Space Interceptor: A Review
Released Oct/Nov 2004
Background Story
Quotes:
In the third millenium, Earth's mega-corporations have turned to colonizing the solar system after exhausting native resources. You are the hero as you blaze through enemy fleets around massive spaceships, tumbling asteroid fields and snaking planet-side canyons. An intuitive interface and standalone tutorial make Space Interceptor easy to play yet impossible to resist. Teeth-rattling missions include escort, strike and rescue operations. Simultaneously fire ship-to-ship missiles, ship-to-ground missiles, photon torpedoes and plasma bombs. Grand explosions create columns of light and energy that race into the dark depths of space. Astoundingly realistic environments include countless special effects and 3D sound. Space locations are painstakingly rendered from real-life data. Your missions will take you through eye-popping settings like the asteroid belt, Jupiter's moons, and a faraway galaxy - all stunningly rendered in 3D. Incredible special effects, beautiful graphics and grand explosions enhance the experience I just love the way the developers and distributors write these introductions; though for 2004, it wasn’t far wrong
Introduction
Space Interceptor was originally released in November 2004 to fill the gap in a genre that had been ignored for quite some time. It was first given away in July 07 and seemed to have been a very popular download with over 90% thumbs up out of 349 votes and it received 121 comments largely in praise of the game. This is yet another game I missed due to being on vacation last summer, so I’m really pleased that it's being repeated again as I’ve got a growing interest in space shooters. You can see the previous comments by following the link below and the next four links take you to Gamespot, Game Zone IGN and Game Chronicles sites where you’ll find more reviews of today’s giveaway, Space Interceptor
It is quite a large download at 391Mb that when installed is 409Mb. Installation is a breeze, with a combined activation and set up file together with a read me. As with previous Merscom games there's no shortcuts added to the desktop or start menu. If you're not sure how to go about creating a short cut there is a short tutorial on how to do this. Just follow the first link below:
Creating Shortcuts:
http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/forums/topic/2594?replies=9
More Independent Reviews:
http://game.giveawayoftheday.com/space-interceptor/
More Independent Reviews:
http://pc.gamezone.com/gzreviews/r22002.htm
http://pc.ign.com/articles/567/567710p1.html
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/sim/projectearth2/review.html
http://www.gamechronicles.com/reviews/pc/spaceinterceptor/projectfreedom.htm
Merscoms home site:
http://www.merscom.com/games/spaceinterceptor.php
The Game
This is almost like a big dollars game as opposed to a $19.95 arcade game apart from it being very easy to jump in and get right down to the action, and the fact that there’s no multiplayer (which would probably have made this a classic arcade game) as well as the fact that if you’ve got several hours spare you could work through the entire game in one session. The graphics are really cool (for 2004) and do give you a feel of like you’d ‘want’ to think it would be like if you were really in a space interceptor shooting at baddies, lol The game play is excellent. I think this is one of the better giveaways I’ve seen here on the game giveaway project; of course that all depends upon your point of view though. I happen to love space shooters; all styles of space shooters but in particular this type of space shooter. With that in mind I must say that this is where even the most ardent proponent of writing an unbiased review comes a little unstuck, though I did temper my score. I could easily have given it a 10 out of 10, but I do think if you’re not particularity interested in this offshoot of a space shooter it may get a little boring after the first several missions as the main theme throughout the game is surprisingly shoot ‘em up, lol, though you do apparently get to play escort to a Capital ship and even get a stationary role in one level when you command a gun emplacement. though it may have the opposite effect and convert you to this style of game play because it really is the easiest shooter to jump into of this type I’ve ever come across so far. (which is what you’d expect of an arcade game)
The game controls may appear dizzyingly complex at first for anyone who’s not used to games that have a multitude of keyboard controls. But in reality, despite there being 14 keyboard controls, (It looks like there are several more when you first jump into the options menu, but 8 of the 22 controls listed are for the mouse. The learning curve from rank novice to space hero is amazingly quick because your basic flight controls and firing are controlled by the mouse. You can do some amazing stunts just by moving the mouse. The rest of the controls seem extraneous; though for total immersion getting to know the rest of the keyboard controls is essential. Most of the keyboard controls are for adjusting the flight of your ship, for example W and S roll your ship to the right and left and the keys 1 through to 4 switch between your onboard weapons.
This game is comparable to Universal Combat which was a commercial game until Jan 08 when it was converted to abandon ware by it’s developer, though Universal Combat is much better than today’s giveaway. If you like this you’ll certainly like that one. And if you like that one let me recommend a title I bought recently called Spaceforce: Rogue Universe which though less than a year old has already been brought down to half it’s original price. I’ve posted a link to the abandon ware title in the forums so if you want more of this excellent space shooter just follow the link to the thread over in the forums for the download link to that game and many more space shoot ‘em ups.
The options menu is also quite unusual for an arcade game with several toggles for video and sound. If you’ve got a good sound card, then you’re going to be delighted to know that this game supports 3D surround sound, which is going to give you a fantastic immersive feeling together with the excellent visuals. My advice is download this game now. Once you’ve mastered flying (which really is easy) there’s a lot of playability in this game, with 21 separate missions that include space combat, planetary bases and moon missions. Just check out the three movies and images as well as the links to the off site reviews for a better idea as to whether you’ll like this game.
As you progress through the levels you can choose to research a specific area of your ship, so as to improve it in such areas as Attack or Defense. If you choose defense for example research will be carried out on reinforcing your hull so that you can withstand more attacks or look into improving the auto repair system or enhanced energy shields. There are also speed enhancements and weapons enhancements. You can choose between three difficulty settings. The easiest setting will automatically give you all the defensive and speed enhancements so the only enhancements you have to earn are the weapons improvements, which include four upgrades. At the end of a level you can choose to research a different area of the ship or continue to research the one you were doing previously.
You can save and return to any level that you’ve previously played either when starting the game up or while playing the game (though if you do this any progress in the level you are playing will be lost. . There’s also a quick save button (F5) If your mission fails you return to the beginning of the mission you failed.
There are several toggles in the options menu that should enable those with slower systems to enjoy this shooter as well as you can reduce the graphical detail, which is always a big resource hog.
Here’s what Tal Blevins of IGN (who scored this game 7.8 out of 10) had to say about this game
Quote:
There is one ball turret mission where you're immobile, but it fits in well with the "story" (I say "story" because it's about as deep as "shoot, roll, shoot, shoot, shoot") since you're on a capital ship. This mission reminded me of Luke and Han taking out TIE Fighters circling the Millennium Falcon, and it's obvious that the designers took a lot of cues from famous Hollywood sci-fi movies. The game even culminates with a Death Star-esque finale (don't worry, I'm not spoiling any of the plot since there is none)
Images and Movies
I haven’t bothered uploading the screen captures I took today because I found about 80 brilliant in game images over on gamespot, so I’ve posted a link to those and to a Google search instead. As they are probably much better than I could capture in the time I have to write this review.
The following three movies will give anyone who’s not sure about downloading today’s game a much better idea as to what to expect. There’s nothing like in game video sequences to whet the appetite. :lol: Those together with the reviews that you can find above from game sites reviews such as the ones I’ve posted above e.g. game spot, game chronicles and game zone will help tremendously. I must say the reviews themselves had me sold, scoring an average of 7 to 8 out of 10 from all of the reviews I checked
Movies
http://uk.gamespot.com/video/914541/6114268/space-interceptor-project-freedom-gameplay-movie-1
http://uk.gamespot.com/video/914541/6114272/space-interceptor-project-freedom-gameplay-movie-2
http://uk.gamespot.com/video/914541/6114275/space-interceptor-project-freedom-gameplay-movie-3
Gamespot Images
http://uk.gamespot.com/pc/strategy/projectearth2/screenindex.html?page=1
Googled Images:
http://search.msn.co.uk/images/results.aspx?q=Space+Interceptor+game&go=Search+Images&form=QBIR\#
System Requirements:
• Windows 98/Me/2000/Xp
• CPU: Pentium III 700MHz or faster
• System memory: 256MB RAM
• Video Memory: 32 MB 3D Video Card
• Mouse, keyboard, sound card
• DirectX 9.0c (included)
Recommended System:
• Pentium 4 1.6 GHz
• System Memory: 256mb RAM
• Video Memory: 64mb 3D Video Card w/ PS 2.0
Conclusion
Today’s review has relied heavily upon outside sources rather than my own view of the game simply because the demo was restricted to the training levels and one mission that was set to be played on the easy setting, so I easily won the game with little effort, though I still enjoyed playing it. I do think the combination of reviews from several sources as well as still images from game spot and the excellent videos (all three of them) are ample evidence to show that this is a well made and very playable game in the true spirit of arcade games.
I personally loved today’s game, though the demo was far too limiting lol. They should have allowed you to compare what it would be like having to start the game with a weaker ship, though it was fun to be able to be king of the ether within minutes of playing. Following the giveaway I then played the full version game and discovered that my preferences from the demo were saved, and included the full armor and speed upgrades, though after playing a few levels, restarting a new game set on easy reset everything and I was then left with a much more vulnerable ship. I actually prefer it this way though because after playing two levels with the original preferences that must have remained within the registry, that is with the shields and speed set to maximum, it seemed too easy.
There are some beautiful effects and the planetary views with the asteroid belt and star field were excellent. This together with the ease of control made this a great pleasure to play and I look forwards to exploring the rest of this game over the next few weeks.
I’d give it 7.5 out of 10, because I think once you’ve played the three main scenario types that I mention above I think the game may become a little tedious. I think my opinion has been colored by the excellent abandonware title Universal Combat that I’ve also been playing recently and the commercial game that I bought for Christmas, both of which I think are better games as there’s more of a story line involved
Thank you very much Merscom for giving this fine space shoot ‘em up away, and as always to the Game Giveaway team for finding quality developers such as Merscom. :)
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Other Space Shooters:
There’s a very large thread over in the forums that discusses and lists a whole range of free space shoot ‘em ups (shmups) ranging from full version commercial games such as Forbidden Galaxy, Star Shooter, Galaxy Strike and Alien Wars being given away via game top as well as some superb abandon ware titles such as Universal Combat a massive 3D space shooter that has just been converted to abandon ware earlier in the new year. Universal Combat is part of the massive Battle cruiser franchise. I installed it last week and am impressed with the game; also try Realms a superb top down shooter. There’s also some fantastic online multiplayer games to download, all of which are totally free; such as Alien Arena 2007 and Allegiance as game I‘d hoped they would convert to a single player game because the graphics are superb. There are at least 30 browser games and several freeware titles as well such as Fraxy and Orbiter, and that’s only looking at the post I made in the thread. Others have posted loads of different titles as well so head on over to the forums by following the link below:
http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/forums/topic/2724?replies=17
WR
