Overview

Freelancer

Freelancer is one of the luckiest titles in modern game development. Not because it was originally developed by the Roberts brothers (of Wing Commander and Privateer fame), nor because it had a lead-up title in Starlancer, but because it avoided a stigma. Being far too ambitious for its time schedule, Freelancer was delayed numerous times and even was at the central issue which led to the departure of Chris Roberts, its designer and producer. Yet it never got the reputation of Daikatana, Duke Nukem Forever or any of a number of lesser titles that were famous only for being late.

Let me see your wares

Warp speed

That's an angry ship

In fact I had personally put Freelancer in the back of my mind, and was shocked to get a delivery from Microsoft with a Freelancer beta disc inside! It was certainly one of the more surreal experiences of my career to find myself installing Freelancer. On the one hand there was the long-buried remnant of my fanboyism and adoration of anything remotely related to Wing Commander (yes, I loved Armada.) On the other, there was the overwhelming reserved professional who expected a buggy, incomplete and butchered title. After all, Microsoft has done so little in recent memory to promote Freelancer that it was natural to assume they were pawning off the beta on us just to prepare everyone for disappointment.

Lanced

Freelancer’s scope has been decisively narrowed since Microsoft took an active hand in development. This decision raised questions about the game’s continued viability. There were fears it would end up as a shadow of its former self, a huge idea but with holes in the gameplay.

Torpedoes away!

Bye bye

Die you Rheinland scum

Judging from our time with the beta, Digital Anvil actually pulled it off. This is a leaner, slimmer, trimmed Freelancer, not a concept full of holes. Before coming to that conclusion, we took the time to play completely through the singleplayer campaign and take the game out for a spin on freeform mode.

With the beta, we had to set up a multiplayer server for one player to play a solo freeform game. It remains to be seen if Digital Anvil will include a singleplayer mode that doesn’t include the campaign.