This dramatic story based on the dynamic history of the 20th century warfare includes over 25 minutes of Holly-quality computer generated cinematics and 40 custom composed music tracks. Pilot 12 different fighters and dogfight with enemy fighters that each have their own "artificial intelligence" profile for more realistic space combat. Join the fight for the future. Enlist.

Average Customer Review: ( 24 customer reviews )
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The minimum requirements are prety low, especialy when compared to recent space sims like Freespace 2, but it looks better than any other space sim out there.

6 of 6 found the following review helpful:

StarlancerMay 05, 2000
By David Best
When I first played Starlancer, I was VERY impressed. The graphics may be it's best feature, other than the fun missions. What I like about it is that you don't play the same kind of mission over and over again., they are pretty much different. Some aspects may be the same, but the setting always makes it different.

The gameplay is great! Downing your fist enemy will be historic to you, as you fly by you will see the debris (and mabye the pilot) of the fantastoc explotions. The missions are nice and long, so the game will last. If only there was an in-game save feature. The story ties the game together well with in-mission events. The sound is great too. Except for the constant "ARGGHHH!" and "NOOO" of the downed Russian fighters, everything is great.

The ships are cool, and I love how you can land during a mission. Multiplayer is the funnest I've played yet, and the game will run fine on a 56k modem. And if your stick on a mission, log on and find some guys to help you beat it-hence-co-operative gameplay. Deathmatch is better, though.

Starlancer is great, and for the guy who said Russians as bad guys were bad, the designers wanted a change from furry lions and wanted a more close to home conflict. BUY THIS GAME!

54 of 72 found the following review helpful:

Freespace LiteApr 30, 2000
By Sarcastor
My god, I can't believe what passes as a good game nowadays. Being an extreme fan of the Wing Commander series, as well as other space simulations like Descent Freespace, I was more then ecstatic when I first bought Starlancer. After playing the game for 5 hours, I was disappointed. 2 days later I was downright appalled.

Descent Freespace 2 raised the bar for what a space sim should be. Starlancer is nothing more then a colorized version of Wing Commander. Sure, there's alot of action, and the graphics are purty, but it could have been better - alot better. Actually they should have called it Freespace Lite - For Dumbies.

First of all, it's downright impossible. Even at the easiest setting, I barely managed to finish each level. Why? The enemies weren't' that hard to destroy. It had to do with the fact that your ship, no matter which ship you choose, couldn't carry anything worthwhile. In Descent Freespace 2 (DS2), the ships could carry dozens of missiles of various types. In Starlancer, you have 3-7 hardpoints which carry one missile each. Yep, one missile. Except for the screamers, which come in 20, but they have no lock-on capacity. Imagine trying to kill 10-20 ships each level with 4 missiles. And the worse part is you can't reload!

And then there's the fuel. Even though it's 2160, you're still using solid fuel, so if you tend to use the afterburner (which you need alot because everything is so far apart), you'll have to install fuel pods, which limits the missiles you can carry. So now you're left with 2 missiles, which makes the game even harder.

And then there's no logic behind it. At the beginning of mission 8, the enemy carrier is launching torpedoes at your carrier. Your carrier informs you to just attack the fighters and disregard the torpedoes, because their cannons will handle it. Yet 30 seconds later, when enemy bombers jump in and start launching ALOT of torpedoes at your carrier, the carrier begs you to shoot down all the torpedoes before they are destroyed. So you command your wingmen to destroy your bomber, but since they're so inept, it takes them 15 minutes to destroy 1 bomber. Meanwhile you're chasing back and forth shooting down torpedoes. I had to replay that mission at least 8 times because the wingmen couldn't tell the difference between a bomber and a hair dryer.

Communication Remember how in DS2 you had complete control of your wingmen? In Starlancer you only have three options: help me, ignore this enemy, or go home. What happen to guard? What happen to rearm? Even though half of the missions require you to guard a freighter or convoy, you can't even tell the wingmen to guard it. And the worst part is, on the keyboard, you use 1-6 to change camera view. Pressing "C" will bring up the communications display, then you hit "1" for talking to the enemy, "2" for talking to your wing, etc.. But since it's so slow, if you hit C then 2 really fast, it will change the camera view! So if you need to issue commands in a hurry, you can't, because the screen will change view! Who's the genius behind this?

Graphics The graphics are the best part of the game. The engine is basically the same as Privateer 2, except with some heavy tweaks. The blackness of space is replaced by distant nebula and asteroid fields. But the odd thing is, you're flying around in our solar system - there's not suppose to be nebula in this area. Ships blow up in little pieces after you destroy them. Each weapon has its own look and feel. Missiles leave a trail of smoke after you fire them. But it's not nearly as good as Freespace 2, where deep space is alive with nebulas, comets, galaxies, planets, etc.

Also there's little things. Every time you play another mission, you have to change your HUD settings. You can choose what displays are shown - missiles, guns, damage, etc. If you turn it off on a level, when you start the next one, it jumps back to the default HUD display. So you have to waste time setting the displays back to what they were before. And then you can't bypass the in-game cinematics, which just takes forver.

Starlancer should have been called Wing Commander 6. Except for the graphic overhaul, the introduction of online gaming (which is pretty cool) and the new ships, it's the exact same gameplay, same commands, and same missions. After 2 days of Starlancer I went back to playing Wing Commander 4. Sure it's outdated, but at least it's got Mark Hamill.

4 of 4 found the following review helpful:

Not bad at all for its priceDec 30, 2002

I was impressed by this game since I expected so little. FreeSpace2-like graphics (meaning good) and gameplay. Ships carry some momentum (instead of always flying where they point), you have side thrusters so that you can strafe, and instead of recharging afterburners, you have a set amount of fuel for the the extra speeed. There's a lot of dialogue during the action, which can be a little annoying. Same old bad physics as with all space "simulators" -- limited speed, moving faster gives you more manueverability, etc. But the game's fun as long as you're looking for simple, good-looking space combat. And by the way, this is a Chris Roberts game, meaning it's Wing Commander under a different name.

3 of 3 found the following review helpful:

Loved it, still love it, still playing it!Mar 03, 2006
By Curious George
I fell in love with this game when it first came out years ago. And there aren't, or weren't, many Microsoft games I could easily say that about. Yeah... it's not the greatest space combat sim ever, but it's well worth the play and I have enjoyed it over and over again.

If you don't know much about the game, think Space: Above and Beyond. If you didn't watch that TV show from the mid-90's it's finally out on DVD so think about picking it up to watch it and you'll understand the allure of Starlancer to someone like myself.

I'm not a multiplayer kind of guy so I never used the multiplayer function. I preferred single player missions only.

I think the various fighters you get to pilot provide an excellent variety along with the plethora of different types of guns and missiles you can arm your fighter with. The only thing I would have loved was the option to trade out your fixed guns for different types of guns. That would have made an excellent game absolutely superb!

What more is there to say? If you are a fan of realistic space combat sims, then this game probably isn't for you. If you liked Space: Above and Beyond, you'll probably like this game too.

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