Wing Commander: Privateer

The Good
Ability to play any way you wanted (merc, pirate, merchant, unpaid militia, or even friend of the Kilrathi). If you want, you can change, too.

It has elements of all types of games from action, adventure, sim, RPG, sci-fi, and strategy.

Graphics are superb. Sound creates an atmosphere and adds to the game. Clues are even given by changes in the sound.

Gameplay is balanced, and the entire game can go on without the actual story line ever being touched (although the story does offer some really nice perks).

Upgrades, different planets, trading, and merchant and mercenary guilds. The guilds really add something extra to the game, doling out credits for successful completion.

A little bit of a twist in communications. You can use your communicator to send ship to ship messages in an attempt to change a hostile ship to friendly, or vice versa.

With a linear story line you can stop the story, go get a better ship, and pick right back up where you left off.

The Bad
Privateer 2. It made a lot of good improvements in the game, but overall just didn't click.

Getting picky, here are some things that could have been better: more ships, more races to encounter, even larger universe, ability to actually make a large difference in the universe, time-line triggered events (like have new weapons be discovered as you progress throughout the game - as it was in P2).

P2 had a lot of improvements, but it totally lost the balance and flow of the game. It was basically just a movie turned into a CD-ROM game.

The Bottom Line
It is NOT another Wing Commander game. Sure, it has some parallels to the WC series, but it's totally different. It's just a well-designed game that actually works! It has a good deal of replay value as you can pick different ships, and you can always try to do something really strange like be a Kilrathi ally. It's really hard to find a game where you can ally with the enemy.

The Good
Just about everything. The gameplay mechanics were completely unique and gave an experience which has still yet to be replicated (unfortunately even with the sequel) of free roaming havok (though I've not personally played some of the space-based MMORPGs yet).

Kill enough merchants without killing pirates? Become a pirate. Pirates don't shoot you but the militia want you for dinner.

Kill enough (I believe its pirates) without touching bounty hunters... bounty hunters don't touch you.

Kill a merchant ship -- take his cargo and sell it.

The game requires an update for handhelds -- it has a fairly light load mechanically and you can play it just for 10 minute intervals if needed -- but gradually work towards ditching your Taurus for a Centurion with Mark5 sheilds kicking Kilirathi back to the top right quadrant.

The Bad
Very unforgiving if you accidentally hit the wrong person. You also can't really run it on modern machines. It desperately needs to be brought to consoles.

The Bottom Line
An addictive space sim which allows jumping from system to system. While you can simply autopilot from nav point to nav point -- its also possible to fly manual straight through the action.

Again, its free roaming and quick to put down nature makes it a perfect game for handhelds. Here's looking at you Sony and Nintendo!

The Good
The first thing that snatched me is the complete customizability of your ship. The ship that you chose to fly with towards the end of the game really managed to demonstrate to the rest of the galaxy what kind of privateer you were. And, the accessories you purchased determined how much money you were making and how good you were at making it... The second is the availability of missions. Although, the plot-advancing missions were some of the best in the game, the fact that there was always something to do in every starbase (from cargo running to bounty hunting) really enhanced the lasting appeal of this game.

The Bad
The limiting number of ships you could fly. It would have been great to fly a military surplus Broadsword, or even the Militia/Retro/Pirate craft, the talon (even if they seemed to be made of paper). If they had made all of the ships that you encountered playable, that would have given this game even more permanent value.

The Bottom Line
Think of this as a version of Wing Commander 2 - only sleeker and a lot more fun. Also, it's a lot less rigid in terms of gameplay since you do everything on your own terms. My favorite Space Combat games (for instance, Star Control 2) are always games that offer customizability and variety, and Privateer is no exception. From what I've heard of Privateer 2 (I haven't actually played it), I'm rather disappointed that not only does it have nothing to do with the original Privateer, but it also took a step backward in gameplay.