Anyone here played Starshatter?

[Gandalf Parker]

This seems to be your only post here. Have you tried the game Space Empires IV from Shrapnel Games?
What did you think about it?

[ July 24, 2004, 22:55: Message edited by: Gandalf Parker ]

[Phoenix-D]

Would be more appropriate in the SF forum anyway; Space Empires IV and Starshatter have very little in common. Only played the Starshatter demo, but:

SS is full 3d, SF is on a 2d plane. That means SS has more depth (heh) that way but is harder to control. Actually SF is much easier to control all around, and also easier to mod. You pay for that with less flexibility, though.

Starshatter doesn't have trading, but it -does- have dynamic campaigns; the best you can manage with SF is semi dynamic.

SS does have a air-to-ground component but frankly it looks like ***. In space I think the graphics are about even..not 100% sure. SS has a more realistic scale, it seems, especially as planet sizes go. SF doesn't have a fighter combat component, really.

IMHO the two games are in similar but not quite identical genera; you'd be better off comparing Starshatter to Freespace 2 (it fares poorly, but then again ANYTHING fares poorly when you set it against Freespace)

[ July 24, 2004, 23:44: Message edited by: Phoenix-D ]

[JLS]

A gamer on a budget point of view.

I like and enjoy the flexibility and depth in most - if not all the Shrapnel games.

= = =
No offense Iceboy: I was not that impressed with the depth in some of the Matrix Games and wish I never spent the money

[ July 25, 2004, 00:00: Message edited by: JLS ]

[Cyclop]

I too have purchased a handful of Matrix games and liked them but never to the point of playing one for 4+ years.
Best money (time spent and value) I've spent was on every purchase of SEIV. Who needs another cheesy (sorry Narf) 3D sim in another overcrowded genre.

[Gandalf Parker]

Yeah I ended up here because of Dominions (1 and 2) but thinking along the same lines. I was in a very regular 1-new-game-a-month cycle and was surprised to find a game that just would not die! It went from machine to machine as I upgraded.

Now I have SEIV which is obviously another game-of-the-undead. I enjoyed playing M.U.L.E. again in the Space HoRSE remake. And Im beginning to get good vibes about TWE. All from Shrapnel.

OK there are a few games I miss that I think should be everliving. And I see efforts going on for remakes of them. Im going to contact the developers and try to connect them up with Shrapnel. MUHAHAHahahahaa! more More MORE!

[ July 26, 2004, 15:35: Message edited by: Gandalf Parker ]

[PvK]

I tried the Starshatter demo a few days ago and was actually quite impressed. I'll probably spend a couple more play sessions analyzing it before deciding whether to take the plunge, but that's mainly because I'm finicky and my spare time is limited. Basically I thought it looked extremely good, and did a lot of things much better (or perhaps, mainly much more to my personal tastes) than other games with similar elements.

It's certainly a completely different game from the Space Empires series, since it's a ship command simulation rather than a space conquest game.

It's also a much different (but closer than SE) genre to Star Fury, in that Star Fury more closely follows a free-agent roleplaying formula.

Anyway, the things I really liked about what I saw in the Starshatter demo included:

* Detailed ship damage model with fairly complex inter-system dependencies (though I will be analysing it a bit more, and seeing if repair times can be modded up and hull damage modded down, for more fun with derelicts).

* Newtonian ship movement that doesn't seem excessively acrobatic or dumbed down (though I will be analysing it a bit more, too).

Things I specifically thought Starshatter did well that really put me off Star Fury:

* Vastly more realistic scale - space is not cluttered, planets are way bigger than ships, ships and fighters seem to have more appropriate relative sizes, and the space and time for maneuver seem much more appropriate.

* Better distinctions between ship classes. They seem much more appropriate in scale and abilities and limitations based on size and role, as opposed to Star Fury where the different ship classes seem more like "power ups" or RPG "character classes" or "levels".

* Better feel in the destroyer squadron demo scenario of captaining a large ship and leading a squadron, while Star Fury seems more like piloting a suped up star fighter (or bumper car in space) and constantly having to do things like dodge obstacles.

* Seemingly appropriate roles, situations, and equipment for a military ship, as opposed to Star Fury's "you are an undercover ship captain who runs errands to earn credits to upgrade your equipment completely at will and do whatever you want". That's a question of genre, and I do like free agent games like Omnitrend's Universe or Elite, but in Starshatter it seems like the roles and ships and situations make sense (in the demo anyway) while in Star Fury I'm left incredulous about most of the content.

* The movement of the ships, especially the larger ones, seems much more correct in Starshatter.

PvK

[iceboy]

Originally posted by Gandalf Parker:
This seems to be your only post here. Have you tried the game Space Empires IV from Shrapnel Games?
What did you think about it?

yep ive got it and all the expansions. space empires IV is a great game!!!