Any modern space combat flight sims around?

[abs 2]

I just went out and bought X3: Reunion because of this thread. I like the game so far. It reminds me a lot of 'Elite' (Man, I really miss that game a LOT!, except that you can't land on planets.

Does anyone know if they will be making an X4 (and if they'll allow interaction with planets)?

Abs

[Espectro (DayZ) 0]

BUZZARD @ Jan. 11 2008,02:27)]

How succesfull you are depends entirely on your skills (you train skills all the time), your ship, your ship fitting, in what order your killing them bastards and a tiny bit of luck.

In the other words: Each MMO, where you do have to train skills, you just don't need any in reality - you could be stupid monkey, and still gain advantage, since you do play longer than enemy, and he's going to loose to anyone, who has superior weapons, ships etc.

Yea, if you are stupid enough to jump to a low security system

[kavoven 4]

I just went out and bought X3: Reunion because of this thread. I like the game so far. It reminds me a lot of 'Elite' (Man, I really miss that game a LOT!, except that you can't land on planets.

Does anyone know if they will be making an X4 (and if they'll allow interaction with planets)?

Abs

Egosoft is definatly working on X4 at the moment I guess, but I won't believe it'll come out too soon.

Both, X2 and X3 had really, really many troubles with bugs in the earlier versions. X2 was playable with 1.20, but X3 needed a year or so to become what it should be.

Originaly X3 was planned as addon for X2, but then turned into a full game. But the main difference between both are ONLY graphics. Nothing else. They put in a few more sectors and a few more ships and continued the story. Period. And many fans of X2 (including me) became really bored after just a few minuts, because they didn't want to do the same all over again.

So X4 definatly must feature interaction with planets, because you just can't set up another X2 with better graphics.

And by the way: There are still rumours about a possible X:Online

Edit

AND EVE Online will be available on Steam with a 21 Day Trial Accout for each Steam user in a few days/weeks I'll definatly try that

[-ZG-BUZZARD 0]

If X goes online but without subscription, heck, I may even try it out!

[Thunnder Bunny 0]

Glad your giving X3 a try.  If you decide to start using multiple "user made mods", check out the forums to hook em up.   As it's not exactly drag and drop like ofp unfortunately

For me ,the cockpit mod was a must have.  But little things like glowing missile trails, really add to the game.

But beware, 1 mod gave me the option to become a pirate and kill some argon capital ships....needless to say, my own race wants me dead now.   But I don't mind, I'm plundering their merchants....very profitable

On another note I gave Orbiter a try.    Nice sim, but it's the first game in alooooooong time to give me motion sickness.

I lost control and ended up spinning to my doom.....about puked in the process :P

But I got the hang of it now.   Still very cool for a free game/sim.

[hypno toad 0]

There is infinity: Quest for the universe.

You can pretty much say goodbye to all other video games after that comes out.

Everything will be crap in comparison.

http://www.infinity-universe.com/Infinity/

This is pretty much all the videos they have released.

http://www.youtube.com/user/InfinitySupport

[Sc@tterbrain 0]

Got my hands on an old copt of Freepsace, the addon, and Freespace 2.

Freespace 2 is highly reccomended. I had not played it since it came out, and still wonder why it was not a bigger hit. As far as "space combat flight sims," without the RPG or other elements...its the best out there with a distinct lack of anything that resembles it since.

If you don't want to go the RPG-ish route and be a pirate running contraband, and dont care about being the comander of a large ship...

....the pure fighter, bomber, attack, goodness that gives you the feel of "Star Wars" battles is sure to please in Freespace 2. (Great production values too!

Oh, imagine what a game of this type would be like with todays graphics.!!!

[hypno toad 0]

Oh, imagine what a game of this type would be like with todays graphics.!!!

*COUGH* 1 post above yours.

[Hoot1988 0]

one of my flat mates has X3 ill ask if i can borrow it next week i think.

i agree with [ZG]BUZZARD it would be nice to have some more space fighter simulators like wing commander was. maybe blend it with the bigger ships so that you can launch them and possibly fly them both.

I want to get my hands on a Viper MKVII off Battlestar Galactica 2003. keep looking for some good schematics oline but can never find any good enough for me to put into ArmA. Currently working on a F302 from stargate to put in arma and we are working n putting cap ships in game too.

Was considering trying star trek legacy, anyone know if its any good? I really liked the Armada series and Command series of those.

[Black Sphere 0]

Playing EVE were awesome expirience, thou I know with 14-day trial I didn't even scratched the surface of this game. But I managed to exercise a Kill Right on regular player, so I think I've been very good in it  

There is infinity: Quest for the universe.

You can pretty much say goodbye to all other video games after that comes out.

Everything will be crap in comparison.

http://www.infinity-universe.com/Infinity/

This is pretty much all the videos they have released.

http://www.youtube.com/user/InfinitySupport

Well, if

game would be released, everything would be crap in comparison. As it seems it would be not so much of RTS but highly tactical game, as its predecessor. Watch it and drool, sadly that's all you can do regarding this game  

[sanctuary 19]

Oh, imagine what a game of this type would be like with todays graphics.!!!

Actually, there are new feature regularly added to the source code project for Freespace 2, with updated graphic functions and all the bells and whistles you can expect in modern games visuals.

And same ship with several recently added graphic features (shaders, normal maps etc ...) enabled :

(see other screenshots in this thread )

And along that you can find awesome visuals upgrades for every models, effects and textures of the stock game (and for mods/campaigns for it)

[hypno toad 0]

Playing EVE were awesome expirience, thou I know with 14-day trial I didn't even scratched the surface of this game. But I managed to exercise a Kill Right on regular player, so I think I've been very good in it

There is infinity: Quest for the universe.

You can pretty much say goodbye to all other video games after that comes out.

Everything will be crap in comparison.

http://www.infinity-universe.com/Infinity/

This is pretty much all the videos they have released.

http://www.youtube.com/user/InfinitySupport

Well, if

game would be released, everything would be crap in comparison. As it seems it would be not so much of RTS but highly tactical game, as its predecessor. Watch it and drool, sadly that's all you can do regarding this game

I cannot see that one being as good as infinity. Infinity is not an RTS, it is an MMO(not RPG).

It works like a first person to third person game, and it works more like an FPS than an RPG, but you play with thousands of players at once.

Plus you can own your own planet if you want, that has good terrain, all done with terragen.

[Dwarden 1125]

i think the point about "NEXUS 2" techdemo is ...

first look at HighQuality video on

172mb, 1280x720

http://www.stage6.com/user....HD-720p

108MB 720x400

http://www.stage6.com/user....echdemo

look on date mark ... (O.O factor as it's March 2005 )

then look on the effects and realtime rendering (it's from engine video) ...

and say OMFG ...

seriously i hope whoever denied that project to be finished now cries over any news about 'great looking scifi tactical RTS' games like Sins of Solar Empire ...

btw. Infinity planet terrain is not done by terragen ...

whole game is based on procedural programming so everything depends on seed from which it's calculated (e.g. surface of planet or star system bodies or asteroid field and else) ...

[-ZG-BUZZARD 0]

Freespace 2, how I love thee!!!  

Damn, that Nexus Jupiter incident looked good...

*Has wet dream of Freespace 3 being done with such graphics*

Actually, I think that the Freespace saga is probably the most desired one begging for a sequel, since the story is left open, with mankind able to discover/create/"cause" more warpgates/subspace connections, they shouldl find a way home...

But since Nexus has been cancelled my hopes rest on Infinity and Zavtra Vojna (The Tomorrow War), the latter one's english version coming out due 2nd quarter of this year...

For a nice youtube video of Zavtra Vojna

.

[Black Sphere 0]

iseriously i hope whoever denied that project to be finished now cries over any news about 'great looking scifi tactical RTS' games like Sins of Solar Empire ...

They had some serious issues about Black Sun graphic engine ownership so all rights are now transferred to some court and curators or something (maybe they'll make a game )... But I've heard THQ (succesors or something like that of Mythis, the authors of 'Nexus The Jupiter Incident' bouth rights for Homeworld 3, so maybe it's time for new drooling...

[Dwarden 1125]

as far i know Black Sun Engine was developed by Mithis

it was theirs baby built from scratch

but Mithis as company don't exist anymore...

about the rights i heard something else

it was about some major IP theft from some employee/insider,

then erase of company assets

(someone wiped the firms HDDs either to cover theft or damage firm)

and some other ugly stories about court and industrial espionage

hard to say what's true ...

so truth is that Mithis as studio is gone and there are now two new studios

(one named Eidos Studio Hungary http://www.eidos.hu/

and another named Most Wanted Entertainment Ltd.(MWE) http://www.most-wanted-entertainment.com/

where some (or most) of ex Mithis employees are ...

who is where and why ... no idea

Nexus rights are still in hand of HD publishing (they put it on STEAM last year)

THQ is absolutely unrelated to Mithis or Nexus

THQ obtained Homeworld TM (i think from VU/Sierra) so now Relic can work on III

[xawery 0]

There is infinity: Quest for the universe.

You can pretty much say goodbye to all other video games after that comes out.

Everything will be crap in comparison.

http://www.infinity-universe.com/Infinity/

This is pretty much all the videos they have released.

http://www.youtube.com/user/InfinitySupport

If what they claim is true, I must concur: everything else will be crap in comparison; not only in the space flightsim genre, but also the broader MMO niche.

If one reads through their list of features, one will see that they've done away with everything I hate so much about MMO(RPG)'s: the disproportionate power asymmetry between newcomers and veterans in terms of game mechanics, endless grinding, virtual dicerolling, while including such much-coveted featurs as actual first-person control of the avatar/ship and unique quests which can only be completed by a single party/single individual. I hate how all the MMO's out there contain quests which can be completed by every single player. The simple knowledge of this fact ruins the immersion for me: ah yes, this noble lord requests my assistance in assembling his toolshed, as he has done thousands of times before because he's just a string of 1's and 0's whose sole purpose is to give grinders the opportunity to gain XP and raise their "I have no life pass me the Mountain Dew kthxbai" attribute.

I have always wanted to play an online game, set in a persistent yet dynamic universe, where the players face numerous significant choices and have to rely on their own skills, rather than on abstract concepts like "levels" or "experience points".

Whether Infinity will be able to deliver on this remains to be seen, but it sure looks like something I would be willing to pay for on a monthly basis.

[Colossus 2]

There is infinity: Quest for the universe.

You can pretty much say goodbye to all other video games after that comes out.

Everything will be crap in comparison.

http://www.infinity-universe.com/Infinity/

This is pretty much all the videos they have released.

http://www.youtube.com/user/InfinitySupport

Just wow..

[xawery 0]

At the risk of sounding fanboyish (already?!, I must say that the more I browse the Infinity Universe site and forums, the more interesting the project becomes. An MP prototype of the combat engine has been released, and although it's quite basic, it's nice to see newtonian physics at work. A 26-page document containing the background story and a timeline has also been released, and it's actually rather well-written. It creates a lot of opportunities for all kinds of political scheming, hehe. Then there is the EXTREMELY detailed development journal. The devs really keep the fans abreast of what they're working on. Half of the time I'm not even sure what they're talking about, but still

Still, it's an independent studio and the game is being developed in the dev's spare time (although you wouldn't say that judging by frequency of the updates), so I'm careful not to get too enthusiastic. On the other hand, many good full-feature games have been created by independent developers or modders (Mount & Blade, Red Orchestra). Another glimmer of hope comes from the fact that the game relies on procedural generation and the dev team contains enough programmers (their site states specifically that they aren't looking for any more coders). I've seen many a promising project die a silent death because the dev team had plenty of great 3d/2d artists and whatnot, but not enough programmers to do the dirty work that forms the backbone of any game.

So yeah... I'm cautiously optimistic.

[-ZG-BUZZARD 0]

Have you tried out the combat prototype? I installed it once some time ago but didn't manage to get my joystick working to fly a fighter... Dunno if it's possible or not but haven't researched the forums of that game yet...

[xawery 0]

Yep, just finished playing, hehe. It's good fun, even though it's extremely basic. Too bad only a few people play it at any given time, hunting humans with my missiles is a lot of fun I love how you can have one of your larger ships distract one of the enemy's, while the smaller fighters try and take out its turrets. Those ships are LARGE, one almost feels like L. Skywalker on the Death Star, hehe.

It's also a lot of fun to gather resources on an asteroid in a tiny shuttle, and then try docking with your battleship while it's taking heavy fire. Whee!

[kavoven 4]

wow... I read about this game.. two years ago and watched one of the first movies, in which they showed how a spaceship landed on a planet with no loading times at all. I was really impressed but never thought, they would get that far!

No this looks quiet promising and it has many aspects I'd really like to see in a Space-MMO. Let's hope this one will develope into something real

[hypno toad 0]

btw. Infinity planet terrain is not done by terragen ...

whole game is based on procedural programming so everything depends on seed from which it's calculated (e.g. surface of planet or star system bodies or asteroid field and else) ...

No...

Saying a game is done with procedural programming is a very vague term. That is like saying your game is done in C++,

it doesn't tell you anything about the game.

they even mentioned the game engine uses terragen technology (I really can't be bothered to hunt down the post)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BF1CIF74iZA

If you ask me, i see endless similarities.

but look at the terrain, the terrain looks like terragen, it renders like terragen, it is textured like terragen.

Besides, using terragen and seeing how fast it produces large height maps, I can see the infinity engine simply generating a full world in a matter of seconds, then storing the info, for further use.

[Dwarden 1125]

if You know bit IA (Flavien) then You should be aware that word 'procedural' is key

where he as coder of Infinity said he uses Terragen ... point me to that "they said"

as far i know he wrote whole (or most) of procedural stuff himself ...

one of many "Infinity vs Terragen threads"

http://www.infinity-universe.com/InfinityForums/viewtopic.php?t=5461

i bet you most likely got owned by one of April jokes where IA claimed all being rendered in TG

http://www.infinity-universe.com/InfinityForums/viewtopic.php?t=4176

development forum:

http://www.infinity-universe.com/InfinityForums/viewforum.php?f=6

his complete dev journal (here you can easily see he done stuff sooner than Terragen 2 was out):

http://www.gamedev.net/communi....=263350

it's nonsense also because terragen is proprietary engine and not royalty free code for indie developers ...

[sanctuary 19]

Beyond the red line, a standalone free game based on the Freespace 2 source code project and engine has won the best indie game award for the 2007 player's choice category of ModDB.

Totally deserved due to the high quality of the game, and again it shows how incredibly the work of those genius coders can have enhanced the Freespace 2 engine.

Another great space combat game.

BSG:BtR Website