Independence War™ Deluxe

Oh man, what a great gaem that GOG have resurrected. In it's original 'big box' release this was the game I brought at the same time as the Sidwinder Pro joystick that's done me proud right through to today. Even today I have found memories of the wonderful physics engine that encouraged creative combat manouvers, a limited selection of (still quite meaty) weapons, and the novelty of being able to jump into any of the four bridge positions or to leave your crew to do their jobs (suprisingly well a lot of the time...) The missions are superb, offering a rich variety of objectives (some of which only pay of in the equally underated sequel, Edge Of Chaos) whilst telling a deeply compelling story. This deluxe edition then goes one step further, placing you in the shoes and nattily decorated ships of the Indie Fleet for a campaign that is even more punishing. And I mean that as a compliment! The final point in this games favour (other than being able to run it now on pretty much any rig out there) is the opening cinematic (a trademark of Infogrames titles from this period: see I-War 2 and Outcast...), and Jefferson Clay as your cranky ship-board AI advisor. All I have to say is 'Dumb-ass questions in, smart-ass answers back out...'

The other reviews sound nice. Giving the game a fair amount of praise. But sometimes a negative review can give some counter balance that is best in making an accurate decision with a purchase you are unsure of. I must say the game was not all that bad as the game itself and how it feels. But This is a negative review because I truly did not like either this first game nor its sequel. The physics of the game are completely wrong. The game is trumped as a accurate physics game. Which is fine...if you are under water. Yes, alas the game physics are not in fact of a space environment, but of being under water. Which is very different. The other thing that bothers me about both games. Happens to be the most crucial element of any game ever created. The control system. This folks, is the worst control system EVER!! I do not even mean this lightly. You will think...well how bad can they be? Well give it a few minutes of trying to get anything to work. You are very likely to want to throw your machine through a wall from the sheer frustration of not being able to even play the game from this horrible setup. Somethings to think about before you purchase them.

I got this game boxed and i must admit i dont remember everything about it actually, but i write this to let new potential users to be warn about a couple of things. Well first of all, for this price i suggest any first person space sim shooter's fans to give it a try, its an interesting game sure, but dont expect descent or starglider anyway, as written in many other reviews this is not a typical "fighter" space battle sim, here you will have your trouble to take down even a single enemy ship as the challenge is related more to become able to pilot your fat ship then to other aspects of the game. Beside that idea could be appealing im in need to tell that i remember this game quite frustrating about the difficuly to fly your ship in a decent manner, imo this is a bit further the "satisfaction" of mastering any simulation game, this tend imo to become a bit boring experience, at least it happened to me. If you are like me a keyboard+mouse only pc gamer, be warned that piloting that ship is really challengeing, maybe with a joystick could be a different expereince, but defo this game is not for everyone. Personally i gave up after not so many time cause i was bored to try hitting a single enemy for half an hour ;) , and its more then 30 years that im pc-gaming (conting Commodore too), so dont think it was the only space sim i palyed.

No matter how well written it is, if it does not even run, then nothing else matters. My system is an HP laptop, Windows 7 64-bit. ATI CPU and graphics (low-end machine). I can watch the opening cut-scene, but then it crashes. I have tried the usual suspects: all switches in compatibility mode and running as admin. Still dies. Pity. This sure looked like a good game. I hope GOG actually does something to get this to run on a modern OS soon.

It is still not a great game. I has not aged well, the controls are awful. The AI is awful. But hey, it is late 90's. At least here in IW1 you can go "free explore" (using cheats), and it's starmap is much bigger and at least centred on our home Sol system. IW2 has a pathetic starmap, and one of those even caused a CTD every time you enter (the Dagda system). Not as utterly HUURRRRRHURRHUURR DURRRRR difficult as IW2 neither, but you WILL need the cheat codes for the final 50% worth of campaign missions. I bought this from pure nostalgia from the year 2000....... it did not live up to it's own memories!