GALAK-Z Review for Nintendo Switch

As a frequent and enthusiastic player of mobile games, I’ve begrudgingly gotten used to the new model of freemium games that developers have begun using more and more consistently. The sad reality of the mobile game market is fiercely competition, and it’s the only way a lot of these games can hope to stay profitable. Many of these games still offer high quality experiences, some of which I’ve even put some money into. But I’m still very much coming to terms with how this model is making its way over to consoles. Galak-Z: Variant S is one of the first such games to make its way over to the Nintendo Switch, and the translation in turns is entertaining, generous, frustrating, and bewildering.

The gameplay loop for Variant S should be familiar to anyone who’s ever played an arcade spaceship battle game. Each mission has you navigating through asteroids and space debris of all kinds, defeating enemies on your way until you reach the end of the level and clear it out to escape. In many levels you will have an option to go off the main path for a minute and fight a more challenging enemy to obtain a relic, the game’s genre-typical timed loot boxes. The format never really changes, except for small adjustments to the end conditions of certain levels. Thankfully, Galak-Z does not use a hard stamina system for entering levels; instead, you can play through each mission as many times as you want for additional loot crates as long as your ships have health, cheaply refillable with salvage points you pick up in missions.

Your pilot controls and modifies two main ships which play in pretty different ways. The titular Galak-Z is a humanoid mech with a shield in front, a chargeable close range sword attack, and a grapple arm special that can throw enemies into terrain or each other. The Galak-S, on the other hand, is a more traditionally shaped fighter ship with a shield all around it, a bullet-like projectile, and a homing missile special attack. Both come with their own unique parts and loadouts, and with a few exceptions both can be used in any mission, meaning you can play both of them equally or focus on developing your favorite. I preferred the meatiness of the mech’s sword against the slow moving fighter’s projectiles, but both were fun to pilot and fight through levels.

The presentation is overall enjoyable, with a strong Saturday morning cartoon vibe. The music is unobtrusive in missions themselves, with lively jingles and fanfares sprinkled throughout to emphasize victories and collecting materials. The visuals are actually quite strong, with menus, characters, and other art assets all feeling aesthetically cohesive. In combat, little windows with your enemies’ faces snarl at you from the top right, evoking the many inter-ship communiques I’ve seen in any number of sci-fi shows. And a few of the missions are punctuated with charming and groaning-inducingly punny scenes featuring the small cast of the threadbare story. Performance wise, the Switch’s docked and handheld modes both ran the game perfectly with little to no stuttering, and the handheld mode featured touch screen controls for all menuing, but not for the gameplay itself.

Unfortunately, the charm of the presentation wasn’t enough as the sameyness of the experience really started to take its toll on my enjoyment of the game. Each level ended up feeling very similar, with only slight differences in enemy types, stage hazards and obstacles, and map layouts. Most battles could be overcome by just ramming your ship into the enemy’s while spamming your attack, and the ones that couldn’t just felt like artificially beefed up difficulty from high enemy stats. Alternatively, staying further away from enemies and kiting them could be effective, but felt too sluggish and a little imprecise, even with full analog control of your ship.

Galak-Z is fairly generous with its rewards from daily quests, achievements, and loot chests, as well as the affordability of the game’s paid currency for what it allows you to purchase. But I just didn’t find enough compelling things to want to do with my resources. Ship upgrades were mostly flat stat boosts to damage and shielding, or at best small chances for extra elemental effects on your attacks. The robot companions, used to give you more small stat boosts and to make a defending team for the player bot arena, looked cool but didn’t change the gameplay in a way that felt different enough from the ship upgrades.

The caveat of all this, of course, is that Galak-Z: Variant S is completely free to pick up and try, and you’ll likely be able to get quite far into the game without ever putting down a cent. But even in contexts where I’m taking my Switch on the road, I feel like my limited game time would be better spent with other games that feel more at home on the console. Unless you’re absolutely in love with space combat and want to get as many different experiences as possible, you’re probably better off with another game already in your library.

Score: 5.5/10

Here is the Galak-Z: Variant S Trailer:

For more information about Galak-Z, please visit here: https://www.galakzmobile.com/

Dan Cohen

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The queer SJW gamer your parents warned you about, probably. I'll play anything once, but have a specific penchant for roguelikes, artsy puzzlers, and rhythm games.

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