When I logged into a multiplayer game, there were a bunch of people flying around. However, there wasn’t a whole lot of chatting. People were playing on the same server, but they weren’t really playing together. Most of the people I saw were off doing their own thing. There definitely wasn’t a constant flow of dialogue. In fact, I felt I had a better conversation with the NPCs.
Here’s rough transcript from one of my multiplayer experiences…
/start transcript
New_Player: Hi!
Some_Dude: Hi!
/end transcript
The rest was me asking questions and not getting any answers.
I could see people not being chatty in games like Battlefield 1942… where you’re just to busy to talk. However, in Freelancer, you do spend time warping around. This gives just enough opportunity to say something. I guess the trick is finding the right server. In terms of chatting, Freelancer Multiplayer reminds me of Dungeon Siege. Sometimes you can end up on a dead server, other times you can group with a great bunch of people. I guess that depends a lot on luck.
My greatest disappointment with Freelancer is trying to understand why more people don’t love it. I told my friends at work about Freelancer. They wouldn’t even download the free demo. They were too busy playing Star Wars Galaxies. Well, I don’t know about the rest of the world… but I’m sick of games with monthly fees… on top of the retail box price.
You can truly emphasize the word “Free” in Freelancer. Your free to play out your character in any role you see fit. Your free to set up your server. You have a free reign of movement, to experience exciting space battles. You’re free of the monthly fee! …and there’s a FREE DEMO!