Freespace (was HL2 thread)

[Maj.Striker]

(And yes, Freespace would have been far, far better with the slighest bit of character.)

Got to agree with the Loaf on this one...Freespace was a decent game as far as the flying your spaceship against huge armadas and fleets of ships...that was pretty neat and well done. But the fact that you knew absolutely nothing about what was going on around you or as to who you were, who your wingmen were, who your enemy was, completely negated the decent gameplay. You can't pitch a game that has no backdrop to it. A game that allows you to play the dazzling role of "Generic pilot number 1" with your Alpha wing of generic pilots number 2, 3 and 4! Wahoo, what joy! Today I will be going up against generic enemy number 1 and 2...this one will be tight because...he's just as good as the other guys I faced in the previous 23 missions. But seriously, Freespace could have been a blockbuster if they would have just added half the character interaction from the Wing Commander series.

 

[Eder]

Freespace was funny. IMO, the mysterious alien race was presented in a much better way than in WCP (they had totally different technology at first, didn't learn silly taunts in bad english two days later, etc) but none of the humans or the other race were ever interesting.

 

[Maj.Striker]

Freespace was funny. IMO, the mysterious alien race was presented in a much better way than in WCP (they had totally different technology at first, didn't learn silly taunts in bad english two days later, etc) but none of the humans or the other race were ever interesting.

Now, you're right there. WCP weird aliens were the weakest spot in the Wing Commander universe...very unorthodox and illogical in their presentation. As compared to the Confed's previous enemy, the Kilrathi, the Nephilim were just another strange unknown enemy that we know looks like a bug and flies weird looking ships. With the Kilrathi we had an intelligent enemy who bear a strong resemblence culturally to an Earth society (the Spartans comes to mind) that had an intelligent aim and used cunning tactics to accomplish their goal. The Nephilim apparently believe in just multiplying their numbers and overwhelming by force without any apparent thought or reasoning. With the Kilrathi we had an apparent rank structure and chain of command...we know nothing of the Nephilim. With the Kilrathi we had some great cutscenes of their diabolical plans...the Nephilim we have nothing. It was Wing Commander meets Starship Troopers. The things that revived Wing Commander Prophecy was the continued great character interaction and pretty graphics (for the time).

 

[Delance]

Freespace was funny. IMO, the mysterious alien race was presented in a much better way than in WCP (they had totally different technology at first, didn't learn silly taunts in bad english two days later, etc) but none of the humans or the other race were ever interesting.

How were they silly? What would you consider a non-silly taunt? How do you know they didn't study english beforehand? Perhaps it's silly becayuse they only had three days to learn?

 

[Eder]

Most factions in Privateer had very fitting and non-silly taunts, for example.

As for the other questions, I'm sure people can come up with a thousand reasons why there was nothing wrong with the way the nephilim were presented (learning english poorly in two days then using it for months without improving it any further, etc.) in-universe... but like I said, in my opinion the WCP team was trying to come up with a mysterious alien race, something identifiable with death itself, but from the game's second mission on they turned into funny aliens from a bad 90's flick instead. Like I said, in this aspect I consider the original Freespace didn't do as poor a job as WCP did.

 

[Maj.Striker]

Well, I agree the WCP relation of the Nephilim was poor and just not very scary and besides they should have known better you can't make a scary bug like race in a T rated game...it's not going to scare anyone. It's like making a PG rated scary movie...no one gets scared. So if it was their sole goal to create a scary race then that was a bad objective. But that's a side discussion I suppose, Eder, if Freespace presented their "strange alien race" better than Wing Commander presented its "strange alien race" it's because Freespace didn't even bother to try explaining anything about theirs...it's just an enemy that wants to kill us...they fly different ships and use different technology...no go kill them. Freespace was like Serious Sam in a spaceship...no plot, just go fight.

 

[Quarto]

But that's a side discussion I suppose, Eder, if Freespace presented their "strange alien race" better than Wing Commander presented its "strange alien race" it's because Freespace didn't even bother to try explaining anything about theirs...it's just an enemy that wants to kill us...they fly different ships and use different technology...no go kill them. Freespace was like Serious Sam in a spaceship...no plot, just go fight.

Thre was no explanation in both cases - the plot for both WCP and Freespace was "we don't know anything, they're attacking, we must kill them all". The difference, however, is that in WCP, you had this intro where the enemy was shown in a hugely intimidating manner... and next thing you know, you run into a bunch of sissy little fighters that pose less of a challenge then the Dralthi in the sim missions do. Real scary . In Freespace, on the other hand, the intro wasn't much - but the first time you encountered the aliens, you really were scared, because they were nearly impossible (or outright impossible? I don't remember) to kill. Freespace was bad in many ways, but the way they only gradually gave you the technology to effectively fight the enemy was nothing short of brilliant - at least compared to WCP. It also helped that the cutscenes portrayed them as evil crustaceans that kill a dozen armed marines for breakfast instead of evil crustaceans that yell "we are doom" with a funny accent.

 

[Delance]

The enemies on Freespace were bizarre. But even tought they claim the names of their ships were based on some ancient culture, most of them were just names of bad things as known by western cultures. Of course that should scare anyone. But do anyone know why did they claim that?

But were the Freespace badies would outright kill, the Bugs would torture pilots in bizarre ways. So maybe it's because WCP lacked cutscenes and taunts that they were so scary.

Seriously, there are no taunts in Freespace. That's the only way they it's better.

Also, I'm not sure if Origin had any concept to explain the bugs. But I remember asking on the old comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.space-sim newsgroup what ever happened to those captuerd aliens on Freespace one, and the Freespace guy made some joke about a hidden lab on Earth. Come on, was there ever a good story behind the Freespace plot, or was it just the impression of one, like on most x-files episodes?

 

[Eder]

But that's a side discussion I suppose, Eder, if Freespace presented their "strange alien race" better than Wing Commander presented its "strange alien race" it's because Freespace didn't even bother to try explaining anything about theirs...it's just an enemy that wants to kill us...they fly different ships and use different technology...no go kill them.

I agree, but WCP wasn't much better (and I wasn't comparing the plots anyway, my point is precisely how Freespace had more style than WCP when it came to aliens, while the opposite was the case for the rest of the presentation, IMHO).

You're right that Freespace was "they fly (incredibly powerful) different ships and use different technology (which the good guys only obtain with time)... now go kill them", but WCP was pretty much "they fly weak different ships and use all the same technology, except green instead of blue... now go kill them - because they apparently do experiments with humans!"

In other words, I think the little extra background we got on the Nephilim compared to the FS aliens doesn't make up for how the aliens feel weak in WCP, compared to how the Freespace aliens seem to be - both in their marine-eating cutscenes and in their impossible-to-kill ships. If anything, WCP's cutscenes just make me go "pfft, those can't be the sissies I singlehandedly killed 298 of on my first encounter with them." In the end, I think the most effective alien for a game is the one you wonder if you can even actually kill, not the one you know is doing terrible things to fictional humans, or wants to take over the universe, or whatever the plot is.

 

[Quarto]

The enemies on Freespace were bizarre. But even tought they claim the names of their ships were based on some ancient culture, most of them were just names of bad things as known by western cultures. Of course that should scare anyone. But do anyone know why did they claim that?

Well... I've always been under the impression that Shiva is not something from western culture .

The names of the aliens and their ships in Freespace followed a fairly specific naming scheme - they were named after demons, gods and various evil beings from Hindu and Christian cosmology (makes you wonder why the feminists didn't rip them to shreds for "Eve" ).

 

[Death]

[Freespace aliens] were nearly impossible (or outright impossible? I don't remember) to kill.

They were killable, it just required a lot of dedication, and excelent rocket pod aim, to keep on a ship and wear down its shielding without being able to target them or otherwise follow them beyond visual tracking.

Or, at least that's how I killed one of the lighter fighters (class forgotten), before sensors were upgraded to detect them (default difficulty setting). Cast-iron bitch, though, and after one kill I decided to bug out, before they started chewing on vital systems (wingies all decided to run for cover).

While, overall, I enjoyed WCP more, IMO the FS aliens were introduced better, even with the intro scene they got. But that doesn't help FS compensate for absolutely zero personal interest in either good guys or bad guys thanks to Generic Fighter Syndrome (IOW, no personalities).

 

[BigsWickDagger]

I know this started as a Half-Life thread, and it has gone all over the place, but now I have an inclination to finally try Freespace.....

 

[cff]

IMHO especially FS2 did a fairly good impression with the aliens. I remember that one mission just after you killed their one and only super ship by sacrifizing your own and the doing some scouting. Then there jumps in another of that class of supership they were only supposed to have one. And another one... And you are all alone there... Now that was cool scary mission design IMHO. I might actually say this was the best mission (stoy wise) that I saw in any space sim.

 

[Death]

Split off of HL2 thread, as there's been enough posts on the new subject to warrant a seperate discussion.

 

[Quarto]

Now that was cool scary mission design IMHO. I might actually say this was the best mission (stoy wise) that I saw in any space sim.

I dunno, storywise that sounds pretty awful . I've never played FS2. I thought about buying it when it came out, but two things stopped me - firstly, I didn't particularly want to spend the money on it, and secondly, the back-of-the-box info was a good indication of what I could expect from the storyline (i.e., nothing good).

I mean, come on, it all amounted to something like this: "Remember that big ship you were barely able to destroy? Eh? Eh? Well, now there's a THOUSAND OF THEM, and they're EVEN BIGGER!!!! AND BEAM WEAPONS!!!!!!!!!!"
Oh, wonderful. Such a storyline make you wonder what you could expect from the sequel... would FS3 include an even bigger invasion, or an even bigger invasion with even bigger ships, or an even bigger invasion with even bigger ships with even bigger beam weapons? So many choices...

Mind you, Secret Ops was no better in this regard: "Remember that big invasion that the Midway was barely able to stop? Eh? Eh? Well, now there's a BIGGER INVASION, and you've only got a little cruiser to stop them!!!!".
And sure, what little we know about Strike Force and Privateer 3 seems to indicate that however awful the Nephilim invasion was, it would get a little bit better in the long run... but all in all, storylines that rely on ever bigger odds to surprise the player are not what I would describe as high quality.

 

[Starman©]

I know what he means, this was really one of the best missions in freespace:
Dive! Dive! Dive, hit your burner pilot!

You entered the area right infront of one of those juggernaughts, and in the very first second of the mission-start your wing-leader screams that order. The juggernaught is jumping out 2 seconds later. and flown right through my ship because I didn't dive. The screamed order nearly gave me a heart-attack, and so I was paralyced a few seconds (pretty bad for a pilot, huh ? )

But seriously, while I'm really a fan of the freespace2 combat-engine, it's lack of character-building was really bad. They said it was inspired by WC, but they missed the most vital part what a real shame. But If you want cool space-fights, and can spare a good story, then Freespace 2 is your choice. (especially with all the code-improvements since open-source, and those beams are f**** awesome). Finally a cool way of see battleships fighting together, just like in B5.

About the shivans, I kinda like the way of introducing them, since you don't know anything about them, not even after finishing FS2. All you now is, that they are very old (since they annihilated a huge space-empire already 8000 years ago) and now they are after you. Their intentions are still unknown, but they seem to guard the subspace or something. Their Age is also the explanation for having gigantic ships and unknown resources, since they had enough time to build them. This lack of information makes them mysterious and dangerous, their intention is unknown. They can be somehow compared to the "first ones" in the B5-Series I think.

The FS-story is only the same used-up klischee. "Evil, unbeatable aliens attack humanity, they loose" They start fighting together in order to survive, they somehow win and hereo and princess end up in bed" We all have seen this more than once. Pretty bad, they could have made something good with that technology (but that's what WC-SAGA is for. We are combining the perfect engine with the perfect game ).

As for the WCP-Bugs, they were rather cool looking, but were really bad balanced, they were not really a treat (but I have to admit, that I always played the "normal" difficultie, since ACE was a little to hard for my taste, So I did not really enjoyed it.

Take the dreadnaught for example, A few guns, a few missile-launchers and a fighterbay. Booohoo, I'm scared. One torpedo, and the launchbay is history. Then take a wing of confed-bombers and the dreadnaught is history too.

 

[Maj.Striker]

Freespace 1 & 2 are basically a modern Wing Commander Academy. A great way to make custom missions and a good game engine but lack of plot makes it useless on it's own. However, I'm not straight knocking down Freespace since there are a couple of very good redeeming factors that I like about it. 1. (As mentioned above) it provided a decent way of seeing Capships duke it out which is always fun to see...who hasn't at least once just found a little out of the way spot and parked it while you watch the capships go at it? 2. It comes with an easy to use mission editor that allows you to create a plot that actually makes sense. The real problem with Freespace and I don't believe any mod can actually completely overcome (although WC SAGA will probably come close) is the lack of character interaction...there is really no way to mod this in that I know of unless you make a movie cutscene for each mission in which your character interacts with his comrades.

 

[Lynx]

I actually think Freespace 1 was one of the better space sims. I liked the ship designs, the models looked very good(the Fenris/Leviathan is one of the best designs IMO, it looks kind of like the Roger Young in Starship troopers) and the introduction of the baddies was handeled much better than in WCP; they were indeed scary contrary to the bugs.

But Freespace 2 on the contrary sucked hard. They replaced the interface with a rusty olive-greenish version which is so ugly that it feels like driving a burning stick through my eyeballs every time I look on it. The graphics aren't too good either. The background nebulas look like space is suffering from some sort of freaky disease, and the capship models are the worst seen in any spacesim. Theor models sport some serious modelling errors and they have the worst UV-mapping/texturing ever. It is obvious that the modeller either lacked talent or made the models in 5 minutes. The smaller ships don't look too good either, they choose for more organic, rounder ships which just sucks in my oppinion, though that's a matter of taste.
Plus the BIG ships which every FS fan seems to love; I think they are horrible from a gaming standpoint. Due to their sheer size it looks as if you are standing still near them no matter how fast you fly, and the capships are also goddamn slow which leads to the most static cap ship battles I've seen. They just sit there and slash each others with giant sticks(beams).

 

[ZOmegaZ]

Freespace and Prophecy both are symptomatic of something unhappily common in sci-fi: we create a villian that comes out of a big hole in space with absurdly advanced technology, no inclination to communicate with anyone, and the sole motivation of KILL EVERYONE in big glowing neon letters. 8472 from Voyager, the Derrivas on Andromeda, the Thirdspace aliens from B5, the Nephilim from Prophecy, and the Shivans from Freespace. They might as well all be the same race, really. 8472 was beaten too easily; the Derrivas were from post-S1.5 Andromeda, where you're lucky to find a coherent storyline at all; the Thirdspace aliens played no part in the story at all beyond one TV movie, though they might still have some part to play in the mythology; and the Nephilim were too weak and underdeveloped to be credible. See, if you're going to create a mystery, you HAVE to solve it eventually. There has to be something just as interesting BEHIND the mystery, or the whole thing was pointless. B5 might still have some potential, but the others, the race existed to get blown up, nothing more. The only reason Freespace escapes from being that banal is that the Shivans weren't dumbed down. We never beat them, we just escaped by the skin of our teeth both times. It also helps that there's at least some indicator of there being a deeper purpose behind their actions and existence, even if we may never find out now.

 

[Maj.Striker]

Again, I don't get it. The Shivans were never a threat to me...except for perhaps the very first mission or so I ripped through them like a hot knife through butter. Shoot, I never had to repair...leave me alone out there in a bomber and I could rip up an entire fleet...what is everyone else's problem?