🚀 go-pugleaf

    Hello,
I'd just like to share some brief thoughts after playing the Freespace demo
for a couple of hours.

Interface - Quite smooth & intuitive.  The general feel borrows a lot from
other space-combat games (as does many aspects of Freespace) but hey, I'm
definitely not complaining!  As the old adage goes:  If it ain't broke, then
don't fix.  Many games try too hard to be original, usually muddling up
something that works fine, and...oops, sorry, off in a tangent again : )

Options - First thing that stood out in the demo was the amount of options
and customizability of the various aspects of the game (controls, graphic
detail, even the HUD!)

Views - Where are my side/back/etc views?  Are they not supposed to be in
the demo?  Are there any side views at all?  I surely hope so - hate not
being able to watch as one of those cruisers explode..

Graphics - Quite good, I especially like the large ships.  I like the way
injured ships produce sparks & bolts of electricity (the sparks usually make
targetting harder, especially up close.)  The explosions can be spectacular,
maybe they could release a little more of a *white flash*, especially the
larger ships.  The nebulae could be a little better (never happy are we ; ).
One thing I never really cared much for is the late-wing-commander-style
HUD,  i.e. no cockpit frame, *just* the HUD.  I believe that if you're field
of vision is (at least a little) limited by a cockpit frame, it feels more
like you *are in a spaceship*.  And where's the blue electrical bolts
running through my cockpit frame/instruments a-la Star Wars when I get hit?
(I always wished for that, guess loss of frame-rate would be a problem?)

Sound - Decent, nothing exceptional.  I realise that the event-based
sound-track (is that what it's called?) is not included in the demo, but
then again, musical taste is very subjective and topping the Star Wars theme
is no easy task ; )

General combat/gameplay - I must say I wasn't overly impressed - it has more
of a Wing Commander feel than Tie-Fighter (guess which I prefer).  The
ability to turn off the leading-reticle sight is a *very* good idea (as is
the overall ability to customize the HUD) - give us gamers options wherever
possible - I applaud that!  I found it somewhat frustrating to chase a
Hormus (?) interceptor for 5 minutes just trying to finish him off (maybe
I'm just a bad pilot or *he* was a very good one, just didn't seem that much
fun.)  The AI is generally well balanced & quite challenging  i.e. not every
ship is piloted by an ace although some are definitely better than others -
Would be nice to be able to quickly dispatch a weak enemy in your path with
a single blast as you concentrate on something more important, much like
swatting a fly.  Xwing was excellent in this respect since the weaker
Tie-fighters of the enemy force could be taken out by a single well-aimed
lazer blast - it's hard to describe, but let's just say you're in the middle
of a big furball and whilst chasing/concentrating on another ship you hit
one that crosses your path, 'casual-like', with a single blast before
proceeding (there I go again, sorry..)

 Well, this is it for now.  In general, I enjoyed playing the demo - there
is great potential here, but I think what will really be the cruncher for
this one is the mission builder.  Give me a good, detailed, (event based?)
mission builder (especially one for a space-sim, which hasn't been done
before) anyday and I'll be happy.

You guys at Volition, keep up the good work.  Hope to see that builder and
those BIG capital ships soon!

Simon Griffee