Anh Huy Phan has brought one of my favorite genres to iOS. Star Nomad Elite($1.99) is a trimmed down, stream lined 2d space adventure game. The game notes have a shout out to Elite, Wing Commander, Privateer, Escape Velocity and Freelancer. I was a bit surprised that my favorite 2d space sim, Star Sonata wasn’t also mentioned. In any case, I had a lot of expectations going into Star Nomad. It’s a fun game from a very small indie outfit that could really take you by surprise.

Star Nomad Elite is a sandbox game, which means at least to a certain extent, you make your own objectives and goals. Want to be an ace fighter pilot? Want to be a shipping tycoon? Want to skirt the law, smuggle contraband and make big money? These are the types of goals you can work towards. The game offers you a variety of ways to make money that you can use to upgrade ships and ship equipment. You can buy cheap supplies and sell them in remote locations for a big profit. You can take on delivery, escort and hunting quests. You can buy ships that specialize in combat or shipping and outfit them with defensive and offensive capabilities. If this sounds familiar, its because there are many games just like Star Nomad Elite, except they aren’t on the app store.

So what separates Star Nomad from the pack? There are some positive things and some negative things that make Star Nomad a unique experience. The touch interface is so good it is hard to believe this is a port from a PC game. Much like Battleheart($2.99), the interface is exactly as complicated as it absolutely needs to be and not one bit more. If you are a UI minimalist, this game will have some serious appeal to you. Probably the biggest negative I can think of is that there is a lack of features when you begin to compare it to bigger PC titles. That, in and of itself, is a good thing. What Star Nomad does, it does well. With Star Nomad 2 being worked on currently, I have a feeling that sooner or later we will see most of these features. I want multiplayer the most, but this one is not on the list of planned features for the foreseeable future. Multiplayer is, in many ways, at the heart of a good sandbox. I have hope though, because the developer has been hard at work submitting updates and upgrades and giving us the skinny in our forums thread, even generously offering refunds if you don’t have a device compatible with the game.

The long and short of the gameplay is that it functions very well. Combat is harrowing and rewards you for being able to evade enemy fire. Trade routes are very profitable if you pay attention to the needs and wants of each port. Zones that are dangerous are truly scary, but they have amazing payoffs if you can manage to survive. The game is very well balanced and death has just enough sting to make you cautious. You lose your ship, but you get back the cost of your ship plus any credits you had, but that total is reduced by about 15-25%. Sometimes you have to do some work to get your ship back, but it usually isnt much more than one or two quests worth. In game NPC’s will occasionally chit chat about random things on the radio. They are a decent replacement for real humans and keep the cosmos from feeling devoid of life. They will also occasionally have a hot tip about trade routes that are particularly lucrative.

I’ve criticized other games in the past for requiring out of app reading. Even though Star Nomad Elite has a very minimal interface, it is a game that you can absolutely succeed in without going to the dev’s blog where most of the game’s info is laid out. With that said, I suggest going there just for some tips and strategies, not required but recommended. The game skates the line of not offering enough info, but stays just on this side of the boundary, at least for me. Having played this type of game before I felt very much at home behind the helm of multiple ships and module configurations. The game’s simplicity works for it in this regard.

As the follow up to Star Nomad Elite is not an additional chapter but a full sequel in Star Nomad 2, I feel fairly comfortable commenting further on the lack of features previously mentioned. There are less than 10 ships you can upgrade to, and only a grid of about 20 sectors you can travel to. Each module on your ships has a maximum of 5 or 6 upgrades you can purchase. For a game that exists alongside of something like Star Sonata, that is a very very small scope. If you can fit comfortably inside a sandbox with an itty bitty living space, you’re going to be happy picking up Star Nomad Elite.