Particle Fleet: Emergence

I killed all the coronavirus in this game :D (Pro tips below too)
Honestly, I prefer Creeper World 3 over this for a better value, replayability and fun. That isn't to say Particle Fleet isn't worthy, it's a much shorter game (albeit I didn't spend time on custom ships or community maps) that brings refreshing mechanics and ways to play the game in the same engine - controlling limited ships instead of towers.
The game focuses a lot more on strategic positioning than being able to rush, with a sense of capture the flag for expanding energy production (e.g. there's no reactors building, only terrain mining). Technically speaking, it works, but in practice I found myself having less fun than ❤️❤️❤️❤️ing around and finding out, pushing the game to its limits.
Some later missions are kinda hard: the ships have weak spots in their back (losing thrusters is almost guarantee death), enemy emitters are unforgiving fighting you back aggressively when damaging them, and it's easy to get overwhelmed on micro-managing good positions for 6+ ships. Wouldn't say it's stuff to avoid, there's a nice challenge in this.
All achievements are easily obtainable in ~4-5 hours of gameplay, by finishing the campaing.
Pro tips:
• Use all your EMP points in tech, especially range, defensive cannons. Ship upgrades aren't that much worth it,
• Spamming and moving collectors in the enemy terrain is very effective to capture land, let the cannons do the job.
• If you're stuck in level 15 and 16 with that Big Bertha cannon eating you (like a lot of reviews lol), just hide your main ship behind the top left terrain and add one or two decoy ships in front (can be a hammer), keep cover in the terrain always. You'll lose ships often, but rebuilding them is not an issue on safe terrain.
Worth on a sale, definitely not full price unless you have a history of sinking hours and hours in community maps!

At first, I didn't really like this game. A big reason for that is the game does a poor job of explaining what each weapon does and how certain mechanics work. Additionally, the default ships are fairly underwhelming, which can make it feel like most of them don't have much of a niche. However, once I replayed the game, spent time making custom ships, and did lots of playtesting with them, I was able to understand what everything does. This game is very fun once you know what you're doing and built your own fleet. The campaign is the weakest point of the game. Its real strength comes from the ship editor, map editor, bonus missions, etc. You should just play the campaign to learn the CW lore, while the real experience starts *after* the campaign. It's an excellent game that just does a poor job of advertising its strengths to you.

It's basically creeper world but in space. It's good if you like creeper world. It also probably takes place in the same universe as the creeper world stuff. is what i thought before i got past level 15. anyways. there's more text exposition than normal creeper world games, so if you don't like that then you might not enjoy the story as much.

So, if you liked CW1 and 2, you can play with confidence. Read other reviews for gameplay pros and cons; personally I didn't have much trouble with the user interface, but your mileage may vary. Also I found the game easier to beat than CW1 or 2. Note! -- don't try to beat the game using a fleet of your own design, the story won't advance. (But you can go back and replay the story using your own fleet and crush the game speedily.)
If you've read reviews complaining about the story being some kind of hopeless timeloop, I won't spoil the details but I'll give a brief explanation.
1.) The "prologue" is actually an "epilogue" to the epilogue. The final mission explains what's happening in the "prologue".
2.) The game timeline is linear, and for game story purposes starts in the "naivety" first mission.
3.) The story is a sequel to CW2 and 1. But not an immediate sequel. Plot has happened since CW2 and eventually you'll uncover the plot which will also (sort of) explain the "particulate" "emergence".
4.) The game does end with a hopeful hook into CW3, which I haven't played yet so I don't know how well it will really fold into the ongoing plot. (So I may remember to update this review once done. I've read indications the plots don't fold well, and this game does just flat ignore some plot details developed in CW2 while recontextualizing what was supposedly going on there.)

Actually found this 8 years after its release, still an awesome Knuckle Cracker relaxing/little bit of thinking game.

Creeper world with less attractive physics but more dynamic gameplay where you have an army of ships that you are constantly moving on the map. If you want to you can easily can get hooked by the campaign.
7/10

It's pretty good, I'm not far into the campaign but it is challenging. And the music is delightful, I listen to it outside the game. Seems at this time I have 8 parts left from 20. It'll be a hike. Have fun!