Finally was able to finish that cursed mission (There was a bit of patience involved) and the whole campaign. It's been quite a while since I played Freespace 1 and it was a fun ride. The story does feel a bit more epic than FS2's, but the engagements lack the awesome of Beam Cannons.
Went on to Silent Threat, which I had never played...
Speaking of another Freespace 1 mission I hate, I'm not liking this scanning mission where you go behind enemy lines. These Lilith class cruisers can go to Hell. It took forever for me to scan the last one, most of the time I was colliding with it trying to scan it. By the time I got it, the Eva disappeared. The distance and position you need to be to scan ships and things, mainly large ones, seems kind of finicky.
I did managed to do everything well until the Lucifer, where it asked me to fly into it's fighter bay. I complied, and a bunch of fighters flew out and scanned me. Bah!
I simply could not get past that part. I tried over, and over, and over, and every time I died before I could jump away, missile warning shrieking in my ears.
Once, I thought I had made it, only to explode as I was passing through the jump gate.
Speaking of another Freespace 1 mission I hate, I'm not liking this scanning mission where you go behind enemy lines. These Lilith class cruisers can go to Hell. It took forever for me to scan the last one, most of the time I was colliding with it trying to scan it. By the time I got it, the Eva disappeared. The distance and position you need to be to scan ships and things, mainly large ones, seems kind of finicky.
I did managed to do everything well until the Lucifer, where it asked me to fly into it's fighter bay. I complied, and a bunch of fighters flew out and scanned me. Bah!
I simply could not get past that part. I tried over, and over, and over, and every time I died before I could jump away, missile warning shrieking in my ears.
Once, I thought I had made it, only to explode as I was passing through the jump gate.
The entire idea about this mission is to really be in a "box" which is between the four crates at the start. Nothing will ever detect you there, you can even almost go into the node without the sentries detecting you. Also, as you can see, the Eva and the Lucifer you will go right trough you (or more accurate, you will go right through them) while they're at their exiting speed, so no need to maneouver around like a maniac either. In the end, just simply go to the fighter bay, and once that completes, afterburner away towards nothingness (nothing in front of you on the radar), and when your drives come back online, face the fighters that are chasing you, pass them going backwards, and jump while they're turning to face you again.
The video is on medium, they won't even do any real damage on easy or very easy. It does require more finesse on Insane though, I sort of fumbled the jumping in the video, but it worked, so I kept it.
thank you for this thread, i had always meant to play freespace 2, as i played a ton of x-wing back in the day, but the thread and the kickass downloader/installer made it so easy. I just finished the mission where the
colossus gets rammed by the other ship
and it was damn epic. So next i'm on to the spec ops missions, which i think i accepted. it kinda crashed after i left it on the decision screen too long, so we'll see. hopefully those missions aren't too bad, i've read they are pretty hard.
Finally was able to finish that cursed mission (There was a bit of patience involved) and the whole campaign. It's been quite a while since I played Freespace 1 and it was a fun ride. The story does feel a bit more epic than FS2's, but the engagements lack the awesome of Beam Cannons.
Went on to Silent Threat, which I had never played...
Speaking of another Freespace 1 mission I hate, I'm not liking this scanning mission where you go behind enemy lines. These Lilith class cruisers can go to Hell. It took forever for me to scan the last one, most of the time I was colliding with it trying to scan it. By the time I got it, the Eva disappeared. The distance and position you need to be to scan ships and things, mainly large ones, seems kind of finicky.
I did managed to do everything well until the Lucifer, where it asked me to fly into it's fighter bay. I complied, and a bunch of fighters flew out and scanned me. Bah!
I was having trouble scanning the cruisers too until I realized that when you target a capital ships, it defaults to targetting a turret. If you switch to targeting something big and near the back of the ship (engines or comm) they're as easy to scan as anything else.
Yep, Steel Battalion. Apparently from reading around people have set up controller configs for Mechwarrior 3/4 as well. I'm really thinking about dropping the $50 or so the controller is getting on eBay.
Thats down to $50 on ebay eh? Thats mighty tempting if you can find one in good condition.
I used that for the BF1942 mod Desert Combat.... made a nice chopper stick.
I'm using this for Freespace 2 right now
Or I was... I don't really have room for it, sadly, so I'm sticking with my 360 pad until I can make room.
What is that? It's making me drool.
Morninglord on
(PSN: Morninglord) (Steam: Morninglord) (WiiU: Morninglord22) I like to record and toss up a lot of random gaming videos here.
Are you running FSPort without normal maps, BlackDove?
FSPort is FSPort, it reads its own set of MediaVP's which were made like a year or two ago. The normal maps are a new thing that's only been applied to a few fighters, and a few ships. Quite a ways to go to get all of the ships up to snuff with the normal maps.
So no, it's really not possible until they're made for all the FS1 ships anyway, and even then, I'm not sure whether or not FSPort would need to be updated to display them (I don't know if FSPort uses its own models and textures or if it ties them to MediaVP's. If it's the former, then no, if it's the latter, then sometime in the future when the fighters are updated)
This game is so great. I remember playing Descent when I just a kid on my dad's new flatscreen IBM back in like, 1998 or whatever.
But man oh man does this bring back memories of X-Wing, TIE Fighter, X-Wing VS TIE-Fighter, and Rebel Assault 1 & 2.
Good fucking days right there.
What about X-Wing Alliance? :P I'm tempted to re-install that because of this game. I wonder if there are any good mods for it, especially graphical ones.
Dashui on
Xbox Live, PSN & Origin: Vacorsis 3DS: 2638-0037-166
This game is so great. I remember playing Descent when I just a kid on my dad's new flatscreen IBM back in like, 1998 or whatever.
But man oh man does this bring back memories of X-Wing, TIE Fighter, X-Wing VS TIE-Fighter, and Rebel Assault 1 & 2.
Good fucking days right there.
What about X-Wing Alliance? :P I'm tempted to re-install that because of this game. I wonder if there are any good mods for it, especially graphical ones.
Yeah, X-Wing Alliance Upgrade has improved models, but I think you have to download them all in a piecemeal fashion. I wish TIE Fighter had something similar...
Are you running FSPort without normal maps, BlackDove?
FSPort is FSPort, it reads its own set of MediaVP's which were made like a year or two ago. The normal maps are a new thing that's only been applied to a few fighters, and a few ships. Quite a ways to go to get all of the ships up to snuff with the normal maps.
So no, it's really not possible until they're made for all the FS1 ships anyway, and even then, I'm not sure whether or not FSPort would need to be updated to display them (I don't know if FSPort uses its own models and textures or if it ties them to MediaVP's. If it's the former, then no, if it's the latter, then sometime in the future when the fighters are updated)
FSPort uses the mediavps (provided its set as a secondary, otherwise it uses FS2 retail data) for any ships that are in FS2 as well as FS1. It has its own models for FS1 only ships, and its own weapon effects (except for the Lucifer's beam weapons, which are FS2 style instead of the original effect).
Then I guess it's the latter, in time it will be up to speed.
I have to say, I like the latest venture into shaders and post processing effects. Looks like the next one in line is going to be user-defined bloom setting.
While this is a bit too much, it does show some nice room for making the game look even better.
Anyone playing the multiplayer? Id really like to get in on some group play.
I think they meet once a week or something to play together, it's hard to co-ordinate without the ingame lobby. So, for info on that go here.
I am however fairly certain that the Battlestar Galactica project is looking at a more active multiplayer though from the demo they've released. That one is here.
BlackDove on
0
Options
ShadowfireVermont, in the middle of nowhereRegistered Userregular
Yep, Steel Battalion. Apparently from reading around people have set up controller configs for Mechwarrior 3/4 as well. I'm really thinking about dropping the $50 or so the controller is getting on eBay.
Thats down to $50 on ebay eh? Thats mighty tempting if you can find one in good condition.
I used that for the BF1942 mod Desert Combat.... made a nice chopper stick.
I'm using this for Freespace 2 right now
Or I was... I don't really have room for it, sadly, so I'm sticking with my 360 pad until I can make room.
What is that? It's making me drool.
The flightstick from the PS2 version of Ace Combat 5. There are some "fan-made" drivers for it. Also, there's a 360 version, as well.. both are basically just re-toolings of the Saitek X-35, which is also awesome.
Pros: It's fucking metal. It's the last joystick you'll ever need.
Cons: expensive, and the springs and other internals are really shoddy despite the otherwise sturdy construction. If you really want it to shine, you need to spend even more money for fan-constructed mods that totally replace the springs, gimbals, and potentiometers.
/end shameless bragging
My recommendation: Any CH Products Joystick. Made of really really tough plastic, not that cheap stuff most joysticks use. Reasonably priced, unlike the Cougar.
In case it hasn't been mentioned, do a google search for Beyond The Red Line. It's a BSG mod for Freespace. Or something like that. Pretty much rebuilding everything from the ground up, but the models are amazing. Think the controls were difficult enough in Freespace? These fuckers added two more dimensions of movement, with four buttons each. That shit eats up a keyboard or a joystick. Anyhow, look it up.
Wedge Biggs on
I ain't never crossed a man who didn't deserve it. - Artis Ivey Jr.
Finally was able to finish that cursed mission (There was a bit of patience involved) and the whole campaign. It's been quite a while since I played Freespace 1 and it was a fun ride. The story does feel a bit more epic than FS2's, but the engagements lack the awesome of Beam Cannons.
Went on to Silent Threat, which I had never played...
... Just the brifing on the first mission :shock:
Silent Threat is not so great.
The final mission is total bullshit.
I think I'm one away from the last mission and yeah, not so great. Neat seeing some of the Great War fighters you see still in FS2 come into play finally, and while some of the missions are good (namely ones that remind me of FS2 sized battles), a lot are kinda meh. Could be partly the balancing of the port granted.
I ended up skipping the missions where you have to save one of the 8 escape pods as my wingmen just weren't quick enough to protect them and the pods die in like one hit.
steejee on
The Great DAMNED STEAM SALES AND WII/U Backlog Just Finished: Borderlands (waste of $7)/Mario Brothers U/The Last Story/Tropico 4 Currently Playing: NS2/ZombiU/PlanetSide 2/Ys/Dota2/Xenoblade Chronicles On Hold: Prince of Persia: Warrior Within/GW2/Scribblenauts Coming Next: Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones/X-Com Classic
Then I guess it's the latter, in time it will be up to speed.
I have to say, I like the latest venture into shaders and post processing effects. Looks like the next one in line is going to be user-defined bloom setting.
While this is a bit too much, it does show some nice room for making the game look even better.
Then I guess it's the latter, in time it will be up to speed.
I have to say, I like the latest venture into shaders and post processing effects. Looks like the next one in line is going to be user-defined bloom setting.
While this is a bit too much, it does show some nice room for making the game look even better.
You break the Hscroll so sweetly, I can't be mad.
Oh, man, it would suck to be on that Deimos. Hornets to the bridge.
Howdy all, first time poster (well, that's not true, I used to be part of the PA forums about 5 years ago)
I followed all the instructions in the first post and a set the mod to look at the mediaVP folder. But when i run the game all I see is stuff like this
So after some heavy tweaking to finally get the nicer stuff to run without crashing 2 seconds into a mission (disabled vsync and GLSL support) on my ATi card, finished the original campaign, silent threat, and freespace 2 (for the god knows what time). I got the 'you win but died' ending despite leaving in time, assholes!
I think FS2 beats FS1 just on how fucking epic the whole deal is. FS1 didn't have many multi cap ship battles and lack of beam weapons made them a bit tedious. FS2 is intense from start to finish. Only mission I tend to dislike in FS2 is High Noon as it just sorta drags a bit. Cool idea and setup, but a little long.
Was neat to catch all the FS1 references in FS2 finally since this was the first time I had gone through the original.
Edit: Other Thoughts
- The Ancients stuff in FS1 was interesting, had never seen it before so it was rather informative.
- Admiral Bosch is one of the better characters in gaming.
- The SOC mission beyond the nebula once again sorta confused me in its design. The final moments are intense, but there's a good 5 minute stretch where you don't do jack squat.
- Intro cutscene for FS2 still gives me chills for some reason. I didn't appreciate the rest of the cutscenes as much a while back but do now as they do well to tell the story and set mood, and the final one really pounds in one fact: the Shivans really do not give a fuck about how many of them die.
- AI Pilots have issues with ramming things, I have no idea why, but they can't seem to avoid running into the nearest capital ship at any opportunity.
steejee on
The Great DAMNED STEAM SALES AND WII/U Backlog Just Finished: Borderlands (waste of $7)/Mario Brothers U/The Last Story/Tropico 4 Currently Playing: NS2/ZombiU/PlanetSide 2/Ys/Dota2/Xenoblade Chronicles On Hold: Prince of Persia: Warrior Within/GW2/Scribblenauts Coming Next: Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones/X-Com Classic
I've never touched Freespace, well... ever, but from what it sounds like?
It almost sounds like EVE as a real time/space action game rather than an MMO, and this sounds like a good thing, but I have a few questions.
Can you ever fly massive capital ships? And perhaps more importantly, is there any kind of scenario/mission creator where you can just set up massive space battles, break out the popcorn, and watch a battle capable of rivaling the massive battle at the start of Star Wars Ep III?
Also, I have no joystick, just a mouse and keyboard. How hard are the controls are without a joystick?
I've never touched Freespace, well... ever, but from what it sounds like?
It almost sounds like EVE as a real time/space action game rather than an MMO, and this sounds like a good thing, but I have a few questions.
Can you ever fly massive capital ships? And perhaps more importantly, is there any kind of scenario/mission creator where you can just set up massive space battles, break out the popcorn, and watch a battle capable of rivaling the massive battle at the start of Star Wars Ep III?
Also, I have no joystick, just a mouse and keyboard. How hard are the controls are without a joystick?
You'll only be flying fighters in this game.
As for the Battle of Endor re-enactment... sort of. There's a hard limit on the number of turrets able to be placed in one map (although perhaps the Hard Light people removed the limit). It actually crashed FRED2 for me way back when I tried doing that.
Can you ever fly massive capital ships? And perhaps more importantly, is there any kind of scenario/mission creator where you can just set up massive space battles, break out the popcorn, and watch a battle capable of rivaling the massive battle at the start of Star Wars Ep III?
Also, I have no joystick, just a mouse and keyboard. How hard are the controls are without a joystick?
No, you can't fly anything bigger than a bomber (which is barely bigger than most fighters). The entire game is set so you feel like you're barely worth anything in the whole, gigantic, war effort.
Watching gigantic fights unfold? Not quite like you describe, but plently of missions play out that way in any case . Well, at least in FS2, FS1 has much smaller engagements.
As for KB&M: It's a pain in the ass, I'll admit. Everything's doable, but you have to bind things pretty well for them to work out. Mainly because you will only use your mouse for shooting (precision required) and your keyboard for flying and everything else. Requires some coordination, but after you get used to it is very doable.
And there IS a map editor/creator of some kind then, I presume?
Yep. And it is lovely. I it. Other than all the crashing (my old PC crashed a lot when I was editing... No idea how it performs on more modern machines).
I've never touched Freespace, well... ever, but from what it sounds like?
It almost sounds like EVE as a real time/space action game rather than an MMO, and this sounds like a good thing, but I have a few questions.
Can you ever fly massive capital ships? And perhaps more importantly, is there any kind of scenario/mission creator where you can just set up massive space battles, break out the popcorn, and watch a battle capable of rivaling the massive battle at the start of Star Wars Ep III?
Also, I have no joystick, just a mouse and keyboard. How hard are the controls are without a joystick?
You'll only be flying fighters in this game.
As for the Battle of Endor re-enactment... sort of. There's a hard limit on the number of turrets able to be placed in one map (although perhaps the Hard Light people removed the limit). It actually crashed FRED2 for me way back when I tried doing that.
I don't think they have, but Derelict does have some pretty large battles, so unless you're stacking in lots of densely armed ships, the limit is fairly high.
The community on Hard Light's forums don't like "BoE" missions because of the difficulty of actually balancing them. Either the player has little influence over the success of the mission, or it can't be won. The fact is, even the best capital ships are very vulnerable to bombers, so unless the player is babysitting them, they'll get torn apart.
There is a campaign on the Hard Light forums posted some time last year, I think the thread title was something like "30 missions no filler" and it's basically a series of massive battles. They have no victory conditions, but you really don't have much influence over most of them.
There's also two other campaigns that are good for big battles. I already mentioned Derelict, but there's also Procyon Insurgency, which doesn't have lots of ships, but ups the accuracy and rate of fire on all capital ship weapons except beams and flak, so the missions are more intense than a similar exchange in the main campaigns. Another is the series Into the Depths of Hell (There's four campaigns in the series, with the fifth one expected for release when the author returns from overseas). ItDOH has some large battles as well - the author scripted them fairly well to prevent them from falling apart.
Warning pilot: Enormous post incoming. Dive Dive Dive.
Yup. I played through FS1 (Remake), FS2, the Wing Commander Remake Demo and Battlestar Demo. It's a blast. But there are some things that you have to keep in mind.
1. Configuration - This is extremely difficult to get right. Not only do you have to get all of the correct drivers and programs correctly running, but also you have to set each and every button/keystroke/joystick axis both in the driver software and in the game itself. This is no small feat, and there's no set right way. ...and I doubt that the driver would work in Vista.
While the configuration posted here is a good start, there were some issues with it for me. (It's actually the thing that got me into the game, so I would like to thank whomever did that graphic). Now, I think that I have a really good conf aside from communications. The problem with comms is that you would typically setup your targetting on the 3x3 pad, because you use targetting more often, but the 3x3 pad is most suited for comms 1-9 as well as F4-F12 (target memory). There are times when you need to switch quickly between these functions (i.e. target lifepod, tell A2 to protect my target, target cap ship, tell entire bomber wing to disarm, yadda yadda). Without a dedicated number pad, stuff like this (which is necessary on higher difficulties) becomes very slow.
However, I just started thinking about this again, and I wonder if you can get one of those external laptop number pads and use that in tandem with the controller. That would solve 100% of my issues with using the SB controller.
2. The right flight stick doesn't auto-center like most joysticks. You can fix that by setting up a larger-than-normal deadzone.
3. The driver for the SB controller is a custom software, and I believe that development/support for the project is done. There was one outstanding issue where the left stick hat wouldn't go left in the driver. I use that stick for looking around the cockpit (left, right, above, behind), and as such, I could never look left. Then you have the issue of whether or not the joystick driver will work with Vista. I haven't tried.
4. It would be difficult to use both the controller and the keyboard. As such, you really do need to map every single function to the joystick. This is possible, though. I have every single function (Fkeys, camera control, even the unused Newtonian thrust stuff should BSG utilize it) on the stick. The driver is really nice, and it allows things like changing the entire layout of the controller by the flick of the switches or dial (or even regular buttons).
5. You would think that the SB controller has force feedback, but it doesn't. It doesn't even have rumble.
I spent a lot of time with spaceflight sims. It was my favorite genre before it went away. (I was raised on Elite, WC, Privateer, XWing, etc...) I even have a signed copy of WC3. The signature? Ginger Lynn Allen.
Having said all of that, I would recommend this setup to anybody that has an obsession about this game. There is simply no experience like sitting in your home theater, playing Freespace on your projector in the dark (since the buttons light up). It was the most enjoyable single-player gaming experience I've ever had, I believe. If you have any questions about this config, go ahead and PM me. I believe that I spent about as much time on this as anybody. So much so, that I even had a mouse driver running, so I could control the entire computer from just the stick.
tlc337 on
0
Options
augustwhere you come from is goneRegistered Userregular
Can you ever fly massive capital ships? And perhaps more importantly, is there any kind of scenario/mission creator where you can just set up massive space battles, break out the popcorn, and watch a battle capable of rivaling the massive battle at the start of Star Wars Ep III?
Also, I have no joystick, just a mouse and keyboard. How hard are the controls are without a joystick?
No, you can't fly anything bigger than a bomber (which is barely bigger than most fighters). The entire game is set so you feel like you're barely worth anything in the whole, gigantic, war effort.
Watching gigantic fights unfold? Not quite like you describe, but plently of missions play out that way in any case . Well, at least in FS2, FS1 has much smaller engagements.
As for KB&M: It's a pain in the ass, I'll admit. Everything's doable, but you have to bind things pretty well for them to work out. Mainly because you will only use your mouse for shooting (precision required) and your keyboard for flying and everything else. Requires some coordination, but after you get used to it is very doable.
Posts
Went on to Silent Threat, which I had never played...
... Just the brifing on the first mission :shock:
I simply could not get past that part. I tried over, and over, and over, and every time I died before I could jump away, missile warning shrieking in my ears.
Once, I thought I had made it, only to explode as I was passing through the jump gate.
Here, I made you a video you can pretty much follow through and use as a guideline on where to be at what time (use the node as a reference point, you'll see me referring it to my position all the time during the mission as well).
The entire idea about this mission is to really be in a "box" which is between the four crates at the start. Nothing will ever detect you there, you can even almost go into the node without the sentries detecting you. Also, as you can see, the Eva and the Lucifer you will go right trough you (or more accurate, you will go right through them) while they're at their exiting speed, so no need to maneouver around like a maniac either. In the end, just simply go to the fighter bay, and once that completes, afterburner away towards nothingness (nothing in front of you on the radar), and when your drives come back online, face the fighters that are chasing you, pass them going backwards, and jump while they're turning to face you again.
The video is on medium, they won't even do any real damage on easy or very easy. It does require more finesse on Insane though, I sort of fumbled the jumping in the video, but it worked, so I kept it.
[edit]Here's the ending, got cut off at the 4gb mark, didn't notice until it was all encoded[/edit]
LoL Summoner: infobrains | XBL: cwap4brains | PSN: infobrains
Silent Threat is not so great.
The final mission is total bullshit.
I was having trouble scanning the cruisers too until I realized that when you target a capital ships, it defaults to targetting a turret. If you switch to targeting something big and near the back of the ship (engines or comm) they're as easy to scan as anything else.
What is that? It's making me drool.
FSPort is FSPort, it reads its own set of MediaVP's which were made like a year or two ago. The normal maps are a new thing that's only been applied to a few fighters, and a few ships. Quite a ways to go to get all of the ships up to snuff with the normal maps.
So no, it's really not possible until they're made for all the FS1 ships anyway, and even then, I'm not sure whether or not FSPort would need to be updated to display them (I don't know if FSPort uses its own models and textures or if it ties them to MediaVP's. If it's the former, then no, if it's the latter, then sometime in the future when the fighters are updated)
But man oh man does this bring back memories of X-Wing, TIE Fighter, X-Wing VS TIE-Fighter, and Rebel Assault 1 & 2.
Good fucking days right there.
What about X-Wing Alliance? :P I'm tempted to re-install that because of this game. I wonder if there are any good mods for it, especially graphical ones.
Yeah, X-Wing Alliance Upgrade has improved models, but I think you have to download them all in a piecemeal fashion. I wish TIE Fighter had something similar...
FSPort uses the mediavps (provided its set as a secondary, otherwise it uses FS2 retail data) for any ships that are in FS2 as well as FS1. It has its own models for FS1 only ships, and its own weapon effects (except for the Lucifer's beam weapons, which are FS2 style instead of the original effect).
I have to say, I like the latest venture into shaders and post processing effects. Looks like the next one in line is going to be user-defined bloom setting.
While this is a bit too much, it does show some nice room for making the game look even better.
I think they meet once a week or something to play together, it's hard to co-ordinate without the ingame lobby. So, for info on that go here.
I am however fairly certain that the Battlestar Galactica project is looking at a more active multiplayer though from the demo they've released. That one is here.
The flightstick from the PS2 version of Ace Combat 5. There are some "fan-made" drivers for it. Also, there's a 360 version, as well.. both are basically just re-toolings of the Saitek X-35, which is also awesome.
Here's mine:
Thrustmaster HOTAS Cougar
Pros: It's fucking metal. It's the last joystick you'll ever need.
Cons: expensive, and the springs and other internals are really shoddy despite the otherwise sturdy construction. If you really want it to shine, you need to spend even more money for fan-constructed mods that totally replace the springs, gimbals, and potentiometers.
/end shameless bragging
My recommendation: Any CH Products Joystick. Made of really really tough plastic, not that cheap stuff most joysticks use. Reasonably priced, unlike the Cougar.
Enlist in Star Citizen! Citizenship must be earned!
You mean your 'joy stick'?
In case it hasn't been mentioned, do a google search for Beyond The Red Line. It's a BSG mod for Freespace. Or something like that. Pretty much rebuilding everything from the ground up, but the models are amazing. Think the controls were difficult enough in Freespace? These fuckers added two more dimensions of movement, with four buttons each. That shit eats up a keyboard or a joystick. Anyhow, look it up.
That one's fairly easy to find heh. Yeah, it's standalone too, so all you have to do is download theirs and it's all ready to go.
I think I'm one away from the last mission and yeah, not so great. Neat seeing some of the Great War fighters you see still in FS2 come into play finally, and while some of the missions are good (namely ones that remind me of FS2 sized battles), a lot are kinda meh. Could be partly the balancing of the port granted.
I ended up skipping the missions where you have to save one of the 8 escape pods as my wingmen just weren't quick enough to protect them and the pods die in like one hit.
Just Finished: Borderlands (waste of $7)/Mario Brothers U/The Last Story/Tropico 4
Currently Playing: NS2/ZombiU/PlanetSide 2/Ys/Dota2/Xenoblade Chronicles
On Hold: Prince of Persia: Warrior Within/GW2/Scribblenauts
Coming Next: Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones/X-Com Classic
You break the Hscroll so sweetly, I can't be mad.
Oh, man, it would suck to be on that Deimos. Hornets to the bridge.
I followed all the instructions in the first post and a set the mod to look at the mediaVP folder. But when i run the game all I see is stuff like this
Any idea about what's breaking my textures?
Did you try it without the mediaVPS mod?
Yes, (using the fs2_open_3_6_9.exe) and "No Mods" selected. It looks fine that way, but I'm pretty sure I'm not seeing the normal maps.
I think FS2 beats FS1 just on how fucking epic the whole deal is. FS1 didn't have many multi cap ship battles and lack of beam weapons made them a bit tedious. FS2 is intense from start to finish. Only mission I tend to dislike in FS2 is High Noon as it just sorta drags a bit. Cool idea and setup, but a little long.
Was neat to catch all the FS1 references in FS2 finally since this was the first time I had gone through the original.
Edit: Other Thoughts
- The Ancients stuff in FS1 was interesting, had never seen it before so it was rather informative.
- Admiral Bosch is one of the better characters in gaming.
- The SOC mission beyond the nebula once again sorta confused me in its design. The final moments are intense, but there's a good 5 minute stretch where you don't do jack squat.
- Intro cutscene for FS2 still gives me chills for some reason. I didn't appreciate the rest of the cutscenes as much a while back but do now as they do well to tell the story and set mood, and the final one really pounds in one fact: the Shivans really do not give a fuck about how many of them die.
- AI Pilots have issues with ramming things, I have no idea why, but they can't seem to avoid running into the nearest capital ship at any opportunity.
Just Finished: Borderlands (waste of $7)/Mario Brothers U/The Last Story/Tropico 4
Currently Playing: NS2/ZombiU/PlanetSide 2/Ys/Dota2/Xenoblade Chronicles
On Hold: Prince of Persia: Warrior Within/GW2/Scribblenauts
Coming Next: Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones/X-Com Classic
It almost sounds like EVE as a real time/space action game rather than an MMO, and this sounds like a good thing, but I have a few questions.
Can you ever fly massive capital ships? And perhaps more importantly, is there any kind of scenario/mission creator where you can just set up massive space battles, break out the popcorn, and watch a battle capable of rivaling the massive battle at the start of Star Wars Ep III?
Also, I have no joystick, just a mouse and keyboard. How hard are the controls are without a joystick?
You'll only be flying fighters in this game.
As for the Battle of Endor re-enactment... sort of. There's a hard limit on the number of turrets able to be placed in one map (although perhaps the Hard Light people removed the limit). It actually crashed FRED2 for me way back when I tried doing that.
No, you can't fly anything bigger than a bomber (which is barely bigger than most fighters). The entire game is set so you feel like you're barely worth anything in the whole, gigantic, war effort.
Watching gigantic fights unfold? Not quite like you describe, but plently of missions play out that way in any case
As for KB&M: It's a pain in the ass, I'll admit. Everything's doable, but you have to bind things pretty well for them to work out. Mainly because you will only use your mouse for shooting (precision required) and your keyboard for flying and everything else. Requires some coordination, but after you get used to it is very doable.
And there IS a map editor/creator of some kind then, I presume?
Yep. And it is lovely. I
I don't think they have, but Derelict does have some pretty large battles, so unless you're stacking in lots of densely armed ships, the limit is fairly high.
The community on Hard Light's forums don't like "BoE" missions because of the difficulty of actually balancing them. Either the player has little influence over the success of the mission, or it can't be won. The fact is, even the best capital ships are very vulnerable to bombers, so unless the player is babysitting them, they'll get torn apart.
There is a campaign on the Hard Light forums posted some time last year, I think the thread title was something like "30 missions no filler" and it's basically a series of massive battles. They have no victory conditions, but you really don't have much influence over most of them.
There's also two other campaigns that are good for big battles. I already mentioned Derelict, but there's also Procyon Insurgency, which doesn't have lots of ships, but ups the accuracy and rate of fire on all capital ship weapons except beams and flak, so the missions are more intense than a similar exchange in the main campaigns. Another is the series Into the Depths of Hell (There's four campaigns in the series, with the fifth one expected for release when the author returns from overseas). ItDOH has some large battles as well - the author scripted them fairly well to prevent them from falling apart.
Warning pilot: Enormous post incoming. Dive Dive Dive.
Yup. I played through FS1 (Remake), FS2, the Wing Commander Remake Demo and Battlestar Demo. It's a blast. But there are some things that you have to keep in mind.
1. Configuration - This is extremely difficult to get right. Not only do you have to get all of the correct drivers and programs correctly running, but also you have to set each and every button/keystroke/joystick axis both in the driver software and in the game itself. This is no small feat, and there's no set right way. ...and I doubt that the driver would work in Vista.
While the configuration posted here is a good start, there were some issues with it for me. (It's actually the thing that got me into the game, so I would like to thank whomever did that graphic). Now, I think that I have a really good conf aside from communications. The problem with comms is that you would typically setup your targetting on the 3x3 pad, because you use targetting more often, but the 3x3 pad is most suited for comms 1-9 as well as F4-F12 (target memory). There are times when you need to switch quickly between these functions (i.e. target lifepod, tell A2 to protect my target, target cap ship, tell entire bomber wing to disarm, yadda yadda). Without a dedicated number pad, stuff like this (which is necessary on higher difficulties) becomes very slow.
However, I just started thinking about this again, and I wonder if you can get one of those external laptop number pads and use that in tandem with the controller. That would solve 100% of my issues with using the SB controller.
2. The right flight stick doesn't auto-center like most joysticks. You can fix that by setting up a larger-than-normal deadzone.
3. The driver for the SB controller is a custom software, and I believe that development/support for the project is done. There was one outstanding issue where the left stick hat wouldn't go left in the driver. I use that stick for looking around the cockpit (left, right, above, behind), and as such, I could never look left. Then you have the issue of whether or not the joystick driver will work with Vista. I haven't tried.
4. It would be difficult to use both the controller and the keyboard. As such, you really do need to map every single function to the joystick. This is possible, though. I have every single function (Fkeys, camera control, even the unused Newtonian thrust stuff should BSG utilize it) on the stick. The driver is really nice, and it allows things like changing the entire layout of the controller by the flick of the switches or dial (or even regular buttons).
5. You would think that the SB controller has force feedback, but it doesn't. It doesn't even have rumble.
I spent a lot of time with spaceflight sims. It was my favorite genre before it went away. (I was raised on Elite, WC, Privateer, XWing, etc...) I even have a signed copy of WC3. The signature? Ginger Lynn Allen.
Having said all of that, I would recommend this setup to anybody that has an obsession about this game. There is simply no experience like sitting in your home theater, playing Freespace on your projector in the dark (since the buttons light up). It was the most enjoyable single-player gaming experience I've ever had, I believe. If you have any questions about this config, go ahead and PM me. I believe that I spent about as much time on this as anybody. So much so, that I even had a mouse driver running, so I could control the entire computer from just the stick.
Seriously though, buy a joystick.