Possibilities since fs2 source was released.

mpanty: Well, I haven't played Zelda, but I can assure you that you haven't missed much not having played FF. I sincerely hope that a lot is lost with the translation, or I officially won't understand the Japanese for the rest of my life. Play Planescape Torment instead. It has everything. Except for stunning 3D graphics, but that's just BS as it has no impact on the game itself.

LeHah: I never said FS2 was Game of the Year... However, I believe Grim Fandango was. And it was very well deserved. Back to the sims... Wasn't Starlancer also released 1999? That game had its moments... (And I just recently completed the final mission in total success! WOOHOO!) I'm not saying it ruled, but it didn't suck all the same. What about Tachyon... Hmm... When was it released? I don't remember... Whatever. Poor competition. If FS2 drove the genre to its grave, Tachyon nailed the coffin shut. And still we have Independence War 2, Freelancer, Starshatter (independent game, coming along nicely, reminds you a lot of IW1), Babylon 5: I've Found Her.
 
Well personally my experience of FF games, while limited, has been that they are extremley hit and miss, for example FFIX was an absolute classic whilst FFVIII before it had had a leveling system that meant it was near impossible to complete the game and a plot which didn't really drive you to do so anyway :p

But Zelda has always been on target, someone ALWAYS complains about the most recent games (at this point that would be majoras mask and Celda) but in the end they're always looked back on as classics by the majority, just as they deserve to be!
 
I agree Pedro.

FFIX was probably my favorite of the FF series and I get a lot of shit from "Die-hards" who assume, since it's "new" that it can't be as good as the earlier ones. FFVIII was pretty damned bad, but two former GFs of mine were both obsessed with Squall. WTF?

The best of the FF series remains, perhaps forever, Final Fantasy Tactics. That game had more plot twists than a Clancy novel and more characters than War And Rememberance.

Zelda usually kicks ass, but there was that terrible Zelda game for a game system I can't seem to remember. It was the same system Mario Hotel came out on. Anyone?
 
You're thinking of the Philips CD-i, which had three Zelda games and "Hotel Mario" as part of a deal with Nintendo. Two of the Zelda games were supposed to be awful, the third was supposedly allright.

The CD-i was one of those systems that companies believed could replace the VCR, and so was initially sold for a whole lot of money... (like the 3DO) and thus never caught on.

Had a *really* cool informercial, though, that used to play on TV late at night... a guy meets God and God tells him to buy a CD-i or somesuch.
 
Personal favorites of mine -
PC RPG - Planescape: Torment. Plain and simple, no argument.
"What can change the nature of a man?"

Console - probably Final Fantasy II/IV. Loved VII, HATED VIII with a passion, liked IX, played some of V and III/VI, but the story of Cecil and crew is still my favorite (wouldn't mind if Edge mysteriously disappeared, though...).
 
Personnally, (of the FF series) I like FFVI the best. Probably because It was the first one I've ever played, so I'm probably biased.

As far as console games go, there aren't many games out there that can compare with the likes of Contra!
 
My only experience with FF (or RPGs in general for that matter) was Super Mario RPG (being a fan of almost everything Mario) - fighting Culex in Monstro Town. :)
 
Originally posted by LeHah
FFIX was probably my favorite of the FF series and I get a lot of shit from "Die-hards" who assume, since it's "new" that it can't be as good as the earlier ones.
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You do realize that that is exactly what Wing Commander fans do, right?
 
Freespace wasn't just a bad space sim, it also helped drive the genre to its grave.
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I'm curious as to why you feel that Freespace caused the collapse of the space sim genre, as opposed to being a victim of the collapse. As my stats professor used to say: correlation does not imply causation.

As far as I can tell, each space sim released since WCP has sold worse than the one before, excepting XWing Alliance for which sales were mediocre, but above the then current average. Licensed properties (e.g. Klingon Academy, ST: Bridge Commander) have not done much better than original titles such as Starlancer, Terminus, or Tachyon.

I'm not interested in starting or perpetuating a flamewar, and I'm not really interested in debating the merits of the Freespace games vis-a-vis the Wing Commander series. It is the declining sales trend over ALL space simulations that both concerns and interests me.

Feel free to email me direct if you prefer to take it offline.

Thanks,
 
Really, none of those games you listed were incredibly good (apparantly the ST: Academy games have a sort of cult following, however.)
 
actually, it would be highly possible to turn freespace 2 into a WC game. we already have the code for most of the things people want added. it's called VEGASTRIKE. Vegastrike is open source. if anyone wanted to they could easily transfer parts of the vegastrike code to freespace 2 including navpoint code, and animation code.
 
Originally posted by TC
You do realize that that is exactly what Wing Commander fans do, right?
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Im very aware of it. I defended WC4 when it came out, amongst the "Too much cinema / Not enough gameplay" screams from "fanboys" and game critics. I also would like to defend WC:p since its the most fun to play... I just really dont like the enviroment/story. Its quite the opposite of the old games in terms of atmosphere.
 
Originally posted by TC
Really, none of those games you listed were incredibly good
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Well, I can't help that. Those were about the best space sims released in the past four years or so. Titles I didn't mention: Battlecruiser 3000 v2, X: Beyond the Frontier, Jumpgate, Allegiance. There were also some arcade style shooters like Tellurian Defender and Sinistar Unleashed, but they didn't sell very well either. And there were some space themed RTS games such as Homeworld, Mankind, and DarkSpace. But none of those set the world on fire in the sales department.

So if you are saying that the cause of the space sim crash is simply that no-one has made a really good space sim since WC4, fine. I'd be more inclined to believe that instead of the notion that everything is somehow Mike Kulas's fault. To complete the argument, you would also have to assume that negative word of mouth was able to counteract the very positive reviews several of these games received in the gaming press.

If that is indeed your claim, I'd be interested in hearing any thoughts you might have on why WC4 or WC:p were so much better than the games which followed them.

Personally, I think the problem is simply that popular culture has moved on. Space-based science fiction just isn't as popular as it was between 1977 and 1987. It's a bit like how rock music replaced jazz and swing as the standard form of pop music during the 1960's.

(apparantly the ST: Academy games have a sort of cult following, however.)
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Yeah, go figure. ;)
 
Originally posted by milo
Personally, I think the problem is simply that popular culture has moved on. Space-based science fiction just isn't as popular as it was between 1977 and 1987.
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Ah, it'll come back. Things always go round in cycles. And for the moment, I can't really think of science fiction which isn't space-based. ;)
 
Originally posted by Wedge009
Ah, it'll come back. Things always go round in cycles. And for the moment, I can't really think of science fiction which isn't space-based. ;)
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Not everything is cyclical. Jazz music has been marginalized for forty years. Opera for almost a hundred. Yet these were once considered mainstream forms of entertainment.

Some non-space based science fiction:
  • Cyberpunk
  • Postnuclear Apocalypse
  • Time Travel
  • The Invisible Man
  • Biomedical (e.g. Andromeda Strain, Gattaca)
  • Robotics (e.g. Do Androids Dream...)
  • Submarine (e.g. various Atlantis stories)
  • Other

The Other category includes a wide variety of stories that either occur on alien worlds or on a future earth that has been visited by aliens but does not involve space travel in the plot itself. Some examples: Orson Scott Card's novels Treason and Wyrms, or Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land and The Puppet Masters.
 
Ah, okay. I'm not really into science-fiction, anyway.

And I know not absolutely everything comes back, but hey, I'm trying to maintain a little optimism here. ;) And no one on Earth can see into the future... unless you have a certain DeLorean handy...
 
actually ppl, i thought that some of the games mentioned were very good, freespace and freespace 2 are great fun, in my opinion ranking alongside wc as for tachyon, X BTF and starlancer, in the absence of a WC game theyre good, further, just cos some arrogant buggers out there dont wanna play them, doesnt make them crap, poor sales merely reflect the market here, an entire genre cannot suddenly become crap, fs2 had the same problem wcp did, bad timing (tho wcp wasnt that good anyway :D)
 
Cyberpunk

/si:'ber-puhnk/ (Originally coined by SF writer Bruce Bethke and/or editor Gardner Dozois) A subgenre of SF launched in 1982 by William Gibson's epoch-making novel "Neuromancer" (though its roots go back through Vernor Vinge's "True Names" to John Brunner's 1975 novel "The Shockwave Rider"). Gibson's near-total ignorance of computers and the present-day hacker culture enabled him to speculate about the role of computers and hackers in the future in ways hackers have since found both irritatingly na"ive and tremendously stimulating. Gibson's work was widely imitated, in particular by the short-lived but innovative "Max Headroom" TV series. See cyberspace, ice, jack in, go flatline.

Since 1990 or so, popular culture has included a movement or fashion trend that calls itself "cyberpunk", associated especially with the rave/techno subculture. Hackers have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, self-described cyberpunks too often seem to be shallow trendoids in black leather who have substituted enthusiastic blathering about technology for actually learning and *doing* it. Attitude is no substitute for competence. On the other hand, at least cyberpunks are excited about the right things and properly respectful of hacking talent in those who have it. The general consensus is to tolerate them politely in hopes that they'll attract people who grow into being true hackers.

(BTW, The father of modern Cyberpunk, William Gibson's Neuromancer, had a rather large part of it take place in space.)
 
I don't get you guys. No new Wing Commander game in sight, the possibility to make missions, briefings, etc. without knowing any programming language (or something like that), great graphics and you don't like FS... Nevertheless, if somebody comes up with WC style ships I will gladly release my WC campaign, which is now made with FS style ships.
 
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