Wing Commander™ 5: Prophecy Gold Edition

This is the last installment of the series and well, it looks good but some problems typical of the series as a whole tend to show in force plus a couple of new ones. The story is simple, with a few nice touches reminiscent of what was in Wing Commander IV even though they don't influence the overall plot much (which is more or less the first Freespace without the lovecraftian dread and a b-movie vibe, alien invaders come through portal and shoot everybody and so on), the FMVs are good quality, the production values are similar to WCIV, and it's nice to see Mark Hamill playing a wise mentor guy twenty years before the new Star Wars movies. The graphics are nice and colorful with early 3D accelleration support, very nice to look at even now in its simplicity thanks to the ability to up the resolution on modern machines. The game has throttle and rudder support, though only on one device (which can be remedied nowadays with plenty of utilities either first or third party). While there are a few interesting innovations (like an interceptor with a booster for emergency interception and cluster missiles) the gameplay is VERY repetitive, it doesn't help that the enemy fighters are very hard to kill (they take a lot of hits even from the most poweful weapons), liberally abuse the afterburner and come literally in droves which is a problem since in these games afterburner fuel is limited and it's easy to run out of it. In general the game feels very padded: many missions have you go to a series of navpoints and destroy wave after wave of fighters before moving on, I came out of many missions positively tired, it felt even more repetitive than WCIII which was already really repetitive. There is also a personal pet peeve of mine, if you want to regulate shields, weapons and engine energy you have to use a weird triangle icon that monopolizes your stick, rendering almost impossible to use it in combat. It's a good game overall but it's no Freespace or Tie Fighter.

I truly love Prophecy, it was one of the first games i had played with my Diamond Monster 3D card and boy, it was a miracle back in the day - technical wise. What i really like about the game is the vibe of the space opera and bad-ass like style. Audio is great, all the characters like Casey, Zero, Stiletto and others are greatly voiced actored and there is quite a lot of chat during the fights and i like that. Dogfights are great, just pure fun and you can even taunt your enemies ( very cool ). The new enemy in the Prophecy is called like Nephillim or something like that and it seems that felines from previous installment might have been more interesting. They are just bugs, insect like race, not really scary or particularly interesting. You will also see Kilrathi in few missions here and there, which is great, because like i said, no previous experience. One of the best sims, Conflict Freespace 1/2 are objectively better games all around, but this is the next best thing.

I was so excited to play this one and after the intro... I was couldn't wait. I was a bit torn about the graphics at the time since I really liked the 'more realstic' (i guess) graphics of previous games. but this game managed to suprise me with the story and how events unfolded. I always felt like this game was supposed to have more to it. come to think about I still have some questions about a few things in it. Played this like all the rest of `em with a keyboard and a mouse. getting this game is a no brainer for WC fans and you'll enjoy it all the same if you love a good sci-fi story and some space combat to go along.

The game flows nicely. Nice seeing Mark Hamil. The game is still as fun as the original... Only negative- and its a big one....GOG Version does not support hardware acceleration and the game does not look good. The ships look choppy and pixelated. Get it fixed GOG!

One of the greatest space sim ever. Story is not on the same level than WCIII or IV but anyway excellent sequel. Beautifull graphics (hope this version includes 3DFXglidewrapper or something tha u can enjoy all effects in the game. Woth buying !!!