Space Rangers 2 is the type of game that can easily pass underneath the radar. It's just one of those whacky "European games" from a developer, Elemental Games, that I've never heard of until recently, and considering its competition, I'd probably leave it on a store shelf and go on with my life, completely unaware that it's one of the best and most rewarding PC titles of 2006.

In a sense, Space Rangers 2: Rise of the Dominators is the Elder Scrolls of space-themed videogames in that, while there is a central theme and mission that you can take in order to beat the game, you're free to do whatever the hell you want, and the environments are so massive that you can lose yourself in it for days. It's also a difficult game to classify, as it belongs in no particular genre. The game has many faces and each can provide you with a deep and gratifying experience. Plus, it's one of those games that's entirely what you make of it. You can elect to stay the course and save the universe from the threat of total annihilation, or completely ignore the conflict and carve your own path.

The main quest that I speak of is the battle against the Dominators, this group of merciless robots that are hell bent on destroying all life. You can opt to take it right to them, fight them once and a while, or just pretend like they don't exist and just screw around. But regardless of which path you take, you're going to have a satisfying gameplay experience, and the best part about it is no two games will ever be the same. The universe in this game is just so dynamic that you'll literally have your own set of stories to share with other people that playing the game, who will in turn have their own tales to tell. Plus, everything exists in a persistent world that's always in a constant state of change. Allies will die, planets will be taken over, friends will declare you as their enemy, and prices of items will rise and fall depending on how all of these things affect the market, but I'm getting ahead of myself. It's best to start at the beginning, where the decisions that you make will forever shape your destiny.

As soon as you begin a new game you're bombarded with options and that's normal, as Space Rangers 2 is one of the more option heavy games that I have ever seen. From the outset, you'll have to choose one of five races that include various alien species, including humans, as well as one of five character types, so you may elect to be a human and a pirate, or a mercenary, or one of the game's other professions, but it's important to give some thought to what you want to be, as it will dramatically affect your experience. Humans, for example, aren't liked by various aliens who may also not respect the fact that you're a mercenary, so they may not want to trade with you, and if you get caught in an especially sticky situation, the answers you provide will result in them warming up to you or blowing you to pieces.

After choosing which character you'd like to be you'll then select a space craft, and again, there's a crazy amount of options to tinker with. The ships in Space Rangers 2, there are many, differ on just about every level and it's best to select one that's best suited to your tastes, so if you plan to haul lots of cargo then you'll want a big ship, but if you'd rather zip across galaxies a smaller one is the way to go. And, there's also a bunch of weapons and items that you can equip, shields, lasers, rocket launchers; you could spend 30 minutes figuring all of this stuff out, and you haven't even started a game yet.

When you begin a game you have two options, to run through a brief tutorial, just so you can get the hang of the game's basic commands, or you can just throw yourself into the action. I strongly suggest that you run through the tutorial, primarily because it provides a solid foundation for the rest of the game to sit upon, but also because it's relatively short and the objectives are for the most part simple fetch quests.

At the conclusion of the tutorial you're tossed into space and left to your own devices, and this is where the game's enormity starts to become shockingly apparent. You see, Space Rangers 2 is like a street sign that points in a billion different directions. Elemental Games did a nice job of keeping the interface simple and highlighting the path you could take, so finding something to do is as simple as dragging your mouse along the bottom left portion of the screen, where various tips/objectives reside, but this game's pretty much a blank canvas and you're free to paint whatever you'd like. To that end, you can explore the universe, hopping to each individual solar system, each of which has its own stars and planets, you can immediately attack enemies, explore planets, buy and sell items, blow up asteroids and collect the minerals that they leave behind, and do a plethora of other things. The amount of options is just staggering.