Everything you need to know about Space Marshals 3 - Chapter Two

Posted by Campbell Bird on June 7th, 2021
+ Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad

The excellent Space Marshals 3 just released a new chapter of 12 missions, just about doubling the original release's size. In them, Burton continues his wild adventures through space taking down bounty hunters, illegal intergalactic still operators, and a bizarre space cult, as well as other cartoony, sci-fi/western baddies.

This extended set of missions costs $4.99 (or you can opt to buy the bundled full game for $7.99), so we took a look at it to see if it was worth the asking price. Given Pixelbite's history, particularly with the Space Marshals series, we were confident we'd be getting a lot of bang for our buck, and we were mostly right. Check out the video above for an extended look at most of chapter two as well as some additional impressions below.

I wish I could say Space Marshals 3 picks up where chapter one left off, but that would require me to really care about the game's narrative continuity and lore (which is pretty hard to do, if you ask me). It seems like it does in the sense that the first mission drops you into the town from the first level of the first chapter, though the town turned on you completely and you need to find a way to escape to your ship. This level seems mostly designed to reacquaint you with the game before starting to throw some new stuff at you.

Speaking of new stuff, most of this chapter revolves around new level designs that give you even more tools to take down bad guys. There are alien marshes that you can submerge under to be extra sneaky (so long as you don't run out of air!), and space ship levels where you can trap enemies in airlocks to send them out into the void. There are a few new enemy designs, too, like bounty hunters with scanners that can detect you even if you're hidden from view, and big dudes with flamethowers who are... pretty self-explanatory.

Going along with all of this is a new base of operation for Burton and his compadres, plus a whole bunch of new loot for you to unlock or buy from the bazaar. This loot can really alter your approach to a given level, but if you want to keep unlocking the coolest stuff, you'll need to make sure you aren't always busting out the big guns.

Each mission has its own "gear score" associated with it, and completing missions while not exceeding this gear score (in addition to not dying and taking down high value targets) is key to being offered a full menu of coveted loot at the end of any given level. To speak to this new gear briefly, I had a particularly fun time with this new chapter's semi-automatic sniper rifle and poison grenade launcher, though the latter can get you into trick spots of poisoning yourself to death at times.

This is all part of Space Marshals 3's fun, though. The freedom to play around in its intricate levels with a huge variety of tools--even if some of them can kill you too--is unmatched on the App Store. Sure, the enemy AI is still dumb and the story barely makes sense at all, but who cares when you're able angle a sawblade shot just right to shoot around a corner or simply hone your stealth skills to sail through a level undetected? Chapter two of Space Marshals 3 delivers more room to do these kinds of things in different ways, and I'm all for it. Keep it coming, Pixelbite. Bring on Chapter 3!

Share This: