It's a great game that everyone should get. It's beautiful, with a great flight model and deep mechanics. The sci-fi world they built is also very different from your usual space game, far more in line with the realism of a show like The Expanse than what we usually see.

The addition of a quick-skirmish mode will only make it more enjoyable for every player. You all can see how great the dev has been. It really should be an automatic purchase for the entire Linux community for a game that has the potential to be a space-sim classic.

BTW: The Space Junkie podcast did an interview with the dev that makes for really interesting listening if you're into the space sim genre: https://www.spacegamejunkie.com/podcasts/sgj-podcast-224-helium-rain/ [External Link]

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So I'm split on this one. As a casual gamer just looking for the occasional skirmish, I don't actually feel a huge difference between playing this solo and playing a different FPS like Tannenberg with multiplayer. The feel is pretty similar. In both games, groups of soldiers run headlong towards the enemy, often into ambushes. I wonder if some of the difference is psychologically knowing one has a "real" intelligence behind it and the other not? That said, I can imagine that after hours of gameplay, the cracks in the bots' AI shows. I've seen the kamikaze vehicles too (although this is sometimes unintentionally funny and entertaining) and the AI is very inconsistent. I've had bots nail me with a handgun at sniper distances that'll be maddening. In general, though, I find a game with great bots to be virtually as satisfying as playing against humans.

I do agree, though, that I wish they would stop adding more "stuff" to this game and just nail the essentials like the pathfinding and bot AI. A bomber's great, but if the AI flies it into a mountain, who cares? The boat is awesome, but if the AI runs it aground, what good does it do?

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Did you get a little worried at the start of that headline?

I honesty did!

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Oddly, it runs for me on Ubuntu 17.10 but not on my Solus machine with the same Nvidia drivers...

That said, I love this game and enjoy playing it much more than Everspace. The engine is great, silky smooth. Great graphics. The downside is that the missions are kind of thin, but it's $5. At some point after formal release the developer is going to open it up to modding, and I bet that will be huge, as every franchise could be adopted to this combat engine so well. I can see SW and BSG being natural fits.

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For those of us unfamiliar with the background/backstory, can someone explain the difference between Wine and Wine-staging? Are they different projects?

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Quoting: PublicNuisanceBeen using Solus for my main system for a week or so now. Liking it so far.

Absolutely a distro to watch. I think they've said they want to tackle dedicated GPU/Intel dynamic switching at some point, which would be quite awesome...

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Anyone have a direct email contact? Maybe we need to start writing them...

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Not a fan of Witcher 3's genre, but may need to try it given all the accolades...

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Quoting: slaapliedjeThere are some reports of almost getting Elite: Dangerous working under wine in 'normal' mode. I kind of wonder if the Linux thread on the Frontier development forums is the longest 'can we have a Linux version please?' thread out there. I'm pretty sure it's up to 2000 something posts. I'd have to look again. I know it's been active for years though.

If you need a space fix in the interim, Helium Rain in EA is quite a sweet game so far. It's no AAA like ED, but very satisfying...

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[quote=slaapliedje][quote=Dunc]

Quoting: iiariHmm, what Distro? [for FS2 open launcher install] Looks like the launcher and all the goodies are packaged for Debian Sid

I used the direct download file from the project website, always on Ubuntu derivatives (Gallium OS, Mint, Gnome). I'm glad it's out there and theoretically install-able by someone, but I've already climbed that mountain and have a working version via Wine and I'm not sure I'm willing to start from scratch again, although I have a tinkering laptop I can try it with again (although not until December after some work stuff is done).

Thanks for looking into it!

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