Star Hammer: The Vanguard Prophecy review

Star Hammer: The Vanguard Prophecy is a space combat game that blends concepts from both real-time and turn-based strategy games to deliver a deeply challenging, but satisfying experience.

If you remember Relic's cult classic Homeworld for the PC, you'll feel right at home with Star Hammer.

You control multiple ships in free space, taking charge of who they attack and when, as well as their position on a 3D map.

The main difference here is that Star Hammer pauses the action every ten seconds so you can re-assess all of your options, issue new commands, and divert power to different systems, all before jumping back into the action.

Despite being a very combat-focused game, Star Hammer actually has a pretty impressive narrative component to it.

The campaign focuses on Valeron Dyce, the daughter of a war hero that is suddenly thrust into command in the midst of a resurgence of squid-like aliens known as the Nautilid.

Besides from providing a good context for the combat, Star Hammer's narrative changes based on the way you play the game. If you are a hothead that doggedly rushes into combat, you'll experience a different story than if you play a lot more defensively, which is a really nice touch.

Although it's a pretty impressive package on paper, Star Hammer does have a some issues.

The UI, while helpful, can take some getting used to, and the game camera, despite offering multiple views, is really unwieldy.

These would be bigger problems if the game moved in real time. Instead you can just struggle with the camera while everything is frozen in place.

Star Hammer is a phenomenal package, but it definitely isn't for everyone. There are immediately apparent flaws with the game that can be very off-putting, but they're totally worth looking past if you are a fan of the genre. Star Hammer is one of the best strategy games we've played this year, warts and all.