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What's all the talk about MoO3??? I've played the prequals and also ST: Birth of the federation, and I realy can't see what MoO3 can offer of new gameplay..
Of course graphics will be improved, but still...

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Actually, I'm not sure about your last sentence. MoO3 seems to look extremely poor at times, and I think Gabe(?) from Penny Arcade said it best when he suggested that the game was probably created by some vengeful gaming god to see whether gameplay actually was all you cared about.

Let's just say that some of us really loved the other "Master of..." games (MOO1&2 , Master of Magic) , and MoO3 is promising to be easily the most complex game of the genre. For most people , it's probably going to seem convoluted and boring (not that I blame them) , but I'm really looking forward to controlling every little detail of my future galactic empire.

As for Generals, I wasn't too happy with it.
Sure, the graphics are extremely pretty (the explosions are easily best I've seen yet in a game - infantry does look a bit ugly though), but the single player is just too short and unimaginative. It's all just "build a base, kill the enemy" now. Compared to the Red Alert games, which features extensive naval battles, base defense missions, and the unforgettable "Tanya" commando operations, that is a bit disappointing IMO.
I also miss a real story and characters. I could live with ingame cutscenes if they were as well-done as in Age of Mythology or atleast Warcraft 3. But in Generals? There's just a bunch of scripted sequences as briefings, where you're simply told whom and what to destroy, and occasionally treated to a nice vehicle chase (although the "matrix effect" looks kind of cheap and misplaced), but not introduced to any possibly interesting characters.

for some reason, MOO3 looks too much of a job than a game. I play game to relax and have fun, but moo3 is indeed a very, very deap game which require lots of attention and dedication to fully appreceate it. I am not sure I can give this game that much since I have so many other games to play. I am yet to finish most of my xbox games and I still have some amazing pc games that I am not done with (homeworld, homeworld: cataclysm).

I am also looking forward to Imperium Galactica III. The visual are astonishing and to my suprise, the demo, made for matrox videcard, run flawlessly on my P3 600Mhz with Ati Radeon 64 ddr video card. I never though I could be a game that good looking with all details on on my computer.

Guibs

Anyplace you can download the Imperium Galactica III without subscribing to the site? I would like to try that demo.

The only game i will bye apart from fl this year is vietcong you can down load the multiplayer demo and patch at www.vietcong-game.com But be warned its very realistic.which to me can only be a good thing.

Get the Imperium galactica demo here...

http://www.pcgameworld.com/details.php/id/3088/

Thanks dredloch

I found the demo of IG3. The graphics are amazing and the game was very smooth with all the details maxed out even on my Geforce4 MX440. I can see why fans of Homeworld and Starfleet Command would like it. But I do not think it is the type of game Freelancer is. As such...I will past.

ive read a little about MOO3, mostly story, how does the game actually work though, for example what is the gameplay, is it text based? i don't get it.

_____________________________
Peace through superior firepower.

MO3 does have some cutscenes and action during the combat. And when you interact with the diffirent aliens and such..there is some nice graphics involved...but I do not feel it will be as good as the first Master of Orion was. Master of Orion did some things better than the first one..but the main complaint I had about it was...all the ships looked about the same. In Master of Orion3 that will be improved..but the combat happening all on it's own and the winner being decided who has the best ships....is a turnoff for me. I would like the option of using your own tactic in combat..such as was done in the first two. It was possible to defeat fleets that were stronger than yours if you used the right strategy. And the interface in MO3 looks too much like a Excel spread sheet for my taste. But I was willing to overlook that if they had done the combat better. The Master of Orion games are a empire building career in space. Think of them as Civilization on a galactic scale.

Personally, I'm going for MOO3 before Freelancer, because my computer cannot support 3d games yet, for some reason.
Whenever the 3d card is in use, it freezes up randomly. Not always, but eventually. Very annoying.

You can control battles in MOO3, where did you think that battles were always AI controlled? You don't control individual ships, though, but you do control taskforces. With about 200 ships in combat, controlling individual ships is not good, but you put them into taskforces instead, and control them in groups.
The official site is here

There are some reviews and action reports by betatesters in the thread here

At least untill I could solve this problem with my computer (which I assume would prevent me from playing Freelancer anyways, even if I did buy it.) I'll try to get Moo3.

Why make your own mistakes when someone else has already made them for you?
-Learn from the skeletons floating in the piranha pool: NO SWIMMING!

White Tiger you can control both fleet and ground combat in MoO3 its just you dont control individual ships, you control task forces which is a good thing, the main problem with MoO2 is that you had to control each ship one at a time, which is ok if you only have a few but when you have about 20 it gets really boring selecting each ship and then selecting a target and thats just for one turn. Thats what annoyed me about MoO2, so i think the combat will be better, and in MoO2 you could just get away with building huge ships packed with guns, you cant do that in MoO3 you have to specialise(sp?) and have ships which concentrate on long range attack for example or point defence.

Also being able to select strategies for ground combat is a nice change, in MoO2 it was all automatic.

As for the graphics although there not amazing i think they look good, the game is mainly menus, maps and sliders but thats what the rest of the series was like, and according to reviews the AI for both colony management and diplomacy is good.

If you wanna check out MoO3 heres some sites(some have links to reviews):

Main Site
Orion Sector (Fan Site)
Apolyton

As you can guess i cant wait for MoO3 so im getting it as soon as its released im in the UK so its gonna be another month or so before freelancers released so i dont have this problem.

EDIT: Damn it took me so long to write all this Whasp beat me to it!
EDIT: When am I gonna learn how to spell?


Edited by - NJS The Great on 20-02-2003 01:07:40

Here's my take on buying two new games at the same time:

I'LL NEVER DO IT AGAIN!

The turmoil was too much for me to handle. I bought Icewind Dale and Diablo 2 at the same time, and was unable to enjoy either one, because whenever I played one, I suddenly wanted to go back and play he other. I started to feel guilty when I played one more than the other one, also. It's really pretty sick, actually.

I plan to buy and play Freelancer until I start to get tired of it (1-2 months usually), then I'll look into getting Gothic II or trying out StarWars Galaxies or EVE online to keep me busy until Deus Ex 2 comes out this summer.

I used to buy games one after another. Sometimes as many as 3-5 games a month, but now I buy about 5 or 6 a year, but they are only games that I really, really want. My first title of 2003? Freelancer, of course!

Agreed, relish the experience of one game at a time. Let FL be you all-consuming devotion, and eating, sleeping, breathing become unecessary afterthoughts.

"If this is what you want to do, you'll do it, no matter how long it takes..........and usually the longer it takes the more fun you've had!"

@PCHolt: I agree. Monogamy is the only way to go!

I also 100% agree with Holt. But the problem is, I also get 5-6 games a year, and they mostly come all one or two weeks apart from each other!

I mean, in November, several great games came just days/weeks after each other, Medieval: Total War, NOLF2, Icewind Dale 2, UT2003...then there came several dull months with games as groundbreaking as "Magic Casino 25000"

Now we have all these great games again that are coming just weeks apart, the pattern repeats after every season (or gaming quarter).


I pity da foo, thug, o villian that trys takin' over da world, then comes home cryin' to his mamma!
-Mr. T