Freelancer

Freelancer
Box cover art for Freelancer
Developer(s)	Digital Anvil
Publisher(s)	Microsoft Game Studios
Designer(s)	(pre-2000) Chris Roberts (post-2000) Jörg Neumann
Version	1.1 (June 06, 2003)
Platform(s)	Microsoft Windows
Release date(s)	March 4, 2003
Genre(s)	Space trading and combat simulator
Mode(s)	Single player, Multiplayer
Rating(s)	ESRB: T USK: 12+ ELSPA: 15+ PEGI: 12+
Media	CD
System requirements	600 MHz CPU, 128 MB RAM, 8X CD-ROM drive, DirectX 9.0, 900 MB available hard disk space, Windows 98, 16 MB 3D accelerated graphics card, sound card
Input methods	Keyboard, mouse

Freelancer is a space trading and combat simulation video game developed by Digital Anvil and published by Microsoft Game Studios. The game was initially announced by Chris Roberts in 1999, and following many production schedule mishaps and a buyout of Digital Anvil by Microsoft, it was eventually released in March 2003.

The game allows players to pilot a starfighter and visit many star systems. They can engage in combat with other starfighters to protect traders or engage in piracy themselves. They can also visit planets and space stations to look for jobs and to engage in commodity trade. The single-player story ties up the player in the role of Edison Trent, in a series of missions to save the Sirius sector from a mysterious alien force. As the story progresses, restrictions on player activity are gradually released, and total freedom is granted at the story's completion. Players are given total freedom from the beginning in multiplayer mode.

Originally Roberts promised features such as a multiplayer mode with thousands of players, automated flight maneuvers, and dynamic economies, but they were cut from the final release. The game's initial technical demos impressed reviewers, but after the Microsoft buyout and Roberts' departure from Digital Anvil, critics were doubtful of the game's release. When it was released, reviewers judged it technically good but failing to completely satisfy their expectations.

Gameplay

Describing itself as a combat action game with roleplaying aspects, and an engrossing cinematic story,^[1] Freelancer starts the player off with a small starfighter, a partial map of the galaxy, and the freedom to make money by any means.^{[citation needed]} The player's default view is that of a "third person behind the ship" for better situational awareness.^[1] With no piloting of capital ships in this game,^[2] the starfighters follow "arcade" flight dynamics instead of realistic Newtonian physics.^[3] However, the game allows the player to utilize Newton's first law of motion by cutting power to the engines and turning to face any direction while continuing to move along the starfighter's original path.^[4]

In Freelancer, the player uses a mouse to control his or her ship through a point and click interface to fly and engage in battles.

The game can be fully played by "pointing and clicking" with the mouse, and a few keyboard commands. Moving the ship in any direction is just as easy as pointing there, while shooting an enemy is simply pointing on the lead indicator and clicking to shoot.^[5] Targets off-screen are indicated by pointers at the edges, to make up for the lack of a radar. The point-and-click nature extends to in-flight interfaces, with information windows functioning like those of Windows, allowing ready access to all information, such as targeting, inventory, communications and navigation maps.^[6] A bar at the top of the screen holds icons for commonly used automated procedures like autopilot and docking.^[7] Multiplayer mode takes place in the same setting as the single-player mode, except there is no campaign story.^[8] A personal computer can be a game server and host up to 128 players.^[9] Persistent galaxies can be maintained, but a player's progress can only be saved and resumed on the same server.^[10]

Players have many options when customizing ships and equipment.^{[citation needed]} Their levels, which limit the level of items which can be bought, are determined by their wealth of cash and equipment.^[10] Higher level ships have more equipment slots and allow more advanced equipment to be mounted. Money can be earned through completing jobs found on planets and space stations, or through trading commodities.^[4] The jobs' rewards and difficulties differ by regions,^{[citation needed]} with the more difficult and rewarding jobs in the same region as the more advanced ships and equipment.^[11][8]

Plot and setting

Freelancer takes place 800 years after the events in the computer game Starlancer.^[12] In a bid to escape the civil war, the Alliance faction sent their people in stasis on an exodus from Sol.^[13] Heading towards the Sirius system, the exodites settled and transformed the surrounding space (the Sirius sector) into a region of political intrigue and opportunity.^[14] Named after the sleeper ships they arrived in, four political houses were formed with their societies bearing distinctive marks of their ancestries:^[15] House Liberty of 1920s United States, Bretonia of Victorian era United Kingdom, Kusari of Shogunate era Japan, and Rheinland of Second Industrial Revolution Germany.^[12] The fifth sleeper ship, Hispania, suffered a malfunction en-route and had to be abandoned in deep space.^[4] The descendants of its crew became pirates.^[11]

To avoid complicated three-dimensional maps, Freelancer's places of interests are all placed on a single two-dimensional flat plane.^[16] There are 48 known star systems, which the player can freely travel between by "jumping" through jump gates.^[17] Once in a system, the player can rapidly fly through it via trade lanes – series of gates connecting to form a "space highway" – to visit planets, space stations, mining operations, etc. Asteroid or debris fields populate some of the systems, and huge planets can burn up ships which get too close to them.^{[citation needed]} Secret hideouts and derelicts with loot can also be discovered in deep space.^[18] The Freelancer world is described as dynamic, and full of life.^[2] Trader ships ply the trade lanes, carrying cargo from system to system. Pirates disrupt these trade lanes to attack the traders, while police and space navies with large warships patrol the systems on a lookout against the pirates.

Characters

In-game cut scene featuring Edison Trent (leftmost), Jun'ko Zane (middle), and Quintaine (rightmost)

The player takes on the role of Edison Trent in single-player mode. The designers decided not to allow any character customization, as they wanted to instill as much personality as possible into Trent.^[19] The player is however free to take on any style of play and role (e.g. trader, pirate, bounty hunter).^[12] As the story progresses, the player gets to meet several non-player characters (NPCs) like the Liberty Security Force (LSF) commander Jun'ko Zane, the xenoarchaeologist Professor Roland Quintaine, and the head of a secret organization Casper Orillion. Interactions with NPCs are however restricted to an acceptance or refusal of their proposals.^{[citation needed]} The course of Trent's relationship with them are exposited by the story's cutscenes.

The NPCs are aligned to various factions, such as the police, pirates, companies, and governments within the game.^[4] Each faction has their own agenda, and relations with each other. The player can anger a faction and its allies by destroying its ships. Likewise, a faction's favor — and, to a smaller extent, the favor of its allies — can be gained by destroying its enemies. A bad relationship with a faction will result in the player facing open hostilities from it and being refused to dock with its stations.^[14] A bribe can however offset the bad feelings incurred towards a faction.^[4] Professional voice talent, such as Ian Ziering (Beverly Hills, 90210), Jennifer Hale (Metroid games), George Takei (Star Trek), and John Rhys-Davies (Indiana Jones films and Sliders), were engaged for prominent roles in the game. Amateurs voiced minor recurring NPCs and background chatter.^{[citation needed]} Players can only meet generic NPCs in multiplayer due to its lack of a campaign story (scripted missions).^[20]

Story

Freelancer's overarching story, shown in two hours worth of in-game cutscenes, only exists in single-player mode.^[16] The story is linear without any branches and can only be advanced by the player taking on key missions one at a time. There are usually no time limits to complete these missions, and the player can ignore and "pause" the story to take on side missions instead.^[14][3] To prevent the player from amassing too much wealth and equipment on the side and making the key missions too easy, the current key mission must be completed before the player is allowed to advance a level.^[10]

The opening cut scene on starting the single-player mode shows the destruction of space station Freeport 7 by unknown forces. This leaves Trent without money or ship on the planet Manhattan. While waiting for his debtor, Lonnigan, to regain consciousness, Trent takes up employment with the LSF under Jun'ko Zane, who provides him with a small basic starfighter. Lonnigan refuses to pay Trent when he awakes^[21] and is mysteriously taken away by the LSF. His death is later announced and Trent is contacted by a thief who reveals the existence of a mystery party who wants the artifact in his possession.^[22] An LSF officer kills the thief but is shot by Zane in self-defense. Zane and Trent flee Liberty space; their flight eventually taking them through territories of the four Houses and pirates of Freelancer.^{[citation needed]} Trent locates xenoarchaeologists Kendra Sinclair and Dr Quintaine to learn more about the artifact. While finding additional materials for their research, they stumble upon the existence of the Nomad alien race. The Nomads are the caretakers of the empire of the long-vanished aliens who previously inhabited the Sirius sector, the Dom'Kavosh.^[23][24] They can possess humans and have slowly infiltrated the four Houses in this manner,^[25] planning to ignite a civil war to weaken the humans for conquest.

Trent joins the Order, a secret organization formed to combat the Nomads, and helps to rescue the Liberty president from the aliens.^[26] Sinclair and Quintaine's research reveals the artifact to be a map and trigger for the Dom'Kavosh's hyper gate – super jump gate – network.^[27] The Order launches an attack on what they believe to be the Nomads' homeworld to activate the hyper gates and cut the Nomads off from their power supply.^[28][29] The gates' activation sucks the Nomads to an unknown location, and the Order decides to watch over the gates for their return.^[30] With the Nomads' defeat, events return to normal in the Freelancer world. Trent and Zane are granted full pardons by the governments.^[31] Trent is asked by the Order to be their eyes and ears in Liberty space, and the player can continue playing the game without any story elements.^[32]

Development

A concept drawing of a Bretonian city

In 1997, Chris Roberts began work on a vision he had since the day he conceived Wing Commander.^[15] He aimed to seamlessly integrate cutscenes and gameplay together, and generate a single dynamic world for both single- and multi-player modes with a radically new user interface. Two years later, the project was officially announced as Freelancer at GameStock, an annual event showcasing Microsoft's games to the gaming press.^[33] Roberts announced it would ship to retailers by Fall 2000, and showed off a demo of the game.^[15] The game's setting would be massively populated with activity which have a direct impact on the economy; cities would be lively with moving transports and changing weather, computer controlled traders would import and export goods in the absence of direct player interaction, and thousands of players would interact in the same persistent world as part of this economy. The players could buy and set up their own bases of operation. The game's control used purely mouse-driven interface designed to be intuitive to users. With the implementation of the Neuronet, flight maneuvers controlled by artificial intelligence (AI) can be easily initiated — a click of a button would keep the player's starfighter on the tail of an enemy, letting the player concentrate on targeting and shooting, another click could send the starfighter taking evasive maneuvers to escape foes. Players would be encouraged to keep earning money to upgrade the power of their Neuronets. Roberts also announced the multiplayer mode would be a separate package. Freelancer was shown at Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) the same year, and won several awards. The first signs of delay however emerged with Roberts announcing the earliest release of the game could only be at the end of 2001.^[3] Nevertheless, the ambitious promises were enough for Computer Gaming World to name it one of the games which would revolutionize the gaming industry.^[34]

Freelancer skipped GameStock in 2000 but made another appearance at E3.^[12][35] Journalists queued up to 90 minutes for a glimpse of a demo which consisted of 10 minutes of introduction movie, and 20 minutes of demonstrated game play.^[36] Although they were impressed by part of the graphics and the animated facial expressions, they commented the game still needed more work and were doubtful of the promised dynamic economy. The game's shipping date was also pushed back to 2002.^[37] The date changed again to Spring 2001 in Robert's later interview with IGN, in which he also mentioned the project's coding was near completion, and that the rest of the game's contents would be finished soon after.^[12] Roberts stated they had to split the game into separate single- and multi-player portions as the single-player story would fail to work in the multiplayer setting. The player could still freely ignore the single-player's story, though Roberts felt the team had developed a compelling enough story to make the player play it through. The game's multiplayer was to allow 1500 players trading and fighting each other.^[37] To help the less experienced players against player-killing griefers, zones towards the center of the concentric game universe would be designed to be safer than those towards the edge. The safe zones would be well policed by AI security forces. If a player is witnessed attacking a non-criminal player, a bounty would be placed on the attacker. Police and bounty hunters (AI- or player-controlled) would then attack these players for the bounties.

In June 2000, Microsoft started talks to buy Digital Anvil.^[38] Roberts admitted the project's wild ambitions and its unpredictable development time required greater funds which only a huge company could provide. The project had already overshot its original development projection of three years by 18 months. Roberts trusted Microsoft would not compromise his vision for Freelancer, and believed Microsoft's faith in Freelancer selling at least 50,000 copies when finished. However, rumors of this takeover only gained prominence in December, with numerous gaming sites speculating Digital Anvil's top executives had left the company, and the Freelancer project would be cancelled or scaled back.^[39] On December 5, 2000, Microsoft officially announced their acquisition of Digital Anvil.^[40] Roberts left the company but continued as a creative consultant on Freelancer until its release.^[41] Microsoft instructed Digital Anvil to scale down the ambitions of the project, and focus on their strengths.^[42][11] Axed features were mostly Robert's multiplayer proposals.^{[citation needed]} Despite the cuts, reviewers felt Microsoft still kept the team true to Robert's vision.^[3]

The Freelancer team kept a low profile throughout 2001 before putting on a demo display at International Games Festival 2002, which drew large crowds.^[43] Microsoft announced the project was on schedule, and would be completed by the end of 2002. Reviewers noted parts of the demo looked unfinished, and dated compared with other games announced in 2002. They also wondered what specific goals players should have in the game's multiplayer mode. Digital Anvil finished adding all the content for the game in October 2002, and a closed beta test with about 500 testers was conducted.^[1] Polishing and balancing the game were the only main activities left before releasing it in March 2003. Preview builds given to reviewers revealed the automated Neuronet AI maneuvers, and the branching conversations and sub-quests were cut.^[14] To drum up interest in the game, Microsoft arranged for 30 copies of the functional beta to be randomly given away to interested gamers.^[44] Those who pre-ordered the game also received a Freelancer long-sleeved shirt.^[45] The game finally shipped to retailers on March 4, 2003,^[46] and became available online through Yahoo's Game on Demand service.^[47] Digital Anvil's last support for Freelancer was on June 6, 2003 in the form of a patch to fix server and cheating issues before their redeployment to Microsoft.^[48] In accordance with their policy, Microsoft stopped supporting Freelancer on April 8, 2008. This has resulted in the shutdown of their global server that handled the multiplayer match making.^[49]

Sumthing Else Music Works released the Freelancer soundtrack on November 18, 2003. Composed by award winning composer James Hannigan, music group Visual Music Inc., and Digital Anvil's musician Andrew Sega, it included a bonus DVD that contained the game's alternative introduction movies, concept art, scripts, and deleted content.^[50] Reviewers gave the musical scores mixed reviews, notably in their ability to convey the game's atmosphere to the listeners.^{[citation needed]} Many Freelancer communities created modifications of the game, such as The Next Generation, Crossfire and Discovery. The modifications vary in scale from introducing new ships, planets and missions; to implementing in-game clans, additional random events and a dynamic economy.^[51][52]

Reception

Freelancer's first public showing was well received by the gaming industry, and won four Game Critics Awards at E3 1999, including Best Game of the Show. The early demos and preview builds excited reviewers who only had a few misgivings over Robert's ambitious promises.^[36][37] Though constant delays and Digital Anvil's reorganization raised doubts about the game's release,^[39] the released product received mostly positive scores from the reviewers.

Scenes set against planetary systems such as this have earned praise from reviewers for their beauty.

Freelancer's graphics were rated to be average but delivered at a solid frame rate.^[61] FiringSquad commented that while the graphics were technologically behind the standards, the artistic quality made up for it. GameCritics.com and Skoar! enjoyed what they called a beautiful and realistic depiction of the universe in the game.^[17] AtomicGamer and GameSpot were disappointed that ship designs were uninteresting, and capital ships though bigger than starfighters, were much smaller than what they expected from a 2003 game.^[61] Game Nation TV said the game makes "Star Trek look like a xenomorphic zoo" since each House space has the same style throughout.^[8] GameSpy stated that while most systems have their own interesting visual style, each system is functionally the same as the next, thereby reducing the appeal for long term exploration.^[20] The cultural diversity effect is also lessened by the fact that almost everyone sounds American.^[54]

Skoar! has praised Freelancer having a non-linear game world with total freedom for roleplaying.^[17] However other reviewers lamented the huge game world was not as dynamic as they were initially led to believe. The territories of the houses and pirates never changes despite frequent raids and attacks.^[10] NPC activities are restricted to plying the trade lanes and going about fixed patrol routes. The economy is static; prices remain the same almost throughout the game, changing only once in a while with occasional news.^[56][62][20] The player is forever stuck as a lone pilot constantly repairing, resupplying, and dealing in small change; no wingmen or escorts could be hired, neither fleet nor base could be acquired as well. No distinct and readily identifiable personalities exist, and conversations run stale with only options to accept or decline a mission.^[6] The amount of background literature fleshed out the universe and compensated some of the staticness in IGN's eyes. Reviewers have also complained on the lack of mission variety. All of the freelancing missions involve destroying enemies at a particular location, with slight variations.^{[16][20][63][54]} Reviewers stated that the game becomes a chore after flying such missions numerous times.^[6][55]

Skoar! and Stratos Group agreed the long in-game cutscenes helped to flesh out an interesting single-player story.^[17][16] Although the cutscenes cannot be skipped, and hence unbearable on consequent viewing, they were initially fun to watch with facial and character animation showing off the emotions involved. AtomicGamer however pointed out the lip synching was off and produced a jarring effect.^[61] Reviewers have agreed the voice work done by the professional actors like Ian Ziering as Edison Trent, was excellent, bringing their respective characters to life.^[53][20][6] However the lone male voice voicing all the generic male encounters was derided by GameSpy, GameSpot, and Eurogamer He was criticized for his monotonous delivery, and making all his characters sound alike. This was not helped by the game's dynamic conversation system creating the same badly strung sentences and stringing them into a corny dialogue.^[56][16][17] Despite the hard work going into the planet- and station-side artwork, the animated facial expressions, and dynamic conversations, Tom Chick said they only frustrated and obstructed his desires to trade and obtain missions.^[5] He felt this was made worse by being forced to sit through all of these during the cliched story. A few other reviewers were frustrated when the story forced them to cut short their exploration and move on to another sector in order to continue the story.^[56][61] SKOAR! however said this system prevented boredom from setting in from repeated freelancing missions.^[17] The reviewers who enjoyed the story commented it ended too abruptly, leaving them lost on what to do next,^[55] or finding the continuing game unenjoyable.^{[citation needed]}

Freelancer's move to a mouse and keyboard only flight controls mostly paid off. Resembling more of first-person shooters than standard space flight simulators, and coupled with an intuitive "point and click" nature, it was said to make blowing up enemies easier.^[16][53] GameSpy stated these fights were incredibly fun and should extend the game's longevity in multiplayer. IGN pointed out while this system suited the game's focus on exploration and fast combat, the "pointing and clicking" limited possibilities. It disallowed jinking or barrel rolls, resulting in dogfights being reduced to overly simplistic and repetitive "chase or be chased" sequences which pale to those in other games of the same genre.^[8][64] The lack of wingmen control and customization, the indifference in starfighter speeds, and the uselessness of targeting subsystems were GameSpot's criticisms for what made a tactically shallow game. While Skoar! praised the AI for being able to split up and flank the player,^[17] PC Zone criticized it for concentrating only on the player in dogfights. UGO also pointed out that the player always tended to be the one who had to finish off the enemies due to the lacking friendly AI.^[63] GameCritics.com was impressed with the game's auto-navigation system. It claimed the simplicity and ease of use was convincing in portraying a believable and exciting futuristic navigation system. AtomicGamer however pointed out the bulky in-flight indicators with ugly text were not really useful during combat.

FiringSquad said multiplayer was the "best and worst of Freelancer in a nutshell". It was good that players are free to go anywhere, group with others to earn money, and trade ships and equipment. However, the static economy and universe, along with meager variety of equipment, missions and player interaction became evident during long play sessions. Game Nation TV was disappointed the multiplayer was essentially the single-player mode without a story.^[8] With no player customizations, everyone was an "Edison Trent" and unable to engage each other on a personal level. Despite those limitations, Stratos Group said players still had many options in multiplayer; as real-life counterparts are better than AI non-player characters, together they can take on missions which would have been too difficult to tackle alone.^[16] However, as the single- and multi-player missions are practically the same, IGN and GameCritics questioned the point of replaying them over and over again even with friends. Furthermore, IGN felt it is pointless to amass wealth and buy higher grade stuff when players are unable to bring their progress across to other servers. AtomicGamer praised the game for its handling of lag.^[61] AtomicGamer also pointed out that the multiplayer side will only likely appeal to a niche group, as only a small group (as compared with massively multiplayer online games) can play together in the vast playing space, a situation which UGO describes as exacerbating a sense of loneliness.^[63]

Overall, most reviewers saw Freelancer as a game solid on technical grounds, creating a game which is easily playable and fun.^[63][10] It repackaged the same old concept of having the player starting off as a rookie and ending up saving the world, with the option to continue on in its dynamic world.^{[citation needed]} It never broke or raised the bar of its genre, but boasts high production value, and has been said to be well worth the money.^[6][7] The game however was an anti-climax for those who got hooked by the touted and promised initial concepts, many of which were never realized.^[64][20] It was an over-ambitious project for a company lacking the capital to bring it through in its protracted development.^[65]

References

External links

• Official Freelancer website
• Freelancer at MobyGames
• Freelancer at GameFAQs
• Freelancer at the Internet Movie Database