Starbound

Maybe the best 2D sandbox ever made.

Starbound is a cheaply made indie game that has had a great reception. Your character fled a planet only to land on a new one. Now it is time to discover, explore, fight and survive in your new environment. Navigate planets and upgrade your ships to find warp gates, outposts, shops, quests and more.

Let Us Start With What Could Be A Fatal Flaw

The creators keep updating the game in an attempt to finish it. People that have bought it, and people that are waiting to buy it, have been promised a complex and interesting survival game. The creators keep adding things to it, but it is more like they are updating it rather than finishing it. Some have accused it of being constructed haphazardly and that it is proceeding aimlessly without direction until its creator’s death. Releases and updates are becoming less frequent, and people are not getting the game they were promised. Despite its additions, mods and updates, there are still a lot of people that think it lacks content.

It Has Won Awards

Starbound won the 2013 Indie Game of the Year and has been listed in the PC Gamer Top 100 Greatest PC games. This is because it has a seemingly never-ending world that you can keep exploring. The developers claim it will be finished soon, yet it has been in the early access phase since 2013, and their last patch/update was in April 2015.

It is probably the best 2D sandbox game you can find. It is not pure sandbox because you are not left completely to your own devices within each world. There is a narrative, but you can pursue it at your own leisure.

Farm, build, explore and survive

You can simply hop from planet to planet looking for treasure chests, or you can farm and hunt. You can build on different planets, or you can upgrade your ship. You can go looking for a fight and if you search hard enough then you will find one. There are seven races that you can play as, including playing as a cowboy plasma person or carnivorous plant person.

It is still at a high price for an early-access game, and it is obvious that the developers have made a lot of money and done a runner. Still, for the money you pay, you can squeeze around 60 hours of gameplay out of it.

Pros

• A deep crafting system
• Seven playable races
• Thousands of items to find
• Farming, hunting and survival mechanics

Cons

• The 2D graphics are not good
• It is a side scrolling game that some people won’t like
• Too many options and not enough action
• It can get boring