And once you get past the dated graphics and sound, you'll find a quite immersive real-time strategy game that will probably suck many hours of your life awway. It has a rather rough learning curve, and some of its 'traditions' seem rather silly, but once you get into the groove of the game and start to have units that can actually hold their own in a battle, you'll find that there's a lot to enjoy.
There's a plotline here, but it's nothing that anyone would much care to remember. It involves some humans on Earth getting transported across galactic space to an alien planet, where they quickly devolve into a tribelike manner. Of course, along with this cultural devolution, they continue to progress in the sciences--one has to wonder if these two things aren't usually more opposite. And then the inevitable alien attack occurs, but instead of getting back together, the world of Shattered Galaxy fight each other and the aliens.
One of the first things to wrap your head around is the fact that the sides don't matter in the sense that they don't change the way the game is played. Indeed, every once in a while Nexon rearranges the various sides, making sure that everyone gets some variety as to who they play with. So giving a list of faction names is silly; they're A, B, C, and D for all the game cares, and while you should definitely play to have the faction you're currently in win, you shouldn't become too terribly attached to them.
The game itself consists of two distinct parts--the wandering around the world RPG style bit, and the real-time-strategy combat bit. The wandering around is sort of a 'filler' between battles; you can go to various locations and repair your units or buy new ones, upgrade their abilities and so on. You can also walk between all the various territories on the world map. This makes for a nice touch of realism; if you want to participate in a battle half the globe away, it'll take you a good two or three real-time minutes to get there, as your character walks between the various portals that divide the lands.
Once you get into battle, the game goes into a more standard RTS mode. You'll be controlling a small group of units--six at the start, increasable by raising one of your statistics. The difference between this game and most RTS games is that there are usually a dozen people on either side controlling units, making teamwork an absolute must. The general flow of battle is usually similar; you're either attacking enemy territory or defending home territory. Either way, there are a number of Points of Contention on the map, which look like big circles with pizza wedges sliced out of them. They all start off belonging to the defender, and it's up to the attacker to control a majority of them before the twenty-minute battle timer runs out.
The core mechanics are very much based on RTS sensibilities, with a few leanings towards the RPG side. Your units gain experience in battle, and even if they get destroyed you can repair them practically for free afterwards. You've got the anti-air units, the fast infantry, the bombers, and everything in between. You'll start off with the base models of the various units, but as the game progresses you can upgrade their chassis to more advanced forms and jam new and spiffier weapons into their cockpits. It actually works quite well; the default setup is good enough, but the tweakfiends who spent hours adjusting their MechWarrior 2 designs will find a lot to enjoy here as well.
And so it goes. Land switches back and forth often, and you're never at a loss for money or resources, making the limiting factor your various attribute levels. You gain attribute points by gaining 'levels'; there are four basic classes of units (infantry, mobile artillery, air, and organic) and as you gain a skill level in each of the classes you gain one more attribute point, along with strenghtening your units of that class. It's a nice system, and it keeps things interesting.
