Hard Light Productions Forums
Hosted Projects - FS2 Required => Blue Planet => Topic started by: Son of Orion on May 16, 2011, 12:55:43 am
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I've been a gamer ever since I was like...four or five. Played a ****load of games throughout my life. Old and new, classics and obvious betas, all that stuff. Estimating all the games I've played over the years, I think I've played over a hundred. Maybe even two hundred, but that may be pushing it.
But I'm not here to talk about that. I'm here to talk about Blue Planet, specifically War in Heaven. I mentioned those games because, well, they're full games, not mods. Now, Blue Planet...Blue Planet is something really special. While it's a mod, it ranks up there among the greatest games I have ever played. Seriously, I cannot get enough of it. I already loved Freespace. I loved a lot of great campaigns for it, like Derelict and Sync. All of these had solid stories and gameplay. Blue Planet also had great gameplay, but the story...good god. The story is among the greatest I've known in any work of fiction. Very few stories have played with my emotions as much as this one.
Genuine character development, ambiguous morality, and plenty of shocking twists make BP a true classic for me. It constantly raised my hopes before brutally crushing them. Normally, I'd catch on to patterns like this, but the thing about Blue Planet is that I wanted to believe that things were finally getting better. I just wanted to see an end to all the conflict. I understood the GTVA's intentions. I know that Ubuntu just couldn't work on a wide scale, especially with the Shivans still out there, but ultimately, I sided with the UEF. I really liked the Ubuntu philosophy. Earth was united under a system that encouraged tolerance, diplomacy and friendship. Seeing that society and its valiant defenders being slowly torn apart by a force that outmatched them in so many ways was just heartrending. I really started to resent the GTVA, even though their intentions were sound, and just about every Freespace campaign has you flying for them! It takes a hell of a story to make you hate a faction that you've fought with for so long. I couldn't even see the way they fought as character derailment, either; it was entirely in character for them.
Thrilling missions, solid gameplay, intense combat, and a truly remarkable story? How could I say no to that? I just wanna say this to the BP dev team: you guys rule. Seriously, I'm surprised you haven't officially entered the industry yet. It needs more people like you. Thank you for creating this epic series. I will assist your endeavor in any way I can. Keep rocking. :)
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Thank you on behalf of the whole team. Feedback like this helps keep us going!
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You said it, Son or Orion. I can absolutely say that Blue Planet is one of my very favourite sci-fi universes now. For all of us who played FS1 and FS2 when they were first released, it's a real nostalgic thrill to see the Freespace story continue in a kind of 'rebooted' fashion. The other thing is, I know Blue Planet is not Freespace 3, but after playing War in Heaven I knew I was never gonna long for an offical Volition sequel again. There's no way the story would be as good as the Blue Planet team tell it, and being a mod and not a professional product allows them to go way more 'out there' than an actual software company would do.
So I echo your thoughts and also would add that the use of the music in this campaign blows me away everytime I replay it. I think WiH and The Dig are my two favourite soundtracks from games (I know the music for WiH isn't original, but that collection of tracks is so consistent and fit the atmosphere so well that it wouldn't be the same without it).
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My thought is: Blue Planet is awesomesauce, nuff said.
Storyline: epic
Battles: epic
Music: epic
FREDding: epic
Races: epic
Ships: Awesome
I forgot something I know.
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You forgot "Blowing Tevs: awesome"
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No, he forgot "Steele: Awesome Tactical Genius".
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You forgot "Blowing Up Tevs: awesome"
Fixed to say what you meant. It's still wrong though. :P
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just finished AoA and I loved it, my only problem was with cut scenes, they are awesome but unlike the briefing you cant skip them on your second time around and sometimes the waiting gets really annoying (especially when the reason for it is your squadron, that somehow was decimated before destroying one forward beam while you got all the rest + flak + fighters + 100% hull :banghead:)
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The Blue Planet series is by far the best mod I've played. It's so good, it should be made into a book or a movie or something! I know it's not officially Freespace 3, but it is in my book. Can't wait for the third installment!
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just finished AoA and I loved it, my only problem was with cut scenes, they are awesome but unlike the briefing you cant skip them on your second time around and sometimes the waiting gets really annoying (especially when the reason for it is your squadron, that somehow was decimated before destroying one forward beam while you got all the rest + flak + fighters + 100% hull :banghead:)
Some (two for sure, probably more, but I'd have to check) cutscenes can be skipped by pressing the fire button. And in WiH you have that and a checkpoint system on top of it (activated via the communications menu).