Descent: FreeSpace – The Great War

File: fs_portal.jpg (1001KB, 1680x1050px) Image search: [Google]

1001KB, 1680x1050px

It felt so damn real, the space ships were HUGE as hell.

https://youtu.be/ms7-RopAAw4

THAT fucking music

File: medusa.webm (2MB, 1168x648px) Image search: [Google]

2MB, 1168x648px

>>377029896
I assume you are aware of the Freespace Open project which is basically a complete overhaul of the engine and assets due to release of the game's source code a while back?
http://www.fsoinstaller.com/

Here some webms from the port of the first game to the overhauled engine.

https://my.mixtape.moe/bpwnsw.webm

https://my.mixtape.moe/tlsiez.webm

https://my.mixtape.moe/uwvorp.webm

https://my.mixtape.moe/kgumku.webm

https://my.mixtape.moe/nxzpdm.webm

>>377030187
Too calm.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDHsTlBTFm8

I really love the story of the first game. The slow reveal of the Shivans was perfect. Something they did better than Wing Commander where the Kilrathi were already an established enemy.

File: 4-bastionmenu.jpg (89KB, 640x480px) Image search: [Google]

89KB, 640x480px

>>377030597
>I assume you are aware of the Freespace Open project which is basically a complete overhaul of the engine and assets due to release of the game's source code a while back?

No, I didn't know anything about it.
Just remembered how great that game was.
The story was actually pretty damn good and dramatic, I really liked the briefings and missions and music and pretty much everything about it.
It was by far my favorite space war fly sim.

The hangar was fucking amazing too.

File: fs2_open_3_7_4 2016-12-10 17-41-25-61.webm (3MB, 800x448px) Image search: [Google]

3MB, 800x448px

>>377031035
You're in for a treat then because it's even more amazing than it was before.

>>377031012
>stale war is going on
>both sides can't win but still make up fights here and there
>suddenly someone else appears out of nowhere
>things are getting worse really fast
>both sides are getting fucking raped everywhere and lose systems and the fleet
>at the verge of extinction they have to unite to have a chance to survive

Fuck it was great.
Mass Effect almost repeats the same story years later.

There was even some sort of variety you could get if you succeeded in a mission or failed. The game would acknowledge that in further missions.
Hell you could even save Galatea or lose it, saving it was fucking hard though.

>no mines
>no robots
>no reactors
Years later and I'm still a little mad I got bamboozled by the name. Decent game, but that's not my descent.

>>377030597
>>377031196
Are they remaking the first game?

https://youtu.be/yDrlRq-ZjNk

>>377032041
The first game was ported into Freespace Open.

File: fs2_open_3_7_4 2016-11-25 00-52-41-98.jpg (688KB, 1920x1080px) Image search: [Google]

688KB, 1920x1080px

>>377032041
That is the first game in the webms.
It's the FSPort module.

>>377031849
It was literally just tacked on to try and avoid legal issues with a company that was marketing a file compression tool called FreeSpace. The sequel dropped the prefix as the fears turned out to be unfounded.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJ-xcgBL1mY

I only played Descent 1-3 and never beat them. They scared the shit out of me. Are they intended to be horror games or was that just me being a kid? I can't even play them now.

I loved freespace back in the day. Used to work on mods with hard light folks. Fucking fond memories.

Always wanted a new game in the series though they'd probably just fuck it up now days.

>>377034319
Descent and Freespace are really different.
Descent is more corridor-like while Freespace is literally free space flight simulator.

>>377034408
Devs are just making Saints Row now, a shame.

>>377034581
Those mother fuckers even teased "freespace 3" in saints row 4.

File: freespace 3.jpg (371KB, 1918x1049px) Image search: [Google]

371KB, 1918x1049px

Never ever

I am attracted to Vasudans in pilot gear

>>377031643
>Hell you could even save Galatea or lose it, saving it was fucking hard though.
You can't save it. All you can do is save the escape pods. If it gets destroyed in any other mission, it's a mission failure and you can't advance.

Freespace did a lot of things better than Wing Commander, but branching campaigns wasn't one of them.

>>377031643
>Mass Effect almost repeats the same story years later.
I too saw a lot of parallels to Freespace when I played Mass Effect.

Reapers = Shivans
Vasudans = Turians (they even look a bit similar)
Ancients = Protheans
Knossos = Conduit
Thanix cannon = Beam weapons

>>377032512
>It was literally just tacked on to try and avoid legal issues with a company that was marketing a file compression tool called FreeSpace.
That, and the story was originally about searching for Descent's protagonist.

If you ask me, though, they should have gone with a different name altogether. FreeSpace isn't a very good name. It doesn't tell you anything, nor is it some kind of reference to some major thing in the game.

>tfw the compliments you got by the friendly vasudan pilots made me actually feel happy
Being told you're good by former enemies is too rare for my taste.

I just wish the characters acknowledged your superiority a bit more. Sure at the end of the second game you get turned into a flight squadron leader or something similiar but nobody really goes "hey this guy is winning a lot of battles while every one else gets stomped". At least not that I remember, it's been a long time since I last played the games.
Am I being egotistical

>>377034408
>Always wanted a new game in the series though they'd probably just fuck it up now days.
I don't think they'd fuck it up. Well, they would, but it wouldn't be their fault. The publisher would demand it be dumbed down severely in order for it to be released on a console, and probably wouldn't let them release a FRED3 at all.

>>377038441
The insectoid Reaper ship designs are almost a carbon copy of the Cain cruisers from the Shivans, it's not even funny.

>>377037048
Well, it's the only thing they ever wear. Otherwise, they seem to go naked at all times. It's weird that that's never commented on.

>>377039607
Well they don't seem to have outward dicks and I don't remember any lizard slits
Actually that does make me wonder how they reproduce and govern themselves. I remember their main menu having like a bug hive ish aesthetic but that's not much to go on.

>>377038986
You aren't wrong. Must have been a FS fan at bioware.

File: img-2.jpg (96KB, 800x600px) Image search: [Google]

96KB, 800x600px

One of the things I always liked about the FreeSpace series that few other games manage is making you insignificant and reminding you you're just a guy in a fighter. Big ships duke it out while you can do little more than watch, and battles are lost and won in other systems while you're mopping up rebel remnants somewhere. Far too many games these days have you as some ultimate bad-ass single handedly defeating the enemy and personally kicking the big bad off his throne. It's nice to play a game where you're just one of dozens of fighter pilots following orders and doing their job, listening to the chatter of your wingmen in the same position as you.

>>377040127
>Big ships duke it out while you can do little more than watch
Actually, a lot of missions have you playing a crucial role in taking down an enemy capship, either by bombing it or by destroying its beam cannons. I don't think I've played a single user-made campaign that didn't have at least one mission where your ships will die fast if you don't take out the enemy's beam cannons.

>>377040516
That said, it really was great to finally play a space game where capships are actually powerful and threatening in their own right, instead of just being big targets.

File: GTD Orion.jpg (67KB, 860x462px) Image search: [Google]

67KB, 860x462px

>>377032894
>That flight suit
>That comm officer's uniform
As much as I love Freespace, I have a lot of problems with its visual design. The flight suits and uniforms are downright ugly, and a lot of the ships look overdesigned, like the Orion. The Orion's basic shape is fine, but the textures are way too busy and chaotic.

Wing Commander had much better ship design.

>>377039849
They do seem to have two sexes like we do, judging from the slight differences in the translator voices in FS2, but yeah, no visible sex organs in any of their in-game appearances. As for their government, they had some kind of constitutional monarchy during FS1, with a parliament overseen by an emperor and a royal family, but the emperor dissolved the parliament between FS1 and FS2 and presumably moved more toward an absolute monarchy. Apparently that worked out well for them, though, because they recovered from the Great War better than the Terrans did, despite the destruction of their homeworld.

>>377040127
>One of the things I always liked about the FreeSpace series that few other games manage is making you insignificant and reminding you you're just a guy in a fighter. Big ships duke it out while you can do little more than watch, and battles are lost and won in other systems while you're mopping up rebel remnants somewhere. Far too many games these days have you as some ultimate bad-ass single handedly defeating the enemy and personally kicking the big bad off his throne. It's nice to play a game where you're just one of dozens of fighter pilots following orders and doing their job, listening to the chatter of your wingmen in the same position as you.

You aren't insignificant, you can command whole squads.
It's just not the game where you play as a Rambo unit against everyone.

File: nostromo-1LG.jpg (144KB, 1024x768px) Image search: [Google]

144KB, 1024x768px

>>377041547
I like it that way, hate when ships are like eggs with clean surface (Star Trek).

>>377042820
But anon Terrans got cut off from Earth so they lost all support too
That and the whole human rebellion probably didn't help things in terms of recovering. I always wondered what happened to the Admiral who researched the shivans and went with them. Sucks that we will never know and I haven't really seen any fun fan theories about it either

>>377042995
Yeah, you really can't do everything on your own. A lot of missions depend on using your wingmen effectively, especially in custom campaigns. The great thing, though, is that the game gives you what you need to do that. There are a lot of quality of life features that improve your situational awareness and make it easy to give orders, so it's easier to find out what needs to be done as well as direct people to do it.

File: hercules I.webm (2MB, 710x503px) Image search: [Google]

2MB, 710x503px

>>377043146
My man.
I also liked the designs of the ships in the first FS, too bad they went with the ergonomical approach for the sequel with a few exceptions.
Especially the mark II Hercules looks ugly compared to 1.

File: 360px-Herc_Mk2_12_w14_lighting.png (99KB, 360x288px) Image search: [Google]

99KB, 360x288px

>>377044715
I mean look at this thing, it looks like some space dildo.

File: 480px-GTFValkyrie.png (100KB, 480x351px) Image search: [Google]

100KB, 480x351px

Another example.

File: Perseus_12_w14_lighting.png (596KB, 950x734px) Image search: [Google]

596KB, 950x734px

>>377045064

Love that game and its sequel. It's really well rounded and challenging.
I have no interest in space flight games but this one still managed to get my attention.

File: Lucifer480x340.jpg (81KB, 480x320px) Image search: [Google]

81KB, 480x320px

>>377045165
>>377044961
That shit is pretty awful.

>In the ending of Descent: FreeSpace, the protagonist speculates that the Shivans as a race are not necessarily evil, stating that "the Shivans are the great destroyers, but also the great preservers". Their role was to exterminate other species who advanced beyond their ordained place in the cosmic order. It is postulated had it not been for the Shivans' intervention 8000 years ago, the Ancients may have grown so powerful that the Terrans and Vasudans may not have been able to survive. In turn the protagonist realizes that the Terrans' expansion would have made them a threat to any other fledgling species. This theory is taken further by Admiral Bosch, who hypothesizes that many races came before even the Ancients themselves, who were each wiped out in their turn to allow a new generation to develop.

Yeah Mass Effect totally didn't ripoff the idea.

>>377044961
>>377045064
>>377045165
You sure those ships aren't modded?

>>377044961
>space dildo
Funny you should say that. I remember there being a period years ago where a lot of custom ships being posted on the Hard Light Forums had very phallic-looking parts attached to them.

>>377045064
I always thought the Valkyrie looked a little too much like a primitive design, as if it were one of the first attempts at a highly maneuverable space fighter, converted from one of our space shuttles as a proof of concept. That, or a design based on what people in the 1950s thought spaceships would look like. I do like flying it, despite its paper-thin armor, but I like the look of the Perseus better.

>>377045498
They took it even further in ME3 with the reveal that the Protheans were imperialistic, conquering bastards, just like the Ancients.

>>377045905
Their textures have been upgraded, but the basic designs haven't been changed.

>>377038894
Ya egotistical. I always enjoyed the perspective of being a nameless pilot in a huge war, and not some sort of super hero

>>377047198
>They took it even further in ME3 with the reveal that the Protheans were imperialistic, conquering bastards, just like the Ancients.

There's also a cycle of sci-fi books called Revelation space - first book was published in 2000. Uses the same idea of the "reapers" who come to destroy races when they reach a certain technological point to save the galaxy from being destroyed or some shit.

>>377030665
>those missions in the nebula

so fucking cool.

>>377032295
1st game only or the 2nd as well?

>>377048827
Freespace Open *is* the second game, just with a lot of upgrades. It started when the developers gave the community the source code for Freespace 2.

File: Shivan-SJ-Sathanas-Dreadnaught.jpg (65KB, 700x525px) Image search: [Google]

65KB, 700x525px

DIVE DIVE DIVE HIT YOUR BURNERS PILOT

>>377049012
>he Installer requires that you already have a copy of FreeSpace 2 installed. You can get it from Good Old Games. After that simply run the Installer!

but you still need the actual game installed?

File: DIVE DIVE DIVE HIT YOUR BURNERS PILOT.webm (3MB, 960x540px) Image search: [Google]

3MB, 960x540px

>>377049018

>>377049159
Yeah, you do still need vanilla FS2 installed. On the plus side, you don't need to buy FS1, because the entire game is included in the FS1 Port. You wouldn't want to play vanilla FS1 anyway.

File: katee sackhoff starbuck.jpg (307KB, 600x798px) Image search: [Google]

307KB, 600x798px

>>377049608
thx alot, kind anon! I guess it's time to replay freespace2.
is the game playable via mouse? I doubt my 20yr old microsoft sidewider joystick is supported by windows10 ^^

What do y'all think of Blue Planet and Age of Aquarius?