Idle thoughts whilst playing Freespace 2

[Battlehymn Republic]

I just got it today... HOtU is most generous.

* Is it supposed to be this dark, or is it just me?

* Training simulator- wish I could skip over some dialogue, but helpful, right?

* Launching?!? This wasn't in the simulator. OH CRAP they're throwing fighters at me!

* Why can't auto-target lock onto the fighters flying at me?

* My wingmates are very good at this. But I only got one kill. Oh well.

* First mission- whew, I finished that one. Escorts are remarkably more resilient than I thought.

* Second mission- okay, not too bad.

* You know, I know that most flight sim type games suffer from the Superman Syndrome (which really should be named after Starfox, but I digress), but this solution is ridiculous. I haven't gotten one single kill, except the one that the program apparently allocated for me.

* What is the asteroid using to shoot me with? There's no turrets on the surface. Am I supposed to fly towards it and let it shoot me? It's not dying!

* Ah, I can let that objective fail. I can see why this series is so well-spoken of.

* Third mission- more jumping in. Why are my wingmates so much faster than me, and know where to go before the radar blips pop up?

* Am I just supposed to have the afterburners on all the time?

* It's impossible to dogfight with a numeric keypad!

* Where are the retro-rockets? ACK! COLLISION!

* Seriously, where am I supposed to fire at the larger ships to stop them from shooting at me? There's no turrets!

* NOT ONE SINGLE KILL. This game doesn't have a promotion system, does it?

Conclusion: Pretty particle beam effects, nice mission structures, I hope it's much better in the Hercules.

[Battlehymn Republic]

Man, I'm a fucksplash. This belongs in the game forum.

[Ace Pace]

I just got it today... HOtU is most generous.

I'll adress this later.

* Is it supposed to be this dark, or is it just me?

Check your gamma, FS2 HOTU defaults suck.

* Training simulator- wish I could skip over some dialogue, but helpful, right?

Very helpful, I'm not sure if the HOTU training missions explain energy management which will answer your points later on.

* Why can't auto-target lock onto the fighters flying at me?

Yes, you can, see keyboard shortcuts, however H is pretty good as most enemy fighters will play close.

* My wingmates are very good at this. But I only got one kill. Oh well.

Just remember, lasers first, missles later after shields are down, unless you're using the better missles.

* First mission- whew, I finished that one. Escorts are remarkably more resilient than I thought.

* Second mission- okay, not too bad.

* You know, I know that most flight sim type games suffer from the Superman Syndrome (which really should be named after Starfox, but I digress), but this solution is ridiculous. I haven't gotten one single kill, except the one that the program apparently allocated for me.

The program allocates no kills, it's just the wingmen going after other targets initially, if you'd give them time, they'd go after everything.

* What is the asteroid using to shoot me with? There's no turrets on the surface. Am I supposed to fly towards it and let it shoot me? It's not dying!

Yes, there are turrets, that the Iceni.

* Ah, I can let that objective fail. I can see why this series is so well-spoken of.

Wait for later when it wtfpwns ya.

* Third mission- more jumping in. Why are my wingmates so much faster than me, and know where to go before the radar blips pop up?

* Am I just supposed to have the afterburners on all the time?

Energy management. Energy is a single number that it split between Engines,Weapons and Shields. You can change the settings by the Insert to Pagedown buttons. For cruising, max out your engines, dogfights I suggest you put engines abit below average and max your shields, later on weapons, depending on fighter.

* It's impossible to dogfight with a numeric keypad!

Yes, it's impossible, get a cheap joystick.

* Where are the retro-rockets? ACK! COLLISION!

There..are breaks. You can do 180 in seconds and afterburn.

* Seriously, where am I supposed to fire at the larger ships to stop them from shooting at me? There's no turrets!

Yes, there are, keyboard key(look it up, I havn't played in a year) targets subsystems or just turrets.

* NOT ONE SINGLE KILL. This game doesn't have a promotion system, does it?

Yes, it does. I even printed out my final pilot, all medals and ranks,

Conclusion: Pretty particle beam effects, nice mission structures, I hope it's much better in the Hercules.

The Herc sucks, Herc 2 is..okay.

Uh...I won't spoil.

[Ace Pace]

Now onto the real meat.

HOTU is pretty much an opener. From here on, FS2 is pretty much freeware and available as a DL either as the CDs or as a torrent.

The torrent is better. Why? The game is open source. The game has been modded from a 98' game to a DX8 game. Yes, the modders are bored.

I'll provide links if interested. the torrent is 1.92GB and comes with FS2 and FS1 port.

[rhoenix]

Also, check the command line options. Some are quite helpful in making the graphics much better.

If a missle can't target lock and hit something further or better than my beam weapons can, I'm didn't use it more than once. Swarm missles and target-locking missles I used often.

Be sure to make your beam weapons all fire at once - you'll fire less often, but what you do hit will wish you hadn't. You can do this by pressing "." as a hotkey.

I loved this game, and for the record, I used my Logiteck trackball the whole time. After some adjustments for sensitivity, I loved playing this game with it. I'm nearly to the end, and the problem isn't the fighters you have to shoot down - it's how many there are you have to get through quickly, and the large distance you need to go to chase them down.

Fun stuff, I'm going to jump into the Perseus instead of the Erinyes this time, since the Perseus is faster.

[Ace Pace]

Also, check the command line options. Some are quite helpful in making the graphics much better.

He's using HOTU Build,not SCP.

If a missle can't target lock and hit something further or better than my beam weapons can, I'm didn't use it more than once. Swarm missles and target-locking missles I used often.

Yes, they rock, however most are useless against the better shielded enemies and just waste themselves on shields. The best missle in that case is the trebuchet which can one kill nearly everything except a Seph.

Fun stuff, I'm going to jump into the Perseus instead of the Erinyes this time, since the Perseus is faster.

A Perseus is faster, an Erinyes will eat it for lunch with a combination of Hornets, Harpoons and Kaysers.

[rhoenix]

He's using HOTU Build,not SCP.

Ah, apologies.

Yes, they rock, however most are useless against the better shielded enemies and just waste themselves on shields. The best missle in that case is the trebuchet which can one kill nearly everything except a Seph.

Yes, I've been using them with the Perseus, and they're fun.

A Perseus is faster, an Erinyes will eat it for lunch with a combination of Hornets, Harpoons and Kaysers.

True, but a Perseus with Kaysers and Trebuchets can take down forces just about as fast. The firepower's lacking, yeah, but the trips between engagements is much shorter.

[Stark]

All I can say is, if you're using retail and not the SCP, you're seriously, crazily, compactly missing out. The newest builds/media for SCP are kickass and more stable than they've been for a while.

And no Perseus pilot worth their salt will ever get owned by an Eryines. It's called the Flail-juggle salted with missiles!

[GeneralTacticus]

Ah, FS2. A wonderful game; I lost count of the number of hours I spent playing it, and I even managed to master dog-fighting with a number-pad.

Unfortunately, I can no longer play it, as I downloaded the Open Source version with all the spiffy improved graphics and such, and for some reason, this caused my lead indicator to migrate to the bottom right-hand corner of the screen, making it practically impossible to hit a moving target at any kind of distance. I've tried playing normal FS2 again, but it just doesn't work any more; I start it up, and it says it's missing files.

Anyone have any idea what might be causing this problem, or how to fix it?

[Stark]

If I recall, it might be the old FOV problem. Are target 'lock on' brackets drawn wrong too? If so, blitz your install and put it back on with a new build and you'll be fine. It apparently turned up again in the builds from a few weeks ago, so it's on the Hard Light forums now.

[Bounty]

Are the system requirements for the SCP much higher then those of the retail version ? Can't find it on the site.

[Stark]

Kinda. Sorta. It scales up to occasionally lag my 3200/64 2Gb 6600GT system, but I imagine with the ansio off and not using the adveffects.vp it'd be managable.

[Ace Pace]

All I can say is, if you're using retail and not the SCP, you're seriously, crazily, compactly missing out. The newest builds/media for SCP are kickass and more stable than they've been for a while.

And no Perseus pilot worth their salt will ever get owned by an Eryines. It's called the Flail-juggle salted with missiles!

The flail sucks, you just play out of range and hammer with a trebuchet to make you dodge.

Any time you stand up to me I can just accept the damage and force you to dodge a hornet swarm or one of those missle launching missles.

[Lazarus]

Ace is there any chance you could put that link up for the torrent? And if it doesn't have this improvement mod on, a link to that too? Thanks.

[Stark]

The flail sucks, you just play out of range and hammer with a trebuchet to make you dodge.

Any time you stand up to me I can just accept the damage and force you to dodge a hornet swarm or one of those missle launching missles.

Trebs against fighters = miss.

[Stark]

PS, god knows how you'll get a lock with a flail bouncing you around. The flail is the king of PvP, since it's long range and makes it almost impossible for the other player to do anything.

[The Yosemite Bear]

ok why is this in otsf and not games and gaming.

2. is it just me or were all space fighter simulators just Xwing/Tie fighter clones?

I mean I jumped from X-Wing, to Wingcommander, to free space, to X-Com Interceptor, etc. without changing key alotments.

[Ace Pace]

PS, god knows how you'll get a lock with a flail bouncing you around. The flail is the king of PvP, since it's long range and makes it almost impossible for the other player to do anything.

A flail dosn't bounce you that much with full shields and the Erynies has a rather small cross section.

I don't need a lock for that missle missle launcher to move you around.

Missle launcher annoys you for 5 seconds. In those 5 I have a lock with harpoons. Boom.

[NecronLord]

Man, I'm a fucksplash. This belongs in the game forum.

Thy will be done.

[Ace Pace]

ok why is this in otsf and not games and gaming.

2. is it just me or were all space fighter simulators just Xwing/Tie fighter clones?

I mean I jumped from X-Wing, to Wingcommander, to free space, to X-Com Interceptor, etc. without changing key alotments.

Gah, someone merge the two posts.

Yes, the fighters are derivitations, but that dosn't mean theres no advancement.

[Battlehymn Republic]

Thanks for the words of consoling. I need to actually read the instruction booklet.

However, it it really my imagination, or were my wingmates really, really faster than me?

[The Yosemite Bear]

I don't have insane reflexes so I'm usually the keyboard lovin goose to some other's mavrick.

[Ace Pace]

Thanks for the words of consoling. I need to actually read the instruction booklet.

However, it it really my imagination, or were my wingmates really, really faster than me?

Yes, they were.

They probebly had full engine power and afterburners on.

You can check afterburner/no burner by engine color, which shifts. While engine power is by the length of the trail.

[mauldooku]

Ace, I'd be interested in links to DLing this game. Thanks!

[Stark]

A flail dosn't bounce you that much with full shields and the Erynies has a rather small cross section.

I don't need a lock for that missle missle launcher to move you around.

Missle launcher annoys you for 5 seconds. In those 5 I have a lock with harpoons. Boom.

This doesn't make sense, Ace. Maybe you've played with idiots, but first, a Erynies is HUGE and easy to hit even at a klick. The missile carat moves with your view, so being shaken around by a flail makes locks almost impossible, and in the specific case of Trebs I would go so far as to say *totally* impossible, given its low carat-chase value. Finally, an incoming Treb won't bother a decent pilot at all (since Trebs are slow and you've got CM, you don't need to maneuver like you do to drop CM on dogfight missiles). Locking up a Perseus while being flailed is hardly trivial, and they'll probably miss/be deflected anyway, and they to bugger all damage ANYWAY. There's a reason missiles are basically useless in PvP, and why the flail is immortalised as the cheesiest, most banned weapon in multi ever.

Finally, all of your arguments are worthless since they apply equally or more so to a Perseus, since it's faster and more agile. Erynies are great assault fighters, but saying 'lolz trebs' suggests you've never actually played multi. The idea of hitting a fighter with Trebs, even without being flailed, just boggles the mind. Players don't flying straight lines!