Sins of a Solar Empire has lovely space battles, and a fairly competent fleet AI, so you get more time to enjoy the pretties.
I recall there’s a client that does that. Can’t remember the name.
Knossos!
I really liked the space battles in Nexus: The Jupiter Incident, but I think that one was released more than 10 years ago.
It still looks and plays wonderfully.
Thank you for this recommendation. I owned Project Sylpheed but never played it because I was waiting for a time when I could borrow my brother’s joystick that came with the Ace Combat game he bought for the 360. But now that I know gamepads work so well in other space sims like Elite: Dangerous and Rebel Galaxy Outlaw, I should just go back and try out Project Sylpheed on the 360 with a gamepad instead. I had totally forgotten about the game until your post.
That’s also because Nexus was updated not too long ago, courtesy of THQ Nordic. It now plays nice on modern systems, including out-of-the-box widescreen support and GUI scaling.
GOG plug: https://www.gog.com/game/nexus_the_jupiter_incident
Nexus is great, but I just wish it had something other than a scripted campaign. I know there is a mod to make new scenarios, but I’m not up to designing something balanced and interesting. It really needs an automatic skirmish generator.
I often wish games did not have a script. However, sandboxy games aren’t always an improvement.
IWar 2 had a nice balance of scripted and sandboxy gameplay. I.e. for a good chunk of the game you can travel to most locations at any time if you want to.
IWar 2 is special. It’s also brutal.
The games I have the most difficulty playing are the ones where you have to switch back and forth between multiple devices/systems in real time. Everspace I am looking at you.
Which games have the best (dynamic) scripting? Is it the Wing Commander or X-Wing series?
…dynamic scripting?
I am guessing that dynamic scripting would be the missions that would appear in Wing Commander if you were winning or losing? It’s been a while.
I thought the outcomes of these games were based on success or failure of previous mission objectives.
Wing Commander has a bit of branching, but it’s fairly limited. X-Wing is insanely linear.
What you really want is Star Crusader.
Starshatter was kind of like Falcon 4 in space.
I’m a big fan of Newtonian physics.
IIRC I tried the demo back before the full game was released. It is… too hardcore. The devs deserve everyone’s respect though.