Star Wars: X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter (DOS) - Let's Play 1001 Games - Episode 829

I'm Gaming Jay: Youtube gamer, let's player, fan of retro games, and determined optimist... Join me in this series while I try out EACH of the video games in the book 1001 VIDEO GAMES YOU MUST PLAY BEFORE YOU DIE, before I die. The game review for each game will focus on the question of whether you MUST play this game before you die. But to be honest, the game review parts are just for fun, and are not meant to be definitive, in depth reviews; this series is more about the YouTube gamer journey itself. From Mario games to the Halo series, from arcade games to Commodore 64, PC games to the NES and Sega Genesis, Playstation to the Xbox, let's play those classic retro games that we grew up with, have fond memories of, or heard of but never got a chance to try! And with that said, the game review for today is...

Star Wars: X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter

Star Wars: X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter is a 1997 space combat game developed by Totally Games for LucasArts. It is the third installment of the X-Wing series.

Featuring several technical advancements over the original releases of its predecessors, X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter runs on Windows, requires a joystick, features a CD audio soundtrack, supports high-resolution graphics, and brings texture mapping to the ship models of the in-flight game engine. It includes robust multiplayer options for up to eight players in free-for-all, team-based, and cooperative play modes, and has a sophisticated pilot and mission selection system that tracks the player's points and awards. In addition to selecting what craft they will fly, the player can choose their squadron (and thus role in combat) for each mission.

While all content could be played single-player, it is the only part of the series designed primarily for multiplayer, and it lacked a story-driven campaign. LucasArts later released an expansion called Balance of Power to satisfy popular demand for story-driven campaigns, and to further expand on the multiplayer features.

Totally Games created an expansion pack called Balance of Power in response to criticism that the game didn't offer enough in single-player mode.[2] Apart from new battles and missions, Balance of Power features a Rebel and an Imperial campaign of 15 missions each. The campaigns supported 8-player cooperative play. The parallel narratives of both campaigns revolve around the same series of events, and feature their own cutscenes, but with alternate endings.

X-wing vs. TIE Fighter involved huge technical challenges to deliver a satisfactory multiplayer experience. In contrast with most popular multiplayer shooters such as Doom and Descent, it required far more data tracking and flow. This was due to the typical FPS taking place in a closed environment of rooms and corridors where players have little knowledge about other players' status or whereabouts unless they are looking directly at them. The deep space setting of X-wing vs. TIE Fighter, along with the conventions established in earlier titles, required information about all craft be available to all players all of the time.[4]

Lead mission designer David Wessman took responsibility for the decision to avoid implementing a single-player storyline. "I am primarily to blame for the lack of story in [X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter] because I convinced myself and everyone else that we didn't really need it."

[Sportsvee]

This series of games and the original Battlefront games were awesome. So well made and fun to play. Although, in one mission I figured out you could just sit there and shoot the enemy as it flew its set course 🤦‍♂️ Great to watch again, thanks Jay 🎉

[xyonblade]

Ooooo, I loved these flight sims back in the day.

[lexington]

For the main display there is a key to put up the radar and not the fighter display.

[Heliophanus]

Not just three movies. There were tons of comics, etc.

[lexington]

Oh, I loved this game back in the 90s. I played all the X-Wing ang TIE Fighter games.

[rebelmerlin]

Hello, I was wondering if you could let us know how you recorded the ingame footage? Currently I am trying to do so with OBS but am having lots of difficulty with all the different capture modes (WIndow capture, Game capture and Display capture).

Thanks

P.S I am using the Steam version not sure what version you are using here.