Spaceforce - Rogue Universe

I read a review of a game called "Space Force: Rogue Universe" here:
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/sim/spaceforce2/review.html?sid=6172039
Saying: "-Large, open-ended space exploration and combat game
-Two games in one, with a story mode and a free-form role-playing mode
-Beautiful visuals capture the wonder of space."

Seems very interesting! So I went to the official site:
http://www.spaceforce-game.com/fetures.aspx

I'll quote something from there:

"Player is able to develop his avatar following the role he/she likes to play in the game and can choose between trader, spy, soldier, scientist, headhunter, doctor, pirate, policeman or simply an adventurer"

"An open ended, beautiful and innovative 3D space environment decorated with stars, planets, moons, asteroids, comets, black holes, star bases, floating cities and open for exploration, trade, crafting, diplomacy, fight"

"Player is able to explore the galaxy as a member of one among 10 civilizations placed on different starting location across the universe

"Trade goods, destroy ships and buildings, explore unknown anomalies and ancient ruins, visit orbital stations and distant places and travel using jump gates"

The screenshots look lovely:
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/sim/spaceforce2/images.html?tag=tabs;images

It seems that while the game has already been released the 1.0 retail version was not in a very finished state (that's the standard nowadays with smaller devs). However they seem to be actively developing patches with 1.1 already out fixing numerous bugs:
http://www.gamershell.com/download_20364.shtml

And 1.2 coming up:
http://www.spaceforce-game.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=1772&FID=1&PR=3

The team behind this also seems to be actively discussing things with the community. About the team: "The studio is located in Zagreb, Croatia, where we have focused on developing new ways to make full open ended and non-linear content in games. In the few years that this team has existed, we have developed and published several game types"

This game seems interesting. I'm propably gonna wait and see a bit how they are doing with that patching thing and I'm thinking about getting this game. Has
anyone here played this? And I'm not very interested in impression on the demo version of the game. Has anyone REALLY played this game? I'd really like some opinions/comments about this.

EDIT: Did some more digging.
- The game seems to be actually "Spaceforce 2"
- Opinions among fans/players seem very divided. Some love it white others complain about bugs or the difficulty of the game.
- Play.com is selling it for 23 euro / 15 pounds.

EDIT2: Oh, and I felt there's enough roleplaying elements here to be discussed in this forum (among bioshock and stalker...)

EDIT3: Seems like theres' some active fan modding things going on as well:
http://www.x-dc.net/sf2/

I read lots of opinnions and reviews. Last I remember the story was boring. Somthing about brother finding his lost sister (this plot scheme is getting dry). The free roaming is not so good either and there are bugs. I tried to find positive comment for the game but there simply was none.

Finally I went and picked xwing collection & xwing alliance. The story is good in those and the spacesims are great. They simply dont make them that good anymore.

Well, I for one would very much like a new free-roaming space RPG.

Found another nice review. The negative things in the game according to this reviewer seem to be the interface, lack of tutorial and voice-acting. These are definately not a big deal for me. Everything else seems fine. Also he complains that the game is too hard. To me challenge is always a good thing
http://pc.gamezone.com/gzreviews/r30750.htm

"SpaceForce: Rogue Universe offers two very different modes of play. The first is the story mode, which plays out with set missions. For this mode, you play as an avatar set by the game as you progress through the universe and the game’s campaign. The second is a free-form RPG-esque game that allows you to create your own character and beat your own path across the galaxy. The game’s universe in this mode is huge, giving you tons of hours of gameplay and countless paths to take and missions to perform."

The rating is 7 and the conclusion is:
"SpaceForce: Rogue Universe has an admirable amount of depth, but the unintuitive interface and lack of a tutorial system are extremely frustrating."

Well.. Haven't played the game but to me this is something very interesting indeed. I'm still seriously thinking about ordering this.

Zakhary said:

Well, I for one would very much like a new free-roaming space RPG.

Click to expand...

Me too but it seems like a pipedream. They dont even make normal spacesims anymore. The genre is barely alive. Best games are the old ones. No wonder they still sell them.

Zakhary said:

Well.. Haven't played the game but to me this is something very interesting indeed. I'm still seriously thinking about ordering this.

Click to expand...

There is a demo you could try before ordering it.

I used to be very.. VERY sceptical if not outright dismissive of these games made by small developers from eastern-europe.

Then I played Space Rangers 2. Absolutely loved it. It's propably the most original, interesting and just plain fun games made in the 2000's.

Zakhary said:

Then I played Space Rangers 2. Absolutely loved it. It's propably the most original, interesting and just plain fun games made in the 2000's.

Click to expand...

It was "interesting" but not a spacesim. More like a 2D space shooter from the 90s with 3D rts and other smaller stuff.

Yeah I know it's not a space-sim. I did not mean it like that.
As I said it was the game that removed my scepticism of those
eastern-european games made by small teams.

Also here's a nice FAQ I dug up in case someone other than mee feels
that this game might be interesting:

http://www.spaceforce-game.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=112

It has lots of good info. For example the game has no copy protection whatsoever. A team member stated:

"No we are not bothering with that. Who wants to buy it, that one will buy and who wants to copy that one will copy. There is no chance that we can force someone to buy our game. With copy protection we can only harm sincerely ones that properly buy our game. And if someone like game why don't buy. It only can get better sequel. Especially from us, because we are very small team in development."

Very nice IMO. It has dozens of spelling mistakes but the message is clear and solid. Glad at least someone understands this

Also sys reqs:
Processor min 1.4 GHz
DirectX 9 compatible graphics card 128 MB
16 bit sound card
512 MB of RAM

It contains lots of useful info for those interested.

I had it for another site but passed it on to another reviewer. The person is new so I can't assess their opinions ... so no help from me

Well, some of the voice acting is absolutely terrible. I mean, think bad, and it's a lot worse than that. I can usually ignore bad voice acting and/or dialog (I prefer proper english but beggars can't be choosers) so I can deal with that. Another issue, however, is that the game screams to be played with a proper joystick but when it comes down to it, the game doesn't properly support one (no z-axis, throttle or hat support).

The game looks pretty nice though and if I can look beyond the control and language issues it might turn out to be a nice little game ... but right now, I'm too busy playing catch-up with the huge pile of games on my desk that have been waiting for my newly acquired rig to find that out. For now, Space Force has been placed at the bottom of the pile.

I think I will wait for a patch or two (Seems like those control issues are being worked on too according to the official forums) and start preparing myself for the first run of NWN2 with the soon to be released 1.07 patch.