Multiplayer shout-a-thon Spaceteam is now on Apple TV but, heck, it wasn't easy
Lost in translation?
Spaceteam is a great smartphone game about shouting instructions at your friends as you try to fix a spaceship together.
It's now on Apple TV. The question you should be asking after finding that out is: HOW?!
Henry Smith, the game's creator, has spent the past four weeks trying to answer it. Somehow, he's actually managed it.
The thing is, what works about Spaceteam is that each player can only see their own station and the instructions (for another player) that appear on it. This means they have to shout at each other to succeed.
But with Apple TV there's only a single big screen. So, surely, that dynamic is lost somewhat in translation? Well, yes and no.
How does it work?Smith has found a way around it or so it seems. Currently, the Apple TV version of Spaceteam has two modes.
Observer mode sees an overview of the game projected on the TV screen but doesn't let anyone interact with it. It'll work best in a festival space so people can watch the game.
Then there's Controller mode that sees the TV being used as just another screen for one of the players. Everyone else will need to play with a smartphone, presumably.
There are other unfinished modes that Smith is working on and may add in future updates. One of them, Thwarter mode, lets one person play as the ship's cat as it causes disasters on board.
In any case, to play the Apple TV version of Spaceteam you're going to need the Siri remote and another controller for each person who wants to play.
Not the most practical Apple TV game, then, but if it can live up to the iPhone version it should be some of the most fun you can have in a group.
You can find out more about Spaceteam on Apple TV over on Henry Smith's blog.
