In Duskers, players assume the role of a drone operator, hopping between derelict ships to salvage scrap metal, which can be used to repair and upgrade drones and components; Fuel, which is required to move between ships; Other drones which can be recovered or looted for upgrades and so on. The game is divided into two layers: The "metagame" in which the player can configure, manage, repair and upgrade their drones and components, as well as review their fuel and resource statuses and apply salvaged upgrades to their ship. In this layer, the player decides which derelict to travel to and board next, or whether to jump to another system.
When the player boards a ship, their drones are deployed in the airlock/cargo-bay connecting their ship and the derelict. The player can then directly control each of up to 4 drones, or issue orders via a command line interface. For example, entering "Nav(igate) 1 R2" will have Drone 1 navigate to Room 2. On board the derelicts there are several hazards - Environmental dangers such as radiation leaks, and various hostile life forms and robots. The core gameplay revolves around navigating around these hazards, or in the case of enemies, luring them into other rooms, or otherwise leveraging the abilities of the drones to gain access to salvage as much as possible.
Each derelict may also contain interfaces, allowing the player to activate and deactivate sentry turrets, read crew logs and scan or survey the ship. Scrap metal is the primary currency of the game, and there are no limitations on salvaging it. Disabled drones and ship upgrades must be towed through the airlock to be retrieved.
Drones and their components will become worn through usage and damage, which contributes to their chance of failure, and can be repaired with scrap. As the drone itself is damaged, its performance may degrade. The game ends when all drones are broken, the player will have to reset and everything goes back to square one, except for all the accumulated stats - like the amount of resources they looted, the number of enemies encountered etc - and the collected crew logs.
Reception
Accolades
Duskers won the award for "Best Other Game" at Intel Level Up 2016.[1]
Livingston, Christopher Livingston 20 days (May 23, 2016). "Duskers review". PC Gamer. Retrieved June 12, 2016.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
