Star Wars: TIE Fighter

Due to the success of X-Wing Vs. TIE Fighter, and the sheer popularity of STAR WARS, X-Wing Collector's CD and TIE fighter collector's CD have received a facelift.

TIE Fighter Collector's CD, originally was the complete edition of TIE Fighter including all of the missions (including the separate expansion disks), as well as additions such as spoken briefings and slightly enhanced inflight graphics. The new release has completely revamped the in flight graphics to the level of X-Wing Vs.TIE Fighter, and A new intro movie sequence. It also has added music run from CD tracks instead of the original General MIDI, and the CD tracks are directly from the STAR WARS Soundtracks. You can play the music on a CD player when you are not playing the game. The CD music is only heard during spaceflight in the game. TIE Fighter itself is an excellent spacecraft simulator in which you fly Imperial fighters against the criminal activities of the Rebel Alliance. Missions in TIE fighter range from training missions to chasing after Imperial defectors. Mission structure is better than that of Wing Commander IV: The Price of Freedom (I have yet to play Wing Commander Prophecy).

The movie portion is where Wing Commander soundly defeats it. The plot is good but not to Wing Commander standards. The time span of TIE fighter is during Empire Strikes Back starting shortly after the Rebel defeat on Hoth (X-Wing goes from before A New Hope up to relocating to Hoth)and ending somewhere before Return of The Jedi (The upcoming X-Wing: Alliance will deal with the rebel side of Return of The Jedi and posibly afterwards).

The plot to TIE Fighter is separated into "Battles" which are sets of missions in various systems (there are twelve battles, the first seven are the original game, the rest are from the expansions). Battle One deals with securing the Hoth system, and capturing Rebels attempting to flee to The Outer Rim Territories. Battle Two deals with ending a Civil war between two neigboring planets in the Sepan system. Battle Three involves establishing a space platform near the Outer Rim. The first three battles can be completed in any order but the later ones must be done in order. The plot thickens later on with defections and advancments in technology. I do not want to spoil the rest of the game for those who have yet to play it, so I won't go into much more detail. TIE Fighter Collector's CD has been re-released in two versions. There is a separate TIE Fighter Collector's CD and There is a boxed set called X-Wing Collector's Series that contains X-Wing Collector's CD, TIE Fighter Collector's CD, and a stripped down version of X-Wing Vs. TIE Fighter called X-Wing Vs. TIE Fighter: Flight School.

For many reasons, this is easily the BEST space-flight simulator ever to be made as of 2002. Don't let the fact that it came out in 1995 fool you. With amazing game dynamics and an unparalleled storyline, this game will not only pull you through the missions and levels, but also into the story itself.

You find yourself not as a terrorist rebel of the Skywalker universe, but as a sentinel, an elite sentinel, of the Emperor's vast and powerful war-machine. Missions start off as you start off in your career, as a nobody pilot whose skill quickly shows itself. By the end of the game you have been recognized by the entire Empire and are the Emperor's Hand in all his starfighter operations. You fly alongside Lord Vader, a witness of the spectacle that is possibly the greatest pilot in the galaxy, and take your orders from Grand Admiral Thrawn, the methodical and genial Imperial naval tactician whose shear brilliance nearly brought a new age of Imperial rule years later. Missions are not the everygame hubub of attacking and defending with a few surprises here and there; no way, these missions get nearly impossible by the end, and you have no choice but to become not just good, but the best, capable of crushing all opponents who stand in your way.

This game doesn't just allow you a platform to become a good computer game pilot, it gives you the experience, the training, the cunning, and the shear technological prowess, to beat the best not only the Rebellion, but the Empire, can throw at those loyal to the Emperor. Oh, and you WILL be loyal to the Emperor by the end of the game.

Actually, that comment may be inviting great disagreement, given the many Star Wars games that have come out since. But this one occupies a warm place in my heart, for one important reason: ever since seeing the first Star Wars movie, I'd always wondered what it would be like to pilot an Imperial TIE fighter in the service of the Empire against the Rebel Alliance.

In this game you start off flying unsheilded craft: the TIE fighter, bomber, (easily the worst ship you have to fly in the game due to both it's snail-like speed and it's lack of sheilds,) and the interceptor, the best of the unsheilded fighters (though, sadly, you only get to fly it in four missions in the entire game). Many people may not like the idea of flying ships with no sheilds, but here are some vital tips to get you through without having to replay any one mission too many times: Always get behind the rebel fighters and attack their backs. This will keep you out of the way of their blasters. Frequently push the E key to use your targeting computer to see if any enemy ships have targeted you. If you find the situation too hot to handle, call for your wingmen to come to your aid (Shift C,) or fly close to a friendly capital ship or platform. (There will always be one nearby, since unsheilded Imperial craft also lack hyperdrives.) If the missions are still too hard to beat, you can lower the difficulty level to easy, though that will result in point loss. In later missions you'll get to fly sheilded craft such as the Assault Gunboat, the TIE Advanced, (also referred to as the "TIE Avenger",) and the never-before-seen TIE Defender, the most powerful fighter in the game. If you're a Star Wars fan, this is a must-have.

Since NONE of them have remotely accurate physics, my vote for best space combat sim is Tie Fighter. This is possibly the best incarnation thereof. Tie Fighter had all sorts of different weapons, all sorts of different missions, capships to blow up (though not as big as in Freespace (2).) What more do you need? Just because it has a low polygon count doesn't mean it's not great.

I remember picking up a copy of TIE Fighter back in 1995, that was the floppy version. TIE Fighter is an example of the best in game design. At the time it had revolutionary 3D graphics (when Wing Commander was still 2D.) The storyline was sort of between the scenes of the movies.

One of the best features of TIE Fighter is its usage of Timothy Zahn's amazing trilogy. You'll find some nice references, and see some favorite people, namely Thrawn.

If you've never played this game, as long as you can bear some older graphics, you will love it. I reccomend the X-Wing Collector's Series as it's designed for Win9x and is 3D accelerated. You lose the original MIDI soundtrack (which I sorta miss, it sounds really really nice on a good sound card) but that's an ok tradeoff for the texture mapped graphics.

You simply can't go wrong with TIE Fighter.