Darkstar One Demo Released (July 1, 2006)

ChrisReid

ChrisReid

Super Soaker Collector / Administrator
On Friday, GameSpot premiered the demo for Darkstar One. The game is a space combat sim that we've mentioned in the news several times, because of the number of previews have compared it to Wing Commander. With this publicly available try-out, you can now see for yourself. GameSpot's video preview mentions Wing Commander quite a bit and demonstrates the gameplay in detail. Both commentators in the clip lament the absence of joystick support, but they're not surprised that a modern space sim such as this has built itself around more popular control schemes in 2006. Nevertheless, players seem to have slightly more control over flight than in Freelancer, and the graphics and art style seem fairly sharp. Space sim fans should try out the demo here (950 megs). Thanks to Charles Hall and music_guru/Goliath_GG.




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A new entry in the space-combat genre isn't an everyday occurrence. DarkStar One is a modern update on the old-school space combat and adventure game that used to be a staple on the PC a decade ago, with games such as Wing Commander: Privateer. And like in that game, DarkStar One lets you fly around the galaxy in a customizable spaceship, battling pirates and other foes while also buying and selling on the open market.
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Original update published on July 1, 2006
 
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After "finishing" the demo, I must say I'm looking forward to this game's release. It looks like the first few areas are unlocked only by progressing the story, so unfortunatly it's not as open as it claims. However the combat handles more like Wing Commander than the other recent attempts like Freelancer or X. The story doesn't seem too shabby either, so far.

The one thing that bothers me, is I can't find any US retailers that are listing the game on their website, pre-order or otherwise.

EDIT: Oh, and the reviewers either missed the option, or they're playing a much, much different version. The English demo has full joystick support, you just have to enable it in your game options.
 
played the full game

you can play the full version of this game and many others through something called metaboli, you pay a monthly charge and then away you go
 
Unregistered said:
you can play the full version of this game and many others through something called metaboli, you pay a monthly charge and then away you go
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Only if you're a resident of the UK. Due to the way they get game licenses they're only allowed to distribute the game in the UK, and the Terms of Service state that if you're not a resident, your account will be banned.
 
It's coming...

As I posted in another thread, it's out in Germany, slated for retail release in the UK later this week, and will be in the USA next month.

Tons of non-US places (including UK, NL, AU) have preorders ready:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q="darkstar+one"+preorder

But US retailers are going to be hard pressed to have this one in stock when it goes on sale. They are expecting another space-sim flop, and not many are going to stock too many copies of this game.

Nu
 
from what i have played so far it is a bit like freelancer, easy controls to use and good story. People say you only get one ship but when you find the right number of artificats you can modify your ship and it morphs into a different ship.
 
NuAngel said:
But US retailers are going to be hard pressed to have this one in stock when it goes on sale. They are expecting another space-sim flop, and not many are going to stock too many copies of this game.

Nu
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That doesn't make any sense, because X has always been available for preorder. There was no big retail blacklisting of X3. My bet is that Ascaron either doesn't have a publisher for NA, or that publisher is irresponsible with basic marketing strategy (such as getting games listed on retail websites).
 
Yeah, sounds like the publisher here. "CDV Software" is mainly known for crappy budget titles. It's just luck that they have something that looks decent like Darkstar. Unfortunately this will probably lead to a poorer distribution in the US. It won't necessarily be hard to find, but it might not show up at retailer websites until days before it ships and it could take a little while to make it everywhere.
 
if this game had multiplayer version of it, i would be all over it however, trying to make a multiplayer version of any space flight trading game would require huge amount of bandwidth which does not come at a cheap price tag... along with electricity costs, and land estate rent.

it's my dream too but it ends with a very harsh reality.
 
Darkstar One does not have multiplayer out of the box. However at their boards it is hinted that this might be something that is doable in a mod. So if the publisher already admits this I guess we will see such a mod pretty soon.
Re Bandwidth: Freelancer seems to be very similar in this aspect and that one has working multiplayer...
 
The demo was pretty cool... But it seems that the released English version's got some pretty weird bugs, like the "shaking" nav map... It seems that the demo was actually better code than the full game.

pity. I hope they fix that soon. even X3 got highly playable after enough patches.
 
Out of the billions of problems being complained about on the DSO forums, the only one I have is stuttering during gameplay, which is in the demo.
 
oh well, after some tweaking, it's working fine.
Nice, pretty game.
funny how Germany is the SpaceSim central these days. That makes me like them more :)
 
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