, as you have to be near each other to even play the game) or Bluetooth together, but all iOS devices have Bluetooth now so it should be an easy connection. We had no issue getting together on a local Wifi. Because it circumvents stuff like Gamecenter, I could see cross-platform play (Android and iOS) with this game, which would be delicious.

I feel a bit silly review this game, but let me just say this: if you have friends that have iOS devices, get this game and force them to play it with you. Trust me, it's a load of fun, probably the best "party" iOS game ever, and gets you to all yell totally stupid stuff while trying to be the ultimate Space Team. Words don't do it justice. Just get it. Seriously. JUST GET IT.

Four out of five stars.