Star Valor

Not worth

I am enjoying this game, though it is flawed. It's a great sandbox that allows you to do a lot of things as you please. I especially enjoy the heavy customization that the game offers for your ships by allowing you to install all kinds of modules and enhancements without needing actually to build the ship itself like in Avorion.

I'm using Avorion as a reference since it is also a space sandbox game, that I furthermore have lots of experience with.

What the game gains in ease of play by retaining most of the freedom you'd have in Avorion with ship design, it trades off with a terribly clunky travel/warp system. There are comparatively few systems, which are then connected in little clusters. Travelling within a cluster isn't always easy since while there are jumpgates they don't always lead to where you want.

You can circumvent this by warping directly there with a jump drive if it is within reach (which by the way you often have to use to travel between clusters as there are very few gates leading from one to the other). The flaw which makes using jump drives unfun is that to use them you either need a high enough energy capacity in your ship to facilitate the jump, which you are unlikely to have for a long time, or you have to carry around and use a consumable resource.

While this resource is easily purchasable everywhere, it takes up your precious cargo space and is annoying by the virtue of always having to manage it. I'd like to see this system improved, with more sectors in a tighter space. While Avorion gives you an abundance of travel and trading options, its just utterly lackluster in Star Valor.

I need to live long and prosper so I have time to put into this game.

Gives those Escape Velocity Nova vibes~

Enemy has warped in. Enemy has warped in. 9 levels higher, over and over forever. No matter where I go. Its just over and over - I forgot why I stopped playing. Oh yeah. Not fun. It's constant.

I bought this game 5 years ago, played it for a bit and then almost forgot about it. And now i'm here, i see all the cool things the dev did and i'm having a blast. Indies give us some nice stuff past decade. Waiting for the DLC to drop to spice things up :)

Fun sandbox space mining, trading, combat game

out of Early Access and it rocks. well tuned, solo play or with a fleet of my choosing, amazing. Well done. This is Eve Online without all the server BS eve has.

I don't write reviews but thought this deserved it. The people that have given this game negative reviews have 80+ hours in the game, which i think is telling. This game is really great! It's deceptively deep and gives you a lot of choices on how you want to play. Yes you can CHOOSE to cheese, but that's on you. For how cheap it is and the continuing free updates, I find myself coming back over and over because of the addictive gameplay. I always say I'm going to try something else, but I'm always drawn back to the chill gameplay of mining. Great game to lose hours in.

It's great. Arcade like action on the surface with surprising depth the more you play.

Great!

I have been playing this game for quite a long time. its what, one dude creating this game? and you have people griping and complaining about DLC's . eff this a$$ hat. There have been a few good top down, space style games that have come out in the last few years and this dude created something pretty damn special. Its nothing super elaborate or complicated, but damn its good to keep coming back to.

Seriously, pick this one up if you love space games where you can truly forge your own path. Star Valor nails the sandbox experience. Want to be a feared pirate? Go for it. A wealthy trader? Yep. A dedicated miner or a bold explorer charting the unknown? You can do all of that.

What I love:
True Sandbox Freedom: You're not locked into a single playstyle. Fight, mine, trade, explore – the galaxy is your oyster.

Ship Collector's Dream: So many ships, from tiny fighters to massive capital ships, and you can customize the heck out of them. Finding that perfect loadout is super satisfying.

Engaging Skill Tree: The skill tree actually feels impactful and lets you specialize your playstyle.

Constant Progression: Everything can be upgraded! Your ship, your gear, your skills. There's always something to work towards, which keeps me hooked.

If you're looking for a deep space sandbox RPG with tons of replayability, Star Valor is a hidden gem. Highly recommend!

Very good lots of detail fun loop, single player Eve that's actually fun

Outstanding space sim game. Tons of stuff to do, mechanics work very well and it looks and plays great. If you're a space sim fan, get this game now!

Very good Space simulation game on a 2D plane. Active dev. The game is maturing nicely.
Would gladly buy all future dlc to support @Laious (single dev). Looking foward to the Base Building DLC :D
Become a Pilot, Explorer, Miner, Scavenger, there is a lot of possible gameplay. Lots of ship to unlock by finding them or buying them at space stations. I created a fleet to destroy all my enemies and also mine everything in a sector.

Can't say enough good stuff about this game. Still active and getting updates and a DLC soon.

Probably one of the most played titles in my library of over 5k+ games on all the different platforms I play on. It's games like this that continue to cause problems with getting through my backlog. I absolutely cant wait till the base-building dlc drops! Is it a perfect game, no, but what game is? All games, even games considered masterpieces of their genre always have room for improvement and QOL enhancements. This one is no different. I can't think of another game as similar to this one other than Drox Operative and compared to that game, this one blows it away and appeals to me way way more. I think the fact that this game isn't sitting at Overwhelmingly positive reviews is damn shame. Especially with comments from people who gave negative reviews saying stuff like this "its just too real" (I'm paraphrasing)... From a SURVIVAL CRAFTING GAME, you don't say??? With 2.0 total hours of play time and "struggling not to quit" (again, paraphrasing).., WHAT??? I've spent more time trying to get an old game to work on my gaming rig than that! AYFKM! GTFOOH... I mean maybe these types of games just aren't YOUR thing. Does that make it a bad game. No. Does that make it worth giving a negative review, absolutely not.

Anyhoo.... this game is an absolute blast. It has a little bit of a learning curve, but nothing terrible. If you like ARPG games, Open world games, SURVIVAL CRAFT games, sandbox games or space combat games you will like this game. Just ignore the unhelpful negative reviews.

diablo like space action rpg with procedural generation. every playthrough unlocks new things, making the replayability high. you can choose to be a miner, trader, bounty hunter or pirate. mine asteroids, trade, salvage, craft and comple missions. lots of depth, worth the price and at sale a real bargain.

MY CAPS LOCK IS ON BECAUSE IT GIVES MOVE SPEED BOOST.

Very addictive gameplay. Start as a small nimble ship and end up as a slow hulking dreadnought of death, or maybe a fleet of dreadnoghts.

Fun, fast paced 2D game with a lot of stuff to do and a lot of depth and optimization possible. You can fight, trade, mine, craft, explore, assemble a fleet, scavenge. The gameplay loop is very satisfying and there is also a lot of replay value since there are a lot of potential playstyles as well.

I frikin love this game.
i cant wait for the base building DLC.
totally worth the price.

I liked the concept of the game but the implementation was not that great. The gameplay is not fun... its clunky navigation and fighting .... its too realistic and annoying to play - its a game but feels like I am wasting my time.... I was tryuing not to quit and hoping it would get better, but it didn't.

YES, AND NO !!!!!

I'm loving so much of the game but there are a few things that are really pissing me off. two of the largest issues i've got is loosing time. The game SHOULD have a working auto save but so far i have it set all the way down to 1 minute and still there is no constant saving and i've lost another couple hours this last time I had found and bought then upgraded many things, added an extra 2 ships to my fleet and actually spent a long while mining. And today I LOST ALL of it and i'm back so far that i no longer have the extra PCM loot collector, my spare refinery is now blue instead of purple, i don't have the xtra ships... I mean fk... this is probalby several hours gone because it didn't save it, even when i queit the game i'm sure it said that i saved it before hand. NOW fk... i hate that loss in time. Along with all the lost ancient artifacts. Drives me up the wall.

the other huge issue that's driving me nuts is when i warp in my fleet and we collected a lot of stuff or i'm transporting stuff from one system to another to sell and for whatever reason there is a mass DUMPING of cargo in space. So I have to fly around it to pick it all back up. I pulled off the cargo expansion stuff from those ships and it seemed to reduce the number of times this happens but it hasn't stopped.

OUTSIDE of those complaints. I really like the background music, the pretty space enviroments, the massive amounts of places to go. Even if some of them get a little repetative. I'm personally fond of mining but i wish there was a little more with it. But it is like a very simple version of Eve for that matter. (so long as you got a lvl 3 trading item that records prices and tells you highest and lowest.

This game has huge potential. I would love to see them include a way to make and or upgrade ships, and space stations so you maybe have a better method of protecting your goods or make it as a trade hub. But ignoring my ideas or wants.

What the game does have is great customization, upgrade different types of weapons, little perk bonuses for doing things. Just so so much. it is great. EXCEPT for those things that are driving me up the wall.

IF you buy this game , remember to SAVE SAVE SAVE... because i fking can't stand loosing game progress and rolling back huge chunks of time.

So I struggle with this game, because it is very much a sandbox with a light story. There is a lot of repetition and progression is mostly just grinding til you have enough money to buy a better ship. There is some level gating, but in this game, it doesn't work well, because the items you can get ahead of time you can't use properly because you can't field the equipment you need to use it. In the end it's a game where you are in space, Earth has been taken over by aliens, and you have to decide whether to get involved or just do your own thing. The gist of this game is that you do what you want to and it doesn't hold your hand. Took me a long time just to figure out how to use drones. Google is your friend. If you like games where you craft and gather resources, build a fleet of ships or trick out one to be your private Idaho, then this is the game for you. If you want a game with more guidance and story to move you along, this isn't it. This is a game for those who like to struggle, who like single saves, and remember when being good at Asteroids was the cool thing to be.

Game a good top down space game.
I would recommend the game.

I was permanently banned from the community forums for making a joke.

some seriously salty soy behaviour by an over zealous admin =)

Overall, its a down toot, purely for the ban happy forum admins.

Im cautiously revising my review back to "recommend" after my fleet and my savegame were restored.

I am concerned that if I dont pay close attention my fleet will become "disconnected" again, but for right now I just travel with all ships all the time. My savegame was restored after reinstalling the game.

If the game freaks out again, Ill revise this....

Star Valor is a very cleverly designed game, For a game that doesn't really have a main story, it is surprisingly very replayable and coded extremely well. I've sunk over 300 hours into it, on multiple characters and it still remains a good game to either go crazy with or relax too. I have only had one crash, and that was due to me running too many browser tabs at once at the same time as playing, The only little bugbear is that after a long time of playing, it seems to take a while longer to save, but this is not a serious issue compared to saving times of other games I've played. Truly, it's worth playing and I think the developers have made a masterpiece.

I absolutely love the concept of "Star Valor." It offers a rich and immersive experience, allowing players to explore vast galaxies, engage in intense space battles, and tackle challenging missions. The ship customization is impressive, and the graphics and art style create a vibrant universe.

However, I’ve encountered persistent crashes, especially when trying to save my progress, which is incredibly frustrating. It disrupts the flow of gameplay and hinders my enjoyment of the otherwise fantastic mechanics and design. I want to recommend this game to friends, but I can’t until these technical issues are resolved. I hope the developers can fix these bugs soon, as I’d love to dive back in and fully enjoy what "Star Valor" has to offer!

I can't figure out if I like it or not...give me another 150 hrs and I'll let you know.
Look at all these numbskulls play a $25 game for 50 or 100 hrs then leave negative review saying there's nothing else to do. And if you like the actual gameplay then multiple playthroughs are sweet with different background and perks. I think next run I'm going to work towards a Vhengi laser cruiser. Playing rebels would probably be even more challenging with way less bases around.
Remember Diablo 2 when you couldn't wait to go again as the sorceress? I played the hell out of that game and I honestly don't remember the story.

Underwhelming. Endless Sky is better and free. Yet another bland indie title that over promised and under-delivered.

I actually enjoyed the game for quite a while, yet the "end" pissed me off SO MUCH that all I remember when I think of Star Valor is my anger. WTF did you do, game?


In the last mission that Sam gives you, you get a choice. Basically, the game tells you NOTHING about what is coming but you can tell your dumb buddy that "Yo mah bro I'm gunna be a lone wolf" or "Something something scoundrel". Whatever, it explains nothing and so I thought yearh I don't want this annoying Sam to possibly permanently be in a fleet with me, so I choose lone wolf.

Well, that royally effs your game because now reputation is LOCKED for important factions, so you can't really play anymore as you wish. WHY? This is such a stupid option. Even if it warned you that by making a choice you'll permanently eff your savegame it would be stupid because what good reason is there to lock rep up just because I talked to an annoying buddy of mine? NONE! THAT'S RIGHT, NONE!


A minor annoyance that I would have gladly glossed over what I found a fairly enjoyable game (up until it killed my savegame and I won't play anymore) is that QoL often really sucks. I can't search for a specific weapon, I can't filter my huge base inventory. Why yes I'm a hoarder, judge me if you like. But I like to have a huge stash of different weapons -- luckily the game does not limit station size, which I LOVE. But finding anything is a real pain, it is very unorganized (the sort order isn't even clear to me).

Also the Trader Codex 3.0 can't be looked into (like a table of visited stations), I have no idea it seems to record old data or something but the stations it shows as having an item do not have it. That also sucks, trading would be a fun mechanic but it pretty impossible. Maybe it only shows where an item can be sold? Then it's useless. Why does it not record ship inventory as well? It is annoying to hunt for specific rare equipment like the Large Miner Reactor.

I liked the mining, I wish it had a bit more depth.

I hated fleets, hated them SO MUCH, the AI is just so dang stupid. Even collateral splash damage (purple "Peacemaker" in both x8 Hephaestus hardpoints for the lulz) damages your allies which then become hostile. Very annoying. Generally the AI is super duper stupid, enemies switch between attacking and fleeing so they become "locked" going back and forth when you're just the right distance from them.

Also I really don't understand the rarity of some elements. Like Silicon, which is super valuable. Do you know what silicon is? It is LITERALLY SAND. There's a ton in the universe. If it's so rare, just change the name to something that is actually rare. And why do I not need silicon to manufacture microchips? Seems like it's the most important ingredient. Instead that's copper, smh.

I don't know, man. This has a lot of promise but it seems the dev is focusing now on the DLC instead of polishing up the base game and giving it some much-needed QoL improvements. Yes, that's not sexy. Yes, it won't bring revenue. But, dude.

All of this and I would still give it thumbs up if it were not for that ridiculous stupid ending which locks your reputation. This is the absolutely dumbest thing ever. WHY WHY WHY

Edit: And oh my goodness what a royal pain it is to transfer items from one starship to another, especially if you have a huge weapons stash. They all go into the huge "pool" and since you cannot filter or search there, it is a painstaking process to find them all again to equip them into your new ship. Why can't I search, filter, and sort my weapons stash? This would be such a huge QoL improvement: Give me all missiles which have homing capability with space 4 or less, sort by DPM descending. That would be AMAZING.

Great sandbox game with lots of depth, similar to Escape Velocity of old.

There aren't any obvious quick shortcuts to go all out, has a decent grind for money, lots of customization options and career choices.

The only thing I miss in it it's some kind of campaign or story mission to make it more engaging to see it through to the end.

I would like to give this a positive review, but after a while you realize that there's not really an end game or anything to aspire once to once you have reached that point. It's okay if you just want to play a casual space shooter and blow up some ships. but outside of that this game feels very unfinished and the dev is releasing DLC for more money. I'm just not a fan of that business model of releasing minimum viable products.

Good

Rating: 8.2
Gameplay: Sandbox done right.
Story: Good, your brother is Sam Holo lol
Difficulty: Harder then NMS but it's easy to pick up, fun and hard to master
Graphics: 3d, top down and crude ships but the game is pretty like most space games.
Play Time: Endless
Price: Worth it, it's a steal on sale.
Bugs: None
Audience: Everyone
Grind: Multiple leveling systems, average economy structure and a lot of exploration
Misc: There are better for the genre. This game is a good break from it and should only be picked up if you love the genre or wish to get into the genre. I updated my review because it impressed me late game with the expanding universe.

Very nice game just very limited content to play.

Controls are awful.

Example: you put a gunner in a turret then he shoots an ally because a fast pirate flies by. No, you can't issue hold fire. You'd have to remove the gunner to stop shooting.

Example 2: mining drones force you to target an asteroid to launch despite having "auto targeting" for drones.

Weapon balance is awful.

I am not quite sure what the trigger is for anything going "red". Pirates are often yellow and my gunners refuse to engage.

Missiles that track will run into allies rather than reacquiring a new hostile target or detonating immediately if no valid targets are in range. I shouldn't have to point this out as being stupid.

Great game so many ideas i barely get to lv 20 before i want to try something else.

an old school game that only will be appreciated by +45 :D
and if you had an Amiga back in the day you will feel back the same taste of those good old games.

Really Disappointed

I wait over two years for this game to get any kind of update to have any actual content. And now i just saw that the basebuilding dlc will be a paid DLC and we still don't have any actual content to play like faction wars. Somehow the base game doubled in price also???

This game is just switching and gearing up 3-4 ships in 15 hours to than have nothing to do besides killing enemies with an abysmal ai you outclass with your op gear anyway.

There is nothing more than flying throu random maps to do the same stuff over and over again without any reason (for what do you need ressources anymore when your fully geard).

There is no suspense, no story, no coherent map. Just emptiness to fly through.

Although its a different genre, it's scratching that Sid Meier's Pirates! itch. Wish that dufus would remake Pirates! instead of another Civ. Anyway, Star Valor really kept my interest. I now support the Patreon and am looking forward to the DLC that will fill in some of the gaps in gameplay for this title.

It's fine. There's some fun stuff, but there's nothing really new or outstanding about the game. Most of it is rinse and repeat. There's a lot of micromanagement of ship items and an okay crafting and upgrade system. Trade seems like the weakest way to play the game, as you'll just be fly around port to port and the flip profit on items is pretty low. Mining is the next weakest path, as it just takes forever, although ultimately it will give you unlimited wealth - again there's not much you can do with it. You buy a bigger ship and then... keep mining. That's about it. Combat is kinda weak until you get drones and they just win for you. Scavenging is the best path to free stuff. At the end though, there's nothing no matter what you do. Maybe it's a metaphor of life. Anyway few if any bugs and the UI is nice. 7/10 probably never open it again.

Things that would improve the game:
Any End game content at all
Being able to build space stations?
Some sort of asteroid shield that prevented your large ships from being stopped by them for no reason. The mass of a tiny rock is enough to slow down a 1.5 million dollar end game tier 6 ship.
NPCs of some kind? There's basically one, and he's your buddy or something, then you finish his quest and he leaves forever.
A plot or a story other than "Aliens took over the universe, and go!"
Not sure what else, this type of game usually suffers from the same problems ultimately. You Space trade/pirate/explore until you get tired of doing it and that's it.

so far a varied experienced game. There is multiple ways of playing it that can fit to many mind sets. Still has some minor gameplay glitches that pop up but they are NOT consistent. I like the fact that this game is playable on the less robust computers out there. Still learning about it and playing it.
Pirtaes for the win so far.

Fun for combat and ship design, that's it.
If that is your jam, pick up this game cheap, imo, b/c it's not worth $25.

My main gripe after ~115 hrs, there is not enough story content. All that there really is for the player to do is grind for mats to experience ship design or combat.

Awesome space game. Recommended.

The game is great, but it seriously lacks a direction. It needs a real end goal that you just don't need to complete.
It would have been easy to do too. Just make the factions on the map more meaningful, and slowly encroach. Make us need to take out specific command points/ships/bases in the faction and as you do so, a boss ship could track you down. It would start too strong to defeat, but defeat more of the faction on the run and you weaken it to beat eventually.

That said, the game has insane self-imposed challenge potential, and with the diversity in the ways you can go through the game it is nice to just make new runs over and over.

The upcoming base building DLC is the last thing this game ever needed, as traversing the nodes on the map takes you far away from any specific location and there's no real point once you clear that area, so going back is boring.

Pros:
+Ship diversity.
+New runs can be vastly different.
+Quite a bit of weapons and armors to fine, though the values are pretty boring, it is nice you can tier up.
+Tons of potential for self-imposed challenges
+Difficult unlocks to really give you a goal if there ever was one for this game.
+INSANE levels of power in long term files if you put a lot of effort into finding and raising crew.
+Challenge runs under dire circumstances are possible the more you unlock.
+High quality for what the game is, definitely no regrets getting this. Just give it some time for you to get rolling.

Cons:
-No real end-game,
-Combat is kind of boring once you get any decent at it. Enemies can be a threat but it's very one-dimensional. The biggest danger is just overextending your power and getting swatted like a fly.
-Asteroid fields are a joke sadly. Super cool but the damage is too low to be interesting.
-Lack of diversity in nodes. There are some, but none are very interesting. Space should have more threats in the zones you end up in.

I definitely hope to see more games from this developer. Particularly I'd love to see their next project have some real combat depth. Skill expression is something I think they could do really well on a different project, but this one has kind of run its course for development. Whatever they do, I hope they stick with the idea of a good equipment system, just without the Relic function in this game.