Have you ever wanted to build and launch your very own rocket, design and manage your very own space station, or venture into the depths of space to uncover what lies within its infinite boundaries? If your answer to all these questions is a resounding yes, then Space Agency just might be the adventure you are looking for.
Space Agency is a sandbox simulation game from Nooleus, that’s available on both iOS and Android platforms. It may not be as appealing for everyone but it is a guaranteed treat for fans of rockets, space stations, and astronomical and planetary explorations.
At first glance, Space Agency may appear to be simplistic and very basic considering its art design and screenshots on the app page but once you dive in, you will quickly discover its share of complex and challenging mechanics, along with contents that go well beyond what you can possibly expect from a mobile game.
Space Agency lets you take command of your very own space program complete with everything you need from building and designing your very own rockets, everything there is relating to exploring the vast unknown, and getting back down to Earth safely. Space Agency is not all about planning and building as precision and strategy are also required for you to control the different machinations you launch and navigate in space as well as your rockets.
Space Agency can be picked up and enjoyed by everyone, although its concept and mechanics seem to cater more for people who can dedicate some time to learn everything there is to know about it as well as those who want to test their navigation and precision skills.
If you have just started your adventure within the world of Space Agency or about to pick it up, our beginner’s guide contains tips and strategies to conquer every challenge that comes your way and unlock everything in your adventure!
1. Complete All The Tutorial Levels
Space Agency actually holds a separate icon for its tutorials on the main screen of the app. While this feature certainly breaks away from the conventions of typical mobile games, the volume and scope of concepts and activities you need to know and learn in Space Agency is massive enough in that a separate game mode of sorts must be installed for you to revel in first.
Of course, you can freely hop into the other game modes but we recommend that you take on each tutorial level first. Although you can choose to play the Quick Play mode, as well as Sandboxes, or even Career, not having the slightest idea on what to do will make the entire gameplay impossible, if not very difficult. Going through the entire set of tutorial stages actually prepare you for just about any challenge you will encounter later on in your adventure.
There are 11 stages to complete within the tutorials arranged from launch to landing. Although you can complete the sessions in whichever order you choose, we recommend taking it on following the sequential order as doing so will condition you to remember everything in proper order once you venture into the other game modes.
Each stage within the tutorials come with a briefing, which outlines the objectives you have in that particular mission. Briefings can be a long read but are certainly worth the effort given the information they provide you, which are useful all the way through your adventure. From stage 2 through 11, you can even play a demo of the mission first before attempting it.
In most cases, seeing how the mission is accomplished through the demo makes it a lot easier to understand what needs to be done in the mission. To some extent, you basically need to mimic what the demo gameplay shows you although you can expect that actually doing it will be a lot more challenging.
Beyond merely having a more solid idea about the kind of challenges that await you in Quick Play, Campaign, and even Sandbox Mode, going through the tutorial missions give you a good feel of just how much precision and skill plays a vital role in your space agency operations. While clearing each stage will certainly boost your skills and give you a firmer grasp of each set of controls, it will certainly take a little longer for you to master every bit of it.
As an extra layer of challenge for players who want to push the limits of their skills, you can always attempt to finish a tutorial stage prior to watching the demo. In essence the demo makes it feel like playing through a game with a walkthrough in hand and cuts down the level of challenge the mission has to offer. It is your call, after all, but so long as you complete the entire tutorial play through, you are good to go in taking on the rest of Space Agency’s contents.
2. Consider Quick Plays As The Next Level Challenge
With the tutorial levels handing you a demo on top of pursuing a comparatively simpler set of objectives, the experience and training you earn will still remain lacking after its completion. Do not get us wrong, though, as there is a lot to learn from engaging in each of the tutorial levels especially for complete beginners.
There is always an option to take on tutorial levels repeatedly but we recommend considering the Quick Play levels as the next step towards progression. The Quick Play Mode in Space Agency provides players with 7 distinct practice missions that aim to further improve a variety of skills, most especially launching and maneuvering. In essence, each mission is categorically more challenging than any of the set objectives in practice mode but limitations imposed in a way makes it easier than the actual campaign.
Despite only having objectives to guide you through accomplishing each Quick Play mission, having rockets and payloads basically complete and ready to go is a huge help. The challenges will mostly revolve around actually having sufficient levels of piloting and maneuvering skills that may not be as polished up from your tutorial level play through.
You also do not need to follow the order of each mission as each one is fully independent from the rest. If any, you should consider taking note of the rocket setups and payload involved with the mission relative to the mission’s objectives. Building everything from scratch will serve as yet another huge chunk of the challenges you will take on outside of tutorials and quick play levels.
While you can expect to accomplish the objectives within the tutorial levels with an attempt or a couple, depending on how much of the demo you can assimilate in your actual attempt, you should normally expect the levels in quick play mode to require a lot more attempts especially since you will be performing bits of trial and error along the way. Again, Space Agency is a game that requires a lot of patience, perhaps even more than skill and precision.
Keep in mind that while some of the Quick Play missions will resemble campaign stages as far as the objectives and missions go, along its limitations are the limited resources available, which in turn do not provide for much deviation from the set targets at hand. While strictly speaking there may be more than one way to accomplish the challenges in quick play, the possibilities still pale in comparison to just how much differently you can do things in the campaign as well as the sandbox modes.
3. Take On The Campaign Stages
It is highly likely that the time you spend trying to clear every mission in quick play will greatly exceed the time you needed to pass through each of the tutorial levels. If you have successfully conquered all the above contents, or at least a bigger portion of it, then you are finally ready to take on the real missions in Space Agency. Considering everything we have discussed so far, the campaign levels will prove to be the biggest set of challenges to conquer in the game and there are 37 levels that you need to clear one after another.
At this point in time, you should already have a good grasp of all the operations of your space agency as far as navigations and piloting are concerned. Having gone through a wide variety of missions as well, you should already have a good level of familiarity with the different rocket parts and payloads required specifically for each mission. However, there is still plenty of things to learn from each campaign stage and your skill levels can still be improved, as you will come to discover.
Each of the missions in the campaign mode is unique although some will have a semblance of familiarity with some of the missions you tackled in the tutorial and quick play game modes. We will not be going through missions one by one as doing so will require a lot more than what we can cover within a beginner’s guide. There are, however, available walkthroughs you can find if you find yourself stuck in a particular mission.
Given that the campaign stages serve as the main game mode in Space Agency, the ultimate reward for completing each available stage are the parts that you can unlock and use in the sandbox mode. Note that beyond building the needed rocket or assembling the needed payload is a huge part of the challenge, you will also be face with budget constraints within which you should be able to work with.
Missions in the campaign have minimum requirements to comply with in terms of costs incurred, the time it takes for you to complete the assignment, and whether or not you chose to use checkpoints. While securing the bronze award will sufficiently unlock the next mission, accomplishing the stage with a gold reward will unlock more parts for you to tinker with in the sandbox mode.
Taking mission 1, which is Satellite Launch, as an example, your basic objective is to launch a satellite into orbit, much like one of the earliest missions in the tutorial. What makes this more challenging is that you have to be able to build the rocket with the satellite on your own, as well as work within the limits of the allocated budget. Of course, you will also have to comply with the limited period of time set to achieve the objective.
As one of many possible combinations, you can use a Mercury 1st Stage, Connector Small to Small, Tug Module, the Communications Satellite, and a Fairing Standard to comply with the basic requirements of the rocket you need to launch into orbit. All these parts will have a total cost of $4,750,000, which well within your $8,000,000 allocated budget. Following the launch into orbit, you will need to use the thrusters so that the satellite’s dish will be oriented facing the Earth. Finally, press the release button to complete the mission.
For this mission, the bronze award will be obtained if you spend less than $8,000,000, take less than 2 minutes to complete the mission, and use checkpoints. A silver award will be acquired if you spend less than $6,500,000, take less than a minute and a half to accomplish the objective, and use checkpoints. Finally, the highly coveted gold award can be unlocked if you spend less than $4,750,000, take less than a minute and 20 seconds to accomplish the mission, and never used any checkpoints.
You should not expect to secure a gold award on your first attempt, especially without looking into guides or walkthroughs on how to go about each mission. In essence, Space Agency’s campaign missions are like complex puzzles that require some analytical thinking and experimentation to solve, on top of having precision and maneuvering skills as well as basic knowledge and understanding of different parts.
In all honesty, we do not wish to discourage anyone with the occasional mentions or statements of just how much challenging Space Agency is compared to most games we played not just on mobile but across all gaming platforms as well. Accomplishing missions, one after another, is certainly a feat to be proud of as it certainly takes a lot of time and effort to achieve any mission with or without help from guides and other players.
4. Get To Know Parts And How Each One Works
Space Agency currently holds 135 different parts that you can use to design and build your very own rocket. You will only be able to use a small fraction of these parts in the initial missions you take on in your career and some will perhaps be left for your own exploration once you have started building your own rocket in sandbox mode.
Available parts as well as budget constraints remain as limiting factors that may prevent you from fully utilizing your creative juices in the campaign missions and perhaps more so in the tutorial and quick play challenges. Once you have unlocked all the available parts, however, there will hardly be any limits for your imagination to run wild with your very own creations in sand box mode.
Despite its limitations, however, the campaign mode still offers a wide avenue for you to get to try different parts. Just like in the example we presented in our discussion of the campaign’s first mission, what we recommended is just one of many possible combinations you can try to assemble that will still yield a fairly similar result of clearing the mission. With budget being among the constraints you have to work with, though, what you build can never go beyond the allotted budget you have for that mission.
You can tap on each part available and additional information on them can be seen. Although this may not be as helpful in most cases, some actually have information you can compare with alternatives, specifically what the part can do that others cannot or important info on some parts like lifting power and fuel capacity.
Regardless of the information presented, what is mostly important when it comes to parts is for you to have a basic understanding of what each one does and what parts stand as alternatives to them. If you feel that you still have much to learn in the campaign or sandbox modes even after completing the entire tutorial as well as the quick play levels, then you should know that reveling in the thrill of mixing and matching different available parts, as well as engaging in a series of trials and errors, contribute to what makes Space Agency a unique simulation of how to run and manage your very own space agency.
And this ends our Space Agency beginner’s guide. There is certainly a lot more to learn and discover on your own as you dive deeper into the campaign stages as well as uncover more parts to use in sandbox. If you happen to discover some other useful tips and strategies in addition to what we have already shared, feel free to share them below in the comments!