Terranova: SFC

DraQ · Dec 12, 2008

Anyone remembers this PA simulator?

I played the demo a long time ago and liked it.
Yesterday I managed to download this oldie.

Apart from controls being cumbersome (I'm a southpaw FFS!!!1*gnargh*), it still seems good and, complexity-wise, looks pretty hardcore (good!).

Any thoughts?

Disconnected · Dec 12, 2008

I loved it. One of those games I lost leaving Germany *sniff*

But I'm not sure how well it would play today. I imagine it's one of those games time has been especially unkind to.

Also: holy crap nostalgia trip!!

DraQ · Dec 12, 2008

Disconnected said:
I loved it. One of those games I lost leaving Germany *sniff*

But I'm not sure how well it would play today.

Apart from the "Waaah! I only have two hands!" problem, it seems to play pretty well. It also runs nice under DOSBox.

I imagine it's one of those games time has been especially unkind to.

Eh, the ZOMGaheadofitstime games tend to age gracefully. And TN was ahead of it's time in quite a few aspects. Including GFX. Name few games with reflective water, expansive terrain, gentle distance mist rather than heavy clipping-hiding fog, and innovative hybrid way of rendering characters - 3D objects made of sprites representing individual parts, that are tactical shooters and allow you to run around in a power armour with dozens of different subsystems (including zoom, IR, weapons, spy drones, separate target discrimination and targeting systems etc.) and directional armour damage model.

Also, suit damage looks neat from the inside.

Anyway, why don't you try? I found it 'ere.

Disconnected · Dec 12, 2008

DraQ said:
Anyway, why don't you try? I found it 'ere.

Don't mind if I do! Thanks DraQ.

ScottishMartialArts · Dec 12, 2008

Superb game. As you mentioned it was way, way ahead of its time. I particularly liked how fast paced the missions were: you'd hit the ground, start jetting towards your objective tearing a path of destruction as you go, accomplish the objective, and jet as fast as possible to the extraction bird. It really captured the feel that you were Starship Troopers-style raiders, only planetside for a handful of minutes, but doing extraordinary damage during that short amount of time. As I recall the story wasn't too bad either. At any rate, Terra Nova is one of my all time favorite games, which is no surprise seeing as it came from Looking Glass.

Trash · Dec 12, 2008

One of looking glass finest games, and that's saying something. Too bad it's also the game that quite possibly bankrupted them. Tanked pretty hard because the system requirements where rather...steep and because people apparantly don't know quality when they see it.

EDIT Oh, and that site also has Seal Team. Another awesome blast from the past in which you lead a small strike team in all sorts of missions in vietnam. One of the few games which had you attacking a funerall and the only squad based shooter that gave me a full mission briefing only to let it all get fubar due to being ambushed as soon as you arrive. Get it, it's cool and calling in airstrikes on villages never gets old.

Applegate's Breasts · Dec 12, 2008

Underappreciated, overlooked gem that was ahead of its time.

Cynicus · Dec 12, 2008

I remember Terra Nova very well. 'Twas a Fucking Awesome™ game and remains a favorite of mine. It was tragically ignored, but as was said, it required a pretty stout rig to run it properly which limited its appeal. Most shooter fans had DN3D and Quake on the brain around that time, too.

I've not played it in many years, but I think only the pixelicious graphics would be seriously dated. And no doubt the controls take some getting used to (Southpaw? Ouch!). But I'd expect the rest of the game to hold up reasonably well. I remember the combat being fairly challenging and tactical. There were also a LOT of missions--somewhere around 40 IIRC--and they were varied enough to keep my interest up.

I even liked the FMV. Yeah, it was cheesy like all the rest, but it was pretty well done--easily on par with the stuff Origin was putting out.

Anyway, good call, DraQ. I loves to see me some classics being resurrected.

DraQ · Dec 13, 2008

Ok, I was swarmed and thoroughly raped during the intercept the convoy mission. Somehow me and my squad managed to survive, in thoroughly devastated PBAs and barely alive. I didn't think I was going to make it, but somehow I did, after running behind the convoy, shooting pirates, when it would have taken but one good hit to splatter me across the landscape. I think I managed to lose some loose parts on my way. Good fun.

It was the most difficult mission so far, they're sending me to this icy planet now.

The missions are fucking short, though.

Edit:
Also, GL for teh win, I want something along the lines of a sniper weapon, though.

Multi-headed Cow · Dec 13, 2008

Terra Nova is heavan. I could never get into the Mechwarrior games because I always remembered how much better Terra Nova was.

DraQ · Dec 13, 2008

I have one more complaint - why are the weapon ranges so retarded short?

DraQ · Dec 13, 2008

BUMP

Is it just me, or does this game have genuine, non-retarded squadmates?

Drakron · Dec 13, 2008

DraQ said:
I have one more complaint - why are the weapon ranges so retarded short?

I do not recall the range being "short", some weapons are close combat but there are some with much longer range.

I am not sure but I think there are better weapons later on, after the Invasion, since I certainly remember blowing shit up outside visual range.

Cynicus · Dec 13, 2008

The team AI is good, so it's not you. It's just that it's a bit of a shock when one's used to the shit AI of many newer games.

IIRC, the particle beam has the longest range of the beam weapons. It was my favorite light weapon. It does decent damage and the range is long enough that you have a chance to dodge incoming fire. I don't remember how far into the game you are when you get access to it.

Btw, DraQ, are you having any trouble switching the PBA's HUD to fullscreen view. After thinking about the game all day yesterday, I decided to fire it up and also try the latest incarnation of DOSBox. Everything seems perfect except I can't get the HUD to switch views. I've tried both the switch in the upper left of the HUD and the keyboard command (it's G, I think), but no-go. I'm trying tweaks to the conf file, but no luck so far.

EDIT: Disregard my dumb ass. Fullscreen was disabled during the training. Works just fine in regular missions.

DraQ · Dec 14, 2008

Drakron said:
DraQ said:

I have one more complaint - why are the weapon ranges so retarded short?

Click to expand...

I do not recall the range being "short", some weapons are close combat but there are some with much longer range.

I am not sure but I think there are better weapons later on, after the Invasion, since I certainly remember blowing shit up outside visual range.

Beginning weapons generally don't exceed 150m range, today's AK-47 has 350m effective range and 800m max. A bit bwah, I also fail to enjoy the design of SFC and pirate suits. Still, I do enjoy the game, thoroughly.

Vaarna_Aarne · Dec 14, 2008

Multi-headed Cow said:
Terra Nova is heavan. I could never get into the Mechwarrior games because I always remembered how much better Terra Nova was.

Same here. Compared to this, Armored Core and Heavy Gear, the MW series is a pile of steaming shit.

DraQ · Dec 14, 2008

Ok, I have encountered a problem - in the mission where you have to blow up fuel depot. I figure out, that it would be best to only pick off the sentries, then set charges, repeat 3 more times, blow it all up and go home. The problem is that my squad is more than willing to go in guns blazing, blowing up the fuel tanks and luring out swarms of enemy PBAs. It's slightly better when I order them to return fire only, but after the fighting starts they target and blow up the tanks regardless. How do I stop them from firing at tanks at all? Or do I have to pick up as many sapers as possible, pick the guards off all by myself, then sprinkle the fuel stockpile with explosives, blow it up, then go home?

DraQ · Dec 14, 2008

Meh, getting rid of demo guy, taking repair specialist and just sniping the kegs was the solution. Repair people are so damn useful at keeping the squad in fighting shape.

Are there any missions where demo-men are actually useful?

Cynicus · Dec 14, 2008

You'll need demo experts for a few missions later in the game. There are some missions that have the team blowing up structures (e.g., a bridge). I don't recall ever needing them otherwise, though it seems like there was a mission or two along the way where using demolitions was a viable option but not really necessary.

DraQ · Dec 14, 2008

My squad got raped during that urban combat mission, where you have to watch out for the civilian structures. I managed to do it without civilian casualities, though.

BTW: I was blown away by thermal disruptor effect - today distorting the image this way means "shaders or GTFO".

Cynicus · Dec 15, 2008

Yeah, the missions can get pretty rough as you get farther into the game. There's one near the point you're at that involves rescuing some scientists that had me frothing at the mouth. If Morte had been around, he would've learned new taunts.

I haven't had time to dig into TN too deeply yet, hoping to tonight, but I can already see that I've become horribly spoiled by mouselook over the years. I remember the controls being a bit of a juggling act, but fuck me. I'm going to have to replace my penis with a midget's arm until I get used to things again.

DraQ · Dec 16, 2008

LOL, I managed to totally trash my suit during this mission where you wreck the construction site and try to mop up all the guards.

For some reason I didn't manage to kill all the guards, so I activated the shield ASF (this piece of equipment is godlike - after the whole ordeal I was at 59% health and I wasn't even wearing heavy suit, just medium - I suppose they had to cut me out of it later) and rushed the overwhelming enemy forces concentrations the survivors might have reached effectively single handed, because it took my squadmates time to reach the fray, and by this time, only few enemy drones and, I think, one ground based target remained operational.
Result? I've managed to royally mess up my suit - everything, every fucking system, save for power plant and weaponry (still, the rocket launcher got slightly battered), was at 0%. Good thing I managed to fire off all my missiles before the targeting systems gave off their last breath, as afterwards I was running around effectively blind (the display glitching up all the time so much that it wasn't even funny), unable to target anything, unable to get the ID-lock on anything, with sensors gagging and puking up splotches of rainbow-coloured dots, relying solely on my FPS skills to rake anything around that didn't look like tree or fellow SFC member, but either moved or looked man-made with ion beam.

Good fun!
:D

Multi-headed Cow · Dec 17, 2008

Few games manage to give you that sense of barely scraping by a mission quite as well.

In fact, where'd you find it and how'd you get it running? I might play it again since it's been years. Figured it was going to be a bitch to get running on a modern machine.

DraQ · Dec 17, 2008

Multi-headed Cow said:
where'd you find it

See my second post in this thread.

and how'd you get it running?

Runs fluently and almost flawlessly (rare crashes, non-fatal memory errors when trying to use IR when it's severely damaged, some sound stutter when continuously running longer than several missions) in DOSBox on max settings.

DraQ · Dec 19, 2008

Ok, finished it, the last mission was quite a hard one, at least before realizing that you have to make your demo-man bro run the gauntlet here.

Overall, I liked it, with but one minor complaint - why was it so fucking short?

Ehm, this didn't come out right, lemme try again:

WHY WAS IT SO FUCKING SHORT!?

Terranova: SFC

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