Hardcore Strategy is Coming Back | Grey Goo Review

The real-time strategy genre of games has been on a hiatus of sorts. Back in the 90’s, games like Command & Conquer, Total Annihilation and Starcraft captivated a wide range of gamers. They were easily some of the most popular games of the time. However, as the graphics of modern games got better, the obsessive love for this genre diminished. While some may say that this is where the story ends, things tend to come back in style and it seems that the RTS genre is due for a resurgence. We saw signs of life with Microsoft developing the Age of Empires license and the existence of Planetary Annihilation through Kickstarter, but Grey Goo is a return to form and proves there is interest in the sleeping genre yet.

Petroglyph, the developer of Grey Goo, decided to strip down what made the RTS game great and focus on what the fans would want to play. They aim to bring hardcore, old-school RTS fans a game worthy of their nostalgia that didn’t change the formula so much that old RTS fans wouldn’t adapt to, but it kept things interesting enough for new players. Essentially, they built a game that was fast-paced with a focus on building a base, gathering resources and building units like crazy. That was the formula that people fell in love with and that is what Petroglyph delivered. While the game may not win any beauty contests, it is a damn fun game to play.

The story of Grey Goo is relatively simple and straight forward. There are three species that are battling for control, you have the aliens; Betas, the robot loving humans and the nano-swarm also known as the titular Grey Goo. Here the Betas are living on the planet covered in a powerful resource called the Catalyst. The Betas were trying to open a wormhole, but in doing so, it attracted the Humans and the nano-swarm and it turns out both factions wanted to take control of the resource-rich planet. From there the Betas, Humans and Grey Goo are constantly at battle for a shot at ultimate power.

From the beginning, you’ll notice that Grey Goo has some seriously impressive cut scenes to watch. They are right on-par with some of Blizzard’s best work and it is great to see another contender in the ring putting in so much effort to make the game visually appealing. Not only are the cut-scenes amazing to watch, but you’ll see them in-between the five story missions from each faction. This presentation gives you plenty of incentive, from a visual standpoint, to get through the single player campaign.

Visuals aside, Grey Goo is a very competent RTS and each faction plays quite differently from each other which mixes up the gameplay and accommodates all types of players. First you have the Grey Goo. The Grey Goo is one of the most interesting and different factions in RTS history and it is unlike anything you’ve played before. The Grey Goo is just a massive blob on the map and there is no need to set up a permanent base. The blob floats around the map absorbing enemy players and resources all at once. You can then break pieces off of yourself to contend with larger forces. If you are facing defeat, a smaller blob can run off and collect resources on its own and become the new mother blob and start all over again. The Grey Goo can also navigate difficult terrain and sneak attack just about any base, so if you are up against the Goo, watch your assets carefully. Unfortunately, as innovative as the Goo are, they have some major late game issues. As you build units and they become mother blobs themselves, you have to start exponentially micromanaging each mother individually keeping track of mothers, sub-units and making sure each blob keeps growing bigger to become stronger. It is great to start out with, but the most you use them, the more work you have to do to maintain them.

Next are the humans, which have a unique style all their own. They rely on building units off main power conduits requiring some thinking and base planning before you jump in. This faction is easy to mismanage since you rarely get enough flat space to build all the buildings you may want. You’ll have to prioritize and pick the perfect base building site or you’ll find yourself in a deep hole quickly with no flexibility to expand. However, you can teleport buildings to anywhere on your conduit lines. This is great for getting rushed since you can teleport all the important building to safety and all the turrets to the action. Unfortunately, if the enemy severs your conduit, everything loses power and you lose this ability. This makes the human base quite vulnerable to attack and recovery from a Pyrrhic victory painfully slow.

Finally, we end with the Betas themselves. This faction behaves the most like a traditional RTS faction with the ability to build a base anywhere, the best defense in the game and some of the best end game units available. If you’ve played an RTS before, this faction is going to feel like home for you right off the bat. The Betas certainly feel the most well-balanced of the three factions and don’t have such huge advantages and disadvantages that the other factions prominently display. This may be because we are the most familiar with optimizing Beta-like factions in other games, but surely once people start using humans and the Goo, we’ll see that preference shift away from the Betas soon enough.

As eluded to above, the real issue with the game is the end-game balance at this point in time. The Betas have a unit called the Hand of Ruk, which is a huge powerful unit that allows you to mount smaller units onto it for more fire power. The other factions don’t have anything that comes close to neutralizing or even exploiting this unit. These balancing issues really make it unattractive to play as anything other than the Betas and that preference is clearly seen in the multiplayer head-to-head modes. Luckily, this issue is easily addressed with balancing patches or just giving the other factions a unit that can hang with the Hand of Ruk.

Aside from the late game balance issues, Grey Goo is clearly one of the best RTS games to hit the market in the past several years. With a few tweaks, we could easily see Grey Goo take the place of Starcraft 2 and find its way to the hearts of RTS fans everywhere. If you love the genre, Grey Goo is going to hit all those nostalgic heart strings in one pluck. It looks amazing, it features some really innovative faction designs and it gives you every reason to finish the single player just to see those gorgeous cut-scenes. While I am not sure that Grey Goo will be converting anyone from an RTS hater to an RTS lover, I do know a great game when I see one and Grey Goo definitely fits the bill.

This review is based on a review code of the PC version of Grey Goo developed by Petroglyph