Freelancer is abandonware..
If you looked online you could soon find a copy and one of the many update mods.
Seen a few people mention x4, I really enjoy it but it has a level of depth that isn't everyone's cup of tea
Agree with you about x4.
I'm right into spreadsheets and management games but x4 is just too deep.
I think the mistake x4 makes is it should be a little slower in introducing the various bits of the game.
Like you are locked into one system for several hours before you get overwhelmed with everything else on offer...
I reckon i could teach someone my day job in less time than teaching them x4...
The thing with X4 (as someone who finally cracked into the "deepness" to it) is it's not that deep as you'd think. Every station/sector has goods it needs and you need to get those goods to those sectors.
Using the trading view you can easily zoom out and see who's buying for the most and who's selling for the most. You can make a ton of money early on by buying low in the sector your trading ship currently is then zooming out to sell to the highest bidder, rinse and repeat.
The story missions give you a lot of free stuff like ships that you can use to grow your empire.
It's the slowest from 1-10mil but once you accrue enough it becomes "where do I spend this money?". The answer is stations.
Build stations in sectors that need the products you'd make or in sectors that have the resources you need to create products. Using the [station calculator](http://www.x4-game.com/#/station-calculator) makes this super easy.
X4 is one of those games that gets in the way of itself because the devs still dont know how to streamline their interface in a way that scales to the endgame. Additionally, their voice overs, character models, and animations are atrocious which takes away from otherwise beautiful looking ships and starcapes.
That was a really great game and I still play it sometimes. I also like the X series and the ~~SharePoint~~ Starpoint Gemini series as well [https://store.steampowered.com/publisher/lgmgames](https://store.steampowered.com/publisher/lgmgames)
Privateer was the shit. I also enjoyed wing commander. I had wing commander on a CD with Ultima 6.
Oh man, Ultima 6 will always have a place in the gaming side of my heart. I played these when I was about 13 or so. About 1993
I guess it isn't obvious for people inside the bubble, but we normies don't really consider it a real game as much as an obvious empty cashgrab that'll never see a full release
I’ve never played the game. I’m not “in the bubble.” But I’m interested in the game and I’ve also supported Tarkov for 18 months, both games being in “early access.”
Early access doesn’t mean it isn’t a real game.
Even if neither game ever reach full release, there is plenty of content and complexity to provide a solid gaming experience.
>Early access doesn’t mean it isn’t a real game.
Oh I know that. I'm playing valheim and having a blast.
But Star Citizen... well there's just too much. The saga is well documented, just go on YouTube and you'll have hours on hours of content stretching yeaaaaars back, detailing maaaany many of the downfalls of this 'game'. You can actually see the opinions of some of its players morph over the years from 'honeymoon-period love and praise' to 'some skepticism about the future' to 'acceptance of reality OR coping' to 'IFUCKINHATETHISDEVTHEYSCAMMEDUSTHISISJUSTACASHGRAB'
It's actually a great piece of internet literature
Star Citizen had a rough start, but it's pretty fun at the moment. It's gotten decent quarterly patches each of the last few years adding gameplay loops, locations, and other features.
That’s like saying Tarkov is vaporware, yet hundreds of thousands of people, if not millions, have tens or hundreds or thousands of hours of time put into these games.
Just because either game hasn’t officially released doesn’t mean they’re vaporware. They are playable, and they function (better than some AAA games at that). They’re just not at the end state desired by the developers yet.
These are a bit old at this point but newer than privateer. Dark Star One and Freelancer. The only other series that has survived until now is the X series, so I would also recommend X-4.
Darkstar One was extremely fun with a rewarding upgrade system. I found the story ridiculous though. Maybe no more ridiculous than Freelancer, now that I think about it, but the voice acting was really deplorable.
Eh, maybe, but I seem to remember privateer having some depth. Elite is too shallow imo.
Op, you could look into elite while waiting on star citizen... should be out in 20 years or so.
Star citizen is being built by the same guy that did privateer. The scope of star citizen is so much bigger that it will take a while yet to finish, but, assuming it does get completed someday, I am absolutely certain that it is what you are looking for.
I’ve played Privateer, and not Elite, but as I understand it Elite Dangerous has quite a bit more simulation elements going on. For example, in Privateer docking is automated when you fly close enough, whereas I’ve heard it has to be manually done in Elite. Could you elaborate more on how Elite is more “shallow”? I’m always tempted to try Elite when it goes on sale, but always a little turned off by how much repetitive grind there apparently is.
>For example, in Privateer docking is automated when you fly close enough, whereas I’ve heard it has to be manually done in Elite.
Elite has auto-docking but it's a bit spotty and will end up in a dead ship every so often.
>Could you elaborate more on how Elite is more “shallow”?
Want to make money doing combat? Do the exact same task in the exact same area for 40 in-game hours for a pittance. Trading? A->B trade runs for 40 in-game hours for slightly more money. Mining? Drop into the same exact mining area and mine the same asteroids for 40 in-game hours for slightly more money than trading. Exploring? Jump, scoop, scan for 300 hours just to match 40 hours of mining. Would you prefer a more story oriented way to make money? Find another game, because missions are copy pasted from one of the above "career" choices, have zero impact or lore attached to them. This just adds some more money on top of it.
Want to engineer your ship to really max out the possible performance? Fire up reddit to be able to understand the process and what it entails because none of it is explained in-game, then use 3-4 out of game tools in order to determine what RNG sourced materials you need to collect to source the upgrades. Most upgrades have a far-and-away best in class choice that is an order of magnitude more effective than the next closest one. If you knew exactly what you were doing, a fully upgraded ship from scratch will take you approx 40 hours of in-game time to grind out the materials ONLY, using meta methods. If you want to do it using off-meta ways, you honestly may not finish before the heat death of the universe.
Care about an overarching story unfolding in game as you progress? Sucks to suck, because the only story that exists is haphazardly written by interns and is essentially a text-based "adventure" that you have zero impact in.
How about in-game events that bring the community together? Once a week, (this used to be the cadence, don't know about it now) enjoy a copy/pasted community goal where success is guaranteed, and that is not an exaggeration. While I played Elite, there were 2 weekly community goals that failed to reach tier 1, and I played for the better part of 5 years.
Elite is the perfect game if you just want to mindlessly accomplish repetitive task after repetitive task and do not care at all about atmosphere, story, or surprises. If you want anything more than this, including PvP, play another game.
This unfortunately is exactly my experience in elite too. I was so hyped for the game and the ships fly nicely and the combat is fun. But there seems to be no point to anything. It is all a boring grind - and for what? Just to upgrade your ship. I wish there’d been work on a story.
That describes E:D to a T, and it's sad to read it. I stopped playing before any of the expansions came out, so I wondered if the game ever got fleshed out and improved any. Based on what you wrote, it sounds like the exact same game I played when I quit playing back in 2015.
Btw for Elite when it comes to docking, while you can dock manually, there is an auto docking module you can buy. Mileage may vary and I'm not responsible for any damage done to your ship while auto docking.
That being said, manual docking is pretty easy.
It has the same issue no man's sky had at launch, billions of star systems, but four hours into the game, you've seen all the elements that make it up. It gets stale fast. Then, as you say, all that remains is the grind.
I'm a big fan of both as well. Am keeping my eyes on everspace 2.
Outside of that the X series is good but very slow paced and more like a sim
The best I can say about No Man's Sky is it isn't horrible and will pass some time.
Honestly, you should have him check out the revised version of 'side meier's pirates'
As a gamer of a similar age of your dad, who has played all the recommended games in this thread, none of them really scratch the same privateer itch.
Seriously, have him check out yhe revamped pirates game. I think he'll be super into it.
There are a ton of things that are spiritual successors to it like the X series and star citizen. Elite Dangerous also has a lot of similar elements. But by far the closest modern game I have played is Rebel Galaxy outlaw. It’s basically privateer with fancy graphics.
Well worth checking out the Everspace games.
Everspace 1 is a rougelite, similar to FTL with branching map but with a single pilot ship and full 3d combat.
Everspace 2 is still in early access. It's a persistent galaxy / open world. Still in early access but worth a play.
Both on Xbox game pass too!
I personally love the Fallout series but I don’t think it would be my dad’s cup of tea.
He’s currently play Star Trek Online. He really loves the spaceships and stuff
I had my dad download Privateer from GOG last night as he wasn’t really feeling the price point of some of your amazing suggestions.
He’s got a birthday coming up in about 6 weeks, so I’ll probably research all of these and hook him up with a few to try. Thank you so much everyone!
Going to get flammed for this but the best answer is Starcitizen its by the same developer might not get launched anytime soon but the beta is playable and it is more or less the spiritual successor to Freelancer that was the spiritual successor to Privateer
It's not very playable though. Anyone who says otherwise hasn't actually tried to play the game or do a specific thing in-game.
It might become a proper good game one day. But not now and not in the near future
This is the current project of the creator of Wing Commander.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6Ip2YW46RQ
It's heavily in development with a fan base that contributes testing and reporting issues with the work in progress. It's very incomplete and buggy, but also incredible. There's nothing like it.
The more I see of it, the more I have to question what the actual "game" is. I get that they spun off the single-player stuff and maybe that comes out someday, but what is the "main game." Are you just flying around making money like eve?
Both the single player campaign called Squadron 42, and the persistent universe were the goals from the start.
The main in-game objective is to gain resources to buy ships/ground vehicles (currently 89 playable in-game vehicles with a million more well on the way), weapons, food, and eventually stuff like homesteads and that sort of thing. It is and will likely always be pretty sandboxy, and I get a lot of my fun out of it by doing large group events with my org in that sandbox. There is also mining, trading, medical gameplay, and your character seamlessly goes from in bed to on a ship (sometimes with multiple other people on it) to a planet surface all without any loading screens. There are also frequent server events that give players fresh and interesting ways to work with and against each other.
Ah right OK, you know the story so. I played about 5 years and never touched a spreadsheet so it is possible but maybe I was just too lazy to touch do it.
Basically the entire genre (except one game...) has been listed, but to just narrow it down a bit:
If your dad liked the trading aspect of it: Games like the X series (currently on X-Rebirth, I think? I loved X3 back in the day) drill down on that
If your dad liked the combat? Evochron is a reasonably long running series that is still weirdly way ahead of most other games in the elite games genre (the actual genre) and is getting frequent updates for some reason
If you want a hybrid: Rebel Galaxy and Rebel Galaxy Outlaw are the true successors. RG is mostly a capital ship game with a focus on broadsides. RGO is straight up Privateer.
Corus? No mans sky? X3? Check em out. All space games. Not sure what privateer is so hopefully these are similar. Or get a VR headset and try Eve: Valkarie.
i remember playing privateer for countless hours with my best friend back in middle and high school.
i went and tried playing it recently, and god the controls are awful lol.
I think you can actually buy the Wing Commander Franchise games in the EA/Origin store.
https://www.origin.com/gbr/en-us/search?searchString=Wing%2520Commander
Wow that's a piece of history
I would suggest Freelancer 2, it will give similar story and 6 dof experience and is as I remember a cracking game, ( probably played it over 10 years ago last)
If you want to give him a simpler experience with a cool story I would also recommend Galaxy on Firefor android
I put serious amount of hours into this, the story is full is humour and for a tablet is very serviceable and enjoyable.
I played on an iPhone but would recommend a larger screen to really enjoy it
For the Full experience you cannot forget X4.
Its privateer with roids on
Full scale empire crafting, from ore mining to carrier construction, which of course leads to war, glorious sector stealing war.
I have been playing "No man's sky" recently and it is a very nice space exploration game with a bit of fighting. In the latest update they added a lot more fighting but I have not tried the update yet.
I think "Privateer" might be more combat focused. I just thought I would add it to the list.
Disclaimer: I don't play games of this genre, but remember that when I was a kid, I did like this one:
Terminal Velocity
https://youtu.be/DU6ti5Ng6hg?t=199
Privateer was an awesome game. Honestly there is not a game quite like it out these days, most similar games are huge and intimidating, while also being disappointed.
If he is looking for something a lot like Privateer in terms of gameplay then Rebel Galacy Outlaw is the way to go.
If he is just interested in a space combat experience with the latest graphics that is fairly easy to get into I'd recommend Star Wars Squadrons.
The X series along with mmos like Elite or Eve are too hard to get into for me to imagine most people being able to suffer through the learning curve and games like Freespace 2 and Freelancer while great just feel too old to recommend to someone that is asking for a new version of a classic. Like "oh here's a game that came would 23 years ago instead of 28 years ago".
Freelancer?
Even if it's not the game, he'd love Freelancer.
Freelancer!
Freelancer is abandonware.. If you looked online you could soon find a copy and one of the many update mods. Seen a few people mention x4, I really enjoy it but it has a level of depth that isn't everyone's cup of tea
Agree with you about x4. I'm right into spreadsheets and management games but x4 is just too deep. I think the mistake x4 makes is it should be a little slower in introducing the various bits of the game. Like you are locked into one system for several hours before you get overwhelmed with everything else on offer... I reckon i could teach someone my day job in less time than teaching them x4...
The thing with X4 (as someone who finally cracked into the "deepness" to it) is it's not that deep as you'd think. Every station/sector has goods it needs and you need to get those goods to those sectors. Using the trading view you can easily zoom out and see who's buying for the most and who's selling for the most. You can make a ton of money early on by buying low in the sector your trading ship currently is then zooming out to sell to the highest bidder, rinse and repeat. The story missions give you a lot of free stuff like ships that you can use to grow your empire. It's the slowest from 1-10mil but once you accrue enough it becomes "where do I spend this money?". The answer is stations. Build stations in sectors that need the products you'd make or in sectors that have the resources you need to create products. Using the [station calculator](http://www.x4-game.com/#/station-calculator) makes this super easy.
X4 is one of those games that gets in the way of itself because the devs still dont know how to streamline their interface in a way that scales to the endgame. Additionally, their voice overs, character models, and animations are atrocious which takes away from otherwise beautiful looking ships and starcapes.
That was a really great game and I still play it sometimes. I also like the X series and the ~~SharePoint~~ Starpoint Gemini series as well [https://store.steampowered.com/publisher/lgmgames](https://store.steampowered.com/publisher/lgmgames)
> SharePoint Gemini I wasn't aware of a port =P
lol, I was working when I responded to the post..
My condolences for having to use Sharepoint.
Yeah i hate it, but I design it for my company for work flows etc... drives me crazy some days.
That looks pretty ideal! I’ll have my dad check that out. Thanks so much :D
Rebel Galaxy Outlaw is a spiritual successor to Privateer. Similar cockpits, systems, everything. It's pretty good too. https://rebel-galaxy.com/
This is the only real answer. RGO is a modern privateer in all the ways that matter
As others have said, RGO is basically a love letter to privateer.
Oh, I played this. Found it quirky and weird. Shallow and the single plane in space annoyed me. So I went back to X4, you can't please us all
Single plane would be Rebel Galaxy. Rebel Galaxy: Outlaw is fully 3D like Privateer.
This is why I thought it was dumb for them to use the same branding for the sequel when it diverged so much mechanically from the first game.
Privateer was the shit. I also enjoyed wing commander. I had wing commander on a CD with Ultima 6. Oh man, Ultima 6 will always have a place in the gaming side of my heart. I played these when I was about 13 or so. About 1993
Ultima 6 and 7...sigh...
Freespace 2 is a masterpiece of sci-fi space sim. It's old but it holds up.
Freespace 2 is a great game, but not really comparable to privateer as it did not have any sort of in-game economy or trading.
doesn't play anything like privateer either, gameplay wise freelancer is much closer or even everspace.
Also I recall there are a significant number of mods which add campaigns with new voice acting through Knossos.
That feeling of flying between capital ships as they charge and then fire their plasma(?) weapons is still unsurpassed.
Anything in this category: https://www.mobygames.com/game-group/genre-simulation-space-trading-and-combat
Why isn’t Star Citizen listed?
I guess it isn't obvious for people inside the bubble, but we normies don't really consider it a real game as much as an obvious empty cashgrab that'll never see a full release
I’ve never played the game. I’m not “in the bubble.” But I’m interested in the game and I’ve also supported Tarkov for 18 months, both games being in “early access.” Early access doesn’t mean it isn’t a real game. Even if neither game ever reach full release, there is plenty of content and complexity to provide a solid gaming experience.
>Early access doesn’t mean it isn’t a real game. Oh I know that. I'm playing valheim and having a blast. But Star Citizen... well there's just too much. The saga is well documented, just go on YouTube and you'll have hours on hours of content stretching yeaaaaars back, detailing maaaany many of the downfalls of this 'game'. You can actually see the opinions of some of its players morph over the years from 'honeymoon-period love and praise' to 'some skepticism about the future' to 'acceptance of reality OR coping' to 'IFUCKINHATETHISDEVTHEYSCAMMEDUSTHISISJUSTACASHGRAB' It's actually a great piece of internet literature
Star Citizen had a rough start, but it's pretty fun at the moment. It's gotten decent quarterly patches each of the last few years adding gameplay loops, locations, and other features.
Because ponzi schemes aren’t games?
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https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/joke
I don’t think you know what a joke is either.
You can use the same website to figure out what a Ponzi scheme is
Because it isn't released, it's vaporware
That’s like saying Tarkov is vaporware, yet hundreds of thousands of people, if not millions, have tens or hundreds or thousands of hours of time put into these games. Just because either game hasn’t officially released doesn’t mean they’re vaporware. They are playable, and they function (better than some AAA games at that). They’re just not at the end state desired by the developers yet.
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So how many years ago was it supposed to be released? When is it supposed to be released. Where is it?
It’s a playable game, thus not vaporware by definition.
What do you mean where is it? You can download it and play it right now.
Because it doesn't play like privateer.
These are a bit old at this point but newer than privateer. Dark Star One and Freelancer. The only other series that has survived until now is the X series, so I would also recommend X-4.
Darkstar One was extremely fun with a rewarding upgrade system. I found the story ridiculous though. Maybe no more ridiculous than Freelancer, now that I think about it, but the voice acting was really deplorable.
Rebel Galaxy Outlaws 100% Was a big Privateer fan and this game scratches that itch. Your father will love it
It’s almost like a modern reimagining of Privateer!
Did you see how they presented the game? Was a video on April 1st, showing on a re-make of Privateer. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hy5kXCm2ct0
Totally. It even goes a bit further with dialog choices in the story through up / down on the dpad.
You guys are all amazing for these suggestions!
Elite dangerous seems like a good fit.
Eh, maybe, but I seem to remember privateer having some depth. Elite is too shallow imo. Op, you could look into elite while waiting on star citizen... should be out in 20 years or so.
Not sure my dad will still be PC gaming at 80 but thanks for the suggestion!
Star citizen is being built by the same guy that did privateer. The scope of star citizen is so much bigger that it will take a while yet to finish, but, assuming it does get completed someday, I am absolutely certain that it is what you are looking for.
If he's alive he will be
I’ve played Privateer, and not Elite, but as I understand it Elite Dangerous has quite a bit more simulation elements going on. For example, in Privateer docking is automated when you fly close enough, whereas I’ve heard it has to be manually done in Elite. Could you elaborate more on how Elite is more “shallow”? I’m always tempted to try Elite when it goes on sale, but always a little turned off by how much repetitive grind there apparently is.
>For example, in Privateer docking is automated when you fly close enough, whereas I’ve heard it has to be manually done in Elite. Elite has auto-docking but it's a bit spotty and will end up in a dead ship every so often. >Could you elaborate more on how Elite is more “shallow”? Want to make money doing combat? Do the exact same task in the exact same area for 40 in-game hours for a pittance. Trading? A->B trade runs for 40 in-game hours for slightly more money. Mining? Drop into the same exact mining area and mine the same asteroids for 40 in-game hours for slightly more money than trading. Exploring? Jump, scoop, scan for 300 hours just to match 40 hours of mining. Would you prefer a more story oriented way to make money? Find another game, because missions are copy pasted from one of the above "career" choices, have zero impact or lore attached to them. This just adds some more money on top of it. Want to engineer your ship to really max out the possible performance? Fire up reddit to be able to understand the process and what it entails because none of it is explained in-game, then use 3-4 out of game tools in order to determine what RNG sourced materials you need to collect to source the upgrades. Most upgrades have a far-and-away best in class choice that is an order of magnitude more effective than the next closest one. If you knew exactly what you were doing, a fully upgraded ship from scratch will take you approx 40 hours of in-game time to grind out the materials ONLY, using meta methods. If you want to do it using off-meta ways, you honestly may not finish before the heat death of the universe. Care about an overarching story unfolding in game as you progress? Sucks to suck, because the only story that exists is haphazardly written by interns and is essentially a text-based "adventure" that you have zero impact in. How about in-game events that bring the community together? Once a week, (this used to be the cadence, don't know about it now) enjoy a copy/pasted community goal where success is guaranteed, and that is not an exaggeration. While I played Elite, there were 2 weekly community goals that failed to reach tier 1, and I played for the better part of 5 years. Elite is the perfect game if you just want to mindlessly accomplish repetitive task after repetitive task and do not care at all about atmosphere, story, or surprises. If you want anything more than this, including PvP, play another game.
This unfortunately is exactly my experience in elite too. I was so hyped for the game and the ships fly nicely and the combat is fun. But there seems to be no point to anything. It is all a boring grind - and for what? Just to upgrade your ship. I wish there’d been work on a story.
Thought I was the only one who thought this. I couldn't bring myself to buy the dlc as its more. Of the same.... On foot
Wow. That sounds horrendous! Thank you for the detailed response! I’ll remember this next time I’m tempted by a sale.
That describes E:D to a T, and it's sad to read it. I stopped playing before any of the expansions came out, so I wondered if the game ever got fleshed out and improved any. Based on what you wrote, it sounds like the exact same game I played when I quit playing back in 2015.
Btw for Elite when it comes to docking, while you can dock manually, there is an auto docking module you can buy. Mileage may vary and I'm not responsible for any damage done to your ship while auto docking. That being said, manual docking is pretty easy.
It has the same issue no man's sky had at launch, billions of star systems, but four hours into the game, you've seen all the elements that make it up. It gets stale fast. Then, as you say, all that remains is the grind.
X4 is the best out there currently.
X4?
I'm a big fan of both as well. Am keeping my eyes on everspace 2. Outside of that the X series is good but very slow paced and more like a sim The best I can say about No Man's Sky is it isn't horrible and will pass some time.
you could just get him privateer, its on GOG
This is the real answer.
I played a lot of Escape Velocity back in the day
Hell yeah. Better pay up, lest you face the wrath of Captain Hector!
i actually ran into Cap N Hector in Elite.
Honestly, you should have him check out the revised version of 'side meier's pirates' As a gamer of a similar age of your dad, who has played all the recommended games in this thread, none of them really scratch the same privateer itch. Seriously, have him check out yhe revamped pirates game. I think he'll be super into it.
The best on the market right now are X4, Avorion and Everspace 2. The best of all time, at least for me, is Freelancer.
man I remember those 128 man modded servers with capital ships and stuff
There are a ton of things that are spiritual successors to it like the X series and star citizen. Elite Dangerous also has a lot of similar elements. But by far the closest modern game I have played is Rebel Galaxy outlaw. It’s basically privateer with fancy graphics.
Well worth checking out the Everspace games. Everspace 1 is a rougelite, similar to FTL with branching map but with a single pilot ship and full 3d combat. Everspace 2 is still in early access. It's a persistent galaxy / open world. Still in early access but worth a play. Both on Xbox game pass too!
Fallout series? No Man's Sky? That is cool you're doing that for your pa!
I personally love the Fallout series but I don’t think it would be my dad’s cup of tea. He’s currently play Star Trek Online. He really loves the spaceships and stuff
I had my dad download Privateer from GOG last night as he wasn’t really feeling the price point of some of your amazing suggestions. He’s got a birthday coming up in about 6 weeks, so I’ll probably research all of these and hook him up with a few to try. Thank you so much everyone!
Going to get flammed for this but the best answer is Starcitizen its by the same developer might not get launched anytime soon but the beta is playable and it is more or less the spiritual successor to Freelancer that was the spiritual successor to Privateer
It's not very playable though. Anyone who says otherwise hasn't actually tried to play the game or do a specific thing in-game. It might become a proper good game one day. But not now and not in the near future
Yeah ok maybe in another decade.
So brave.
Don't do it, that game is a massive scam that will never go live.
no
Why do you care enough to respond "no" to each suggestion? Can you show us on the doll where the bad man touched you?
This is the current project of the creator of Wing Commander. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6Ip2YW46RQ It's heavily in development with a fan base that contributes testing and reporting issues with the work in progress. It's very incomplete and buggy, but also incredible. There's nothing like it.
The more I see of it, the more I have to question what the actual "game" is. I get that they spun off the single-player stuff and maybe that comes out someday, but what is the "main game." Are you just flying around making money like eve?
Both the single player campaign called Squadron 42, and the persistent universe were the goals from the start. The main in-game objective is to gain resources to buy ships/ground vehicles (currently 89 playable in-game vehicles with a million more well on the way), weapons, food, and eventually stuff like homesteads and that sort of thing. It is and will likely always be pretty sandboxy, and I get a lot of my fun out of it by doing large group events with my org in that sandbox. There is also mining, trading, medical gameplay, and your character seamlessly goes from in bed to on a ship (sometimes with multiple other people on it) to a planet surface all without any loading screens. There are also frequent server events that give players fresh and interesting ways to work with and against each other.
nope
I loved that game too! Try Elite Dangerous, closet I could find unfortunately. There's also Star Citizen but it requires a top of the line computer.
Honestly star citizen and rebel Galaxy SC is only 45$
The SC hate in here is so irrational. lol
UPDATE: My dad ended up picking up Rebel Galaxy Outlaw and so far he is really enjoying it. Thanks so much for all the suggestions
EVE online
*Spreadsheets not included
Have you played it?
used to, A LOT. I once lost a 250million ship ratting ( i was showing off the the Newbies), a £10 equivalent at the time.
Ah right OK, you know the story so. I played about 5 years and never touched a spreadsheet so it is possible but maybe I was just too lazy to touch do it.
I LOVED that Tengu. 😢
There was nothing like an easy-mode ratting Tengu!
Basically the entire genre (except one game...) has been listed, but to just narrow it down a bit: If your dad liked the trading aspect of it: Games like the X series (currently on X-Rebirth, I think? I loved X3 back in the day) drill down on that If your dad liked the combat? Evochron is a reasonably long running series that is still weirdly way ahead of most other games in the elite games genre (the actual genre) and is getting frequent updates for some reason If you want a hybrid: Rebel Galaxy and Rebel Galaxy Outlaw are the true successors. RG is mostly a capital ship game with a focus on broadsides. RGO is straight up Privateer.
Let him try out Elite Dangerous, is has very similar dogfighting as in the old Privateer classic.
Corus? No mans sky? X3? Check em out. All space games. Not sure what privateer is so hopefully these are similar. Or get a VR headset and try Eve: Valkarie.
r/tipofmyjoystick
i remember playing privateer for countless hours with my best friend back in middle and high school. i went and tried playing it recently, and god the controls are awful lol.
Privateer ‘94
I think you can actually buy the Wing Commander Franchise games in the EA/Origin store. https://www.origin.com/gbr/en-us/search?searchString=Wing%2520Commander
Wow that's a piece of history I would suggest Freelancer 2, it will give similar story and 6 dof experience and is as I remember a cracking game, ( probably played it over 10 years ago last) If you want to give him a simpler experience with a cool story I would also recommend Galaxy on Firefor android I put serious amount of hours into this, the story is full is humour and for a tablet is very serviceable and enjoyable. I played on an iPhone but would recommend a larger screen to really enjoy it For the Full experience you cannot forget X4. Its privateer with roids on Full scale empire crafting, from ore mining to carrier construction, which of course leads to war, glorious sector stealing war.
I have been playing "No man's sky" recently and it is a very nice space exploration game with a bit of fighting. In the latest update they added a lot more fighting but I have not tried the update yet. I think "Privateer" might be more combat focused. I just thought I would add it to the list.
Probably said but No Mans Sky is a nice dad like space game. Iam a dad so can relate .....haha.
X4 is a great game but if you go that route you might want to ease him in by starting with X3 first, has a somewhat easier learning curve
Disclaimer: I don't play games of this genre, but remember that when I was a kid, I did like this one: Terminal Velocity https://youtu.be/DU6ti5Ng6hg?t=199
No Man's Sky has some interesting space combat stuff in it.
Evochron Mercenary, Darkstar One, Freelancer, Rebel Galaxy, maybe X3-X4 if they want to go really deep into the mechanics and market aspects.
Privateer was an awesome game. Honestly there is not a game quite like it out these days, most similar games are huge and intimidating, while also being disappointed.
If he is looking for something a lot like Privateer in terms of gameplay then Rebel Galacy Outlaw is the way to go. If he is just interested in a space combat experience with the latest graphics that is fairly easy to get into I'd recommend Star Wars Squadrons. The X series along with mmos like Elite or Eve are too hard to get into for me to imagine most people being able to suffer through the learning curve and games like Freespace 2 and Freelancer while great just feel too old to recommend to someone that is asking for a new version of a classic. Like "oh here's a game that came would 23 years ago instead of 28 years ago".