Space Pirates and Zombies

Worth buying? What 300 Steam reviews say.Worth buying? Here’s what 300 Steam reviews actually say.

Very Positive · 92%Very Positive · 92%2011

$9.99

US Steam price, checked 2 h ago

The verdict

A charming, deep 2D top-down space shooter with fleet building and ship customization, but very grindy and repetitive, and it may fail on modern Windows. Skip it if you hate grinding.

Great for

Fans of Starsector or Escape Velocity who like ship building, tech trees and long fleet-progression grinds

Main risk

Repetitive grind and difficulty spikes, plus black screens or crashes on modern PCs

What players love

Deep ship and fleet customization

Mentioned in ~1 in 4 positive reviews

“The ship customization allows for a lot of variety, and the differing phases of the game keep it from getting tedious.”
Steam review · 92.8 h played ↗

“A huge number of ships, and even more weapon options and modifications for them and for the ships themselves.”
Steam review · translated · 34.9 h played ↗

“The ship designs are distinctive with their own mix of strengths and weaknesses and each has fully customisable loadouts”
Steam review · 45.9 h played ↗

Addictive, long-lasting and replayable

Mentioned in ~1 in 6 positive reviews

“You know that game where you check on steam and it says you've played 200+ hours and you are just like.... holy.... That's this game.”
Steam review · 157.3 h played ↗

“The game is still a masterpiece. 5th playthrough in 10+ years.”
Steam review · translated · 19.4 h played ↗

Charming 2D art style

Mentioned in ~1 in 8 positive reviews

“I also like the visuals - the colourful space looks beautiful!”
Steam review · 233.8 h played ↗

“I'm a bit of a sucker for bright colors and this game provided those in spades in an aesthetically pleasing way.”
Steam review · 124.3 h played ↗

Fun, responsive tactical combat

Mentioned in ~1 in 8 positive reviews

“responsive tactical small fleet combat”
Steam review · 36.8 h played ↗

“the combat is frantic and fun and the universe you explore is massive”
Steam review · 1.4 h played ↗

Humor, atmosphere and TotalBiscuit voice

Mentioned in ~1 in 10 positive reviews

“It's just a great and addictive game with a lot of character and humorous writing.”
Steam review · 75.5 h played ↗

Runs on low-end hardware

Mentioned in ~1 in 21 positive reviews

“Should run on a toaster.”
Steam review · 58.6 h played ↗

“Low system requirements as well.”
Steam review · 209.5 h played ↗

What players complain about

Excessive, repetitive grind

Mentioned in ~1 in 3 negative reviews

“The correct acronym for this game isn't S.P.A.Z, its S.L.O.G. Super Long Overly-painful Grind.”
Steam review · 12.9 h played ↗

“This game could have been a good 5 hour game, but it is stretched to 40+.”
Steam review · 37.3 h played ↗

“Monotonous resource farming, samey missions, pointless wandering through space, the game didn't click.”
Steam review · translated · 2.9 h played ↗

Repetitive missions and gameplay

Mentioned in ~1 in 4 negative reviews

“Starts okay, but very quickly the amount of repetitive grinding of recycled side missions required to progress starts to feel disrespectful of your time.”
Steam review · 5 h played ↗

“Very boring and monotonous. There is little mission variety.”
Steam review · translated · 12.6 h played ↗

Won't start or black screens on modern Windows

Mentioned in ~1 in 5 negative reviews

“So this game won't work on my Windows 10 4k Rig in full screen”
Steam review · 0.1 h played ↗

“I launched the game and see a black screen and a cursor.”
Steam review · translated · 0.1 h played ↗

“Used to be great, no longer launches for me in Win10.”
Steam review · 75.8 h played ↗

Difficulty spikes and poor balance

Mentioned in ~1 in 6 negative reviews

“Huge difficulty spike when entering the second ring (at least on normal) where you are out gunned and under tech level”
Steam review · 100.8 h played ↗

“Played the game on casual, get attacked by like 6 Hammerheads..”
Steam review · 47.1 h played ↗

Awkward, floaty controls

Mentioned in ~1 in 9 negative reviews

“The controls are really obtuse. It feels like I am constantly fighting the controls for..control.”
Steam review · 1.1 h played ↗

“The spaceships feel very floaty to me and inaccurate”
Steam review · 15.4 h played ↗

Zombies and bounty hunters ruin late game

Mentioned in ~1 in 14 negative reviews

“The whole last bit, with the zombies? Janky, capricious, unfun grindfest.”
Steam review · 74.2 h played ↗

“IMHO the game was ruined with the addition of the Bounty Hunters.”
Steam review · 138.4 h played ↗

System requirements

From the Steam store page

Steam Deck: Playable

Minimum

OSWindows 7/XP/Vista

Processor2.5 GHz Processor

Memory1 GB Available System Memory

Graphics256MB 3D DirectX 9 Compatible video card

Storage250 MB Available HD Space

OSWindows 7/XP/Vista

Processor2.5 GHz Processor

Memory1 GB Available System Memory

Graphics256MB 3D DirectX 9 Compatible video card

Storage250 MB Available HD Space

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