[Shining_Saber]

I played Darkness Rising, as it came with my Windows 98.  Recently, about 2 months ago, I got up and bought FS1 + Expansion new from Amazon, then I downloaded FS2.  I have to say, this is the best space game I've played.  Besides EVE online, of course. 

[MadGeneral]

A demo of freespace 1 shipped with an old dell barge I bought many a year ago.

Actually, I didn't know it was a demo until it abruptly ended after capturing the taranis or some such thing, had to chase down a cain with stilettos.

After getting halfway through, I had to finish, so i bought 1.

[BlueFlames]

Having been in the Descent community for years, I had heard of FreeSpace, but hadn't actually played it.  When I heard about a sequel, I gave the FS2 demo a shot, and figured there were worse ways to spend fifty bucks.  In retrospect, I've gotten many, many times the value out of FRED2.

[Flipside]

A friend of mine showed me Freespace 1, it was the first time I'd seen anything running under Glide, and I was utterly blown away, I think only seeing Unreal 1 for the first time had the same effect on me. I loved the atmosphere, the graphics, for all my complaints about 'shiny' games, were amazing.

I'd grown up playing games like the original X-Wing with software rendering etc, so I bought a (I think) Banshee purely so I could play it.

Ah.. those were great days, Dungeon Keeper 1, Freespace, Syndicate Wars....

[achtung]

I got Darkness Rising with my old Dell.  Played it, put it down for a few years.  Found it again, played it, and searched for "freespace" on some file sharing program.  That got me the HoTU version, and then I started googling FS, and wound up here through Karajorma's FAQ.  Shortly thereafter I bought FS2 on eBay and installed the SCP.

[foolfromhell]

I used to play Tachyon: The Fringe, and I loved it. Then, when playing online, some dude said that FS2 Online was better.
So, I asked my friends if they had FS2, and one dude had "FS2: Collosus". I played it, loved it, and got FS2 Retail.
Arrived at teh SCP scene recently.
Funny thing was that the first time I played FS2, I thought they copied everything from Tachyon. Its the other way around.
Every damn thing in Tachyon except the buying stuff and the glide thing was copied from FS2. The Interface has the same features in the same place.

[Mongoose]

I'm kind of in BlueFlames' boat.  I remember seeing the FS1 box at a friend's house (said friend also introduced me to Descent, come to think of it...), and I remember thinking, "Huh...another Descent game?  But not?  Bwuh?"  Eventually, I learned exactly what the game was from other people in the Descent community, so I decided I'd give it a shot.  I was utterly hooked instantly (and so was my younger brother; he used to sit in the room and act as a copilot, calling out status updates ) and tore through the game.  I wound up buying a second copy of the game just to get Silent Threat; thankfully, the fan-made missions were worth the price.  Even after I found out about FS2, it took me forever to get my hands on it (though I certainly wore out the demo in the meantime); I didn't trust eBay, and even if I did, the prices on there were outrageous.  I was finally about to bite the bullet and give it a shot, when Interplay announced the 20th Anniversary release.  $50 later, and I was finally the proud owner; the way I see it, I've gotten my money's worth a thousand times over.

(Oh, while I'm thinking of it, BlueFlames, do you ever check on PD every once in a while?  We're trying our best to keep the place running, though it's really not what it used to be at all.)

[G0atmaster]

Dad bought me the FS1 and Silent Threat bundle for Christmas one year, and I thought to myself, "oh here we go, another dizzying, lame Descent game..."  But needless to say, it FAR exceeded my expectations.  (FYI I have nothing against Descent, it was just so frustrating to me at 7 years old I couldn't stand another one.)  When I heard FS2 existed, I searched and searched and searched, found the HotU version, was massively disappointed by the streamlined quality of it, searched some more, found some guy with images of the disks, played with those for a few months then forgot about em, and dug em back out again when I discovered HLP.

[arlecchino]

my mate has been raving about how good it is and i really respect his opinion when it comes to games so i thought i'd give it a go, he brought all his Freespace stuff over including  mods and media vp updates and installed it all on my computer today

[Harbinger of DOOM]

I got the Mac version off of MacGameFiles and played it for awhile, then I moved on......... I then rediscovered FS2 and played it on my Windows laptop and the ReadMe directed me here........ I then remembered about FS2 on my Mac.... LOL

[starbug]

i got the demo for FS1 of the PC mag PCZone then that was me hooked and still am hooked.

[Snail]

I got Darkness Rising (the first mission act) with my Dell. Played it over and over again, found out that it wasn't the end, and then got the white label release.

[phoenixemperor]

It came free with my first PC in 2000.

[Wobble73]

I got FreeSpace2 - Colossus free with a Voodoo2 Orchid graphics accelerator card!

[Turey]

The full version of FS1 came as a DVD on my IBM Aptiva(?) comp.

[Mars]

I found Freespace through Descent

[Kie99]

Got FS1 free with my computer several years ago.  There were a couple of features missing (i.e. the ability to patch the game) but it didn't harm my experience.  Bought FS2 a couple of years later.

[cloneof]

just searching the internets.

[Tahna Los]

Saw Freespace on demo at a local computer store.  The only way to truly reel in a bystander.

[Unknown Target]

My dad owns a computer store, and he made a deal with me that if I got two good report cards, I could get a game. I saw Freespace on the shelf and randomly picked it. The rest is history

Oddly enough, when I first bought it I thought the 30 mission campaign was going to be too short. Boy was I wrong, haha.