Last night a few friends introduced me to what is possibly the best smartphone party game I’ve ever played: Spaceteam. Billed as a “cooperative shouting game”, the game is played on up to four mobile phones or tablets (Android or iPhone), all of which need to be on the same WiFi. Once you’ve passed that particular hurdle, you just need to start up the game and hit go.
What follows is a beautiful chaos. Each player has four or five randomly generated set of sci-fi style panels, with knobs to twiddle, switches to flip and buttons to press. Instructions will come up on each player’s screen – “set retrorockets to 4!”, “engage the quantum doodad!”, “caramelise the onions!” – and chances are they won’t have the relevant control on their own instrument panel.
So they have to shout out the command, and hope that the person who does have that particular control hears them, and does it. Also, sometimes there are asteroids, and everyone has to shake their phones manically for a few seconds. Or, there is a wormhole, and everyone has to invert their phones.
Of course, this means there is shouting almost all of the time, and the challenge lies in communicating effectively.
If you miss too many commands, then your spaceship eventually blows up. On the other hand, if you succeed at doing enough of these randomly chosen commands, then you reach hyperspace and move onto the next level – where you have all new panels, and also you need to do everything slightly more quickly. Also, sometimes there are levels with Star Trek style panels that shock you constantly, or leak slime everywhere, or the translator has failed and some panels are written in an alien language.
It gets increasingly frantic, but remains enjoyable throughout. I played three rounds last night, and at the end of it all I was incredibly hoarse, but also very happy.
If you’re hanging out with friends and you’re in a place where you won’t be immediately kicked out upon making a noise, then I highly recommend giving it a go.
The game is free, with the option for a £3 upgrade that provides more varied controls, hazards and other content. (This upgrade is also currently in the Android-only Humble Mobile Bundle, which is pay-what-you want).
Have you played Spaceteam? Let us know in the comments below!