Asteroids Rock! (December 2, 2007)

ChrisReid

ChrisReid

Super Soaker Collector / Administrator
Today's poll asks which Wing Commander games have your favorite asteroids. This might be because you prefer the challenge of dodging tightly packed rocks in one game, or you could vote based on the relative ease of cruising through a field in another game. There are quite a variety of asteroids featured in the Wing Commander series, so think hard and then hit the Discuss link to tell the world how you decided.








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The last poll asked which official guide was your favorite. While a bit different from the other choices, the Wing Commander Movie's Confederation Handbook took first place. The handbook's always been quite impressive with its huge color section and detailed movie backstory. The combined guide for WCI&II was virtually tied for the top spot as well. It's written as an impressive narrative walkthrough of the earlier games. WC3 and Prophecy's guide also ended up with a strong 3rd and 4th place showing. In general, voters voted for the guides that added the most new fiction and information to the universe.



What's your favorite official Wing Commander guide?




WCI&II Ultimate Strategy Guide
21.97%
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Privateer Playtesters' Guide
7.78%
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Armada Playtesters' Guide
1.83%
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Origin's Official Guide to WCIII
13.73%
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Authorized Combat Guide to WCIII
5.95%
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Origin's Official Guide to WCIV
10.98%
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Origin's Official Guide to P2:TD
3.20%
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Prophecy: Official Strategy Guide
12.13%
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Terran Confederation Handbook
22.43%
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Ended on December 2, 2007 | 437 votes



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Original update published on December 2, 2007
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Tough choice between WC1/2, Proving Grounds and Privateer. Proving Grounds' asteroids are great for that possibility to hide behind the larger ones but I am the least familiar with them so I don't remember if the smaller ones offered any threat.

Privateer's were a horror - even with the joystick up/down trick, a real challenge. And WC1/2 seem to have a good balance for the risk.

Still, I voted for Priv's for the sheer amount of emotions they have created in me.
 
My first introduction to spacesims was a weird combination. My second computer was the first to run games (my computer before was a Dell 320/SX that had two floppy drives and a word processor) and it was a then ultra-powerful 800 Mhz with 16 megs of RAM. The system was suppose to come with a CD-ROM (Wing Commander 2 / Strike Commander / Syndicate Plus / Ultima... I forget which one) but the guy who made the system for us forgot to send it to us.

This was unforgiveable, so with my Christmas money, I bought X-Wing Collector's CD and played the heck out of it for a week. I went back to school after Christmas break and my friend Dave said "You have to play this game i'm borrowing!"

That game was, of course, Wing Commander III.

The graphics blew me out of my seat and to this day, its one of the games I think has aged the best in terms of graphics (though the cinematic parts look a little rough with age). The asteroids were a big surprise; I never thought I'd see something so dense and detailed in my life. So anytime someone mentions asteroids, the second thing I think of is Wing Commander III. (The first thing I think of is The Empire Strikes Back, of course)
 
LeHah said:
The graphics blew me out of my seat and to this day, its one of the games I think has aged the best in terms of graphics (though the cinematic parts look a little rough with age). The asteroids were a big surprise; I never thought I'd see something so dense and detailed in my life. So anytime someone mentions asteroids, the second thing I think of is Wing Commander III. (The first thing I think of is The Empire Strikes Back, of course)
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I just caught Empire a few nights ago on HBO. I love the scene in the asteroid field where one of the asteroids destroys the bridge of an ISD. The next scene shows an impromptu holo briefing in Executor updating Vader on the status of the hunt when suddenly one of the ISD captains braces for his life and disappears, fading into oblivion...

None of the other officers so much as blinks an eye. Classic, simply classic!!
 
Sorry to ask stupid question but.. where exactly in Armada you could fight in the asteroids? Single player challenge or something?
 
The one thing that I hated with early WC games was the asteroids fields (and mine fields). They slowed down the action in every mission that had them, and sometimes screwed the whole sortie. Sometimes they could be fun: Like when I had to fight Gratha, Krants, or Jalthi in them (sometimes they were more useful then my Wing Man), but usualy they were more of a pain in the ass then they were worth.

So I voted for Wing 3/4 since they were the first WC games where the asteroids didn't piss me off.
 
Mekt-Hakkikt said:
Privateer's were a horror - even with the joystick up/down trick, a real challenge.

Still, I voted for Priv's for the sheer amount of emotions they have created in me.
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They were rather nerve wracking weren't they? Especially during the ES missions where you had to fight pirates and Kilrathi capital ships in them.

I think what's so great about Prophecy asteroids is they're mostly pretty harmless.
 
They were rather nerve wracking weren't they? Especially during the ES missions where you had to fight pirates and Kilrathi capital ships in them.
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Actually, that was when they were the most help - a few quick bursts of afterburners and a little luck-skill and you could clear away the Kilrathi without actually having to do any dogfighting.

I think what's so great about Prophecy asteroids is they're mostly pretty harmless.
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That's my problem with Prophecy (and WC3 and WC4) -- they don't *do* anything. They aren't a hazard, they just add a little background color to the maps... space sims need *more* hazards and environments, not less.

As angry as the Wing Commander I & II (and especially Privateer) asteroids made you sometimes, they really helped define the game and increase the challenge. Games should be as hard as is reasonable, not as easy as is possible.
 
I think I played WC3 on a Pentium 90 - and was able to leave the room to get some snack while the game was loading. :)


Bandit LOAF said:
(...)
That's my problem with Prophecy (and WC3 and WC4) -- they don't *do* anything. They aren't a hazard, they just add a little background color to the maps... space sims need *more* hazards and environments, not less.

As angry as the Wing Commander I & II (and especially Privateer) asteroids made you sometimes, they really helped define the game and increase the challenge. Games should be as hard as is reasonable, not as easy as is possible.
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I second that.
 
Bandit LOAF said:
Actually, that was when they were the most help - a few quick bursts of afterburners and a little luck-skill and you could clear away the Kilrathi without actually having to do any dogfighting.
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Ha, that's true. I loved watching a casual Militia patrol flying around the nav point I was at to see one eventually hit an asteroid and get heavily damaged.



Bandit LOAF said:
That's my problem with Prophecy (and WC3 and WC4) -- they don't *do* anything. They aren't a hazard, they just add a little background color to the maps... space sims need *more* hazards and environments, not less.

As angry as the Wing Commander I & II (and especially Privateer) asteroids made you sometimes, they really helped define the game and increase the challenge. Games should be as hard as is reasonable, not as easy as is possible.
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Well at least in Prophecy they could've made it so if you afterburn straight into an asteroid you would blow up on impact. Instead of having to ram the asteroid repeatedly. But why would anyone do that? I did it several times cause I was bored.
 
I seem to recall that was some big deal about asteroids back when the game came out - they have some giant damage number that takes days (?) of shooting to wear down... the Maverick guys who visited IRC dared us to blow one up at some point.
 
Eh? You actually can destroy them? I tried it several times but just figured after awhile there weren't capable of being destroyed. I would like to see a screenshot of such a feat. :D
 
I prefer the WC1 asteroids.
Don't get me wrong: I HATED flying or fighting in an asteroid field when I played the game, but: It has to be that way. (BTW: I really missed mines in the other WC games. I hated them even more than asteroids in WC1, but they added so much atmosphere..... In the other games mines were mostly harmless :( . Apart from the ones the K'ha'haf dropped in WC3 when flying behind them :mad: :D)
I like big asteroids like in WC3 (you can hide behind them and things like that), but there should be much more of them and asteroids of different sizes, AND they should be moving. I think a WC1 asteroid field with some bigger ones like in WC3 (and even bigger ones where you can fly into craters and caves like seen in Star Wars) would be perfect for me.
 
Bandit LOAF said:
Asteroids only show up in the Proving Grounds addon - and they're very cool.
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I really can't remember very: I know that the larger asteroids appeared as grey dots on the radar and that if you were near them, your dot would vanish.

But what about the smaller asteroids (were there any?) - were they WC 1/2 or even Privateer-style or harmless?
 
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