| Title | 8th best game of 2019: Rebel Galaxy Outlaw |
| Author | Tom Chick |
| Posted in | Game reviews |
| When | January 14, 2020 |
In modern aerial combat, aircraft fight against blips on screens. Maybe -- just maybe -- they might fight against a speck far off in the sky. Conflict and technology has advanced in such a way that combatants stand farther and farther apart..
Autofollow sounds like the kind of feature that would get me playing space sims again, here’s hoping it’s copied by others in the genre.
It helped that no one cared about frame rates and therefore the speed of gameplay.
Ha, we’re we ever that young? But I admit, I do quirk an old man eyebrow whenever I encounter an internet post calling 30 FPS “virtually unplayable.”
The framerate police always remind me of audiophiles…
An I-War follow up would be great but they’d have to dial the difficulty down…
That’s awesome
games about being in things that fly will be played with controllers from now on
Sez you.
Counterpoint: I played through the campaign in well-named ‘Old School’ mode, with all of the auto-follow flight assist stuff turned off. Anyone who wants a dose of classic space sim combat should dust off their joysticks and at least try this mode.
RGO is easily as good as I recall Privateer being in my rose-colored memories. That’s why it topped my GOTY list.
I would say better. If only due to graphics.
I remember the graphics being fine, and won’t try to dig up pictures to see just how laughably dated they really are.
I tried it with an emulator recently. Yeah, dig not. :)
Did you try Privateer Gold?
I have not. How is it better? Please. I need some Privateer goodness.
It was an unfinished or mostly finished port for Win9x/Linux without being the DOS version to require DOSbox. It’s completely free so you can try it.
Ha ha, you guys thought Privateer would hold up!
You can even do that in Rebel Galaxy Outlaw? I guess it makes sense as a difficulty setting. But I’m afraid I wouldn’t have an appetite anymore for old-school “follow the cursor at the edge of the screen”. I could imagine turning off the aim assist, which is pretty generous in the default difficulty.
But, hey, I bet you got a cool Epic Games Store achievement for playing at that difficulty level. Oh, wait… :)
-Tom
Privateer’s space battles and graphics in general do hold up, especially given today’s retro aesthetics. What doesn’t hold up is the incredible amount of grind needed to advance.
no one is pining for an I-War remake.
This is incorrect.
What IS correct is that Privateer does not hold up. Sadly.
Same. Come on Tom, why ya gotta pick on my favorite space sim of all time?
Is there anything about Outlaw to change the mind of someone who doesn’t like the first Rebel Galaxy? Or is it just more of a refinement?
That was a great point Tom about turning in old dog fighting games. Made me smile.
It’s totally different @robc04
First one was a larger ships game. This is the second coming of Wing Command Privateer.
