Is Freespace 2 any good?

[Satori (original)]

Ah well I've already set up FS2 with mods so I'll give that a go before I start up IW2, so all's well I suppose.

 

[MetalCraze]

You can't compare FS2 to IW2 really. They are too different, right down to the core of the design. One is more about physics and using it together with inertia to battle stuff - the other one is about fighting big battles in between hugeass destroyers raping each other with fat beams. Play them both.

 

[Satori (original)]

What's your recommended control scheme? Mouse + keyboard, all keyboard or gamepad?

 

[WhiskeyWolf]

FS2 - mouse + keyboard
IW2 - joystick + keyboard

 

[Silellak]

FS2 - mouse + keyboard
IW2 - joystick + keyboard

Why would you play any space shooter with a mouse? Especially an old-school-style one like Freespace?

 

[vazquez595654]

I found the game really bland. I never got past the intro missions. They were so boring. The first mission of the game didn't really do anything for me either. The best space opera game I played was Wing Commander IV or something. I remember it had full motion video, Mark Hamill, and I think Biff from Back to the Future was in it.

 

[MetalCraze]

Well too bad FS2 isn't an interactive movie with 5 minutes long missions in between FMVs.

 

[Satori (original)]

Any tips on how to not get hit? After the first few missions I'm always around 10% hull integrity.

 

[NiM82]

Any tips on how to not get hit? After the first few missions I'm always around 10% hull integrity.

Do a barrel roll!

 

[Black_Willow]

Any tips on how to not get hit? After the first few missions I'm always around 10% hull integrity.

Being someone else than o fucking looser helps a lot.

 

[Quilty]

Any tips on how to not get hit? After the first few missions I'm always around 10% hull integrity.

Do you get hit by missiles? If so, then using some thrust at the last few moments before impact usually serves to evade them. Also, you can fire countermissiles. As far as getting hit by lasers etc., you'll have to practice dogfighting and manually evading the enemy. Always make sure you know who is targeting you, and don't stray too far from your group. In some missions you are in command of your wingmen, so you can tell them to destroy whoever is attacking you. Personally, I find that using only keyboard helps a lot, I can't play mouse+keyboard. I use my right hand for the keypad to control the direction in which I'm flying and the left hand for speed/thrust/primary and secondary fire/targeting. It takes a bit of practice, don't worry.

 

[Satori (original)]

I take the fact that turning is painfully slow as a design choice since it wouldn't make much sense if you could just flick your wrist and do a 180 in a millisecond, this is what's really hampering me so far.

 

[MetalCraze]

Hmm strange - I don't even remember being hit that much. In fact I thought that FS2 lacked difficulty. But yeah never fly along a simple trajectory, always manoeuver.

 

[Black Cat]

What MetalCraze said. If you are really finding Freespace 2 to be uberhard either are playing it in Very Hard, that is something like Maese Masoch dificulty, or are really bad about space dogfights.

Learn the controls from memory, and configure them to be in patterned clusters around the keyboard. The basic thing you need to do is target the closest enemy, match speeds, hug its tail, and fire at it with basic pattern understanding. When he goes kaboom repeat with the next one, and if someone comes to help that one change focus to its saviour, blow him, and then go on with the pattern, don't worry about going back to the one you just left, he will either attack you, thus becoming the closest enemy, or go around until someone puts a missile on its exaust. If someone puts a missile on you launch a counter, do some erratic turn that does not put you in collision curse with the warhead and fire those afterburners. And learn to play with those energy setup thingies with one hand while dogfighting with the other, you can greatly enhance your abuse output by adapting your energy setup to the situation mid-flight, or at least memorize the missions and then use lulls in the action to change your setup.

If you have good reflexes and reactions and, like, manage to not get killed a lot the only ship you will need in the entire game is the first interceptor thingie you can get, and the only payload you will ever need are a pod of rockets and a pod of stilettos. With that configuration and a lot of skill you can ironman the game on hard, since it can do everything you will ever need to do, from dogfighting a wing of dragons (nya, if you are having trouble now wait until those start to appear!) to killing some big ship to defending a convoy from enemy bombs.

If you are not in that league choose the heaviest ship you are confortable with, but my friends always call those the coffins because you will die a lot more using those than using some interceptor thingie with 90 on hull, since not getting hit is way better than resisting two and a half blasts more. Better to develop the skill to fly the interceptor, too, because otherwise your ending is not going to be, like, supervery nice and all that. If you want you can later change the first interceptor for the Vasudan one, but the payload options are diferent and you can't solo everything with that one.

Or play on easy :wink:

Oh, yeah, and remember to dive, dive, dive and hit your burners, pilot. :D I love this game so much.

 

[poocolator]

The really tough missions are the pain-in-the-ass escort missions and other missions with unusual objectives. Late-game suicide missions are also a bitch, but the medals and promotions should keep ya truckin', brutha!

 

[cutterjohn]

gog.com has both FS1 & 2 as part of their anniversary thingy where you can buy one Interplay game and get a second free...

 

[Panthera]

Or you can just download the Freespace 1 missions for FS2 Open.

 

[RaXz]

But that port seems to be lacking some stuff from FS1, as a newb I rather get the full FS1 experience. I am already used to the low resolution.

I didn't like Wing Commander 4, but played WC1 sick, 2 was fun too. But the rest didn't grab me like part 1 did.

Replaying IW2 as well, it's been a long time. I only have to fix a flickering texture problem that eats a lot of fps.

 

[Quilty]

Hated those escort missions. The ships I was supposed to escort had like 5 hit points.

But for every shitty escort mission there was the exhilarating shoot down the bomb/infiltrate/fight in a nebula/fight in the shadow of huge-ass ships mission. I get a soaring erection just thinking about the phallic Colossus.

 

[Gold]

I just replayed FS2 over the weekend. My biggest beef is with the deux ex machina parts of some missions. Which is something I preferred about the WC games, if you could pull off stupid things (blowing up carriers that you shouldn't be or killing dozens of fighters) then good for you, but in FS2 if you start to wittle down a capship by yourself it would always leave. Just frustrating.

 

[Arem]

Replaying IW2 as well, it's been a long time. I only have to fix a flickering texture problem that eats a lot of fps.

Do you have a nvidia gpu?

 

[RaXz]

No, Ati Radeon.

 

[Achilles]

Freespace 2 is fantastic, one of the best games of all time.

 

[Arem]

No, Ati Radeon.

Strange. I tried IW2 on both nvidia/ati gpus and the ati worked fine - it was an older radeon model though (X 850). With nV I had the flickering issue near stations, for example at the beginning of the game.

 

[RaXz]

Yeah same thing here, at the start it was really laggy with that large asteroid in the viewport. Fixed it with a simple ini tweak, by enabling static buffer.