Space game breakdown-- Star Wolves

[Adipose Rex]

Hi all,

Did not bother to post thoughts on TV--tried, enjoyed, reminded of old favorite Terra Nova, but have not had energy to go back yet.

Anyways, Interested in hearing about favorite space sims/ and especially space rpg/trading games. Curious to know what Star Wolves series is like most of all, hands on impressions welcome.

Have played: Freespace 2 open, Tie Fighter, etc. Escape Velocity/EVNova and enjoyed. Also Space Rangers 2. presentation of last was sloppy, but game was fun.

Wondering also what Elite is like. Not bothered with fancy graphics if game is good. Also frontier?

Interested to hear you!

 

[Demnogonis Saastuttaja]

Well Star Wolves was okay, but nothing special. Try it out because why not.

 

[Multiple Sarcasm]

If you're thinking of Star Wolves, then better go with Nexus: The Jupiter Incident. It's also retarded-story-driven, but the tactical options and gameplay are way better. Which are good, but still not great, so don't get your hopes up too high.

 

[Trash]

Well, I can recommend these. Dunno if you already played them.

Homeworld is awesome. It's the first rts set in space and, well, still the best. Homeworld 2 sucks so stay with the original.

Star Wolves 1 was pretty fun. Well worth a try, not to mention that the game can be found in bargain bins everywhere. Star Wolves 2 was horrid shit though. Heard rumors that Star Wolves 3 was good but have never tried it myself.

Precursors is a very fun blend of SF rpg, elite and fps. It lets you explore planets, run around seedy space ports and blow up freighters in space. Game is impossibly ambitious but actually got it together. Never understood why it didn't become a giant hit. Get the Russian version together with Wesp5's translation fanpatch.

Elite is the grandfather of the space trader game. It's incredibly aged and you're much better off with its sequells Frontier and First Encounter. These games basically let you loose in the galaxy and let you do whatever you damn well please. Frontier is my favourite of these.

I-War and I-War 2 are two great AAA starship battle simulators. Games sold for shit but won lots of accolades and simply rule. Basically a freespace/tie fighter with you flying a corvette with a newtonian flight model. Absolutely gorgeous and fun.

 

[Morkar Left]

Megatraveller 2 - pure rpg with the best chargeneration ever. Ground fights and ship combat are automatically, controls sometimes clunky, a huge galaxy but every city looks exactly the same. But it got the whole scifi theme well together. For instance you can have a ship but you can travel between planets without your own ship, too. The flight ticket you have to buy comes in three classes, the poor class is cryo-travelling and can harm your stats for instance. Reading the extensive manual is a must btw.

Starflight 1 + 2 - still the best exploration spacegames for me. There was never and probably will never come such a game again. Chargen is poor (you just use a race for every crewmember and buy their stats with money) and gfx are really simple.

rlprospector - a roguelike that is similar to starflight but with even more exploration on planets and you can equip every crewmember with gear. Space is not as big as in starflight and communication with aliens is still poor. But I can really recommend it and it doesn't take long for a playthrough.

Whales Voyage 1 +2 - nice little scifi-rpgs in EOB/DM-style. Controls are shit and it gets especially annoying in combat (when you have to reload your weapons). Interesting concepts and the turnbased spacebattles were fun for me. If only the economy wasn't broken and the shit controls...

If you want to play Elite just get Oolite. There are tons of plugins available to make the universe very interesting and worthwhile to fly around. Controls and combat feels are bit outdated because it's based on a game that invented the genre in the first place.

Instead of Frontier First Encounters you can use the remake FFE D3D to have better gfx. Still not everything finished but playable. Frontier is the game that has besides I-war 1+2 the most realistic flightmodel but includes planet-landing as well.

X2/X3 of course.

The excellent I-war 1+2 and Precursors (you can combine the russian version with the english version and wesps patch to have english cut-scenes) were already mentioned

 

[Trash]

Personally I preferred Megatraveler 1 because the planetary interface somehow felt less clunky and the worlds felt more unique. Might be the nostalgia though. Both Megatraveller 1 and 2 are absolutely huge and can cost you months of your life. Incredibly fun games.

Starflight is awesome but don't forget about Star Controll 2. Another classic gem that has a lot in common yet feels entirely different. PS If the Starflight graphics are unbearable for you get the much prettier Genesis/Megadrive version to run on a emulator.

As long as we're also including rpg's (and why not?) Buck Rogers: Countdown to Doomsday and its sequel Matrix Cubed are oldskool SSI Goldbox SF rpgs in which you get to zoom around the solar system fighting the evil RAM, exploring asteroid bases and boarding pirates.

 

[Morkar Left]

Personally I preferred Megatraveler 1 because the planetary interface somehow felt less clunky and the worlds felt more unique. Might be the nostalgia though. Both Megatraveller 1 and 2 are absolutely huge and can cost you months of your life. Incredibly fun games.

I fooled around a bit with MT1 and I didn't get into the combat controls. But I think I tried not enough. MT2 control is mostly automatic but the chars get some personality and that always the member with best stats does something was very convenient for me.

Starflight is awesome but don't forget about Star Controll 2. Another classic gem that has a lot in common yet feels entirely different. PS If the Starflight graphics are unbearable for you get the much prettier Genesis/Megadrive version to run on a emulator.

Definitely a more eyecandy-version and I think the controls are a bit better too compared to dosbox. But laptopguy captain has no stats...

 

[GarfunkeL]

For something little different, try Star Control 2 or its open-source remake, Ur-Quan Masters.