FreeGames/Transcendence

Link: http://neurohack.com/transcendence/ (See also its mod community on its forums and links page)
Genre: 2d space shooter, with trading and exploration and a plot.
Platform: Win32.
Rico factor: Two.
Multiplayer: Nope.

So, this is a bit of an oddball. I first encountered it ages ago, and it's got a bit of polish since then.
In the game, you play a spaceship in a top-down view, travelling from system to system, exploring, trading and angering various factions by destroying them and looting their bases.
And yes, you can mine asteroids. Grrr. Stupid obligatory miners.

What it does right

It's simple. Easy to understand. Gives you good feedback on whether you are doing well or not and rarely instakills you for a mistake. (You have to really upset an enemy for it to not allow you to retreat)
The plot starts off as "Get to the centre of the galaxy, something awaits you there" and grows - but nethack style most of the fun is in discovering how things work and what you can do.

It has similar randomness, allowing for a great deal of replayability (which you will probably need in order to beat it) whilst still having certain signature locations to measure your progress against.
Even after beating it there will be sub-plots (and entire factions) that you miss and are interesting enough to go back for.

It is also easy to mod - adding systems, factions, weapons etc. is easy - adding extra adventures isn't so easy, but other people have done it for you.

What it does wrong

It doesn't tell you it's a RogueLike. It looks like an arena shooter, with a much more interesting set of weapon/armour progressions. (Most armour is good against certain guns and weak against others, and you can apply upgrades on top of that. Weapons are the usual mix of fast/powerful/easy-to-use.)
It also doesn't really tell you that you can end up leading fleets of ships.
Well, I'm telling you. It is a RogueLike, approach it as such and you'll fare much better. And you can have fleets, but it's hard.

It also suffers from slight balance problems - in my opinion one of the early guns is just too good for too long, leaving you using it for ages and getting very stuck later. There's also a faction later on which drops far too much fuel, removing most of the resource management from the game.

What it doesn't tell you

F1 does tell you the keys, but it forgets to highlight the useful ones. 'u' to use items, and 's' to go view your cargo hold (to ditch stuff, or, importantly, refuel.)

CategoryGames : ComputerGame