[corvette108048]

how much better or worse do you think it would be

[Dark Hunter]

Not a whole heck of a lot better. The FSO guys have done wonders.

[Sarafan]

Not a whole heck of a lot better. The FSO guys have done wonders.

That's true!

[karajorma]

how much better or worse do you think it would be

It would probably be released for the consoles and thus without the possibility of modding it. The game itself would be good but simplification for the console would probably cost you a lot of FS2's ability to control wingmen for instance (or at least to be able to fly while doing it!)

So while the game would probably still be good, it wouldn't form a community around it for long.

[Scooby_Doo]

EA would have probably boughten them out, and we'd be seeing Freespace 7: Buggier than evar'!

[lenard27]

If FreeSpace came out today, it would have been all about the flashy graphics and the story would have gotten lost at a seedy rest stop along the highway of development.  I'm glad FS2 came out in 1999 rather than 2007.

[admiral_wolf]

While there is no doubt that the SCP has taken FS2 to a new level, I think that with modern day computers and an updated game would be excellent.

[Dark Hunter]

If FreeSpace came out today, it would have been all about the flashy graphics and the story would have gotten lost at a seedy rest stop along the highway of development.  I'm glad FS2 came out in 1999 rather than 2007.

QFT.

[IceFire]

While there is no doubt that the SCP has taken FS2 to a new level, I think that with modern day computers and an updated game would be excellent.

I'm not sure about that.  When FS2 came out it was the shiniest of shiny graphics with all of the cool background nebula and fancy beam effects and so on and so forth.   I understand the sentiment but to be honest the Volition guys set out to make the best looking and best playing space combat game they could and they did an excellent job on both fronts.  If they had the chance to do it again...I think they would be just doing both.

[fsphiladelphia]

With the new normal maps on, this game does look like it came out "with todays graphix" [sic].

[Flipside]

Having played a selection of the more modern space combat games like Rogue Universe, Tarr etc, I must say that there isn't a lot of difference between their graphics and the latest builds of the SCP, certainly, as far as the effects-engines go, they are better, things like nebulas, plasma clouds etc, have the advantage of volumetric rendering etc. However, for the main part, the difference is not that massive.

As far as gameplay goes, knowing more modern game-construction techniques, it would have had iffy voice-acting, would never have been allowed to finish on a Cliffhanger, and would probably play like Freelancer.

So, to be honest, I think a 'modern' version of Freespace 2 would be a dumbed-down, console-friendly, thin-storylined game with pretty graphics.

[Black Wolf]

While there is no doubt that the SCP has taken FS2 to a new level, I think that with modern day computers and an updated game would be excellent.

I'm not sure about that.  When FS2 came out it was the shiniest of shiny graphics with all of the cool background nebula and fancy beam effects and so on and so forth.   I understand the sentiment but to be honest the Volition guys set out to make the best looking and best playing space combat game they could and they did an excellent job on both fronts.  If they had the chance to do it again...I think they would be just doing both.

Keep in mind though that the degree of difficuty involved in making a modern game look good vs a 1999 game. The mmodels and textures would have to have been 10x more detailed, the nebulae and effrects more complex, not to mention probably a lot more graphical coding to debug... I'm not saying they couldn't do it, but if they werre working on the same kind of time constraints, something would have to give. Would that have been the story? Hard to say, but keep in mind Silent Threat - [V] aren't exactly crowing about the quality job they did on that little gem I suspect. Who knows if the same kind of sloppiness have infected FS2 if they were under the increased pressure modern graphics would demand?

[Mars]

I think it would play about the same and would look slightly better than FSO

[IceFire]

Its true...all of that demanded more and I'm not an expert at the workflows involved and unless you are part of a game development house probably neither of us can speak with absolute authority on the subject but I take a more optimistic viewpoint that they did a very good job with FreeSpace and FreeSpace 2 and turned out some really fantastic graphics at the time (talking about detailed graphics - most of the FS1 ships and some of the FS2 ships were done with very high levels of detail and then scaled down for in-game use - thats partly why we have some great reference materials) and if it was a matter of managing man power you'd still have the couple of people writing (mostly Jason Scott as I understand but there was more and definitely Adam Pletcher who was one of the architects of the whole thing) the story.

I'm just more optimistic.  Silent Threat I think everyone felt was not upto quality levels expected but I think it was supposed to boost sales overall and it did.  Fortunately it and most of the content (ships, weapon ideas) weaved their way into the rest of the series in FreeSpace 2.

[Desert Tyrant]

I think it would play about the same and would look slightly better than FSO

Ditto.  Maybe i'm too much of an optomist, but I don't think that FS would end up as a watered down turd on consoles.

[corvette108048]

I think I miss led you to what I meant
If interplay and volition came out with FS in 1998 and FS2 in 1999 with todays graphix how do you think it came out.

[Dark Hunter]

Do you mean "how would the graphics have come out?", or all aspects of the game in general?

[lenard27]

It be kinda hard to have FS2 come out with today's graphics in 1999.  Considering the year is 2007 so today's graphics wouldn't have existed back then.

If that is what you're getting at. Sorry, I'm more easily confused than a cat...

[Jeff Vader]

Interpretation 1. If you mean a scenario where the FreeSpaces were released at the end of 1990's but with graphics of 2007, computers would have died.

Interpretation 2. If you mean a scenario where the FreeSpaces were released in 2007, with graphics of 2007, it might have been a flop, since the genre really is dead. Barely any new titles and even those that are published tend to suck. Can't tell if there would have been any differences storywise, since the story wasn't that great a saga in FS ever. Just an excuse for shooting stuff. Which is fine, I think. Implementing complex drama into a space shooter is quite difficult. You have to either choose the game to be a huge drama that appeals to story lovers, or a standard shooter which appeals to those who like to fly with spaceships and shoot.

[corvette108048]

Replay to Lobo
No if in 1998/1999 your average New computer Had a 256MB NVIDIA video card, 256 MB ram and a 3.5 GHz  Processor. video games for PC where like they are today. With Interplay still running strong how would FS1 and 2 come out?