Starfighter Origins is a natty looking space combat simulator, but one focused on the intricacies of bigger battles as opposed to one-on-one dog-fights.
To many, myself included, the best and worst thing about -the exceptional- Elite: Dangerous is the combat zones and larger battles. While the game’s one-on-one fights are certainly tense, the difference between a simple duel played out between agility, skill, and load-out and a larger battle ground are enough to throw most of the rules out of the window, and increase the risk immensely.
Zipping around the pirate-laden asteroid belts a few jumps out from Bacon Market, my regular hang-out, is when the game is best, but the fact that you actively need to push and push to earn the funds to build your ship – and, should you have a bad turn of luck, get your ship back; is enough to weigh heavy on you as you bound past exploding ruins and carefully turn-away from the denser parts of the belt as you try to turn the tables on your pursuers.
Starfighter Origins then, or as it was formerly known (when we did a Greenlight Highlight on it) CDF Starfighter, is the latest game to attempt to pull that experience into a more scenario and skirmish based issue of instances. Indeed, the game is actually a rebuild of a VR title, keeping the same impressive visual style (and diverse selection of ships), but adding further improvements to various systems.
If sleek spaceships, or debris littered battlefields are your bag, then it’s definitely worth a look. You can find a recent trailer for the game below, as well as a link to the game’s Steam page (that you might wishlist it).
Starfighter Origins is set to release on Windows PCs on the 28th of March.
This space combat sim needs to have strafing abilities if it is to be taken seriously. I am all for more of a Wing Commander or Freespace game over the likes of Privateer and Elite Dangerous. It is looking like it will have decent HOTAS support (which these days is lacking such as Everspace) and soon to have TrackIR as promised by the developer. These are great but not being able to strafe is a huge turnoff for skirmishes in space where ships will not act like airplanes. Just fly Star Citizen or Elite or Everspace or any number of newer space combat sims (even older games like Freespace 2 Open) and you will see the importance of strafing.
I agree wholeheartedly, full spectrum/facility of movement in any space title is integral. Sometimes I just log into ED and find a pirate infested asteroid field – there’s nothing like a CQ dogfight in a densely populated space to make you feel like a space ace.