Reply To: Out beyond the new frontier

[Pix]

#10103

I’ve gone for the easy option and downloaded a cheat to start the game with 2 million credits. I still wouldn’t say it makes life simple but it’s one less thing to worry about while I’m learning the ropes. Having figured out my way around to some extent, I reckon I’d be OK starting up again now. This is definitely a game in dire need of tutorials as it’s quite inscrutable at first despite having read the manual before I began.

I must have sunk 10 hours into this now at least, mainly working for the federation. It’s strangely compelling but there isn’t enough happening to necessarily convince me that I’m not wasting my time playing it. Newtonian combat is the most exciting and doesn’t feel all that tactical or arcade-like at the moment. I’ve been switching my engines off and using manual thrust which seems to work most of the time but if an opponent gets you in their sights I can have had it before I even have chance to do anything. Joystick support seems to be digital only which was disappointing so I may as well have been playing with the keyboard – I’m using the mouse instead which works well enough.

I do like stories in my games and they are entirely lacking here. I have read the first of the many short storied included in one of the games 3 manuals (which was below average at best). I’ll still probably read the rest before the month is out for scene setting. There is a gazetteer as well telling you about many of the worlds but it wasn’t interesting reading. Maybe with the context of having played for a bit, I may get more out of it.

The amount packed onto one 720K disk is certainly astounding. You could spend months playing this. The sound seems a little buggy – I’ve not been able to get any life from the MT-32 option on either a 486 or PII. The adlib works but seems patchy as to whether I’ll hear my laser fire or other sound effects. This is probably yet another DOS game that runs better on DOSBox than real hardware.

When I was scanning the magazines, I noticed that this released the same month as Privateer which is quite the coincidence. Privateer was probably more up my street but there is enough to admire here that I expect it to keep me occupied all this month.