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Topic: Playing Through "Starflight" / How would you combine SF with SCII? (Read 3234 times)
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Rapajez
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Posts: 69
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Well, after hearing a ton of references to "Starflight", and how it was a "spiritual successor" to SCII, I finally decided to give it a try. I decided on the Sega Genesis port, since that had the most "updated" graphics and controls, and there's plenty of emulators available for PC and Android.
You definitely can see the similarities, the first time you leave your home system, you are greeted with a star map containing hundreds of stars. You get that, sandbox, explore around and meet weird aliens feel. Having different crew members filling in dedicated roles, with different statistics was a cool idea; although, it becomes pointless early-on, when you can max out their training without much effort. The planetary exploration is definitely a lot more fleshed out, with the landscapes being much larger, and mining consists of using a scanner and digging, as well as pickup up bits on the surface.
I don't think they did as good a job with the story progression as SCII. A lot of times, I've been aimlessly wondering space, until I stumble upon some breadcrumbs toward a new artifact or race. The dialogue trees are also a lot less exciting. You can only ask the same 5 questions to each race, or answer questions they ask you. The combat is relatively boring, compared to the unique ships and counters in SC.
All and all, it's definitely worth checking out if your a UQM/SCII fan. If nothing else, to see what inspired them. Also, Stardock has mentioned in a few posts, that they want to look at Starflight as a model for their SC reboot.
Anyway, I was wondering what a perfect modern hybrid of the 2 games would be like. It would be cool to flesh out the crew roles and statistics in your primary ship, or even in the captains of your escorts. Also would be neat to expand on the planetary exploration, e.g., not just picking up dots. It was also cool that the dialogues could include the races asking YOU questions, instead of you doing all the questioning. I'd keep everything else about SC the same though. 
Anyone else played SF recently? What would you like to see from SF in the SC reboot?
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oldlaptop
*Smell* controller
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Posts: 337
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The one most important thing that should be taken from Starflight is (in my humble opinion) the basic concept behind Starflight's planetary exploration. SC2 planetside was a simple arcade minigame, Starflight actually managed to give you the sense that you were exploring a *planet*. Beyond that, hmm... I would actually be interested to see more emphasis on exploration, as in Starflight. Story-wise, this fits in very well - one of the most interesting roles for the player character that I can think of is that of one of humanity's first interstellar explorers, using one of the first of the Hyperspace drives the Chenjesu apparently gave us. Starflight 1 in particular threw the player out into the stars with very little idea of what would be found there, this strikes me as a very appropriate mood for the era Stardock apparently want to set SCreboot in. Other good Starflight ideas were actually integrated well by SC2 itself - the modifiable flagship in particular sticks in my mind.
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Gekko
*Many bubbles*
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I really liked a few things in Starflight. I still have to really play it through, but at least the first hours were interesting. Unfortunately, I couldn't handle the real time style that the game used for everything. As damage messages and such appeared, you had a few seconds to read it and navigate the mess that your controls were. I kind of gave up due to that. Maybe the Sega version is better in this regard?
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Rapajez
Frungy champion
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Posts: 69
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The one most important thing that should be taken from Starflight is (in my humble opinion) the basic concept behind Starflight's planetary exploration. SC2 planetside was a simple arcade minigame, Starflight actually managed to give you the sense that you were exploring a *planet*. Beyond that, hmm... I would actually be interested to see more emphasis on exploration, as in Starflight. Story-wise, this fits in very well - one of the most interesting roles for the player character that I can think of is that of one of humanity's first interstellar explorers, using one of the first of the Hyperspace drives the Chenjesu apparently gave us. Starflight 1 in particular threw the player out into the stars with very little idea of what would be found there, this strikes me as a very appropriate mood for the era Stardock apparently want to set SCreboot in. Other good Starflight ideas were actually integrated well by SC2 itself - the modifiable flagship in particular sticks in my mind.
I agree with the exploration aspects. I like the idea of "Here's your hyper-drive, go find stuff!". I think SCII did a much better job with the ship upgrades. Having different modules that vary by the slot they're in, is much more exciting than going from "Engine 3" to "Engine 4". I thought it would be even more fun if you can integrate upgrades based on the different races you meet in game. E.g., add a Mrnhrmm laser to your ship if you meet and become allies, or a Spathi Engine.
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Rapajez
Frungy champion
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Posts: 69
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On a completely unrelated note...
**SF Spoiler Warning***
I have the crystal cone, crystal pearl, and a whole mess of artifacts...I've followed every lead I have, and I have no idea what I'm supposed to do now. I'm assuming I have to deal with the Ulreck (sp?) and blow up the crystal planet, but I'm kind of stuck now.
**End SF Spoiler Warning***
Another area where SCII improved was multiple sources for the same key information. If you didn't get the info from one race, Haynes, or random exploration, you probably got it from the Melnorme. You rarely got stuck like this.
Really, the Melnorme were another ingenious invention by TFB. Almost like an in-game Hint-Guide, but you actually had to EARN the tips, one by one, without breaking the feeling of immersion. I hope StarDock can carry that forward.
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« Last Edit: September 10, 2013, 10:21:03 pm by Rapajez »
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