Slashdot Mirror
FreeSpace 2 Gets Reissue As Limited Edition
Rastor writes "The PC space combat sim FreeSpace 2 is being re-released as a special Limited Edition via the Interplay Store! According to Volition Watch: 'There will be 2000 copies available, and only through the Interplay store. They will be numbered copies and will be selling for $49.95.' Why should Slashdotters care? Besides being a highly-rated game when released in 1999, the source has been released and a Linux port is available." VolitionWatch also notes "all the extra add-on campaigns and MODs available... literally hundreds of hours of gameplay time" - a limited-edition re-release is an interesting move in a world where games normally go from full-price to budget to bargain bin, and rarely return.
If you've never played it, it has the most impressive capital ships evar. They really convey the sense of scale - it can take a while to fly the length of a capital ship and they shoot beams wider than your fighter - without making you feel ineffectual (e.g. you can destroy those beam cannons if you can deal with the flak and the anti-fighter beams.)
And later on (MILD SPOILER) you're fighting in a nebula, so you can't see anything, which works wonderfully.
Tim
Omnia vestra castrorum habetur nobis.
when i can get it for 15$ on ebay?
It's a collectors item - in addition to all the second hand $15 copies on eBay, it's still possible to see a unopened mint-condition Freespace2 go for over US$80.
Here is an example from Jan 6 this year, where it went for US$92.
--
Freelook - A Free Headtracker for Games and Disabled Access
Check out dosbox.sourceforge.net. It's an emulator that works great for old dos games. It even makes some of the games that were difficult to squeeze into the base 640K seemingly easier to get running with sound blaster, mouse, etc. All the support it automatically built in. Mount directories as a virtual hard drive/cd drive. All open source with windows/linux versions for download. Such nostalgia.
Not really, since the only reason the HOTU CD-rip is online at all is because the game is no longer available at any retail outlets.
They are really very different games, excepting the fact that both of them take place in some kind of ship in space. D3 is a lot like, well, Descent, whereas FS2 plays a lot like Tie Fighter or Wing Commander. I personally love the game (better than the first FS, which I still liked). Great story, great art, great tech (the nebulas are just amazing, and the framerate was great even on middle-power hardware when it was released), great music, great mission design, great voice-acting (especially Admiral Bosch), great fun. Easily one of the best PC games ever, IMO. How it didn't sell well is beyond my imagination - the only thing I can think of is that it really needs a joystick, and maybe not many PC gamers had one any more when it came out.
There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion. -- Francis Bacon
But have you tried it recently? The protected mode parts have only been in for a few months...
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.