Oolite Bulletins

Ill have a look at Space merchants when i am home.

scum of the universe is now on the work computer looks like old skool styles. nice one.

vega strike hasn't been active in many many months, which is a shame. not that i could ever get my ship to fly properly!

Escape Velocity Nova does a lovely job of a 2D Elite-like game. More arcadey and light but tons of fun.

there is one problem i've noticed with alot of space traders in that a lot of them are almost exact clones of the elite sequels only with, say, a different setting. i guess there's nothing wrong with this but if you're not going to improve on the original, then why bother?

perhaps in the same way that the elite universe to Ian Bell felt like Farscape...perhaps ppl thought 'i love elite but it shoudl be more like this....

of course that makes more sense for giles williams than a company, but hey, whatever!

there's some new game out -- spaceforce or something -- that looks interesting. the ship designs dont do much for me but the screens of the inventory management and ship customization section look fascinating.

I will repeat myself, but Space Rangers 2 is the only innovative space game I saw so far. The ship equipment is far more advanced than in Elite,
the trading phase is similar but there are much more missions and also the text adventure.
The only bad thing is the lack of 3D graphics in space fight. It could have been a perfect game.

I tried the demo of Spaceforce, which I've been following for a long time. My PC pretty much died though. I always end up disappointed in the new breed of Elite clones. Darkstar One had my expectations up but that never quite clicked either.

I do like Space Rangers though (apart from the text adventure bits!).

Hi Sabreman, so how does Oolite shape up then?

Space Rangers 2 is more a strategy game than a Elite similar game.

Has anyone played X3 Reunion? Just bought myself the 2007 edition (which has loads of bugs removed and fan patches). Spent 3 hours yesterday just reading the manual and I still havent got round to playing it. But by all accounts it seems to be a very involving space trading game.

TGHC wrote:

Hi Sabreman, so how does Oolite shape up then?

It's great, of course

I find that there's a fine line between me really enjoying a space trading/combat game and really not getting on with it at all. Elite is close to perfection but it does lack a little in terms of depth and features that I'd like to see - most of all complete solar systems rather than single-planet systems, more of a feeling of a living universe, which is something that freelancer does very well. A bit of trade between planets in-system, a bit of atmospheric action... that would just about make it perfect. Of course Oolite had great potential for this.

X3 takes the whole thing into territory that becomes a bit too much like work rather than play. I admire its technical beauty but I tend to drop into it and wander about lost and bewildered for a bit then exit. Between mouse control Freelancer / Darkstar One style and the Elite stick control I much prefer Elite's more precise and relaxed style. Dogfights in Freelancer tend to amount to nothing more than a couple of minutes of FPS chaos, whereas a fight in Elite feels like a real test, victory is well-earned.

The beauty of Oolite is that you *can* have multi-planet, multi-station systems. You just have to write an OXP like Assassins.oxp

Captain Hesperus

Dogfights in Freelancer tend to amount to nothing more than a couple of minutes of FPS chaos, whereas a fight in Elite feels like a real test, victory is well-earned.

with freelancer it's almost entirely a matter of numbers. whoever has more shields, health packs, and gunpower will win. you basically lock on, follow, and hammer the fire button.

one thing i loved with freelancer though was how it had things like 'asteroid forests' and shipwrecks. it made you feel like you were really exploring.

The only bad thing is the lack of 3D graphics in space fight. It could have been a perfect game.

i don't see this as a problem. it's not really a simulator or anything. you can't faily fault it over being something it was never meant nor attempted to be.

X3 takes the whole thing into territory that becomes a bit too much like work rather than play. I admire its technical beauty but I tend to drop into it and wander about lost and bewildered for a bit then exit.

oh! i thought this about x2 for awhile actually. it's really not the case at all though. the manual just confuses things immensely. basically, the first think you need to do is get an updated trade... system, which allows you to get an at-a-glance price on the commodities in ANY station in any system you have a ship or assets in. after you do that, it's really easy to figure out how they chain of raw materails to finished goods goes

anyway, so, ARE there any oxps that change all of the systems to have many planets, or do you need to script each system individually?

Some new screenshots from the german board.
http://www.wolf-359.de/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=42

Charlie's Planets.oxp adds planets randomly to every system (from a pool of about 20 odd different ones). But this is really a test OXP. I think he planned to script them individually but then got side-tracked with the Orb. If you serach the boads for Charlies planets, you be able to find a download link. As its an early alpha, he's not put it up on Oosat.

The other OXPs which add planets (Lave, Disco, Assassins etc) script them at particular systems.