About Secret Ops

[Ansark]

I just beated Secret Ops for the first time (through the winning path, athough I had to eject at Krieger 4), and I felt the urge to tell my impressions.

Simply put, I didn't like it, not a bit.

I found it to be the hardest of all Wing Commanders, from 1 to Prophecy. Ridiculus quantities of enemies, lots of escort missions (I think they should rebrand the expansion as "Escort Ops"), loooong missions, repetitive objectives...

It took all the most frustrating aspect of Wing Commander and cranked them up to eleven. And I sorely missed the inmmersive feel the cinematics (be it FMV or pixel art) gave.

As I understand, this "thing" was released online for free, so I guess that could explain its shoddy quality. But, nonetheless, I would like to know the opinion of other people about it.

 

[LividLiquid]

While I dearly miss the cutscenes, I quite like Secret Ops, though your criticisms are fair. I'd even add one: many's the mission where Cerberus' big gun took me out near the end of a mission no matter how hard I tried to avoid it. It's like they did it on purpose.

It does get frustratingly difficult even on easy mode. I think there was a thing originally where you'd tell it how much Wing Commander you'd played when you downloaded it and it would like, scale difficulty? Does anybody know what I'm talking about?

In any case, it has some of the best bomber missions of the whole series and I think Prophecy has the best flight model of all the games and Secret Ops is more of the same. They're the only two in the series where right after a playthrough I can just start over and do them both again.

 

[Pedro]

I've got to admit doing my last play through (which I did in timeline order so I'd already done the movie) it was a depressing note to end on.

Episode 6 felt so ridiculously hard, 7 was more "was that it?". General balancing issues but a huge problem of just being wave after wave.

I think had the fiction viewer been in the game it would have helped, a lot. But there was... too much fiction *runs*

Since it was an online release only it would have been impossible but for Prophecy Gold it would have made all the difference in the world to have them as video messages. Just talking heads in a square next to the text, no sets - some for the news articles.

But yeah... Secret Ops was the only thing in my playthrough that I found I didn't enjoy (I did skip Armada, Academy, Arena). I really do appreciate what a love letter to the fans it was supposed to be - and boy am I grateful for it because that's what let us early modders put full campaigns together....

...but I don't enjoy it.

 

[Ansark]

While I dearly miss the cutscenes, I quite like Secret Ops, though your criticisms are fair. I'd even add one: many's the mission where Cerberus' big gun took me out near the end of a mission no matter how hard I tried to avoid it. It's like they did it on purpose.

It does get frustratingly difficult even on easy mode. I think there was a thing originally where you'd tell it how much Wing Commander you'd played when you downloaded it and it would like, scale difficulty? Does anybody know what I'm talking about?

In any case, it has some of the best bomber missions of the whole series and I think Prophecy has the best flight model of all the games and Secret Ops is more of the same. They're the only two in the series where right after a playthrough I can just start over and do them both again.

Well, I was never killed by the Cerberus cannons, but I did misterously die several times near enemy capships. I suspect it was by "friendly" torpedoes.

Guess we all have different tastes. I personally didn't like any bomber in WC (except the Broadsword, I was grateful when I got to fly that flying tank, specially after experiencing the fragile Ferrets and Epees). And Krieger 4 felt like one of the most frustrating bomber missions in the saga: A slow bomber, 1+2 capships, 4 corvettes, big initial fighter escort and infinite waves to replenish them. Although, in retrospect, the fact it was preceded by other frustrating missions might have made it look worse than it is.

In comparison, the last mission is a joke. Just take out 1 capship with not that much of a fighter escort, and you are done.

I had no such problems with Prophecy. If anything, I felt it was in the easier side, specially coming from WCIVs oneshot missiles. I'm no fan of more and weaker enemies, and the narrative isn't on par of WC IVs, but I still enjoyed it for what it is.

I mostly agree about the flight model. Compared to 3 and 4 (which has some strange bugs with the joystick deadzone that makes fine aiming difficult), the game feels very smooth, and it has true throttle support! Although I also like the flying model of 1 and 2.

PD: I forgot to mention that I was on ace difficulty.

PD2: Trying again Krieger 4. I did manage to beat it in ace. But man, it was hard! It seems that the trick is to destroy all the mantas in the vicinity before going for the capital ships.

I've got to admit doing my last play through (which I did in timeline order so I'd already done the movie) it was a depressing note to end on.

Episode 6 felt so ridiculously hard, 7 was more "was that it?". General balancing issues but a huge problem of just being wave after wave.

I think had the fiction viewer been in the game it would have helped, a lot. But there was... too much fiction *runs*

Since it was an online release only it would have been impossible but for Prophecy Gold it would have made all the difference in the world to have them as video messages. Just talking heads in a square next to the text, no sets - some for the news articles.

But yeah... Secret Ops was the only thing in my playthrough that I found I didn't enjoy (I did skip Armada, Academy, Arena). I really do appreciate what a love letter to the fans it was supposed to be - and boy am I grateful for it because that's what let us early modders put full campaigns together....

...but I don't enjoy it.

Yeah, I wholeheartly agree about your description of episode 6 and 7 (although I felt the first mission of 7 was still quite challenging).

I also didn't enjoy the experience. Which is a shame, because I did enjoy the rest of the saga (even the secret missions of 1). The fact it's the "last" (still have to try Privateer 1 and 2 some day) also adds salt to the wound. As It leaves a sower taste to the "end". I'd have preferred for it to end at Prophecy base. I think that's what I will do if I ever do another run of all the main Wing Commanders.

PD: After all those escort missions looking for them in the map, I think I'll start to see Mantas in my nightmares.

 

[ChrisReid]

It does get frustratingly difficult even on easy mode. I think there was a thing originally where you'd tell it how much Wing Commander you'd played when you downloaded it and it would like, scale difficulty? Does anybody know what I'm talking about?

Yeah, you used to have to go to SecretOps.com to register for the game before you could start it up. Part of the registration asked for your experience and then that chose the default difficulty level you started at.

I also didn't enjoy the experience. Which is a shame, because I did enjoy the rest of the saga (even the secret missions of 1).

There is a ton about the Secret Ops experience that is somewhat lost to time. Here's Boomer announcing the cadence: https://www.wcnews.com/news/1998/08/15/digesting-so-info For starters, we're talking about 1998 here. Just eight months after Prophecy was released, Origin already has a brand new 50+ mission follow-up ready to go, and it's available to download completely free. That's the main way everyone gets their games today, of course, but this was completely unprecedented for a game of this scale. It was all over the headlines with people wondering if this would be the future of game distribution (which it was).

But it wasn't just that the game was available for free, it was a community experience. A new episode was released each Thursday, and then you got through the weekend to play through the series, which would then give you a code. Depending on your performance, the code you plugged in would deliver new branching narrative fiction on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday leading into the next episode on Thursday. Along with the newly minted wcnews.com, which happened to come online a couple weeks prior, everyone was part of this massive experience episodically playing the missions together, discussing what was different/the same about the fiction they saw and theorizing about what was coming next. Giant ships like the Plunkett and Murphy were an absolute treat, and everyone loved seeing the Excalibur, Thunderbolt, St. Helens, etc again. Yes, the missions were challenging, but we also got to play in a variety of 'black' super fighters with experimental, which was a blast.

It wasn't supposed to be the last PC Wing Commander game. They gave it away for free just to tide fans over until the next great Wing Commander experiences came out. The story about all those and what didn't happen is a long complex topic beyond the scope of this post. I can see the difficulty of just speed running the game without this context, but for someone like me, I can't separate Secret Ops from the sense of possibility and excitement that it was imbued with at the start.

 

[Ansark]

Yeah, you used to have to go to SecretOps.com to register for the game before you could start it up. Part of the registration asked for your experience and then that chose the default difficulty level you started at.



There is a ton about the Secret Ops experience that is somewhat lost to time. Here's Boomer announcing the cadence: https://www.wcnews.com/news/1998/08/15/digesting-so-info For starters, we're talking about 1998 here. Just eight months after Prophecy was released, Origin already has a brand new 50+ mission follow-up ready to go, and it's available to download completely free. That's the main way everyone gets their games today, of course, but this was completely unprecedented for a game of this scale. It was all over the headlines with people wondering if this would be the future of game distribution (which it was).

But it wasn't just that the game was available for free, it was a community experience. A new episode was released each Thursday, and then you got through the weekend to play through the series, which would then give you a code. Depending on your performance, the code you plugged in would deliver new branching narrative fiction on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday leading into the next episode on Thursday. Along with the newly minted wcnews.com, which happened to come online a couple weeks prior, everyone was part of this massive experience episodically playing the missions together, discussing what was different/the same about the fiction they saw and theorizing about what was coming next. Giant ships like the Plunkett and Murphy were an absolute treat, and everyone loved seeing the Excalibur, Thunderbolt, St. Helens, etc again. Yes, the missions were challenging, but we also got to play in a variety of 'black' super fighters with experimental, which was a blast.

It wasn't supposed to be the last PC Wing Commander game. They gave it away for free just to tide fans over until the next great Wing Commander experiences came out. The story about all those and what didn't happen is a long complex topic beyond the scope of this post. I can see the difficulty of just speed running the game without this context, but for someone like me, I can't separate Secret Ops from the sense of possibility and excitement that it was imbued with at the start.

Interesting. I guess that as a transmedia experience, and the expectation of future titles, the feeling would be quite different. Plus, I know some people do like this kind of challenge.

I still think that, the way its packaged today, without the whole transmedia thing, it is a unpleasant experience and a poot way to end the saga. But I can understand your point.

It was nice to know about this experiment, thank you for sharing this info.

As a newcomer, I must admit it has been a bit weird discovering this buried "big franchise". It seems it went from fame to oblivion in a couple years. And its quite forgotten nowadays. I only got to learn about it thanks to Star Citizen. It's a shame.

I guess that, to you, Secret Ops might have felt like a last hurrah. Specially with all those rescued models from previous titles.

 

[Shades2585]

@Ansark @ChrisReid is quite right. At least half of the SO experience was the online story, the discussions, and the anticipation for the upcoming missions.
And while we will never be able to get that back I did create a Strategy guide which delves deep into the history of SO and, if the hyperlinks still work, links to all the story.
SO Guide 3.1
SO Manual

And If memory serves me correctly, (forgive me it has been a LONG time.) there is as SO Episode 1 exe. (which needs to be posted) that will reset your character and remove all the SO episodes so you can play and install each episode one at a time, thus giving you the winning/losing/natural passwords to read the appropriate fictions.

I hope this is helpful in some small way..

This maybe helpful too.
SO downloads

Yeah, you used to have to go to SecretOps.com to register for the game before you could start it up. Part of the registration asked for your experience and then that chose the default difficulty level you started at.



There is a ton about the Secret Ops experience that is somewhat lost to time. Here's Boomer announcing the cadence: https://www.wcnews.com/news/1998/08/15/digesting-so-info For starters, we're talking about 1998 here. Just eight months after Prophecy was released, Origin already has a brand new 50+ mission follow-up ready to go, and it's available to download completely free. That's the main way everyone gets their games today, of course, but this was completely unprecedented for a game of this scale. It was all over the headlines with people wondering if this would be the future of game distribution (which it was).

But it wasn't just that the game was available for free, it was a community experience. A new episode was released each Thursday, and then you got through the weekend to play through the series, which would then give you a code. Depending on your performance, the code you plugged in would deliver new branching narrative fiction on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday leading into the next episode on Thursday. Along with the newly minted wcnews.com, which happened to come online a couple weeks prior, everyone was part of this massive experience episodically playing the missions together, discussing what was different/the same about the fiction they saw and theorizing about what was coming next. Giant ships like the Plunkett and Murphy were an absolute treat, and everyone loved seeing the Excalibur, Thunderbolt, St. Helens, etc again. Yes, the missions were challenging, but we also got to play in a variety of 'black' super fighters with experimental, which was a blast.

It wasn't supposed to be the last PC Wing Commander game. They gave it away for free just to tide fans over until the next great Wing Commander experiences came out. The story about all those and what didn't happen is a long complex topic beyond the scope of this post. I can see the difficulty of just speed running the game without this context, but for someone like me, I can't separate Secret Ops from the sense of possibility and excitement that it was imbued with at the start.

Interesting. I guess that as a transmedia experience, and the expectation of future titles, the feeling would be quite different. Plus, I know some people do like this kind of challenge.

I still think that, the way its packaged today, without the whole transmedia thing, it is a unpleasant experience and a poot way to end the saga. But I can understand your point.

It was nice to know about this experiment, thank you for sharing this info.

As a newcomer, I must admit it has been a bit weird discovering this buried "big franchise". It seems it went from fame to oblivion in a couple years. And its quite forgotten nowadays. I only got to learn about it thanks to Star Citizen. It's a shame.

I guess that, to you, Secret Ops might have felt like a last hurrah. Specially with all those rescued models from previous titles.

 

[AD]

As a newcomer, I must admit it has been a bit weird discovering this buried "big franchise". It seems it went from fame to oblivion in a couple years. And its quite forgotten nowadays. ... I guess that, to you, Secret Ops might have felt like a last hurrah. Specially with all those rescued models from previous titles.

Yeah, it was a pretty great experience unlike anything else at the time. Nothing else has quite captured that weekly anticipation.

Still, Secret Ops and Prophecy were still relatively successful at the time and the reasons for the series disappearance are many and convoluted. EA/Origin worked on various WC titles for a minimum of 6 years after the last official title, starting and stopping various attempts at a new title in various stages of development. Space sims did go out of fashion at some point but the biggest reason was EA's push to make Origin their "online" studio after the success of Ultima Online. MMOs looked like the money printing machines of the future.

EA cancelled several "Wing Commander Online/Privateer Online" attempts in favor of some of their other accuisitions. Eventually one the team that had gotten the furthest eventually set up shop elsewhere and took what was essentially the WCO concept and turned it into Star Wars Galaxies (minus the space sim combat which eventually did get added as their Jump to Lightspeed expansion). Meanwhile several different attempts to bring WC back all floundered in early development (but not for lack of trying). Origin was shuttered in 2004 IIRC.

A more recent attempt to bring Wing Commander back started with a push to make a light game for the xbox 360 arcade platform (at the time limited to 50MB per game and that gave us Arena. Had Arena been more successful, EA was ready to shell out of a larger concept more traditional game. But the non-traditional style of Arena led to backlash and any future plans died with it.

There was an attempt at a mobile WC game sometime after that around the time Ultima Forever or whatever it was called came out that didn't get that far.

Somewhere around 2013-14ish EA, there was another attempt (probably capitalizing on the Success of Star Citizen's crowdfunding) to make a WC game, but EA did not like the pitch by Piranha Games, the Mechwarrior Online folks. That led to the dumpster fire crowdfunding campaign for 'Transverse' which they tried to sell as another space mmo.

I've heard rumblings that there has been interest in projects since then but I don't have any details on any more recent attempts to us the WC IP. The biggest issue today is basically Mass Effect and Star Wars. For years EA had had exclusive rights to the Star Wars IP for games and they also had their other successful Mass Effect IP that are both more in the public consciousness these days, so financially speaking those were safer bets for the shareholders.

 

[Ansark]

Yeah, it was a pretty great experience unlike anything else at the time. Nothing else has quite captured that weekly anticipation.

Still, Secret Ops and Prophecy were still relatively successful at the time and the reasons for the series disappearance are many and convoluted. EA/Origin worked on various WC titles for a minimum of 6 years after the last official title, starting and stopping various attempts at a new title in various stages of development. Space sims did go out of fashion at some point but the biggest reason was EA's push to make Origin their "online" studio after the success of Ultima Online. MMOs looked like the money printing machines of the future.

EA cancelled several "Wing Commander Online/Privateer Online" attempts in favor of some of their other accuisitions. Eventually one the team that had gotten the furthest eventually set up shop elsewhere and took what was essentially the WCO concept and turned it into Star Wars Galaxies (minus the space sim combat which eventually did get added as their Jump to Lightspeed expansion). Meanwhile several different attempts to bring WC back all floundered in early development (but not for lack of trying). Origin was shuttered in 2004 IIRC.

A more recent attempt to bring Wing Commander back started with a push to make a light game for the xbox 360 arcade platform (at the time limited to 50MB per game and that gave us Arena. Had Arena been more successful, EA was ready to shell out of a larger concept more traditional game. But the non-traditional style of Arena led to backlash and any future plans died with it.

There was an attempt at a mobile WC game sometime after that around the time Ultima Forever or whatever it was called came out that didn't get that far.

Somewhere around 2013-14ish EA, there was another attempt (probably capitalizing on the Success of Star Citizen's crowdfunding) to make a WC game, but EA did not like the pitch by Piranha Games, the Mechwarrior Online folks. That led to the dumpster fire crowdfunding campaign for 'Transverse' which they tried to sell as another space mmo.

I've heard rumblings that there has been interest in projects since then but I don't have any details on any more recent attempts to us the WC IP. The biggest issue today is basically Mass Effect and Star Wars. For years EA had had exclusive rights to the Star Wars IP for games and they also had their other successful Mass Effect IP that are both more in the public consciousness these days, so financially speaking those were safer bets for the shareholders.

I think that if Squadron 42 finally releases, and it's relatively succesfull, EA could try to revive the franchise. But who knows. I think Star Citizen in general has given a lot of exposure to WC to younger audiences (myself included). I even read somewhere that SC was initially planned as a Wing Commander sequel and was pitched to EA, not sure if it's true.

Still, kind of ironic that the only space sim EA has released since WC has been Star Wars Squadrons, a spiritual succesor to X-Wing/Tie Fighter. Which, I understand, was the major competitor of Wing Commander back in the 90s.

PD: BTW, Tie Fighter was my first experience with space sims... in 2017. So it has a special place in my heart.

 

[Ansark]

@Ansark @ChrisReid is quite right. At least half of the SO experience was the online story, the discussions, and the anticipation for the upcoming missions.
And while we will never be able to get that back I did create a Strategy guide which delves deep into the history of SO and, if the hyperlinks still work, links to all the story.
SO Guide 3.1
SO Manual

And If memory serves me correctly, (forgive me it has been a LONG time.) there is as SO Episode 1 exe. (which needs to be posted) that will reset your character and remove all the SO episodes so you can play and install each episode one at a time, thus giving you the winning/losing/natural passwords to read the appropriate fictions.

I hope this is helpful in some small way..

This maybe helpful too.
SO downloads

Thanks to the info and the links. I may check them out.

But as for the game itself. I still hold to my negative perception about the experience because of its mission design (too many and too long escorts, too many waves, too many enemies in general etc.) so I doubt I'll ever play it again.

At least now I know more about why it is the way it is, and the story behind it.

 

[Bandit LOAF]

I think that if Squadron 42 finally releases, and it's relatively succesfull, EA could try to revive the franchise. But who knows. I think Star Citizen in general has given a lot of exposure to WC to younger audiences (myself included). I even read somewhere that SC was initially planned as a Wing Commander sequel and was pitched to EA, not sure if it's true.

It's true! A lot of the early concept material (the big carrier, the alien fighter Jim Martin did) were for a Wing Commander pitch. They were still trying to make something happen all the way to the 11th hour... Chris was meeting with folks from EA just a day or two before we announced at GDC Online.

Secret Ops does really suffer played as a straight game... especially because you can really tell that each episode had a different designer. You go from somebody throwing a million Devil Rays at you at once in one episode to someone building you up to one ace.

(The big thing behind the scenes was that the remaining team was extremely green and they had absolutely no money. They sold the SO 'experiment' to EA as safe because it could be the needed value add for a Wing Commander Prophecy Gold SKU. Mission disk sales died in 1994 and the replacement, at least for a time, was enhanced 'Gold' editions of games launched ten to twelve months after the initial version. But Chris took the most experienced guys when he started Digital Anvil and then a lot of the others left after Prophecy because EA massively reduced their project completion bonuses. So the guys left to do Secret Ops were very hungry but not as experienced!)

 

[Ansark]

It's true! A lot of the early concept material (the big carrier, the alien fighter Jim Martin did) were for a Wing Commander pitch. They were still trying to make something happen all the way to the 11th hour... Chris was meeting with folks from EA just a day or two before we announced at GDC Online.

Secret Ops does really suffer played as a straight game... especially because you can really tell that each episode had a different designer. You go from somebody throwing a million Devil Rays at you at once in one episode to someone building you up to one ace.

(The big thing behind the scenes was that the remaining team was extremely green and they had absolutely no money. They sold the SO 'experiment' to EA as safe because it could be the needed value add for a Wing Commander Prophecy Gold SKU. Mission disk sales died in 1994 and the replacement, at least for a time, was enhanced 'Gold' editions of games launched ten to twelve months after the initial version. But Chris took the most experienced guys when he started Digital Anvil and then a lot of the others left after Prophecy because EA massively reduced their project completion bonuses. So the guys left to do Secret Ops were very hungry but not as experienced!)

-Watching the initial Star Citizen trailer after playing Wing Commander, it looks like a Wing Commander 1 remake. So much details: Ship designs, confed green, people scrambling to launch, a launch tunnel with the same looks, Kilrathi like symbols on the radar, Hornet fighters, Bengal class carrier, Kurasawa System, Vega Sector... Just call it Tiger's Claw and you have it!

Quite a shame we have to wait so long (been a backer since 2013). I would have been happy with a WC like single player experience. At least now it seems we can see the light at the end of the tunnel.


-Yeah, the obsession with throwing Death Rays is also something I didn't like of Secret Ops.

Base game: Scary ship that only appears sporadically as some sort of a boss. Then you get to fight 2 of those bastards in the last mission.

Secret Ops: Here, have fun with 2 waves of 4 Devil Rays in the same mission.

Sure, "Black" ships are OP, but still...


-So, much of the Wing Commander expertise went to Starlancer? Interesting. I intend to try that one after I'm done with Privateer 1-2. A shame it's not available on a digital store.

 

[Bandit LOAF]

-Watching the initial Star Citizen trailer after playing Wing Commander, it looks like a Wing Commander 1 remake. So much details: Ship designs, confed green, people scrambling to launch, a launch tunnel with the same looks, Kilrathi like symbols on the radar, Hornet fighters, Bengal class carrier, Kurasawa System, Vega Sector... Just call it Tiger's Claw and you have it!

Yeah there's a million details in there! To give you an idea of how close it was, Hannes rendered out versions that said both WING COMMANDER and SQUADRON 42 for the final delivery.

-So, much of the Wing Commander expertise went to Starlancer? Interesting. I intend to try that one after I'm done with Privateer 1-2. A shame it's not available on a digital store.

More Conquest, Loose Cannon and Freelancer... StarLancer was done by the former Privateer 2 folks in the UK. Some of whom are still together working on Squadron 42 today! Many of the artists from Wing Commander III and IV went on to work on the SFX for the Wing movie, too.

 

[Sharpshooter]

I found it to be the hardest of all Wing Commanders, from 1 to Prophecy.

That's an interesting point of view! Personally, I wouldn't go that far. Out of the "main" games (WC1, SM1, SM2, WC2, SO1, SO2, WC3, WC4, WC Prophecy, WCSO, and I'll include Privateer and Righteous Fire just for the sake of it), I believe that I found WC1 and its expansion packs to be the hardest games overall - I'm not taking the last two missions of SO1 into account for this, as the difficulty spike is just ridiculous. I don't recall Secret Ops giving me all that much trouble the first time I played it aside from Krieger 4 (but that was before I read the walkthrough and saw that the waves of enemy fighters are endless if you don't destroy the capships) and possibly Talos 1 : saving all three transports (especially Cheryls Song, I believe) proved to be immensely difficult.

I'm hazy on the exact chronology, but I believe the first few episodes of Wing Commander : Standoff were the first WC games that I tried to finish without cheating (although I vaguely recall playing WC1 without cheating... fairly soon after that, I think?), so that may be why I did not find Secret Ops to be all that difficult. I still love Secret Ops, and actually found it to be more enjoyable than Prophecy, which I thought to be too easy overall.

Secret Ops: Here, have fun with 2 waves of 4 Devil Rays in the same mission.

Sure, "Black" ships are OP, but still...

Now imagine having to defeat two Devil Rays at once in an Epee in Unknown Enemy. 😇

 

[Ansark]

That's an interesting point of view! Personally, I wouldn't go that far. Out of the "main" games (WC1, SM1, SM2, WC2, SO1, SO2, WC3, WC4, WC Prophecy, WCSO, and I'll include Privateer and Righteous Fire just for the sake of it), I believe that I found WC1 and its expansion packs to be the hardest games overall - I'm not taking the last two missions of SO1 into account for this, as the difficulty spike is just ridiculous. I don't recall Secret Ops giving me all that much trouble the first time I played it aside from Krieger 4 (but that was before I read the walkthrough and saw that the waves of enemy fighters are endless if you don't destroy the capships) and possibly Talos 1 : saving all three transports (especially Cheryls Song, I believe) proved to be immensely difficult.

I'm hazy on the exact chronology, but I believe the first few episodes of Wing Commander : Standoff were the first WC games that I tried to finish without cheating (although I vaguely recall playing WC1 without cheating... fairly soon after that, I think?), so that may be why I did not find Secret Ops to be all that difficult. I still love Secret Ops, and actually found it to be more enjoyable than Prophecy, which I thought to be too easy overall.

Well, I played all WC from 1 to SO this last two months, and that was my impression. WC1 had some extremely difficult missions like the Kurasawa Ralari and the one involving a captured Confed capship. 1 I beat exploiting a bug, 2 I simply escaped, went directly to the Tiger's claw and got a medal anyways. But the rest of the game felt quite manageable, even SO1 and 2. Maybe It was made easier by running the game at 3000 cycles.

WC2 had few difficulty spikes here and there, but nothing specially frustrating (except the last one on SO1, which I only beated thanks to some strange behaviour/bug).

BUT SO in general felt more difficult and frustrating for me. At least on Ace Difficulty. I found myself, for the first time, obsessively using the navigation map to check for potential threats to my escorts. And getting quite annoyed by unnending waves of fighters. I'm just not a fan of facing that many enemy waves. Even if the enemy is relatively weak and my ship is quite OP. I am also no a fan of long escort missions in which I lose my carrier in the last nav several times. Also, can't remember what mission it was, but I started with a huge fighter escort on a patrol, just to end alone and in the red by nav 4. Not sure if the AI in that particular mission was set to overly stupid.

In general, I didn't have problems staying alive (while not on a bomber), but escort missions could be quite challenging. And long patrols annoying.

And yeah, I also struggled seriously with Krieger 4. Had to leave it for later. At least the game lets you continue.

I'll admit that, in retrospect, the experience was more frustrating than difficult. But still, it required some planning I didn't need in any other WC I played. In general, it's been the WC game/expansion I liked the least.

PD: Isn't Standoff supposed to be specially hard?

Now imagine having to defeat two Devil Rays at once in an Epee in Unknown Enemy. 😇

Whoever designed such a mission must be specially evil. Now you just need to tell me there are also SO like missions flying a Hornet or a Scimitar. And a Krieger 4 on a Broadsword.

 

[Sharpshooter]

But still, it required some planning I didn't need in any other WC I played.

I suppose the planning part is part of why I like Secret Ops so much.

PD: Isn't Standoff supposed to be specially hard?

It is! I actually tried to replay it a few months ago and I found it to be a bit frustrating. I think part of the reason behind it being so difficult is that

1) The game keeps track of the number of ships on your destroyer/carrier. So whenever you lose one of those ships, that has the potential to make the next few missions harder, which means that you are more likely to lose another friendly ship, which in turn has the potential to make the next few missions much harder, etc. You get the idea. It's very easy to go from a bad situation to an even worse situation if you aren't careful.

2) The likelihood of the player successfully completing the game also depends heavily on AI behavior (read : luck). I gave up on Episode 2 during my last playthrough after replaying the same mission more than a dozen times because I just didn't want to lose any friendlies. I think I will try to allow myself to lose a few more ships than last time the next time I play Standoff.

Admittedly, I didn't find it to be as frustrating the very first time I played it because I attributed my losses to the poor flying skills I had as a newbie rather than to bad luck, so I felt really proud whenever I won a mission. Now that I've improved a lot, realizing that luck plays such an important part in not losing friendly ships is a bit annoying.

Regarding the Kurasawa Ralari mission, I use ChrisReid's tactics to beat it. Tell Bossman to break and attack as soon as you reach the Ralari Nav, and since the Ralari has a third friendly Rapier to defend it, just attack one of the two Grathas that your allies aren't targeting. Destroy it with missiles and full guns (and ramming if necessary), repeat the process for the second Gratha that your allies aren't attacking, and you should be much more likely to win. For the record, saving both transports in Hubble's Star 2 is even harder than winning the Ralari mission.

Regarding Jotunheim 3 : Those 5 Rapiers were a nightmare! I destroyed all of them and the captured Confed capship, but I had to skip the last two encounters, I think. Thankfully, I seem to recall that no more than 4 Rapiers will attack you at the same time.

 

[Ansark]

I suppose the planning part is part of why I like Secret Ops so much.

I do like planning. Specially on strategy games. Not so much on space sims with no mid mission saves where an escort can blow up after a 15 min run because I ignored or wasn't fast enough to take 1 Manta at the last nav point.

It is! I actually tried to replay it a few months ago and I found it to be a bit frustrating. I think part of the reason behind it being so difficult is that

1) The game keeps track of the number of ships on your destroyer/carrier. So whenever you lose one of those ships, that has the potential to make the next few missions harder, which means that you are more likely to lose another friendly ship, which in turn has the potential to make the next few missions much harder, etc. You get the idea. It's very easy to go from a bad situation to an even worse situation if you aren't careful.

2) The likelihood of the player successfully completing the game also depends heavily on AI behavior (read : luck). I gave up on Episode 2 during my last playthrough after replaying the same mission more than a dozen times because I just didn't want to lose any friendlies. I think I will try to allow myself to lose a few more ships than last time the next time I play Standoff.

Admittedly, I didn't find it to be as frustrating the very first time I played it because I attributed my losses to the poor flying skills I had as a newbie rather than to bad luck, so I felt really proud whenever I won a mission. Now that I've improved a lot, realizing that luck plays such an important part in not losing friendly ships is a bit annoying.

Hmm, as a Homeworld fan I'm quite familiar with that system. But I understand that in this case the game has no scaling difficulty to adjust the challenge to the player's resources. Nor salvage corvettes.

Regarding the Kurasawa Ralari mission, I use ChrisReid's tactics to beat it. Tell Bossman to break and attack as soon as you reach the Ralari Nav, and since the Ralari has a third friendly Rapier to defend it, just attack one of the two Grathas that your allies aren't targeting. Destroy it with missiles and full guns (and ramming if necessary), repeat the process for the second Gratha that your allies aren't attacking, and you should be much more likely to win. For the record, saving both transports in Hubble's Star 2 is even harder than winning the Ralari mission.

Regarding Jotunheim 3 : Those 5 Rapiers were a nightmare! I destroyed all of them and the captured Confed capship, but I had to skip the last two encounters, I think. Thankfully, I seem to recall that no more than 4 Rapiers will attack you at the same time.

Will try your suggestions next time I play WC1. Though I'm also tempted do go to Rostov instead.

I must say I didn't mind that much about Jotunheim 3. Technically your mission isn't to destroy the Rapiers nor the capship, and you don't need to do so to progress or win the series. So I treat them as bonus objetives.

I also liked the idea of SM2 about not destroying everything in your path and retreat being the valid option. It doesn't make sense to face a whole fleet with two Hornets nor blowing your cover with the Dralthis.

Also liked the concept of retreats in WC1 in general. Makes the Kilrathi more relatable, plus it was nice to avoid further waves.

 

[Sharpshooter]

I do like planning. Specially on strategy games. Not so much on space sims with no mid mission saves where an escort can blow up after a 15 min run becauseI ignored or wasn't fast enough to take 1 manta at the las nav point.

That's a fair point.

It doesn't make sense to face a whole fleet with two Hornets nor blowing your cover with the Dralthis.

But you've got to admit, destroying a whole fleet with a Hornet and getting yelled at by Halcyon for it was pretty funny. Then when you do it a second time and destroy the Snakeir-class carriers in a Dralthi, he just comments that it wasn't your mission and tells you that you did a good job nonetheless.

Now you just need to tell me there are also SO like missions flying a Hornet or a Scimitar.

If I remember correctly, the ships that you can fly during the Unknown Enemy campaign are :

-A modified Scimitar
-A modified Epee
-A modified Gratha
-A modified Banshee
-A (modified?) K'Ha'Haf

You're up against Kilrathi forces at first (during the first few missions) and then you're up against Nephilim forces. The odds are usually nowhere close to being in your favor, either.

Four of the ships I mentioned above are pretty awful ships. The K'Ha'Haf seems to be the one exception, but you don't get to use it for the hardest missions.

The simulator in Unknown Enemy has a few more ships that you can fly, and overall the Bearcat is one of the best ships in UE, even if it's a simulator-only ship. It's also the default ship for the simulator mission known as Treacherous Nebula, which is probably one of the most truly evil Wing Commander missions ever designed.

 

[Ansark]

But you've got to admit, destroying a whole fleet with a Hornet and getting yelled at by Halcyon for it was pretty funny. Then when you do it a second time and destroy the Snakeir-class carriers in a Dralthi, he just comments that it wasn't your mission and tells you that you did a good job nonetheless.

I didn't check it. Didn't have the patiente to try to take out all those enemies in such weak fighters. But I guess its a nice touch to take suicidal players into account.

If I remember correctly, the ships that you can fly during the Unknown Enemy campaign are :

-A modified Scimitar
-A modified Epee
-A modified Gratha
-A modified Banshee
-A (modified?) K'Ha'Haf

The guys behind the mod defitivele had some weird sense of humor. Of all the Confed fighters you take the Scimitar and the Epee? The Banshee is the one from the Border Worlds or Confed? The BW's one at least is decent. Don't know about the confed one, haven't tried Armada.

At least for the cats they took the Gratha and not the Jalthi nor the Dralthi.

 

[Sharpshooter]

I believe the point behind giving the players the Scimitar and the Epee was to see how long one could survive (against overwhelming odds, might I add) in those fighters. There's even a mission where you fly a Scimitar that's already damaged! I actually really love Unknown Enemy - and just to be clear, I still very much love Standoff as well, no matter how many times it made me feel like throwing my computer out the window. I would strongly recommend those two mods to any WC fan.

I think the fact that some missions are somewhat luck-based in Secret Ops, Unknown Enemy, and Standoff is more due to the way the Vision Engine works, for the most part : there's very little you can do to affect your allies' AI in a given mission, and since Vision Engine games tend to have really big fights with more than a few allies fighting by your side, this becomes far more of a problem than in other WC games.

I was talking about the Border Worlds Banshee. Its main guns are pretty weak in UE (even worse than the guns on the Epee) but at least it can take a few hits, I guess? The strongest fighters in UE are probably the K'Ha'Haf, the Ferret, the Avenger (there's a simulator mission where you take out a big Kilrathi strike force with it, and it's *incredibly* useful there), and the Bearcat. The Banshee can also be pretty useful if flown well, although some may still like the Epee better in some fights due its stronger main guns. The Gratha is kind of "meh", to be honest. It's a decent bomber, but it performs pretty poorly in dogfights. The Scimitar... is probably one of the worst human ships in the game despite the Viper cannon's ability to damage capship components.

At least for the cats they took the Gratha and not the Jalthi nor the Dralthi.

Aww, I really like the SM2 Dralthi, it may not be the strongest WC fighter ever, but it's a lot of fun to fly, in my opinion. It's like some weird mix of the Hornet and the Scimitar. It's actually one of my favorite WC ships! I really wish there were more enemy fighters to capture and fly in the main WC games.