I was just a bit too young for TIE Fighter, but XvT (especially + expansion)... that was win. I played that game so much I got to the point where I could singlehandedly shoot all the cannons off of a Star Destroyer (Imperial class, of course) in Hard mode.
Mostly because I wanted the most awesomest medal evar for that particular mission and it kept eluding me.
You know, I would cut out the heart of someone on this forum and offer it to the gods for LucasArts to license out Star Wars to Namco so that Namco's Ace Combat team could make a new Star Wars arcade sim that was as good and exhilarating as an AC game to test out the waters to see if there's a market for more Star Wars sims that are more complex than the Rogue Squadron games.
No one seems to do arcade flight sims as well as Namco does and I don't care if the games aren't quite as complex as X-Wing or TIE Fighter as long as they're more complex and actually fun unlike the Rogue Squadrons. And hopefully it would lead to more TIE-like stuff in the future!
But I don't know where I was going with this. It won't happen either so oh well!
I didn't feel a big impetous to bust my ass for this mission, in a way. Sure, it was da boss they captured, so I gotta look good. But, on the other hand... it's the fucking Emperor. Even before we saw Revenge of the Sith's acrobatics, I was thinking guy could have force shocked the shit out of the kidnappers... so why would I be concerned? Just plant a beacon and let the old man get some jollies. He hasn't beheaded anyone in 20 years. We can pick him up later.
If the emperor gets kidnapped, the emperor wanted to get kidnapped.
This made me laugh really hard. I have this picture in my head of a cutscene where you're kneeling before the Emperor and instead of being thanked he simply says "You ruined my weekend!" and then you're made extra crispy via the force.
Tie Fighter made me love the Star Wars universe where the movies failed to. I used to love opening the ship viewer thingy and finding out the names of all the different crafts. Then I'd spend my day in school doodling them.
You know, I would cut out the heart of someone on this forum and offer it to the gods for LucasArts to license out Star Wars to Namco so that Namco's Ace Combat team could make a new Star Wars arcade sim that was as good and exhilarating as an AC game to test out the waters to see if there's a market for more Star Wars sims that are more complex than the Rogue Squadron games.
No one seems to do arcade flight sims as well as Namco does and I don't care if the games aren't quite as complex as X-Wing or TIE Fighter as long as they're more complex and actually fun unlike the Rogue Squadrons. And hopefully it would lead to more TIE-like stuff in the future!
But I don't know where I was going with this. It won't happen either so oh well!
I am so sick of the testing the water games. I don't want mechassault I want mechwarrior. I don't want a shadowrun fps I want a rpg. I don't want an arcadey x-wing or tie fighter I want a sim. These dumbed down games never seem to sell all that well and then the publishers use that as a reason to not ever make what we are all really waiting for. X-wing is due for an update. Come on Lucas Arts quit screwing around and hook us up.
Come on Lucas Arts quit screwing around and hook us up.
Co-op over live? Yes please.
I've been harping on this for years. Years!
For multiplayer, what I'd love to see are a couple of different modes (this would make everybody happy, so I'm assuming it will never happen :x):
1. Classic X vs. T: Basically, the same game as the old ones, with snazzy graphics and killer sound. Toss this into single-player too--I'd love to play through those old missions again.
2. Imperial Navy vs. Rebel Fleet: Bring on both the fighters and capital ships. I think it could work with 10 vs. 10... maybe more if we can get some bigger numbers for online console multiplayer. One or two players are in charge of a large ship while the rest of the team launches out in fighters. Your SD, Corvette or Nebulon-B Commander would take care of overall situational awareness (big, colorful space maps ftw), repairing and rearming fighters, and going at the enemey capital ship and enemy fighters with turbo lasers. Want now!
NexusSix on
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I fear the genre is really really dead. Even if they made a non arcady Xwing or Tie game, how many of you would play it the RIGHT way, with a flightstick? These games just are not the same with the mouse. And they suffer even more when designed to be played with the mouse.
How many own a proper flightstick anymore? I have a VERY dusty force feedback pro I would love to dust off. Not even sure if it has drivers for dx9 though.
I am so sick of the testing the water games. I don't want mechassault I want mechwarrior. I don't want a shadowrun fps I want a rpg. I don't want an arcadey x-wing or tie fighter I want a sim. These dumbed down games never seem to sell all that well and then the publishers use that as a reason to not ever make what we are all really waiting for. X-wing is due for an update. Come on Lucas Arts quit screwing around and hook us up.
Co-op over live? Yes please.
When did you sneak into my brain and read my wishes? We need REAL space sims. Not this Rogue Squadron shit they kept trying to put it. REAL mech games. Mechwarrior. Mechwarrior 3. Not that watered down 4 or Armored Core crap. Complicated games for people who actually want to think. Shit that uses a Joystick and a Throttle. Hell, throw some pedals in there for good measure. I weep for these lost game style.
You know, I would cut out the heart of someone on this forum and offer it to the gods for LucasArts to license out Star Wars to Namco so that Namco's Ace Combat team could make a new Star Wars arcade sim that was as good and exhilarating as an AC game to test out the waters to see if there's a market for more Star Wars sims that are more complex than the Rogue Squadron games.
No one seems to do arcade flight sims as well as Namco does and I don't care if the games aren't quite as complex as X-Wing or TIE Fighter as long as they're more complex and actually fun unlike the Rogue Squadrons. And hopefully it would lead to more TIE-like stuff in the future!
But I don't know where I was going with this. It won't happen either so oh well!
I am so sick of the testing the water games. I don't want mechassault I want mechwarrior. I don't want a shadowrun fps I want a rpg. I don't want an arcadey x-wing or tie fighter I want a sim. These dumbed down games never seem to sell all that well and then the publishers use that as a reason to not ever make what we are all really waiting for. X-wing is due for an update. Come on Lucas Arts quit screwing around and hook us up.
Co-op over live? Yes please.
If this were just a XBLA update of the orginal TIE fighter how many people would buy this off arcade?
Tie Fighter made me love the Star Wars universe where the movies failed to. I used to love opening the ship viewer thingy and finding out the names of all the different crafts. Then I'd spend my day in school doodling them.
I am so sick of the testing the water games. I don't want mechassault I want mechwarrior. I don't want a shadowrun fps I want a rpg. I don't want an arcadey x-wing or tie fighter I want a sim. These dumbed down games never seem to sell all that well and then the publishers use that as a reason to not ever make what we are all really waiting for. X-wing is due for an update. Come on Lucas Arts quit screwing around and hook us up.
Co-op over live? Yes please.
When did you sneak into my brain and read my wishes? We need REAL space sims. Not this Rogue Squadron shit they kept trying to put it. REAL mech games. Mechwarrior. Mechwarrior 3. Not that watered down 4 or Armored Core crap. Complicated games for people who actually want to think. Shit that uses a Joystick and a Throttle. Hell, throw some pedals in there for good measure. I weep for these lost game style.
You can't play a REAL space sim on a gamepad. Sim is as much about the control interface as it is about the game itself. And I doubt we will ever have a force feedback flightstick for the 360
I am so sick of the testing the water games. I don't want mechassault I want mechwarrior. I don't want a shadowrun fps I want a rpg. I don't want an arcadey x-wing or tie fighter I want a sim. These dumbed down games never seem to sell all that well and then the publishers use that as a reason to not ever make what we are all really waiting for. X-wing is due for an update. Come on Lucas Arts quit screwing around and hook us up.
Co-op over live? Yes please.
When did you sneak into my brain and read my wishes? We need REAL space sims. Not this Rogue Squadron shit they kept trying to put it. REAL mech games. Mechwarrior. Mechwarrior 3. Not that watered down 4 or Armored Core crap. Complicated games for people who actually want to think. Shit that uses a Joystick and a Throttle. Hell, throw some pedals in there for good measure. I weep for these lost game style.
You can't play a REAL space sim on a gamepad. Sim is as much about the control interface as it is about the game itself. And I doubt we will ever have a force feedback flightstick for the 360
Yeah well then you don't get one. PC games aren't exactly flying off the shelves these days so if they want to make money they have to at least go multiplatform with it. A seperate controller doesn't work, Steel Battalion showed us that. At the end of the day it is not impossible to make it work on a controller. Sure I would prefer a good flight stick too but if it comes between that and just not getting it I would play it on a controller.
If they can put Wing Commander on SNES, then obviously they can do more. Sure controls will have to be simplified, but I'm certain it could be done.
A damn good space sim doesn't have to have a gajillion controls. They just need to put some serious thought and a good story behind it. something few developers are willing to do.
I still reject the idea that MechAssault and ShadowRun FPS would have led to more fleshed out RPGs had they sold well. Let's face it, if those games had sold well, it would have spawned more shooter games just like it. MechAssault is the proof right there. It obviously sold well enough for a sequel, but wait, the sequel was just the same game with prettier graphics and a couple of gimmicks thrown in. It didn't turn into a hard core Mechwarrior RPG
Don't get me wrong, I did like MechAssault, but I want more and not just more of the same.
Why do you think games are more mainstream now, They HAD to appeal to a broader audience so that it will sell well. Hardcore games, pretty much by definition, don't appeal to broad ranges. Hardcore anything is a niche. Developers will still occasionally take risks with more complex games, but they will continue being a rarity.
I still reject the idea that MechAssault and ShadowRun FPS would have led to more fleshed out RPGs had they sold well. Let's face it, if those games had sold well, it would have spawned more shooter games just like it. MechAssault is the proof right there. It obviously sold well enough for a sequel, but wait, the sequel was just the same game with prettier graphics and a couple of gimmicks thrown in.
Yeah I've never understood that logic either.
It's like, before Batman Begins was in the works, people kept saying that if only more people had gone to watch Batman & Robin we would have seen a new Batman movie. Well yes, we would have. And it would have been the same utter crap that the previous two movies had been.
Instead, people didn't go out and buy the crap purely 'for the sake of the franchise', and the execs realised that there's only so much tripe we're willing to take. End result, it took a fairly long time until the next Batman movie, but we finally got what we wanted.
I think that was a far better outcome than going along with all the idiots who kept saying "you killed the franchise by not buying it!", and being rewarded with yet more crap.
In short, buying crap "for the future of the franchise" only really ensures you'll get more of the same.
Uh, there is no way they could condense the X-Wing/Tie fighter games down into a gamepad. Not without completely overhauling the game. You need buttons to:
-increase throttle
-decrease throttle
-match speed to current target
-adjust weapon energy
-adjust shield energy
-transfer weapon energy to shields
-transfer shield energy to weapons
-toggle shield orientation
-cycle through lasers, ion cannons, and torpedos
-cycle between firing configurations
-targeting (cycle forward, back, closest, ect)
-wingman control (order to attack/defend, return home, ect)
Those are just the ones I can recall off memory. I'm sure I'm missing a few more. I can't honestly see doing that with a 10 button gamepad. These games used up a surprising amount of real estate on the keyboard, and you needed to utilize all those option I just listed to get through later missions. No, the best you could do is pretty much something like the Rogue Squadron games, and those were a lot more arcadey and simple than the PC games.
Please note though that I'm NOT trying to start THAT argument up. Just that the style of game that X-Wing/Tie Fighter/X-Wing Alliance were was a lot more sim like, and you needed a lot of controls for all their different functions. There's just no way you could condense them down into a gamepad without drastically changing the feel of the game.
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Uh, there is no way they could condense the X-Wing/Tie fighter games down into a gamepad. Not without completely overhauling the game. You need buttons to:
-increase throttle
-decrease throttle
-match speed to current target
-adjust weapon energy
-adjust shield energy
-transfer weapon energy to shields
-transfer shield energy to weapons
-toggle shield orientation
-cycle through lasers, ion cannons, and torpedos
-cycle between firing configurations
-targeting (cycle forward, back, closest, ect)
-wingman control (order to attack/defend, return home, ect)
Those are just the ones I can recall off memory. I'm sure I'm missing a few more. I can't honestly see doing that with a 10 button gamepad. These games used up a surprising amount of real estate on the keyboard, and you needed to utilize all those option I just listed to get through later missions. No, the best you could do is pretty much something like the Rogue Squadron games, and those were a lot more arcadey and simple than the PC games.
Please note though that I'm NOT trying to start THAT argument up. Just that the style of game that X-Wing/Tie Fighter/X-Wing Alliance were was a lot more sim like, and you needed a lot of controls for all their different functions. There's just no way you could condense them down into a gamepad without drastically changing the feel of the game.
Comprimises would have to be made no doubt. However there is a lot of room between Rogue Squadron and X-wing. I think they could get it pretty damn close with a controller.
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augustwhere you come from is goneRegistered Userregular
edited February 2008
You could pretty easily get all those controls by combining buttons and the d-pad.
Wing Commander had all the controls on the SNES pad.
You could pretty easily get all those controls by combining buttons and the d-pad.
Wing Commander had all the controls on the SNES pad.
the controls did suck balls, but it worked. Corin7 is right, compromise would be required.
What I want is Ace Combat 5 with better AI and better story, (though to be fair AC5's story wasn't bad, just lol Nagase lol! That and I'm just not a fan of the eastern aspects of the game) and some better gameplay...
Uh, there is no way they could condense the X-Wing/Tie fighter games down into a gamepad. Not without completely overhauling the game.
We need a Steel Battalion-esq controller.
Even more importantly, once we get this hundred buttoned god controller for our console of choice, we need it to be open source so multiple developers can make games for it.
That was the deal breaker for me with Steel Battalion. No other game companies would make a game that used the controller, so you were stuck with a huge controller, 1 game for it and a 200 dollar hit to the wallet. I don't know if noone else did anything for it because the controller was sold in such limited numbers thus strongly limiting the potential sales for any game that used it or if Capcom wouldn't release the development rights to anyone else.
The thing with Steel Battalion was that it was an ego project for one of the guys at Capcom. His name escapes me at the moment, but the company gave him the go-ahead to make his dream mech simulator knowing there wasn't much potential for a huge franchise and profits, so Capcom kept it to a small scale release. It is a shame though, and I love SB just for the fact of being such a balls-out hardcore giant robot game.
Back on topic though: I see no reason why a developer couldn't come up with a good control scheme on a pad for another X/TIE game that is more sim than arcade. The market for sim games of this nature, I think, dictates a decision like that a lot more than technical hurdles.
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-ULTIMA RATIO REGUM-
Yeah well then you don't get one. PC games aren't exactly flying off the shelves these days so if they want to make money they have to at least go multiplatform with it. A seperate controller doesn't work, Steel Battalion showed us that. At the end of the day it is not impossible to make it work on a controller. Sure I would prefer a good flight stick too but if it comes between that and just not getting it I would play it on a controller.
Don't be stupid. Steel Batallion didn't show us anything other than how Steel Batallion did. It was ONE game. Which they then tried to sell to us AGAIN with multiplayer that had a shelf life of 'whenever we take the servers down'. Capcom made a bunch of mistakes in making, promoting, and marketing steel batallion that would not necessarily be copied by another.
Plus, a good controller <> steel batallion. That thing was crazy and over the top.
As far as a billion buttons go, much of it could be put into menu systems. If they do a good power config menu then you can put all the power options under one button. Press select to bring up the power hud and then you have 10 buttons to re-use however you want in ways that relate to power based on a power screen overlay. Similar to how the voice menus work in modern fighting games if you need an analogy.
As far as making money, PC games don't lose money these days. They don't make AS MUCH as multi-console games. The NEVER DID unless you go back to before consoles existed. They are not being dumbed down to break even, they are being dumbed down in an attempt to allow the producers to make more money hats.
Deep games are still VERY viable. They just don't print money.
My problem with a gamepad is not the lack of buttons, they have plenty. Compare a gamepad to a flightstick and you will probably see more on a modern gamepad than any but the craziest of flightsticks.
My problem with a gamepad is that wiggling my thumb slightly does not feel nearly as invogoriating as controlling a flightstick.
A smart company making a flightstick would have it match the number of buttons as a controller and have it work just like a normal controller as much as possible so buying this new space sim game also means you could go back and replay that ace fighter game with this new, awesome controller.
The TOTAL OPPOSITE of what Capcom did with steel batallion. Make the controller be a big selling point, not an obstacle to purchase. Make it more like wii play or links crossbow training where some people buy the game and don't even WANT the game. They just want the controller.
Yeah well then you don't get one. PC games aren't exactly flying off the shelves these days so if they want to make money they have to at least go multiplatform with it. A seperate controller doesn't work, Steel Battalion showed us that. At the end of the day it is not impossible to make it work on a controller. Sure I would prefer a good flight stick too but if it comes between that and just not getting it I would play it on a controller.
Don't be stupid. Steel Batallion didn't show us anything other than how Steel Batallion did. It was ONE game. Which they then tried to sell to us AGAIN with multiplayer that had a shelf life of 'whenever we take the servers down'. Capcom made a bunch of mistakes in making, promoting, and marketing steel batallion that would not necessarily be copied by another.
Plus, a good controller <> steel batallion. That thing was crazy and over the top.
As far as a billion buttons go, much of it could be put into menu systems. If they do a good power config menu then you can put all the power options under one button. Press select to bring up the power hud and then you have 10 buttons to re-use however you want in ways that relate to power based on a power screen overlay. Similar to how the voice menus work in modern fighting games if you need an analogy.
As far as making money, PC games don't lose money these days. They don't make AS MUCH as multi-console games. The NEVER DID unless you go back to before consoles existed. They are not being dumbed down to break even, they are being dumbed down in an attempt to allow the producers to make more money hats.
Deep games are still VERY viable. They just don't print money.
This is a bit of a pointless discussion right now. I played TIE fighter on a mouse and keyboard and I definitelly enjoyed it., and I'm pretty sure you could map all the controls I used there to 4 analog axis + 12 buttons + 1 4-way D-pad.
It's no longer button a and button b. There have been more complex control schemes than that properly done on modern controllers. GUI design has also improved. Today you'd do all the comms stuff and shield management by holding a trigger and selecting optons using one analog. You could even do it while still controlling the ship with the other analog.
The reason console games are not as deep when it comes to management as PC games is due to the tastes of their target audience, not to the limitations of the control scheme.
Except in RTSs, that is.
EDIT:
I don't know, pack in a flight stick for free doesn't make financial sense when you have a standard analog device in every console.
Maybe make it optional, like those arcade joysticks that came out with VF5 (damn, I want, no I NEED one of those before Street Fighter 2 HD comes out).
I spent my very first $10-off discount Babbages card on X-Wing. I was SO pysched. I played that game to death.
..until I got TIE fighter. Like many others here, I was totally infatuated with that game. Played through the entire thing multiple times --- even made sure to do all the training simulator missions, just so I could get some more badges. So many fond memories. And yeah, the clear the mine field with the Interceptor was a pretty memorable mission.
I was, in general, a flight-sim junkie when I was a kid. The very first game I ever bought with my own money was the F117-A simulator. I remember sitting my parents down for a "serious" talk about, yes, direct quote, my "investment" and then going to pick it up. Our 8086 could barely run it ---- but it started me down the path.
Yeah well then you don't get one. PC games aren't exactly flying off the shelves these days so if they want to make money they have to at least go multiplatform with it. A seperate controller doesn't work, Steel Battalion showed us that. At the end of the day it is not impossible to make it work on a controller. Sure I would prefer a good flight stick too but if it comes between that and just not getting it I would play it on a controller.
Don't be stupid. Steel Batallion didn't show us anything other than how Steel Batallion did. It was ONE game. Which they then tried to sell to us AGAIN with multiplayer that had a shelf life of 'whenever we take the servers down'. Capcom made a bunch of mistakes in making, promoting, and marketing steel batallion that would not necessarily be copied by another.
Plus, a good controller <> steel batallion. That thing was crazy and over the top.
As far as a billion buttons go, much of it could be put into menu systems. If they do a good power config menu then you can put all the power options under one button. Press select to bring up the power hud and then you have 10 buttons to re-use however you want in ways that relate to power based on a power screen overlay. Similar to how the voice menus work in modern fighting games if you need an analogy.
As far as making money, PC games don't lose money these days. They don't make AS MUCH as multi-console games. The NEVER DID unless you go back to before consoles existed. They are not being dumbed down to break even, they are being dumbed down in an attempt to allow the producers to make more money hats.
Deep games are still VERY viable. They just don't print money.
I will try not to be stupid it is just so hard with this tiny IQ of mine.
If pc games are still flying off the shelves please tell Infinity Ward and Epic to quit their bitching about the pc game market then. For now I will go with their opionion of the PC Market over yours. If you were a developer making anything but a mmo right would really do a PC only release? Really?
I think Steel Battalion did show us a lot. So again we disagree. I would love to see some sales data on how the most recent Ace Combat sold. I imagine about 95% sales were minus the big goddamn controller.
Believe me I want what you want. I just don't think it will ever happen and I am willing to settle for a little bit less as long as it gets us something. However I doubt we will get anything. If it doesn't have lightsabers these days lucas doesn't seem to be into it.
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ShadowenSnores in the morningLoserdomRegistered Userregular
Cover a medical frigate until it can jump away or something.
STD jumps in, drops a bunch of TIE Bombers, jumps out. You haul ass over there.
STD jumps in again on the other side of the frigate, drops more bombers. You hope you finish the first bombers fast enough and then haul ass over there.
Repeat a few times. God damn was that mission hard to do without losing the frigate.
And to make it worse, in those stupidly poor written X-Wing books, those walking talking hard-on "charecters" tha the author created all sit there talking about how awsome they are for completing that mission without breaking a sweat.
Man, I tell you that mission pissed me off so bad. And then fictional charecters telling me how I sucked for not being able to do it first time? Made it worse.
Oddly, while I blew at X-wing, I was able--possibly because I read the X-wing novels beforehand--to beat that mission first time out.
Also, while I was no great fan of Stackpole's style when he wrote those books, the initial scene with Corran and his friends beating the Redemption scenario was, in fact, not bad--because three of them were dead, and one of them had had his ship disabled and only through luck got the last enemy.
Uh, there is no way they could condense the X-Wing/Tie fighter games down into a gamepad. Not without completely overhauling the game. You need buttons to:
-increase throttle
-decrease throttle
-match speed to current target
-adjust weapon energy
-adjust shield energy
-transfer weapon energy to shields
-transfer shield energy to weapons
-toggle shield orientation
-cycle through lasers, ion cannons, and torpedos
-cycle between firing configurations
-targeting (cycle forward, back, closest, ect)
-wingman control (order to attack/defend, return home, ect)
Those are just the ones I can recall off memory. I'm sure I'm missing a few more. I can't honestly see doing that with a 10 button gamepad. These games used up a surprising amount of real estate on the keyboard, and you needed to utilize all those option I just listed to get through later missions. No, the best you could do is pretty much something like the Rogue Squadron games, and those were a lot more arcadey and simple than the PC games.
Please note though that I'm NOT trying to start THAT argument up. Just that the style of game that X-Wing/Tie Fighter/X-Wing Alliance were was a lot more sim like, and you needed a lot of controls for all their different functions. There's just no way you could condense them down into a gamepad without drastically changing the feel of the game.
You're forgetting just how many buttons a modern pad has. You could also change all the transfer energy buttons to one button, just cycle through all the options. Put stuff on the D-Pad, etc. Or use an overlay menu like the original Perfect Dark.
It's possible.
Or you could just play one of the old ones on a pc.
I am not saying the PC market is better than the console market. I am just saying that niche games can still pay for themselves and are viable. The big-boys just don't give a shit about viable anymore. They want their money hats. So anything that is less than the MOST is not worth effort. If they can make more off the dumbed down game than they can off the niche game, they will make the dumbed down game EVERY TIME. It isn't a question of whether the niche game can make money anymore with the big companies.
[deleted stuff]
We need a smaller indie company to get ahold of the rights so they will be happier with making less money, but I doublt LucasArts will give a company like that their IP anymore.
Cover a medical frigate until it can jump away or something.
STD jumps in, drops a bunch of TIE Bombers, jumps out. You haul ass over there.
STD jumps in again on the other side of the frigate, drops more bombers. You hope you finish the first bombers fast enough and then haul ass over there.
Repeat a few times. God damn was that mission hard to do without losing the frigate.
And to make it worse, in those stupidly poor written X-Wing books, those walking talking hard-on "charecters" tha the author created all sit there talking about how awsome they are for completing that mission without breaking a sweat.
Man, I tell you that mission pissed me off so bad. And then fictional charecters telling me how I sucked for not being able to do it first time? Made it worse.
Oddly, while I blew at X-wing, I was able--possibly because I read the X-wing novels beforehand--to beat that mission first time out.
Also, while I was no great fan of Stackpole's style when he wrote those books, the initial scene with Corran and his friends beating the Redemption scenario was, in fact, not bad--because three of them were dead, and one of them had had his ship disabled and only through luck got the last enemy.
Yeah, it was pretty obvious to me when I first read those books that Stackpole had played the games and was trying to play off of those in terms of how the combat dynamics worked. Especially since during that scenario he uses the trick of throttling down to zero and shooting off missiles at range.
Man I feel like such a geek for remembering that. I haven't read those books in years, why do I remember this stuff? :x
I am not saying the PC market is better than the console market. I am just saying that niche games can still pay for themselves and are viable. The big-boys just don't give a shit about viable anymore. They want their money hats. So anything that is less than the MOST is not worth effort. If they can make more off the dumbed down game than they can off the niche game, they will make the dumbed down game EVERY TIME. It isn't a question of whether the niche game can make money anymore with the big companies.
[deleted stuff]
We need a smaller indie company to get ahold of the rights so they will be happier with making less money, but I doublt LucasArts will give a company like that their IP anymore.
Eh. I've watched the development of a few indy games like Shatterstar, and my impression is that you absolutely have to accept that a niche game is not going to be anywhere near as cutting edge as TIE Fighter or Wing Commander were back in the day. When these hardcore games come out, they always seem to be relatively expensive (for PC games, so $50-60), with considerable concessions made in graphics and polish. I think if a company poured the millions of dollars needed to make a TIE Fighter game with voice acting, super-high def PC graphics and the whole shebang, they would absolutely lose money on their "niche" product if they went PC only. Half Life 2 is a fairly forgiving game for anyone with a graphics accelerator to jump into; TIE Fighter, not so much.
Also, the space action sim genre isn't really as dead as all that. In the last year, the following space "sims" came out:
- Evochron Renegades
- Tarr Chronicles
- Romanians in Space was released in, uh, Romania and then made available for download
- Spaceforce: Rogue Universe, which claims to be available on Steam
- Starshatter: The Gathering Storm
- Parkan 2
- Arvoch Conflict
- ...and Derek Smart is still around and making stuff, I think
Also, X3 just had a follow-up announced.
I haven't played most of these, but with the possible exception of X3, they all come across as games developed on a lower budget for a niche market. X3 is about as niche as it gets, but I think it does have higher production values than the rest (and it's not exactly the world's most polished product, either, from what I hear).
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Cover a medical frigate until it can jump away or something.
STD jumps in, drops a bunch of TIE Bombers, jumps out. You haul ass over there.
STD jumps in again on the other side of the frigate, drops more bombers. You hope you finish the first bombers fast enough and then haul ass over there.
Repeat a few times. God damn was that mission hard to do without losing the frigate.
And to make it worse, in those stupidly poor written X-Wing books, those walking talking hard-on "charecters" tha the author created all sit there talking about how awsome they are for completing that mission without breaking a sweat.
Man, I tell you that mission pissed me off so bad. And then fictional charecters telling me how I sucked for not being able to do it first time? Made it worse.
Oddly, while I blew at X-wing, I was able--possibly because I read the X-wing novels beforehand--to beat that mission first time out.
Also, while I was no great fan of Stackpole's style when he wrote those books, the initial scene with Corran and his friends beating the Redemption scenario was, in fact, not bad--because three of them were dead, and one of them had had his ship disabled and only through luck got the last enemy.
Yeah, it was pretty obvious to me when I first read those books that Stackpole had played the games and was trying to play off of those in terms of how the combat dynamics worked. Especially since during that scenario he uses the trick of throttling down to zero and shooting off missiles at range.
Man I feel like such a geek for remembering that. I haven't read those books in years, why do I remember this stuff? :x
Because the X-Wing books are awesome.
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I don't know about anyone else, but I would pay lots and lots of money for some sort of master collection lumping X-Wing, TIE Fighter, XWA and XvT into one bundle.
I have them in various incarnations including disks, but a singular DVD would be the greatest thing ever.
Amen. Heck, if they'd just release a patch that'd let me play XWA without having to downgrade my DirectX, I'd be thrilled.
I fear the genre is really really dead. Even if they made a non arcady Xwing or Tie game, how many of you would play it the RIGHT way, with a flightstick? These games just are not the same with the mouse. And they suffer even more when designed to be played with the mouse.
How many own a proper flightstick anymore? I have a VERY dusty force feedback pro I would love to dust off. Not even sure if it has drivers for dx9 though.
I own a Thrustmaster Top Gun Afterburner with separate full-size throttle. It weeps alone in the closet.
I spent my very first $10-off discount Babbages card on X-Wing. I was SO pysched. I played that game to death.
..until I got TIE fighter. Like many others here, I was totally infatuated with that game. Played through the entire thing multiple times --- even made sure to do all the training simulator missions, just so I could get some more badges. So many fond memories. And yeah, the clear the mine field with the Interceptor was a pretty memorable mission.
I was, in general, a flight-sim junkie when I was a kid. The very first game I ever bought with my own money was the F117-A simulator. I remember sitting my parents down for a "serious" talk about, yes, direct quote, my "investment" and then going to pick it up. Our 8086 could barely run it ---- but it started me down the path.
Just...wow. It's like you lived in my house.
Our original computer was an 8088 (yes, that's eighty-eighty-eight, as in one shot short of coming in a suitcase) and when we got our 386 it was like a whole new world opening up. F-117A, SSN 688i, Falcon 3.0...awesome. Anyone else play with a friend, where the off-person controlled the keyboard and took over Artoo's role? Anyone...? <crickets>
Then with my PII "powerhouse" (at the time) I got XWA and Mechwarrior. Let me manage power between lasers/shields/engines, let me eject/disable damaged components, or let me shut down entirely to evade detection for ambushes? Yessir, I'll take that.
Recently, the only thing that's jumped out at me in that same sense has been Jumpgate, just because I like the idea of a custom mix of components and seeing the recharge rate of my lasers affected by the output of my engine makes me drool.
I want more of that kind of intricate detail and control. I don't want to fly around shooting lasers. You can have your Ace Combat or whatever for that. I want to have more options and be able to fight smarter than the other guy, managing my systems or my environment or the circumstances to devastating effect. My most vivid memories of X-Wing are not racking up 81 TIE kills but surviving a serious melee by smart rationing of laser and shield energy or having to make the choice of whether to double my speed and arrive with no lasers/shields or come in slower and let the frigate take a beating for a minute.
I think all of us want that level of complexity Arcelebor. Problem is, the mainstream gamer doesn't and sadly, it seems they control the market right now.
I'm not saying Ace Combat 5 in space would be my ideal game. It just seems like it would be a good compromise between space sim and shooter. Just something to get the foot in the door. When you think about it. The original Wing Commander is pretty simplistic when compared to TIE fighter or Freespace, but that was good enough for a lot of us to get hooked.
The story was engrossing, the graphics and controls improved over X-Wing, and you got to fight for the Empire. As already mentioned repeatedly, it wasn't done in a cheesy fashion, either...the Empire wasn't portrayed as particularly evil, and you really did just feel like a cog in your side's war machine. I know that for years after playing that game I always found myself rooting for the Imperials whenever I watched the space battle scenes in the movies.
Hell, just reading this thread makes me want to try to dig up a copy and see if I can get my joystick working with it.
EDIT: Wasn't there an SVGA version made as well? I might have to find that one.
This sentence alone kills any arguments about X-Wing/TIE Fighter games being too complicated for todays market. Even at the time, they were pretty 'dumb' and more 'arcadey' compared to other flight sims. Compared to X3...holy shit. At least in X/T all you need to worry about is your own ship and completing the mission objectives. The reality is, if any space sim is going to make money, it's going to be one with a golden goose franchise like Star Wars slapped on the front cover. If it's also a long awaited sequel to a legendary space sim...I just don't get why it hasn't happened already.
X/T are basically the precursors to 3D space shooters on consoles. Look at games like Colony Wars and tell me they weren't heavily influenced by the format laid down by Lucas Games (which may just have been copied from Wing Commader, but whatever, point is it translates to a console format). The control system is actually pretty simple, and could easily be managed with two context menus - one for power management, one for orders/comms - and then mapping the other stuff - targeting, speed, shooting, weapon switching - to their conventional positions on an analogue controller.
Whats more, most of the hard work has been done already. The universe is all there, you don't need to think to hard about creating all the ships and how they should be balanced. The real task would be finding a writer to make a storyline as compelling and exciting as TIE Fighters was. If Warren Specter hadn't just gone over to the dark side...I mean, Disney, then he might have been the man to recreate those shades of gray.
The story was engrossing, the graphics and controls improved over X-Wing, and you got to fight for the Empire. As already mentioned repeatedly, it wasn't done in a cheesy fashion, either...the Empire wasn't portrayed as particularly evil, and you really did just feel like a cog in your side's war machine. I know that for years after playing that game I always found myself rooting for the Imperials whenever I watched the space battle scenes in the movies.
This is actually why X-Wing was so good as well, IMO. You weren't Luke Skywalker, you weren't even a Jedi. You were just some pilot flying for the Rebels, slowly working your way up from Flight Lieutenant. It actually makes you feel more involved in the universe because you are just a small part of it, partially influencing events, making a difference, occasionally doing deeds of heroism, even swinging the tide of history in your factions favour but not because you wield a Deus Ex Machina. Your acts are genuinely heroic because you are just a regular joe who has to make do with the limited power distribution and weapons load-out that a lone A-Wing can provide, not some magical power that can crush a Star Destroyer with the flick of a wrist. You win against all odds because you bust your ass, not because you're a demi-god.
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You try so, so hard, but you never seem to make it.
Mostly because I wanted the most awesomest medal evar for that particular mission and it kept eluding me.
No one seems to do arcade flight sims as well as Namco does and I don't care if the games aren't quite as complex as X-Wing or TIE Fighter as long as they're more complex and actually fun unlike the Rogue Squadrons. And hopefully it would lead to more TIE-like stuff in the future!
But I don't know where I was going with this. It won't happen either so oh well!
This made me laugh really hard. I have this picture in my head of a cutscene where you're kneeling before the Emperor and instead of being thanked he simply says "You ruined my weekend!" and then you're made extra crispy via the force.
I am so sick of the testing the water games. I don't want mechassault I want mechwarrior. I don't want a shadowrun fps I want a rpg. I don't want an arcadey x-wing or tie fighter I want a sim. These dumbed down games never seem to sell all that well and then the publishers use that as a reason to not ever make what we are all really waiting for. X-wing is due for an update. Come on Lucas Arts quit screwing around and hook us up.
Co-op over live? Yes please.
I've been harping on this for years. Years!
For multiplayer, what I'd love to see are a couple of different modes (this would make everybody happy, so I'm assuming it will never happen :x):
1. Classic X vs. T: Basically, the same game as the old ones, with snazzy graphics and killer sound. Toss this into single-player too--I'd love to play through those old missions again.
2. Imperial Navy vs. Rebel Fleet: Bring on both the fighters and capital ships. I think it could work with 10 vs. 10... maybe more if we can get some bigger numbers for online console multiplayer. One or two players are in charge of a large ship while the rest of the team launches out in fighters. Your SD, Corvette or Nebulon-B Commander would take care of overall situational awareness (big, colorful space maps ftw), repairing and rearming fighters, and going at the enemey capital ship and enemy fighters with turbo lasers. Want now!
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How many own a proper flightstick anymore? I have a VERY dusty force feedback pro I would love to dust off. Not even sure if it has drivers for dx9 though.
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When did you sneak into my brain and read my wishes? We need REAL space sims. Not this Rogue Squadron shit they kept trying to put it. REAL mech games. Mechwarrior. Mechwarrior 3. Not that watered down 4 or Armored Core crap. Complicated games for people who actually want to think. Shit that uses a Joystick and a Throttle. Hell, throw some pedals in there for good measure. I weep for these lost game style.
If this were just a XBLA update of the orginal TIE fighter how many people would buy this off arcade?
5 jillion or 5 jigajillion?
English was is overrated anyways.
Let 'em eat fucking pineapples!
You can't play a REAL space sim on a gamepad. Sim is as much about the control interface as it is about the game itself. And I doubt we will ever have a force feedback flightstick for the 360
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Yeah well then you don't get one. PC games aren't exactly flying off the shelves these days so if they want to make money they have to at least go multiplatform with it. A seperate controller doesn't work, Steel Battalion showed us that. At the end of the day it is not impossible to make it work on a controller. Sure I would prefer a good flight stick too but if it comes between that and just not getting it I would play it on a controller.
A damn good space sim doesn't have to have a gajillion controls. They just need to put some serious thought and a good story behind it. something few developers are willing to do.
I still reject the idea that MechAssault and ShadowRun FPS would have led to more fleshed out RPGs had they sold well. Let's face it, if those games had sold well, it would have spawned more shooter games just like it. MechAssault is the proof right there. It obviously sold well enough for a sequel, but wait, the sequel was just the same game with prettier graphics and a couple of gimmicks thrown in. It didn't turn into a hard core Mechwarrior RPG
Don't get me wrong, I did like MechAssault, but I want more and not just more of the same.
Why do you think games are more mainstream now, They HAD to appeal to a broader audience so that it will sell well. Hardcore games, pretty much by definition, don't appeal to broad ranges. Hardcore anything is a niche. Developers will still occasionally take risks with more complex games, but they will continue being a rarity.
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Yeah I've never understood that logic either.
It's like, before Batman Begins was in the works, people kept saying that if only more people had gone to watch Batman & Robin we would have seen a new Batman movie. Well yes, we would have. And it would have been the same utter crap that the previous two movies had been.
Instead, people didn't go out and buy the crap purely 'for the sake of the franchise', and the execs realised that there's only so much tripe we're willing to take. End result, it took a fairly long time until the next Batman movie, but we finally got what we wanted.
I think that was a far better outcome than going along with all the idiots who kept saying "you killed the franchise by not buying it!", and being rewarded with yet more crap.
In short, buying crap "for the future of the franchise" only really ensures you'll get more of the same.
-increase throttle
-decrease throttle
-match speed to current target
-adjust weapon energy
-adjust shield energy
-transfer weapon energy to shields
-transfer shield energy to weapons
-toggle shield orientation
-cycle through lasers, ion cannons, and torpedos
-cycle between firing configurations
-targeting (cycle forward, back, closest, ect)
-wingman control (order to attack/defend, return home, ect)
Those are just the ones I can recall off memory. I'm sure I'm missing a few more. I can't honestly see doing that with a 10 button gamepad. These games used up a surprising amount of real estate on the keyboard, and you needed to utilize all those option I just listed to get through later missions. No, the best you could do is pretty much something like the Rogue Squadron games, and those were a lot more arcadey and simple than the PC games.
Please note though that I'm NOT trying to start THAT argument up. Just that the style of game that X-Wing/Tie Fighter/X-Wing Alliance were was a lot more sim like, and you needed a lot of controls for all their different functions. There's just no way you could condense them down into a gamepad without drastically changing the feel of the game.
Steam ID: Good Life
Comprimises would have to be made no doubt. However there is a lot of room between Rogue Squadron and X-wing. I think they could get it pretty damn close with a controller.
Wing Commander had all the controls on the SNES pad.
the controls did suck balls, but it worked. Corin7 is right, compromise would be required.
What I want is Ace Combat 5 with better AI and better story, (though to be fair AC5's story wasn't bad, just lol Nagase lol! That and I'm just not a fan of the eastern aspects of the game) and some better gameplay...
...in space
Why are developers not making that game?
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That was the deal breaker for me with Steel Battalion. No other game companies would make a game that used the controller, so you were stuck with a huge controller, 1 game for it and a 200 dollar hit to the wallet. I don't know if noone else did anything for it because the controller was sold in such limited numbers thus strongly limiting the potential sales for any game that used it or if Capcom wouldn't release the development rights to anyone else.
Back on topic though: I see no reason why a developer couldn't come up with a good control scheme on a pad for another X/TIE game that is more sim than arcade. The market for sim games of this nature, I think, dictates a decision like that a lot more than technical hurdles.
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PRERELEASE VERSION-NOT FOR FIELD USE - DO NOT TEST IN A POPULATED AREA
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Don't be stupid. Steel Batallion didn't show us anything other than how Steel Batallion did. It was ONE game. Which they then tried to sell to us AGAIN with multiplayer that had a shelf life of 'whenever we take the servers down'. Capcom made a bunch of mistakes in making, promoting, and marketing steel batallion that would not necessarily be copied by another.
Plus, a good controller <> steel batallion. That thing was crazy and over the top.
As far as a billion buttons go, much of it could be put into menu systems. If they do a good power config menu then you can put all the power options under one button. Press select to bring up the power hud and then you have 10 buttons to re-use however you want in ways that relate to power based on a power screen overlay. Similar to how the voice menus work in modern fighting games if you need an analogy.
As far as making money, PC games don't lose money these days. They don't make AS MUCH as multi-console games. The NEVER DID unless you go back to before consoles existed. They are not being dumbed down to break even, they are being dumbed down in an attempt to allow the producers to make more money hats.
Deep games are still VERY viable. They just don't print money.
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My problem with a gamepad is that wiggling my thumb slightly does not feel nearly as invogoriating as controlling a flightstick.
A smart company making a flightstick would have it match the number of buttons as a controller and have it work just like a normal controller as much as possible so buying this new space sim game also means you could go back and replay that ace fighter game with this new, awesome controller.
The TOTAL OPPOSITE of what Capcom did with steel batallion. Make the controller be a big selling point, not an obstacle to purchase. Make it more like wii play or links crossbow training where some people buy the game and don't even WANT the game. They just want the controller.
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This is a bit of a pointless discussion right now. I played TIE fighter on a mouse and keyboard and I definitelly enjoyed it., and I'm pretty sure you could map all the controls I used there to 4 analog axis + 12 buttons + 1 4-way D-pad.
It's no longer button a and button b. There have been more complex control schemes than that properly done on modern controllers. GUI design has also improved. Today you'd do all the comms stuff and shield management by holding a trigger and selecting optons using one analog. You could even do it while still controlling the ship with the other analog.
The reason console games are not as deep when it comes to management as PC games is due to the tastes of their target audience, not to the limitations of the control scheme.
Except in RTSs, that is.
EDIT:
I don't know, pack in a flight stick for free doesn't make financial sense when you have a standard analog device in every console.
Maybe make it optional, like those arcade joysticks that came out with VF5 (damn, I want, no I NEED one of those before Street Fighter 2 HD comes out).
..until I got TIE fighter. Like many others here, I was totally infatuated with that game. Played through the entire thing multiple times --- even made sure to do all the training simulator missions, just so I could get some more badges. So many fond memories. And yeah, the clear the mine field with the Interceptor was a pretty memorable mission.
I was, in general, a flight-sim junkie when I was a kid. The very first game I ever bought with my own money was the F117-A simulator. I remember sitting my parents down for a "serious" talk about, yes, direct quote, my "investment" and then going to pick it up. Our 8086 could barely run it ---- but it started me down the path.
I will try not to be stupid it is just so hard with this tiny IQ of mine.
If pc games are still flying off the shelves please tell Infinity Ward and Epic to quit their bitching about the pc game market then. For now I will go with their opionion of the PC Market over yours. If you were a developer making anything but a mmo right would really do a PC only release? Really?
I think Steel Battalion did show us a lot. So again we disagree. I would love to see some sales data on how the most recent Ace Combat sold. I imagine about 95% sales were minus the big goddamn controller.
Believe me I want what you want. I just don't think it will ever happen and I am willing to settle for a little bit less as long as it gets us something. However I doubt we will get anything. If it doesn't have lightsabers these days lucas doesn't seem to be into it.
Oddly, while I blew at X-wing, I was able--possibly because I read the X-wing novels beforehand--to beat that mission first time out.
Also, while I was no great fan of Stackpole's style when he wrote those books, the initial scene with Corran and his friends beating the Redemption scenario was, in fact, not bad--because three of them were dead, and one of them had had his ship disabled and only through luck got the last enemy.
You're forgetting just how many buttons a modern pad has. You could also change all the transfer energy buttons to one button, just cycle through all the options. Put stuff on the D-Pad, etc. Or use an overlay menu like the original Perfect Dark.
It's possible.
Or you could just play one of the old ones on a pc.
[deleted stuff]
We need a smaller indie company to get ahold of the rights so they will be happier with making less money, but I doublt LucasArts will give a company like that their IP anymore.
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Yeah, it was pretty obvious to me when I first read those books that Stackpole had played the games and was trying to play off of those in terms of how the combat dynamics worked. Especially since during that scenario he uses the trick of throttling down to zero and shooting off missiles at range.
Man I feel like such a geek for remembering that. I haven't read those books in years, why do I remember this stuff? :x
Eh. I've watched the development of a few indy games like Shatterstar, and my impression is that you absolutely have to accept that a niche game is not going to be anywhere near as cutting edge as TIE Fighter or Wing Commander were back in the day. When these hardcore games come out, they always seem to be relatively expensive (for PC games, so $50-60), with considerable concessions made in graphics and polish. I think if a company poured the millions of dollars needed to make a TIE Fighter game with voice acting, super-high def PC graphics and the whole shebang, they would absolutely lose money on their "niche" product if they went PC only. Half Life 2 is a fairly forgiving game for anyone with a graphics accelerator to jump into; TIE Fighter, not so much.
Also, the space action sim genre isn't really as dead as all that. In the last year, the following space "sims" came out:
- Evochron Renegades
- Tarr Chronicles
- Romanians in Space was released in, uh, Romania and then made available for download
- Spaceforce: Rogue Universe, which claims to be available on Steam
- Starshatter: The Gathering Storm
- Parkan 2
- Arvoch Conflict
- ...and Derek Smart is still around and making stuff, I think
Also, X3 just had a follow-up announced.
I haven't played most of these, but with the possible exception of X3, they all come across as games developed on a lower budget for a niche market. X3 is about as niche as it gets, but I think it does have higher production values than the rest (and it's not exactly the world's most polished product, either, from what I hear).
Because the X-Wing books are awesome.
Our original computer was an 8088 (yes, that's eighty-eighty-eight, as in one shot short of coming in a suitcase) and when we got our 386 it was like a whole new world opening up. F-117A, SSN 688i, Falcon 3.0...awesome. Anyone else play with a friend, where the off-person controlled the keyboard and took over Artoo's role? Anyone...? <crickets>
Then with my PII "powerhouse" (at the time) I got XWA and Mechwarrior. Let me manage power between lasers/shields/engines, let me eject/disable damaged components, or let me shut down entirely to evade detection for ambushes? Yessir, I'll take that.
Recently, the only thing that's jumped out at me in that same sense has been Jumpgate, just because I like the idea of a custom mix of components and seeing the recharge rate of my lasers affected by the output of my engine makes me drool.
I want more of that kind of intricate detail and control. I don't want to fly around shooting lasers. You can have your Ace Combat or whatever for that. I want to have more options and be able to fight smarter than the other guy, managing my systems or my environment or the circumstances to devastating effect. My most vivid memories of X-Wing are not racking up 81 TIE kills but surviving a serious melee by smart rationing of laser and shield energy or having to make the choice of whether to double my speed and arrive with no lasers/shields or come in slower and let the frigate take a beating for a minute.
I'm not saying Ace Combat 5 in space would be my ideal game. It just seems like it would be a good compromise between space sim and shooter. Just something to get the foot in the door. When you think about it. The original Wing Commander is pretty simplistic when compared to TIE fighter or Freespace, but that was good enough for a lot of us to get hooked.
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The story was engrossing, the graphics and controls improved over X-Wing, and you got to fight for the Empire. As already mentioned repeatedly, it wasn't done in a cheesy fashion, either...the Empire wasn't portrayed as particularly evil, and you really did just feel like a cog in your side's war machine. I know that for years after playing that game I always found myself rooting for the Imperials whenever I watched the space battle scenes in the movies.
Hell, just reading this thread makes me want to try to dig up a copy and see if I can get my joystick working with it.
EDIT: Wasn't there an SVGA version made as well? I might have to find that one.
This sentence alone kills any arguments about X-Wing/TIE Fighter games being too complicated for todays market. Even at the time, they were pretty 'dumb' and more 'arcadey' compared to other flight sims. Compared to X3...holy shit. At least in X/T all you need to worry about is your own ship and completing the mission objectives. The reality is, if any space sim is going to make money, it's going to be one with a golden goose franchise like Star Wars slapped on the front cover. If it's also a long awaited sequel to a legendary space sim...I just don't get why it hasn't happened already.
X/T are basically the precursors to 3D space shooters on consoles. Look at games like Colony Wars and tell me they weren't heavily influenced by the format laid down by Lucas Games (which may just have been copied from Wing Commader, but whatever, point is it translates to a console format). The control system is actually pretty simple, and could easily be managed with two context menus - one for power management, one for orders/comms - and then mapping the other stuff - targeting, speed, shooting, weapon switching - to their conventional positions on an analogue controller.
Whats more, most of the hard work has been done already. The universe is all there, you don't need to think to hard about creating all the ships and how they should be balanced. The real task would be finding a writer to make a storyline as compelling and exciting as TIE Fighters was. If Warren Specter hadn't just gone over to the dark side...I mean, Disney, then he might have been the man to recreate those shades of gray.
This is actually why X-Wing was so good as well, IMO. You weren't Luke Skywalker, you weren't even a Jedi. You were just some pilot flying for the Rebels, slowly working your way up from Flight Lieutenant. It actually makes you feel more involved in the universe because you are just a small part of it, partially influencing events, making a difference, occasionally doing deeds of heroism, even swinging the tide of history in your factions favour but not because you wield a Deus Ex Machina. Your acts are genuinely heroic because you are just a regular joe who has to make do with the limited power distribution and weapons load-out that a lone A-Wing can provide, not some magical power that can crush a Star Destroyer with the flick of a wrist. You win against all odds because you bust your ass, not because you're a demi-god.