Starlancer

THE BAD:
-Some missions are way too difficult

SUMMARY:
StarLancer takes place 300 years before the events of FreeLancer, at that time, the earth is run by a government called "the alliance", members include the USA, japan, and britain. Meanwhile the opposing fraction "the coalition"; ruled by germans, africa and korea, has complete control of all space territory in the outer rim region and are threatening the alliance to comply with them. Of course the alliance refused and soon, a full scale war broke out between the two fractions and lasted for many years. The coalition fought with everything they've got and manage to finally break through the alliance's defense line on planet Mars, then the coalition gathered all the fleet they've got and begin marching towards earth for a massive invasion.

The weakened alliance tried everything but kept on losing battle after battle and eventually they're unable to defend themselves and earth any longer, as the coalition launches a planet wide bombardment that lead to the complete destruction of the alliance supreme command headquarters (including the launch base for the sleeper ships in the FreeLancer intro) The remaining leaders of the alliance gathered all the forces they've got left and escaped into the outer rim, far away from the earth. The alliance then began planning the recapture of earth and a counter offensive plan against the coalition.
intro story ends here.

The alliance were out of pilots so they had to gather civilians and organized them into squadrons of space fighter force to do guerrilla strikes and hit n' run mission in order to weaken the coalition, that's where you come in at starlancer, you're a pilot of an alliance battleship, and throughout the game you'll go through a lot of difficult missions that will require not only your trigger finger but also your brains.

Most of your missions contains multiple objectives in a single mission and but in a split second everything could turn pretty ugly so you'll need to not only do offence, but defence at the same time, also the game introduce a live battle-field so anything can happen, yes anything, you'll never know what you mission will turn into; expect the unexpected.

For example in one of the mission you were told to go destroy the enemy battle ships, at least in the briefings. while you're doing that a squad of cloaked bombers swarms all over your mother ship and attempted to destroy it, so you're have to turn around and defend your ship as the enemy launchs reinforcements and without notice you'll find yourself having dozens of ships shooting at you while your mother ships continue to get blasted and catches on fire. The enemy battleships then starts closing in, your wingman screams in horror as giant torpedos are being launched at your mothership, then you lose contact with your ship and then your original mission objective became useless becasue you just know it's no longer possible to complete it, so what do you do while all this is happening around you?

You do what you think it's right! noone is going to tell you what to do in starlancer when things get nasty, the choice is in your hands; you can go kill the bombers first so your ship can fired back at the enemy, or shoot down the torpedos to defend your ship and hope your wingman will take care of the enemy battleship, or even goes nuts and directly assault the enemy battleships head on and pray your mother ship will hold on until you finish them off.

There are many many intense and chaotic missions like these thought out starlancer, there are always many ways to complete the mission and many ways to failed it, you can't just go blasting every enemy you see because sometimes when you do that your mother ship gets destory or your objective target escapes, plus sometimes there are over 30 fighters and battleships on screen at once so you constantly need to adapt as the situation can change dramatically in a pinch, you'll need not only luck, but strategy as well.

In freelancer most of the time you spend running away from you enemy or forced to pull out of a tough fight, in star lancer you just don't and can't do that, half of all the missions in the game have consequences based on what you did that will effected the next mission so you'll need to make tough decisions during fights, for example:

if you didn't destroy ALL of the battleships in early mission because you're busy doing something else or having a hard time, let's say you've complete most of your objectives and you'll still move on to the next mission, which assign you to destroying an enemy station but the enemy ship from the previous mission return with other battle ships to stop you from destroying the station, then you find yourself in an ambush and things got alot worst, this is just one of the many horrible events that could happen in this game if you goof around and think you'll just get a game over; tried killing your wingman, you'll get a cutscene in which you're blindfolded in a first person view and shot to death by an execution squad.

Also in starlancer the story is always constantly moving forward, you can't go back and reply any mission or correct your mistakes, so thinking before acting is always a good idea. In one of the later mission your mother ship is hopelessly surrounded and your captain tells you get away and leave him behind, that mission will be one of the best thing you'll experience as you watch your own precious mothership blown up into a million pieces as a friendly ship called yamato comes to your rescue and i remember myself almost breaking down to tears, the game makes you attached to the characters, even your expandedable wingman, and when you see them die in the story it'll make you'll feel very sad as well. Indeed, starlancer has a very good story.

Sure, starlancer doesn't have fancy graphics like the pc game freelancer does but it's an older game so you can't blame it, besides the graphics DO look very nice, can't say space and planets look realistic though, but it'll do. The story in starlancer is alot darker, moody and much sadder than freelancer, so grab a tissue box if you can. The unforgettable orchestra music will immerse players right into the game, the sound effects are fantasic as well. some cutscenes are rendered using the in game engine and while the rest are presented in high quality FMV format.

Starlancer's controls are extremely easy and responsive. The dogfights are difficult yet challenging, starlancer offers a much more enjoyable experience than freelancer in my personal opinion, but in the end it's up to you to decide. The reply value of the game is very small though, you wouldn't want to play it again after you beat it for a while, but some day, you might pick up that game again and never forget what a amazing experience it was.

I give this game a 5 out of 5, a perfect score for a perfect game.