[Akalabeth Angel]

I simply don't agree that any user-made campaign can be thought of as a true sequel.

Exactly. Just take them and enjoy them for what they are.

[Snail]

So what was the purpose of even arguing which mod was closest to FS3?

And whatever way you think about it, the best mods are determined by (quite obviously) their quality. How close they are stylistically to the original installments is neither here nor there.

[Locutus of Borg]

And would we REALLY want a sequel anyway unless it was built on the current engine?

[Snail]

And would we REALLY want a sequel anyway unless it was built on the current engine?

Uh, what?

Preferably a sequel would be portable, but not on the old FS2 engine...

[Locutus of Borg]

If it's on a new engine and not portable, then the SCP would become obsolete, but that's just my opinion.

[General Battuta]

If it's on a new engine and not portable, then the SCP would become obsolete, but that's just my opinion.

I very well hope so, or it wouldn't be a very good sequel, would it?

The whole point of an FS3 is to accomplish what the SCP can't or won't due to time and labor constraints.

[Akalabeth Angel]

So what was the purpose of even arguing which mod was closest to FS3?

Closests to FS2 since FS3 doesn't exist

And whatever way you think about it, the best mods are determined by (quite obviously) their quality. How close they are stylistically to the original installments is neither here nor there.

Hmmn, I think the best mods vary with each individual and are more an issue of how much they enjoy them. And while there is a certain amount of "community consensus", that list of mods is always fluctuating and is really more based upon the flavour of the day. Years ago people would say S:AH, Homesick, Derelict, etcetera. Now they say Transcend, Sync and Blue Planet and the underrated Procryon Insurgency.

If it's on a new engine and not portable, then the SCP would become obsolete, but that's just my opinion.

That depends largely upon the modability and the features of the new game. If the game can't be modded very easily, obviously this community will continue. Likewise, if there are features present in the SCP that aren't present in the new game then some people will stick with SCP. People are still creating levels for the original Doom and Wolfenstein 3D and who knows what else. People won't stop making FSO missions just because FS3 comes out. And even if an FS3 is in the near future I would imagine it would be at least 2-3 years at least.

(Giving all those LONG term projects some time to finally get out the door hahahaha)

[NGTM-1R]

Hmmn, I think the best mods vary with each individual and are more an issue of how much they enjoy them. And while there is a certain amount of "community consensus", that list of mods is always fluctuating and is really more based upon the flavour of the day. Years ago people would say S:AH, Homesick, Derelict, etcetera. Now they say Transcend, Sync and Blue Planet and the underrated Procryon Insurgency.

Most of us still say Homesick, Derelict, and S:AH.

[Locutus of Borg]

Oh, Derelict all the way.

What's S:AH?

[bahijal74]

We need hookahs..would make it so fun trust me...

[NGTM-1R]

Take your druggy sentiments to Nuke, he'll be more sympathetic.

[darkdaej]

Hmmn, I think the best mods vary with each individual and are more an issue of how much they enjoy them. And while there is a certain amount of "community consensus", that list of mods is always fluctuating and is really more based upon the flavour of the day. Years ago people would say S:AH, Homesick, Derelict, etcetera. Now they say Transcend, Sync and Blue Planet and the underrated Procryon Insurgency.

Most of us still say Homesick, Derelict, and S:AH.

Indeed, Derelict is my favoured campaign and always has been.  Blue Planet is great, but I think the fact that your character is named and actually has speech removed the player from his PC.  Silent PC's that are surrounded with talking ones engross me more in a story (as I can think up my own responses to them as well).  

A great example of this is Half-Life 2, early in when Alyx speaks to you and notices you don't respond she asks you: "You don't talk much do you?"  I laughed my head off at that one.  Gordon Freeman is the FPS character I have always preferred, simply because he does not speak.  
Speaking FPS characters have always annoyed me, because you see through their eyes.  If they speak, then you simply see through them, you aren't them...

[General Battuta]

I've always found that silent protagonists (like Gordon) completely destroy immersion. No reaction to crazy events? No characterization? No desires, no motivation?

I've never wanted to inhabit an empty shell. Moreover, Gordon just makes things absurd by never responding to the people around him.

[darkdaej]

I've always found that silent protagonists (like Gordon) completely destroy immersion. No reaction to crazy events? No characterization? No desires, no motivation?

I've never wanted to inhabit an empty shell. Moreover, Gordon just makes things absurd by never responding to the people around him.

I understand your point, but then again I still get a kick out of him.

all he needs now is legs...and a body (Mr. Floating Hands, lol)

Then again, I've always considered Freeman to be a mute (even though he grunts and hisses)

[Akalabeth Angel]

Hmmn, I think the best mods vary with each individual and are more an issue of how much they enjoy them. And while there is a certain amount of "community consensus", that list of mods is always fluctuating and is really more based upon the flavour of the day. Years ago people would say S:AH, Homesick, Derelict, etcetera. Now they say Transcend, Sync and Blue Planet and the underrated Procryon Insurgency.

Most of us still say Homesick, Derelict, and S:AH.

That's because you're old. Like me.
What ever happened to Blaise anyway?

[darkdaej]

excuse the doubleposting:

Also the goal of the Silent Protagonist is that the reactions to crazy events are the player's, not some character outside the player himself.

F.E.A.R. accomplished this with greatness (not F.E.A.R. 2, the original)

I nearly crapped my pants on a couple occasions on my first playthrough of "First Encounter Assault Recon"

[Akalabeth Angel]

I think speaking and non-speaking PCs have inherent pros and cons for the reasons stated above. PREY for example had a speaking PC and many times the dialogue he said was quite funny. But for PREY I think it's necessary because most of the time he's fighting humans and they're not going to say a lot of English whereas FEAR for example the marines are always chitter-chatting.

I disagree that talking PCs take away the immersion though. Thief-Dark Project, one of my all time favourites has a talking PC but it's also the most immersive and intense game I've ever played.


Back on the subject of Freespace, talking PCs and characterization can be a good thing or not depending on one's preferences. However I don't think Freespace is really the best sort of game for related characters to the player. Most campaigns, such as Blue Planet, can really only relate one character to the player on any meaningful level. I think if a campaign really wants to relate a host of characters it needs proper cutscenes ala the Wing Commander games so each wingman or admiral or whatever can be given more character and more of a voice. So when you see that one line of dialogue in mission, it actually has more weight and meaning.

That being said, despite the limitations, BP, Transcend, Homesick and similar campaigns have done a decent job of relating characters.

[Mongoose]

I kind of feel like the greatest move that Valve could pull at the end of the Half-Life saga is revealing that it's not that Gordon doesn't talk...it's that he can't talk.  A physically mute, ass-kicking theoretical physicist?  What more do you need?

(As a side note, Gordon being mute doesn't bother me in the least.  Like darkdaej said, his reaction to a particular scene is my own by extension.  I don't just control him; I am him.  Having him speak would destroy what Valve is trying to convey.)

More on-topic (such as it is), I completely understand what AA is saying here.  I'd disagree with NGTM-1R's assertion that the new campaign formats that have arisen have gone "beyond" what originally achieved; I feel it's not so much a case of "beyond" as it is "to the side."  There have been some great achievements in character- and thematically-driven campaigns (with BP being of the former and Transcend/Sync of the latter), but in my mind, they're no better or worse than the impersonal, story-driven paradigm of the retail campaigns.  They're just a different option available to the community's storytellers.  AA's not saying that no other fan-made campaign can "be FS3" in the sense that any of them are actively claiming to be so, but rather that the majority of fan-made campaigns don't fit in the same format that made the retail campaigns what they are.  I will agree that PI is about as close as anyone has come to recapturing that atmosphere, and I'd submit ST:R for being just as successful (if not even more so, thanks to the superb voicework).  Both of these campaigns utilize many of the same mannerisms, tropes, and structures that used to great effect in their own campaigns, and that's the very sort of thing I'd want to see in a future sequel.  I love playing most of the (for lack of a better term) new-paradigm campaigns that have been created, but they'll never fill the void in my heart that a true successor to FS2 would.

[stuart133]

The thing is though surely it must take a huge amount of effort to put in a mission editor as good as FRED and this would probably increase production costs. If there wasn't a FRED 3 or it was rubbish I feel that many people would not play FS3 for long but instead come back to 2.
I feel that given to apprehensiveness that Interplay would feel about releasing FS3 they would try to make it as cheap as possible without compromising the game, which could mean scrapping FRED 3. This in my view would make it a great disappointment and leave many of the fans here not really feeling that they were getting their money's worth, what with the amount of user content freespace players can enjoy at the moment.

[Locutus of Borg]

They should release any new campaign game bundled with the two previous ones. That way, new people could pick it up as well as old, and they wouldn't need to tell a story as if the player had never heard of the shee-vanz before.