Aerodynamic sleekness

Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're being oppressed.

Seriously, the people responding that way are just used to years and years of "HAHA WING COMMANDER ISNT REAL LIEK DESCENT" trolling - don't take it personally.
 
Dishwasher said:
Jeah I was just thinking that I got a bit of a harsh reaction, cuz first I state that Wing Commander I a great arcade style space sim and that it should be respected as is. And that people should not try to make sense out of the physics because they make no decent sense (wich is why the ships look cool) . And before you know it people start turning the world around saying hey wingcommander physics make no sense but they don't need to because it's a great game so stop whyning about those physics... aaaargh :). Well anyway i guess I got the message passed over but had to pay the price of being the bad guy.

As of the aerodynamic sleekness those ships? They have it to look cool! And the rock ships? I always used to think of it as camo. because the meters of rock around the vessel tend to mask their em signature making them look electronically and visually like just another asteroid. Personally I think their big square behind's just made great target practice.
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LOAF's comment about "physics and space sims going together like razor blades and gum" fits best here. However, it's one thing to state the game's not realistic. It's another completely different beast when you try to point out why, using real-world examples, and justifying the illogic of the situation by how 'expensive' things are and bringing in questions like 'why develop that physics defying technology' when it's already there in game (gravitic control, inertial compensation). If it wasn't there, like the really smart pilot-capable AIs, then that'd be a valid argument to make. If it's already present in game... then it makes little sense to focus on that as being impractical or as an argument against (x).

We've seen no signs that they've got usable and affordable pilot-capable AIs, else they'd already be in use somewhere - in Prophecy they ended up sending a half-dozen pilots in a cloakable and jump-capable fighter to recon Kilrah. This would have been the perfect situation to use an AI-controlled probe, or a series of them; instead they lost six pilots and risked a seventh just to find out that the Kilrah system was under apparent interdict, and then jumped in a corvette group. Another example is the patrols run in each and every game - a perfect use for autonomous AI-controlled drones. The only drone we ever see in any WC game which operates by itself for long periods, though it lacks a certain intelligence, is the Steltek Probe.

Next time, I'd probably suggest choosing examples a bit more carefully - it's all fine and dandy to argue that the game's not realistic. It's another to explain why it isn't realistic, and then throw out half the stuff already seen in game (gravitic control, lack of AI-capable craft, scoop-modified flight).
 
Bandit LOAF said:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're being oppressed.

Seriously, the people responding that way are just used to years and years of "HAHA WING COMMANDER ISNT REAL LIEK DESCENT" trolling - don't take it personally.
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Yeah, thats why i reacted the way i did. Sorry dishwasher. :(
But when i was a lurker there would always be someone saying something like this: "Wing Commander fans is very, very stupid, LOL because Freespace is very, very good, and WC is very, very, very baaaaaaad, LOL!" What happened to those guys anyway, havent seen them for a while. Not that im complaining. :D
 
Dyret said:
Yeah, thats why i reacted the way i did. Sorry dishwasher. :(
But when i was a lurker there would always be someone saying something like this: "Wing Commander fans is very, very stupid, LOL because Freespace is very, very good, and WC is very, very, very baaaaaaad, LOL!" What happened to those guys anyway, havent seen them for a while. Not that im complaining. :D
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I never understood why freespace fans "hate" wing commander so much.. and vice versa. I loved both can't wait for interplay to go bankrupt it's about time that volition got their license for freespace back... atleast they are verry willing to create a sequel . For all the wing commander fans who haven't tried freespace 2 try it, it really is pretty good.... for a wing commander clone ;)
 
Dishwasher said:
I never understood why freespace fans "hate" wing commander so much.. and vice versa. I loved both can't wait for interplay to go bankrupt it's about time that volition got their license for freespace back... atleast they are verry willing to create a sequel . For all the wing commander fans who haven't tried freespace 2 try it, it really is pretty good.... for a wing commander clone ;)
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I think the big brouhaha was that Interplay and the fans of FS 1/2 hyped it as being the 'ultimate' space combat sim because of the to-scale ships (capships were positively HUGE), the more 'realistic' physics, and the fact that there was a mission editor with FS1 which let people create their own missions.

I liked it as a game, though it could be a bitch when you didn't do things exactly the way the designers intended you two, at least in FS1 - I remember failing missions because I didn't go after the second group of enemies first, and similar Starlancer-like situations.

And don't even talk to me about the final mission, trying to run the bomb into the Shivan dreadnought....
 
Shipgate said:
Hmm, I've honestly never played Freespace. What is it about?
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Short form: Earth starts exploring space, using a Subspace drive that lets it jump either in a system, or else to other systems if you go to the jump point. Earth begins colonization.

Earth meets another alien empire, the Vasudans, which are very hide-bound traditionalists. Earth insults the aliens, and war is declared. Earth and Vasuda Prime are now mortal enemies, and fight one another.

Enter a third race - the Shivans - whose technology is almost completely unstoppable, who have shields, and who crush everyone in their path; Vasudan and Terran both. Vasuda and Earth are forced to unite forces, though an apocalyptic cult shows up among the Vasudans, called the Hammer of Light, which says it's useless to resist the invaders and begin stopping the other Vasudans and Earth from trying to fight off the enemy.

End of FS1: Vasuda Prime is destroyed, along with a good deal of the Vasudan race. Earth is cut off from subspace contact, as their jump node is blown up by an exploding Shivan dreadnought which was about to attack Earth.

FS2: The Shivans return, and the Terran-Vasudan alliance is now more official. They're back, and they're badder. This time, to stop them, the GTVA (Grand Terran-Vasudan Alliance) ends up blowing up a whole star in a supernova.
 
I never understood why freespace fans "hate" wing commander so much.. and vice versa.
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I think the easiest explanation as to why we pick on them so much is that you get so much bang for your buck in doing so. Wing Commander fans and other space sim fan groups (StarLancer fans, B5ItF fans, etc.) have always had a friendly banter about which game is better... In general, a fun friendly competition. But whenever we take a jab at Freespace, the Freespace kids get riled up to a hilarious extent and show up at the message board screaming about how we've offended their very cores (G)

Take a look at our April Fools update from last year: https://www.wcnews.com/news/1629 . We made fun of Freelancer, Wing Commander, ourselves, Akkbar, Boomer and Freespace. Only one of those things showed up at the CZ ranting about how they were going to 'hack our server'. :)

Short form: Earth starts exploring space, using a Subspace drive that lets it jump either in a system, or else to other systems if you go to the jump point. Earth begins colonization.
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You forgot the most important part of the Freespace universe: the part about chasing robots through tunnels to rescue space-men.
 
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Gheh i always remember the moment when the vasudan destroyer uses it's beamweapons for the first time on a NTF cruiser. Damn was it fun to bank away from that beam when it almost cut's your ship in half :). I must say though that the differences in game engines could only have been time related. All wing commander games looked asthonishing for their times. And i'm sure that a new wing commander game would force us all to upgrade our hardware :)
 
Dishwasher said:
Gheh i always remember the moment when the vasudan destroyer uses it's beamweapons for the first time on a NTF cruiser. Damn was it fun to bank away from that beam when it almost cut's your ship in half :). I must say though that the differences in game engines could only have been time related. All wing commander games looked asthonishing for their times. And i'm sure that a new wing commander game would force us all to upgrade our hardware :)
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I dont know, i have a Geforce FX 5900. At least i dont think i'll have to upgrade for the next six months.
 
Dishwasher said:
Gheh i always remember the moment when the vasudan destroyer uses it's beamweapons for the first time on a NTF cruiser. Damn was it fun to bank away from that beam when it almost cut's your ship in half :). I must say though that the differences in game engines could only have been time related. All wing commander games looked asthonishing for their times. And i'm sure that a new wing commander game would force us all to upgrade our hardware :)
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Actually, Freespace 1 came out in 1998, and Freespace 2 was a year later. In other words, both games came out just around or after the time of Prophecy and Secret Ops. Nice engine, though EA's last half-dozen games haven't exactly pushed the hardware envelope... so upgrading may not be necessary.
 
Shipgate said:
Didn't they also claim they have missiles that hit targets with surgical precision? Those didn't turn out to be that surgical I don't think.
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I never understood that analogy...I've never heard of a surgeon removing someone's appendix with a missile (and leaving the rest of the body intact I mean).
 
If whe helped EA die out like interplay perhaps EA would sell their wing commander rights like interplay did with Fallout :D . Atleast the Fallout community (wich i'm verry fond off) finnally sees their long awaited sequel being produced!
 
Couple of sorta-random thoughts:

"Surgical strike" is a pretty lie to sell the press (and, indirectly, the Drooling Masses™ that gets its info from said press) and dumb politicians. One of many, many terminally overused and misunderstood phrases found in the "news" media nowadays.

Dishwasher, did you take a stupid pill this morning or something?

Much more off-topic, and this thread moves to the appropriate forum (Off Topic forum, oddly enough). Arguably it belongs there as it sits, now, but I'm too lazy to move it.
 
I can't really see FS1 or 2 as more realistic. if WC games are 10% realistic, FS are 15%. Iwar 1 and 2 are REALLY a LOT more realistic than both of them. and very hard to play too.

But my point really was, if AI pilots are so good, what would be left for US to do???
 
Edfilho said:
I can't really see FS1 or 2 as more realistic. if WC games are 10% realistic, FS are 15%. Iwar 1 and 2 are REALLY a LOT more realistic than both of them. and very hard to play too.

But my point really was, if AI pilots are so good, what would be left for US to do???
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I think it was more realistic in the sense of engine proportions - a capship that was a km long in there really DID look like it was a km long, and took not all that much time if you were flying fast enough to cross. The WC games didn't achieve this sort of proportion till about Prophecy or so, where the Midway actually did look big enough to meet the measurements listed in the manual.

However, the cult of Freespace was rabid about the proportions and the realism... that and the mission creators. I remember once playing a whole fan-made campaign in the game, which was cool. I never was a card-carrying member of the cult, not after getting my ship blown out from around me for the fifth time in one mission, though.
 
Edfilho said:
But my point really was, if AI pilots are so good, what would be left for US to do???
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I guess we could relax in the rec room .
It would be kinda sad if the only objective in WC was: Drink at least 6 drinks before the battle is over. :(
 
The WC games didn't achieve this sort of proportion till about Prophecy or so, where the Midway actually did look big enough to meet the measurements listed in the manual.
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Yup, Wing Commander didn't catch up to Freespace until a game that came out before the first Freespace did.
 
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