Nice. I will definitely give it a try when I get chance.
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So I got hold of a copy of Star Assault and installed it... and I can report that it isn't worth bothering with.

The graphics are OK but quite dated. The backdrops look ok, as do the lighting effects, but they wouldn't have won any awards even 5 years ago.

The problems however start when you actually play the game. You start off by having to equip your ship by dragging components from the store into your ship's sections (engine, reactor, shields, weapons etc). The game doesn't tell you that you have to do this though so I tried to start the first mission and was given the message "your CPU isn't powerful enough" which confused me as it wasn't referring to the CPU in the computer, but the game rather confusingly called the ship you fly a CPU. So after realising this and equipping the ship it let me start the first mission. And oh boy, the animated guy reading out the mission briefing is very amateur looking, but at least the voice over isn't so bad.

Once the first mission began the usual intercom commands from the space station (which is common with many space games) began, directing me to an asteroid field where I would find some enemies to take out. Sounds like the usual first mission stuff. But the controls. Umm... very basic. The mouse controls the direction of the ship, with the left mouse firing the currently selected weapon and the mouse wheel zooming the view in and out (all that actually seems to do is scale the ship). The rest of the basic controls are keyboard based, with the Page Up and Down keys controlling engine power, the 1-0 keys selecting the current weapon, F1 turning auto pilot on, C switching between external and cockpit view, and a couple of other things.

Now the control problems. First you move the mouse and the ship shows some thrusters firing to move the ship, but where are the physics? The movement of the ship feels like it is stuck to the front of your view and you are rotating as if this view were a turrent. So it feels like you are rotating the game's view like a first person shooter, with a space ship stuck on the front of the view where the cross hair should be. Very strange and it doesn't work.

Anyway, I thought I would try out the first mission, so I hit F1 and let the autopilot take me to the destination, which it did. Some reference points appeared in the area showing the location of the enemies, who started to close in and fire at me. I started to shoot back but then I noticed something else. How are you meant to aim at something without a cross hair? I basically had to fire and see where the bullet spray was going and then try to guess where to line the ship up to hit the enemy. But that wasn't that easy with the enemies yo-yoing around me going from 800m away, then flying past and going off away from me again. I got the shields of two of the ships right down but it was very had to hit them and they just kept hitting my ship until it exploded! This was the first mission to teach you some basics, and yet the enemy were shooting non stop constantly depleting my shield. Mad!

At which point I quit the game!

So to sum up, definitely not a good example of a space combat game. It is in no way on a par with X-Wing or Wing Commander, and is in no way comparable to something like Freespace 2! I'm off to play Freelancer and X3 instead...
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Like i thoght... it didn't smell good...

Freespace 2 ? Never play it, is it like homeworld 2?
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Try the Beyond the Red Line demo at this site http://www.game-warden.com/bsg/ for Battlestar Gallactica version of Freespace 2.
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I've already played the Beyond the Red Line demo and it's great.

For a game running on such an old engine it is looking very nice, which just shows how good the original Freespace 2 engine is. And the actual game mechanics are spot on with the feel of the vipers being just right, and even the short wave radio chatter between pilots. Everyone should give the demo a play for sure.
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No, Homeworld 2 is a space RTS, whereas Freespace 2 is a space combat sim, and a great one at that. The closest games to compare it to are X-Wing and the like. And unlike games like Wing Commander which are quite arcade shoot 'em up like, Freespace 2 is a bit more serious and is best described as a full on flight sim, but in space. It is a brilliant game.

To give you an idea of what it is like, take a look at these BattleStar Galactica, Beyond the Red Line mod screenshots:






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Good choice of screen shots. They also show up what i find as the only failing of Freespace and that is the lighting. Freespace 2 is best played in a pitch black room with no distractions. Any amount of light and you may not see whats happening.
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True, but to it's credit, you have to admit that is pretty realistic. I have the feeling it's quite dark up there.
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I'd have loved if they had a real physics engine option for it though. Can't dark up there as there's too many laser blast's etc up there. But remember "In a locked darkened room no one can hear you scream, in frustration that you missed one of the buggers and can't see him because it's too dark and he snuck up behind you and killed you."
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Yep, but they are cylons, it's what they do!

BTW, when is the last BSG series due to air? I'm getting withdrawal symptoms.
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