Lucasarts teases X-Wing/Tie Fighter

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http://g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/69...

G4TV wrote:

LucasArts' two-pronged attempt to revitalize their classics with The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition and Tales of Monkey Island appears to be a success. As part of a follow-up interview with LucasArts president Darrel Rodriguez about plans for the months ahead, I asked Rodriguez for thoughts on a return of the company's lauded X-Wing and Tie Fighter flight sim series.

His answer?

"We don’t have any announcements now, but stay tuned," said Rodriguez. "We will soon….."

I don't care if these are straight ports, I'm buying 50.

Don't f*ck it up, Lucasarts.

Yeah, I get the feeling that either they'll be straight ports through Steam or with updated graphics only; I'm not getting a sequel vibe from this.

My life is probably going to be over if they release an updated port. Preferably with decent mouse control, so I don't have to get a joystick.

cube wrote:

My life is probably going to be over if they release an updated port. Preferably with decent mouse control, so I don't have to get a joystick.

That's the real kicker; joystick usage isn't as prevalent now as it was back in the 90s. I wonder how Lucasarts will handle that.

Oh god I hope they don't.

With the way games are these days it will undoubtedly be some easymode game that will take liberties with all of the fond memories I have of the earlier games.

I'm thinking something like HAWX reskinned with crap from the prequel trilogy.

Rat Boy wrote:
cube wrote:

My life is probably going to be over if they release an updated port. Preferably with decent mouse control, so I don't have to get a joystick.

That's the real kicker; joystick usage isn't as prevalent now as it was back in the 90s. I wonder how Lucasarts will handle that.

To be fair, the originals did have mouse control. It sucked, but you could do it. Basically, you move the mouse, and your fighter turned.

If they did a Freelancer or Wing Commander approach where the mouse cursor's distance from the center determined your turn rate, it would work beautifully.

I won't buy it if it's just a straight port. It will be difficult to control and the game will fall short of what I imagine it to be in my head all these years later. We need updated graphics, good mouse support, and AI improvements.

We need a new space combat sim. The last truly hardcore one was Freespace 2.

I doubt any game released these days would dare have the same level of challenge as Freespace 2.

I think of the tech that is out there and the awesome game that could be made and then I look at a pile of crap like DarkStar and weep.

I've been waiting for the natural successor to Freespace for years and years.

The beauty of the Star Wars space genre is that you don't have really complex flight dynamics to deal with that really call out for joystick control. The space combat expansion for the Star Wars MMO did a fine job of it with just mouse control. If you're using the mouse to drive a plane, it should be a chase the cursor model, not a flick the mouse left for a bit of left turn. Slavishly trying to follow the FPS control scheme in vehicles is a pretty big recipe for failure. Another problem is the lack proper HUD indicators of either the current control state or your vessel's direction of travel.

Freespace 2 wasn't really that hardcore. It had atmospheric flight dynamics, which wasn't really all that "realistic".

In terms of space flight sims, there really hasn't been anything really realistic, in terms of flight models and overall tactics. The closest I can think of was probably Wing Commander, because it was possible to maintain your thrust vector and change your orientation in that one, but even that had mostly atmospheric-based characteristics.

I miss Privateer, never got into the Wing Commander series much but I loved Privateer.

JoeBedurndurn wrote:

The beauty of the Star Wars space genre is that you don't have really complex flight dynamics to deal with that really call out for joystick control.

That's why I always thought that the X-Wing/TIE Fighter games would work well on a console. It's not like there's a couple hundred buttons to push like in Falcon 4.0 or Flight Sim.

cube wrote:

Freespace 2 wasn't really that hardcore. It had atmospheric flight dynamics, which wasn't really all that "realistic".

In terms of space flight sims, there really hasn't been anything really realistic, in terms of flight models and overall tactics. The closest I can think of was probably Wing Commander, because it was possible to maintain your thrust vector and change your orientation in that one, but even that had mostly atmospheric-based characteristics.

What about the Independence War games? Newtonian physics, man.

Jesus I need to cut back on duplicated words. I think I edited out four of them from that post and there's still one in what RB quoted.

I would really love to see an updated version or a new entry in the series. I didnt get into X-wing as much, but I played Tie Fighter a ton, wearing out a flightstick in the process.

X-wing was pretty brutal difficulty-wise wasnt it? Death really meant pilot death / end of the campaign as far as I remember. Tie Fighter was a little more forgiving.

Xwing vs Tie Fighter was a real disappointment for me. I wanted more of the Tie Fighter campaign, and XvT was just a multiplayer game with some missions you could fly alone.

Did anyone buy the Balance of Power add-on for XvT? Did it add a good singleplayer story?

Then there was X-wing: Alliance (or something like that) right? The final one they released. It just didnt catch my interest like the earlier ones, maybe because you began as a mercenary. I guess I just wanted more adventures are part of the Empire.

Irongut wrote:

X-wing was pretty brutal difficulty-wise wasnt it? Death really meant pilot death / end of the campaign as far as I remember.

The remake they did for Windows 95 let you back-up your pilot, but it was a bit of a pain. If they can, I hope they change it.

Irongut wrote:

Then there was X-wing: Alliance (or something like that) right? The final one they released. It just didnt catch my interest like the earlier ones, maybe because you began as a mercenary. I guess I just wanted more adventures are part of the Empire.

Alliance was probably the best of the series, mostly because the single player story actually felt a lot more personal than X-Wing or TIE Fighter.

Plus, the YT-2000 was freaking overpowered.

I'm getting nostalgic. Based on your recommendations, I'm going hunt down my ol Xwing:Alliance disc and see if it still installs.

TheArtOfScience wrote:

We need a new space combat sim. The last truly hardcore one was Freespace 2.

I doubt any game released these days would dare have the same level of challenge as Freespace 2.

I think of the tech that is out there and the awesome game that could be made and then I look at a pile of crap like DarkStar and weep.

I've been waiting for the natural successor to Freespace for years and years.

You've tried the X series right? Doesn't get much more hardcore than that.

Instead of joystick play it with a game pad! I have installed Tie fighter 95 and have been playing it off and on with a 360 controller, not quite enough buttons to map everything so I do have to reach up every now and then. But most of all good times.

They should keep the graphics the same and just add multi-player capabilities. I really want that 1000+ player battle of Yavin.

I think X3:TC will have me space combat simmed out before this arrives.

I will buy it if it's a straight port. I will buy if it's a remake. I would prefer both a graphically updated port and an entirely new game. I still have my old 2 button flight stick as well as a newer logitech one (usb). The old flight sticks rocked.

A newer steam enabled version of XvT would be very cool as well. Sort of a Team Fortress 2 in space.

cube wrote:

In terms of space flight sims, there really hasn't been anything really realistic, in terms of flight models and overall tactics. The closest I can think of was probably Wing Commander, because it was possible to maintain your thrust vector and change your orientation in that one, but even that had mostly atmospheric-based characteristics.

Jumpgate Evolution has that functionality (or will, when it actually releases). Just thought I'd point that out.

I have no idea what else encompasses "realistic" "flight models and overall tactics" for space, though. I would actually like to hear more on this. What's missing?

garion333 wrote:

I have no idea what else encompasses "realistic" "flight models and overall tactics" for space, though. I would actually like to hear more on this. What's missing?

Newtonian physics is the primary thing missing from pretty much every space flight game. I can't really recall a game since the Wing Commander days that didn't just treat spaceflight as if the rules of atmospheric flight applied. I'm pretty sure I've read somewhere that Jumpgate Evolution continues the trend of using atmospheric flight models for the spaceships.

How could you make a playable game with full newtonian physics? It'd be almost impossible for 2 ships travelling at mind-boggling speeds in the vastness of space to ever hit each other.

I think that some realism has to be sacrificed for playability. We are already making concessions about FTL travel and photon lasers and magic shields and whatnot.

Are ya'll just talking about inertia? If so, that'd make for some pretty difficult to control twitch gameplay. You'd have to make the combat less visceral and have what amounts to aim-assist to get that to work, imo.

But hey, I'd give it a try.

If it is another game that eschews the dogfighting and instead has you push buttons to engage in combat a la' EVE then...well...I'd rather just play EVE.

Elycion wrote:
garion333 wrote:

I have no idea what else encompasses "realistic" "flight models and overall tactics" for space, though. I would actually like to hear more on this. What's missing?

Newtonian physics is the primary thing missing from pretty much every space flight game. I can't really recall a game since the Wing Commander days that didn't just treat spaceflight as if the rules of atmospheric flight applied. I'm pretty sure I've read somewhere that Jumpgate Evolution continues the trend of using atmospheric flight models for the spaceships.

It sounds like a good idea, but it doesn't really fit our culture's schema of how space combat is supposed to look. Also since you're basically forging new territory here, the game developers also have to figure out what sort of tactics and procedures their virtual space fighters are going to follow. If you're really stuck with Newton, then every attacker is probably starting his battle accelerating madly away from his opponent to cut his velocity down to something he might actually be able to fight at instead of his interplanetary cruising speed.

TheArtOfScience wrote:

Are ya'll just talking about inertia? If so, that'd make for some pretty difficult to control twitch gameplay. You'd have to make the combat less visceral and have what amounts to aim-assist to get that to work, imo.

That's exactly what Wing Commander did from the beginning. With certain craft, you could lock your current course, and rotate your craft around any axis to try to hit stuff. It made bombing runs on large ships a lot more interesting than the normal "point craft towards blob, hit button when tone sounds, run like hell".

I'm pretty sure Independence War 2 had an option to fly with a Newtonian physics model. I opted for the simpler arcade dynamics though.

JoeBedurndurn wrote:

It sounds like a good idea, but it doesn't really fit our culture's schema of how space combat is supposed to look.

Unless you count Battlestar Galactica.

Babylon 5 is the TV show that would be a better reference for what a space combat sim could do. The human Starfury class fighter craft operate under proper Newtonian physics, yet they didn't reach the enormous speeds that would render combat unmanageable by human pilots.

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