Freespace 2

As a child I loved the game Colony Wars, and I spent years looking for another space sim that could match those memories. The Freespace series has certainly proven to be one of the best experiences I could ask for in this genre, and is indeed a Good Old Game. But even a top notch game like this has flaws, and the most glaring one is in its controls. The game is playable with a keyboard and mouse, but there are times when one needs to dogfight hordes of enemy fighters and a mouse just can't cut it. The game recommends a joystick and that should be taken as a warning. If you don't have a joystick, then be warned. The game will still be immersive, it will still be one of the best games ever, but you will die painfully in certain heartless missions (less so than the first game thankfully.) The game also suffers from some cliches, but it's difficult to make a great plot for a genre (sci-fi) that's kind of over-saturated overall. Sci Fi plots are everywhere, and a space sim like this just has to deal with the territory. But if you do have a joystick, then it is criminal for you not to buy this game! If you don't have a joystick, you should still get this game. This is one of the brightest gems of GOG's catalogue by far!

Ever since I beat FS1 and FS1:ST Ive wanted to try this game, now, I beat it, and I just cant stop!

This is a great space game with many single player missions. You need to follow the instructions from this link to get it working on a modern computer as the game was designed for win95&98. http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/index.php/Installing_FreeSpace_2_Open

I remember years and years ago when the original Freespace came out. I played it every day every night. It made me a gamer. That was then. I never was able to get a hold of FS2 however, until 2 years ago via gog.com . I played it before upgrading anything. It was my childhood all over again only BETTER! This is one of the best games our there even to this day. The storyline, while helpful that it is to know form the original, is well summarized form the start. you have simple but helpful instructions and training that when finally completed even earns you one of many medals that you feel like you always have EARNED. the promotion system is rewarding, while subtle, the debriefings always realistic, weather you shoot your friends and die or jump out early or just finished the mission. You even are allowed finally to move on if you fail 5 times, which believe me for some mission is a send. You are a pilot though, and you never forget that is ALL you are, but its not a bad thing, no you feel that rush of your adrenaline trying to destroy this or that. you hear teh warning of the missile alert your constantly adjusting engine shield weapon power, your never at a lost or hesitant with your controls and every single control IS changable. That is just the tip of the iceberg. The graphics even before they were upgraded by the scp project are astounding the music perfect and the sounds riveting! voice acting could be a SMIDGE better but not overly much. the storyline is immensely immersive however. you finish the game with a loss that is wonderful but heartbreaking. You want to know more, you want to continue the fight even after all that has happened....but you cant...the worst and saddest part of this game is the fact that despite the MASSIVE mods and enhancements out there..there is no conclusion..there is no end to the story. This game is going to make you fall in love with space...if only to feel its loss knowing its gone. Get this game. There isn't anything more unique and more amazing.

First of all, this game's graphics have aged very well. The lasers glow, the rockets fwoosh, the big ships slash through each other with massive beam cannons and spray flak and lasers everywhere. It still looks good after all these years, and there are texture packs online to improve it even more. All the races have a distinct style: The Terrans get standard blocky ships, the Vasudans get organic yellow curves, and the Shivans get scary twisted black and red. These graphics make it amazingly satisfying to dogfight or help out in a big capship battle. The gameplay is fairly straightforward: There's a nice variety of missions, from dogfighting to interception to escort, and they're all pretty fun. Dogfighting handles nicely since the game lets you automatically match speeds to stay on your enemy's tail, gives you a reticle to lead your target, and other helpful bits of information on your HUD. Dogfighting, chucking missiles around, divebombing a massive capship to demolish its beam cannons and give your own capitals a fighting chance, these are all tons of fun and the main reason I gave this game 4 stars. Unfortunately, the game's more advanced controls have more keys than a pipe organ. There's like 10 different targeting options, from "target the next enemy" to "target the ship subsystem under my reticle," each with its own key, your guns have different firing modes and that gets a few more keys, your throttle settings take up all your number keys and more to make adjustments, and you get miscellaneous keys for your flares, shield orientation, and so on. It's a mess. If you find you need to switch guns mid-battle, you'll definitely have to take your eyes off the screen for a while. Also, bomb interception is the most annoying game type ever invented. The idea is that when an enemy bomber tries to torpedo your capship, you can shoot down their bomb before it hits, then hunt down the bomber before they fire again. Unfortunately, bombs are hard to spot, so you don't always know when you should be running interception and when you should be hunting bombers (strike one). Then you need to press the "B" key to actually target the bomb, one of those many confusing keyboard commands I mentioned above (strike two), and bombs travel pretty fast so you usually won't intercept them in time, anyway (strike three!). I just gave up and let my wingmen handle it. So, beautiful graphics, varied gameplay, exciting dogfights, massive battleship duels, marred by messy controls and annoying bombers. Definitely worth getting, just be aware of these issues before you jump in.