Dropped by publishers and unsuccessful on Kickstarter, Interstellar Marines should be a dead game. I know of few others that have managed to keep coming back for another shot at release. Its tenacity is extremely impressive and from what’s been shown of the game it does look like a fun project.
Well, finally you can actually buy it and play it, albeit in alpha form.
Following a successful Greenlight, Interstellar Marines has made its way on to Steam as part of its Early Access programme. Meaning you can put into an unfinished version of the game and receive regular updates up till its release.
Buying now gets you a slice of what you can later expect. The campaign is absent, though there is a singleplayer “playground” to show you something of what it will be like and multiplayer is limited to 4v4. Here are the features currently in the game:
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Team Deathmatch (4vs4) in highly dynamic environments.
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5 unique maps featuring dynamic environment configurations such as time of day, rain, thunder and lightning, emergency lighting, fire alarms etc.
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Experience various maps and prototypes in “Playground” mode (singleplayer).
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100% dynamic lighting and real-time shadows as well as destructible light fixtures.
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Full-body first person character simulation (no more floating hands!).
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Physically present combat helmet (visor glass is affected by light and rain).
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Submachine Gun (CE6) with full-auto fire.
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Shoot from hip or look through the Red Dot scope for increased accuracy.
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Toggleable tactical flashlight for when it’s pitch black.
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Toggleable laser to assist your aim (no crosshairs)
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Smooth network play even on high latency connections with packet loss.
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Realistically simulated ragdolls with momentum transfer.
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Play on high capacity dedicated servers in both US, Europe and Australia.
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World’s most advanced in-game chat system.
And, this is what developer Zero Point Software are working on for near future updates:
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Linux support.
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Dynamic multiplayer game modes.
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Steam features (stats, achievements, friends).
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Character movement (walk, sprint, jump, crouch).
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Tactical gameplay (fatigue and adrenaline).
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Co-op features (multiplayer).
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Weapon features (rate-of-fire, extensions, reload types).
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Extend general game UI and HUD system.
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In-game profiles.
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More weapon types and models.
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New multiplayer maps.
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Environment variations, theme and context.
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Shooting range (singleplayer).
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Developer Commentary mode.
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Oculus Rift support.
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Server / LAN support.
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Artificial Intelligence (AI).
Further details and a big “Add to Cart” button can be found here.