A fun indie game that is simple enough to pick up but rarely involves any deep strategic planning.
+ In Eufloria you control asteroids and tiny seedlings, and I mean control in the very loosest sense. The only thing you are in control of is where to send seedlings and then which trees to plant. The two trees you get to choose from are Dyson trees, which regularly spawn new seedlings, and defense trees, which launch attack missiles if enemies get within range of the asteroid. Both of these trees are automated and leave you sitting and waiting most of the time. Each asteroid (and likewise each seedling produce by an asteroid) has a unique combination of three stats: energy, strength, and speed. At first you can't view the stats of asteroids that you haven't discovered yet, but in general the larger asteroids produce stronger and faster seedlings. Your general goal is to collect seedlings, send them to new enemy-controlled asteroids, and take over that asteroid. You can then plant new trees by spending 10 seedlings to help defend your new asteroid and produce new seedlings. Later in the game each asteroid will occasionally spawn a flower which can be planted on top of trees to produce either much stronger seedlings (for Dyson trees) or mines that will attack in four directions instead of one like the seedlings (which can be made by planting flowers on defense trees). Other than that the game is really simple, repetitive, and not very engaging. You just decide when to plant new trees, where to send your seedlings, and continue this process until you defeat all the enemies in a level. It would have been more interesting to have a few more trees or a few seedlings. Or at least have more control over the attacks rather than just clicking and dragging seedlings to move to a different asteroid. A real big annoyance, too, is the lack of rally points. In later levels when you have lots of asteroids under your control you have to manually click and send the seedlings from distant asteroids to a closer asteroid. Another problem is that the AI can be extremely relentless. The best tactic is to attack as soon as you can and with all your seedlings in a blitzkrieg fashion. It works on most of the levels but there are various levels where you really have only one right path. Still, the game can be fun and addicting but in general I think the vibe is supposed to be calm and relaxing. It's kind of confusing to have a real time strategy game be relaxing, so perhaps that's why I was somewhat misguided.
Story/Presentation: 2/5
+ Before and after each level there is a text box which describes the events which are supposed to be happening. The story is not really engaging but it does provide enough motivation to prevent the game from being totally mindless.
Graphics: 3.5/5
+ The graphics have their own style to them in accord with the relaxing theme. The colors are calm and pleasing just like the animations of the seedlings and trees. A unique feature that Eufloria uses is a very extensive zoom which can go from seeing all asteroids at once to right up on the individual tree branches. The zooming is quick and easy, and makes the game just a little more beautiful. What I didn't like was how the camera locked itself in place sometimes when I wanted to scroll around farther.
Value: 3/5
+ I ended up playing the game for over 13 hours even though my completion time for the levels was less than 10. This just meant that in the early levels when you're still getting used to things you'll have to replay levels quite frequently. After you beat it you unlock quite a few new modes which I might revisit but I'm not entirely certain of. It does offer you plenty of game time though, and is well rounded for an indie strategy game.