Game News Star Wolves demo! Now in English!

[Saint_Proverbius]

Tags: Star Wolves; Xbow Software

<A href="http://www.3dgamers.com/">3D Gamers</a> has posted <A href="http://www.3dgamers.com/games/starwolves/downloads/">a mirror</a> for the <i>English</i> version of <A href="http://www.excalibur-publishing.com/starw.htm">Star Wolves</a>. It's a <b>217MB</b> download, but there's gobs of mirrors for the space flighty CRPG from <b>XBow Software</b>.
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It's been way too long since someone's made one of these.
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[Spazmo]

Hopefully, the English translation is as well done as the French.

 

[Sheriff05]

How is this is? is it worth the download and install? anyone tried it ?

 

[Sol Invictus]

Downloading now at 120kbps.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

It's kind of interesting, but you can't advance your characters in the demo. You also can't save, so it's rather limited.

It could use some work, or perhaps I'm not smart enough to move things handily, but getting my mothership to a big cache of blown up pilots wasn't fun. However, once I did get the mothership there, it was neat watching it suck up the spoils of battle.

As for the translation, it's slightly horrid. The voice acting is fairly awful too.

Still, it's unique enough to picque my interest. I'll probably pick it up.

 

[Otaku_Hanzo]

Hopefully, the English translation is as well done as the French.

Yeah. I'll have to give this a go later.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Just some corrections.. You can gain perks in the game. I thought the white highlight meant you already had those perks, when they're actually the ones you can select. Also, while you can't save the game in the demo, you can stop and then "continue" the game when you launch the demo later.

 

[RGE]

I didn't bother with the tutorial, so maybe that's why my main problem was camera control. Getting the camera to show something useful was pure luck, and getting it to show something more than green squares shooting up red squares was rare. So I must ask myself, what is the big point with all those fancy graphics if you will hardly see the ships anyway? Oh well, even without my camera troubles the game was boring. I never really cared for linear mission games. I want freedom. Something like Elite/Frontier with updated graphics, more variety in missions, better balanced trade system and way less random pirate attacks.

 

[Shagnak]

Well there is always X2.

Kind of like Elite with better grafix, but Im not certain about the "less pirate attacks" etc cos I didnt play it enough. It ran like shit on my machine, but maybe it will run better now.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

I never really cared for linear mission games. I want freedom. Something like Elite/Frontier with updated graphics, more variety in missions, better balanced trade system and way less random pirate attacks.

More freedom would be fantastic. As it is though, the missions have have side quests and your character has the ability to make moral choices in the dialogues which apparently affects what missions you get in the future as well as who likes you and who doesn't. That's not too bad of a sacrifice, but I would rather be able to free fly around as well. I'd also like to be able to own starports and such, but it's an interesting start.

 

[bryce777]

I think that mission based combat games can't really be called rpgs...I am surprised they bill this as such.

I could not get it to work, unfortunately. I keep getting corrupt zips.

The camera problems do not sound good. One thing I find about east europe and russian programmers is they have some disturbing ideas about how GUI should work.

 

[Jed]

I could not get it to work, unfortunately. I keep getting corrupt zips.

Ooh, that doesn't bode well for your RAM...

 

[bryce777]

You think so?

Well I would think it would just be the network between here and there....

 

[Jed]

The only time I had consistent corrupted zips was when my RAM went bad. Who knows? Probably your connection...

 

[Seven]

It's kind of interesting, but you can't advance your characters in the demo. You also can't save, so it's rather limited.

It could use some work, or perhaps I'm not smart enough to move things handily, but getting my mothership to a big cache of blown up pilots wasn't fun. However, once I did get the mothership there, it was neat watching it suck up the spoils of battle.

As for the translation, it's slightly horrid. The voice acting is fairly awful too.

Still, it's unique enough to picque my interest. I'll probably pick it up.

If you want something similar (except on a 2D plane) but more polished go pick-up space rangers (the character development is more sophisticated too).

EDIT: this title is completely non-linear and you have the freedom to go anywhere.

 

[bryce777]

The only time I had consistent corrupted zips was when my RAM went bad. Who knows? Probably your connection...

Ah, damn.


I have never had this before.

I better try to get a tester program, I guess.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

If you want something similar (except on a 2D plane) but more polished go pick-up space rangers (the character development is more sophisticated too).

EDIT: this title is completely non-linear and you have the freedom to go anywhere.

There an English demo for this game? Excalibur is supposed to be releasing Space Rangers and Space Rangers 2 in Europe, along with a demo for them. However, their demo hasn't been released yet. As far as I know, it's still Russian only at this point.

 

[Dhruin]

The original Space Rangers was multi-language - Russian, English and French, so I guess it's possible any "Russian" demo might be multi-language.

 

[Seven]

I didn't know that a sequel had come out, cool. If I recall correctly the demo allows you to choose the install lanaguage. I don't seem to recall where I got the demo from though. I think you probably pick the game up on ebay for a few dollars (it's a deal if you can snag it at under $20). IMO it's head and shoulders above starwolves in everything except graphics.

 

[Balor]

Well, in Russia, like I already mentioned in appropriate thread, Space Rangers (first ones), despite complete lack on any notice in mass media, not to mention full-scale hype, become on cult game just by the word of mouth.
Second one easily defeated HL2 in all aspects (gameplay-wise too, at least for me). It's user rating on AG.ru is 96% - higher then ANY game ever existed (well, at least then any in their database).
Of course, it's not like EVN in scale, and text quests are more fun, not 'epic' (I'd say, however, that in EVN, their 'pathos dispenser' broke and spewed at least triple portions for pretty much every quest), but the world is living (think STALKER in 2D), functioning economic model, and in SR:D there are quite fun "Nether Earth"-style quests, that are rather fun, as well as other extra tidbits that polished the game into perfection.
Of course, it will all depend on how good the quests will be translated (some are, well, almost completely UNtranslateable from my viewpoint - too 'regional', as well as some banter between the ships... oh, I LMAOed at some!), but I'd say, even with the worst translation, it's more then worth your money.
P.S. *Cackles evilly* I've learned English to play English games "first-hand', so to speak... now, looks like that learning Russian (Because of games like Stalker, Silent Storm, Space Rangers, etc) becomes a good idea for international gamers .
P.S.S. To be fair, it's still not as fun as Star Control 2. But heck, this was a 'one-in-a-sentury' game, and even 3rd part failed to duplicated the success of it.

 

[Oyarsa]

Star Wolves English Demo review (of sorts)

Abstract: Star Wolves has the potential to deliver a really fun space-based mission and character building game, but whether it actually does deliver is too unclear for this player to drop more than $30US (and that would be on a good day).


Graphics are nice and play style in missions is reminiscent of HW2, et al. Exploring mission zones for extras, zipping around in space, seeing heavy missiles strike a Mobile Pirate Base, all good stuff. Missions both main and incidentals (especially incidentals) seem to hold ambiguity on who you are helping and the legitimacy, morally and legally (which may be different) of that assistance. Unfortunately, dialogue choices did not seem to yield different kinds of responses from other parties. This suggests there is much to railroad the player through a certain narrative arc. On the other hand, some options would yield extra rewards possibly indicating more flexibility than was apparent in the demo.

Technical issues:
If I quit or lost a mission I could not access it to start it again via the Continue or Load Game commands. Once I was able to successfully start a new game and then load the mission in question. May be an issue with how they crippled the save game feature, or it may be a bigger problem. Right now, though, I don't know if I can save in mission. Playing out demo mission two over and over because of unacceptable losses at the very end going after a hidden bonus target is annoying.

Gameplay:
Since play is command rather than control oriented I would appreciate pilots and wings following orders rather than going off and ignoring commands. The unaceptable losses mentioned usually resulted when pulling back a damaged fighter to repair in the mothership and resetting the Wing orders to Escort the mothership. Ace in his fairly lame starting ship (sometimes Viper) would often fly away from the mothership (Usually when the target was outside the motherships scanning range) and engage the heavily armed and armored target solo?!? He always got toasted. Idiot. Because of this I question the ability of pilots to properly execute sniping (either Ace's trait or long range missile attacks) from a stationary and remote position. I have not tested this, though so it is merely speculative.

Mission selection raises some questions. The set-up seems designed to handle multiple mission options. Does it? If I face two good missions and can only choose one will the other still be there next time? Are some randomly generated in addition to the plot drivers? How well do the paths diverge based on my handling of dialogues and mission actions?

Pacing is a concern. If the three missions in the demo are the first three the full game has this is a pretty big concern. A two stage mission facing that kind of resistance, both in quality and quantity, needs better equipment and/or skills than you can be equipped with after the first two missions, and that includes taking out the big bonus target in Mission Two without loss. If the demo just pulled three missions to give the flavor, no problem, but I don't recall that info being put forward. Mission One and most of Mission Two provided no challenge on Normal, then suddenly Mission Three throws at approximately ten hostile wings (plus more that may go hostile) and a mobile pirate base at you. Given the dearth of supplies, prepping for that is rather difficult.

Camera controls take a bit of getting used to but were not a problem, although sometimes dogfights were too zoomed out at the beginning. Overall, controls felt fairly natural in relatively short order.

Playing the demo was fun and I wouldn't mind exploring that universe, but demos are supposed to pique interest not raise questions and Star Wolves has raised too many for me to risk serious cash