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      <h5><b><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">//<a href="../../../index.html"><font color="#7C420E">loonygames</font></a>://<a href="../index.html"><font color="#7C420E">issue 
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                      <p><b><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" color="#0000FF"><i><font color="#904C10" size="2">The 
                        Top Shelf: </font><font color="#904C10" size="4"><br>
                        Freespace 2</font></i></font></b><br>
                      
                      <div align="right"> <font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-1">By 
                        <a href="mailto:hb@loonygames.com">Noel &quot;HB&quot; 
                        Wade</a></font></div>
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                  <td width="45%" align="right" valign="top"> 
                    <h5 align="right"><b><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" color="#00025E">Vol. 
                      2, Issue 9<br>
                      January 27, 2000</font></b></h5>
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              <loonystart> 
           
              <p align="left"><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">The screens 
                / interfaces in the game are probably my biggest beef with <b>Freespace 
                2</b>. The menus and interfaces seem far more complex than they 
                need to be; possibly in and effort to enhance the &#147;sci-fi&#148;-ness 
                of the game. I personally found them a bit intimidating at first; 
                and I didn&#146;t feel that it was made clear that much of the 
                options (such as HUD configuration) are already taken care of 
                for you in a fairly good manner. There also didn&#146;t feel like 
                there as an option to just jump in the game and fly. All of the 
                pilot management screens add a barrier to this, I think. Much 
                of the interface reminds me of the &#147;I&#146;m in a room on 
                a ship&#148; menu screens in <b>Wing Commander 3 </b>(although 
                without the needless tromping about your capital ship). </font></p>
              <table border="0" align="right" bgcolor="#D7B582" width="98" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0">
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                    <div align="center"><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><a href="http:/home/loonygames/loony.timedoctor.org/content/cgi/image.pl?image=/content/2.9/shelf/images/fs3.jpg&amp;w=640&amp;h=480&amp;back=/content/2.9/shelf/index2.php&amp;name=The%20Top%20Shelf"><img src="images/fs3_sml.jpg" width="96" height="72" border="0" alt="click to enlarge!"></a></font></div>
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                  <td height="18"> 
                    <p align="center"> <i><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="1" color="#000253"><ignoreme>Woo...glom 
                      that background (30k).</ignoreme></font></i></p>
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              <p align="left"><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">Gameplay 
                was where I was really hoping that <b>Freespace 2 </b>would break 
                some new ground &#150; but alas, as of this writing I haven&#146;t 
                found anything really innovative. The fact that missiles and guns 
                can be chained together is nothing new, and the flight mechanics 
                are fairly familiar as well (standard airplane-like control). 
                The ships do seem to carry a bit of momentum, but for me that 
                just translated into problems when trying to fine-tune my aim 
                in a dogfight. Ships seem fairly eager to begin a turn or roll; 
                but are not so happy or precise when trying to stop one of the 
                afore-mentioned maneuvers. One of the things that they seemed 
                to hype, was HUGE capital ships. </font></p>
              <p align="left"><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">Well, 
                while it is fairly impressive to see a giant starship warp in 
                and start blasting the hell out of everything with big guns, I 
                personally don&#146;t see that it makes much of a difference in 
                the game. You can target individual components on these ships, 
                you have to fly through heavy defenses on their part, and blowing 
                them up is no easy task. But none of this is news &#150; all of 
                these things could be done with <b>Wing Commander 3</b> (not to 
                beat a dead horse here). In fact, the only significant thing I 
                think that the huge ships add, is an opportunity for more scripted 
                sequences where one huge ship has to warp in to toast another 
                big ship; because you just plain can&#146;t handle the task of 
                taking down such a monstrosity in a fighter craft.</font></p>
              <p align="left"></p>
              <p align="left"><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">I also 
                felt that the difficulty of the game ramped up sharply after the 
                first few missions. You go from a time when you&#146;re just jumping 
                on fighters and taking them out fairly easily, to a couple of 
                situations in which you must be VERY precise and VERY fast with 
                your kills to protect some objectives. Weapons-fire isn&#146;t 
                all that rapid, so accuracy counts for a lot in this game.</font></p>
              <p align="left"></p>
              <p align="left"><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">There&#146;s 
                also the old trick of &#147;let&#146;s send the player on a completely 
                un-beatable mission so we can have some scripted dialog add to 
                the story&#148;. I&#146;ve seen this plot mechanism in space sims 
                WAY too much for it to interest or entertain me at all anymore. 
                Its true that they do fuel some intrigue with the dialog in the 
                beginning; but I&#146;d rather have seen some more original ways 
                of bringing the same information to light.</font></p>
              <p align="left"></p>
              <p align="left"><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">All in 
                all, if you are new to Space Combat simulators, or want a &#147;run 
                of the mill&#148; space combat sim experience &#150; then this 
                is a good game to get. Otherwise, I suggest you try something 
                more challenging and more original; like one of the <b>Battlecruiser 
                3000AD</b> games. Or, save your money and wait for the upcoming 
                line of games like <b>Allegiance</b> or <b>Starlancer</b>.</font></p>
              <p align="left"></p>
              <p align="left"></p>
              <div align="center">
                <p align="right"><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><i>- 
                  Noel &quot;HB&quot; Wade is a regular contributor to loonygames. 
                  Basically, he just wants attention. </i></font></p>
                <p align="left"><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"></loonystart></font></p>
               
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              <p align="left"><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><a href="index.php"><font color="#7C420E"><b><font size="+1">&lt;&lt;Prev</font></b></font></a></font></p>
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<p><i><font face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="-2">Credits: Illustration 
  &copy; 2000 Dan Zalkus. This review is &copy; 2000 Noel Wade. All other content 
  is &copy; 2000 loonyboi productions. Unauthorized reproduction is prohibited, 
  goldarn it.</font></i></p>
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