Sound

Sound in Space

In addition to being the best-looking space shooter we've ever seen, Starlancer comes pretty close to being the best sounding. The various effects, especially missile shooting and explosions, are absolutely stunning. There's nothing quite like lining up a big, fat torpedo bomber and letting rip with a volley of 20 screamers (getting the satisfaction of clicking the button every time too.) The sound layers piling up on each other, especially in close proximity, are great.

Doh! It's not fly-through!

Grraaahhh!

The range for sound effects isn't all that far apparently. Any more than 50 klicks away and even your biggest missile won't so much as give a crackle in your speaker. During slower periods in the action this seems a little annoying, but when you're in the thick of it, guns blazing away, it's actually quite a saving grace. Sometimes you might miss messages from your squadmates, the enemy, or whatever. They're never of vital importance since you're always taken to the spot anyway and it's pretty obvious what to do, but it can be annoying missing cool plot points. Like going through combat, running into an ace and then not knowing that you killed him until later takes the satisfaction away from the task. Just knowing that he's an ace for the enemy seems to make it a more satisfying challenge than thinking that this is merely a particularly pesky AI.

Ain't that Pretty?

All alone, in the night

"Roger Roger Tango 5 Alpha Charlie Niner!"

Speech in Starlancer is the total opposite of what we had in FreeSpace 2. FS2 had pretty basic, typical speech. Nothing that would ever win an award for dramatic dialogue, but it was so normal, it added to believability. Starlancer goes to two extremes. You have either really really good speech, or bad speech. Taunts, either by your character or the enemy, are pretty friggin' awful. Taunts are meant to be lively and fun, not bland and drab. First, the whole dialogue is bad. "You're going down" - yeah, that just really gets under my skin, I'm sure to go after you bud. Second, the tone used by 'your' voice is so... Mr. Rogers'. Maybe it would be annoying to have Mr. Rogers say "You're going down!" to you, but it's not the way a pilot would say it, if he said it at all.

Yamato!

Salvo one at the dark enemy

Tunes

If Starlancer fails to meet the sound standards set by FS2, the biggest reason is the music it uses. FreeSpace 2 had some of the best music out there, it was so moody and involved. The songs changed smoothly and fit the situations very well. Starlancer, while the quality of the music is in no way in doubt, doesn't get the atmosphere benefits. You might get pumped up and warned when something bad is about to happen, but it's not the same feeling.