Freedom Force

Moby ID: 6047
Windows Specs
Note: We may earn an affiliate commission on purchases made via eBay or Amazon links (prices updated 3/23 9:18 PM )
Included in See Also

Description official descriptions

Freedom Force is a real-time tactical role-playing game which allows you to create and customize your own superheroes.

Along with the ability to create your own skins, names and super power attributes, you can take your team of superheroes out in the town to defeat countless enemies, improving the experience points of your character. All of the buildings and items in each city are destructible and you can throw most items at your enemy.

The single player campaign starts with you taking control of Frank Stiles. Frank overhears a conversation between two scientists about a secret experiment. The scientists discover Frank and leave him to die by a glowing statue. Luckily for Frank, the statue turns him into Minuteman, and now you must stop the scientists from getting away.

As you dive deeper into the story, you will gain teammates, each with their own special powers, and even more deadly enemies to defeat.

Groups +

Screenshots

Promos

Credits (Windows version)

211 People (160 developers, 51 thanks) · View all

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 84% (based on 38 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.8 out of 5 (based on 71 ratings with 5 reviews)

Great Caesar's Ghost!

The Good
No one would have believed in the middle years of the twentieth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man’s and yet as mortal as his own.

Scratch that.

From the far reaches of time and space, impending doom streaks towards the Earth!

Much better, this is the Silver Age after all.

Patriot City, 1962—An old man sits on a park bench, dwelling on the events that led to his expulsion from Los Alamos. Catching a scientist giving secrets to a Russian, the old man makes a valiant attempt to crush the communist plot only to be struck down at the foot of the Minute Man statue. But wait, the statue glows! The mysterious Element X leaves the statue it’s imbued and revitalizes and rejuvenates the old man. Now this man, taking the name Minute Man, dons the colonial costume of his namesake, wields a staff, and forms Freedom Force, a society of like-minded superheroes dedicated to the defense of liberty. Little do they know that this is all part of a master machination.

Freedom Force is a cross between an action-role playing game and a real time strategy game. Initially players take control of Minute Man, chasing the spy through the park and around town. Through a series of pop-up tutorial windows, we learn that Minute Man can leap atop tall buildings, rip lampposts from the ground and hammer thugs with them, and has a few basic attacks.

Minute Man controls rather easily. Players click where they want Minute Man to go and he runs to that location (leaping when necessary). Clicking on enemies (mostly thugs at first) uses the default attack and right-clicking on them brings up more options. Minute Man’s initial powers include a powerful punch, an arcing swipe with his staff, and a somewhat limited missile attack. Performing these actions depletes his stamina, so players must exert a little strategy since a winded superhero doesn’t do anyone much good. Minute Man also has the requisite health bar that determines the amount of damage he can take.

Minute Man gains experience when he completes a mission. He also earns prestige points by taking out opponents and completing secondary objectives. Prestige points can be lost if he or his enemies hurt innocents or cause property damage. Prestige points act as currency allowing Minute Man to recruit new members to Freedom Force, either ones that came with the game or player created ones—more on this later.

Even though the first few missions are Minute Man specific, he soon teams up with Mentor, an alien being with psionic powers. Mentor fills in some of the back story and is the first of the story mode characters (ones that the player doesn’t need to recruit). Before long, Minute Man meets up with El Diablo, Man-Bot, and Alchemiss, giving the player real options when creating a party to go on a mission.

Most missions allow for four party members and few of them have required characters. Doubtless players will have their favorites. Minute Man faded into the background as I preferred El Diablo’s flying powers and ranged fire attacks. Even if you leave characters on the back burner (sorry Mentor), they still gain some experience which keeps them in the game.

When characters level up, their core stats don’t change but they do gain more health points and stamina. They also gain new abilities and can power up existing ones. The ability tree seems somewhat rudimentary, since you have to buy and level up seemingly unrelated powers to get the ones you really want. Players also have the chance to buy attributes like flight or poison resistance depending on the character.

Missions typically have the same objective—take out the enemies, but since that covers rescuing a nuke from Nuclear Winter, fighting giant ants, pummeling dinosaurs, or defending the Freedom Fortress from an army of giant robots, it’s unlikely the player will get bored anytime soon. There’s very little repetition in the game’s thirty something missions—except, of course, where the story calls for it.

If you don’t like the characters offered by the game, there’s a character creation screen that lets you design your own superhero. Want a purple hulking beast that can fly and shoot fire? Want an icy lass who’s faster than a speeding bullet and made out of rubber? It’s all here, in a somewhat rough form. Players can design their own heroes, but still need enough prestige points to recruit them. It’s far too easy to design the ultimate hero and then find out that purchasing her is mathematically impossible.

Tired of generic heroes? Want some licensed men in tights to boss around? Check the fan community for Freedom Force versions of popular heroes complete with authentic powers and animations. You have to love a game this well supported.

The Bad
I installed the game and was quickly met with a message that Freedom Force wouldn’t work with my version of Windows (XP SP2). The game asked me if I wanted to continue any way and I said yes, hence this review. If you have XP SP2, it’s probably best to go in expecting to fail. There is a rumored patch on the way (as of 2.05) which addresses this issue.

People I’ve talked to, who didn’t like this game, have legitimate concerns over controlling four characters in real time, especially on levels which require dividing the team. While you can (and must) issue orders while paused, I wonder if another control scheme would have worked better. I do wish that the interface allowed better control of units spread across town—especially since crossing the road can be deadly. If a car (usually a taxi) doesn’t want to stop, it knocks the health points right out of a character. I highly recommend installing the patch which addresses Liberty City’s traffic problems.

Finally, while you can save anywhere in a mission, you keep overwriting the same save spot. Saved missions appear in alphabetical order, not sorted by date or time, so it can take a little effort finding the correct one to load. I’m not sure if any patch helps with this.

The Bottom Line
This game essentially is a playable Silver Age comic book. The voice acting and dialogue is campy and the graphics are cartoony, but not in a pejorative sense. Rather the game captures the excitement of that era without the use of irony. I found it to be the gaming equivalent of sitting in front of a big box of comic books.

Windows · by Terrence Bosky (5397) · 2005

Best interactive comic game ever!

The Good
Let me be honest, I'm not a comic book fan. I might have bought a comic book or two back when I was a kid/teenager, but I honestly never cared much for comics of any kind, especially superhero comics. This game, however, made what was to me a rather silly medium (superhero comics) into something completely and utterly awesome.

From the start of the game with the 'secret origins' of various superheroes, to the finale, the game provides what is the single finest atmosphere of any game made in the early 2000's. You don't just feel like you're playing a superhero game, oh no, you really do feel like you've stepped into a world of Silver Age comics with all it's cheesy, over-the-top glory!

The dialogue is deliciously corny, the heroes's one-liners and motifs are so stereotypical of what they're supposed to be representing that it's just awesome. El Diablo is an ex-Mexican gang member who's imbued with fire based superpowers, and he never lets you forget that he’d Spanish. It reeks of typical 60s and 70s comics and cartoons that its hilarious. The action is riveting and the colorfully named super powers just reek of creativity and lets you feel like you’re wreaking some serious havok on the villain’s mooks as they come your way and attempt to prevent you from stopping their wickedly over-the-top plan to take over Patroit city.

The villains are very colorful and so is the city and environment, everything looks like it was ripped directly from those old marvel or DC comics of the past. I heard that there are a lot of jokes and easter eggs in the game that reference the Silver and Golden Age of comics, but seeing that I’m not much of a fan of comics, I unfortunately have not been able to spot much of them. The fact that I still enjoyed this game immensely is proof that you don’t need to be a comic fan to enjoy it.

The Bad
The only negative things I can think of about this game is that sometimes the combat can be very chaotic as you try to control your heroes and cycle through the somewhat power selection. Having to wait for their energy recharge mid-battle can be quite hectic at times. Other than that, I can’t think of anything else wrong with it.

The Bottom Line
This game is one of the best, most atmospheric superhero games ever created. It is really one of the most perfect interactive comics ever. For gamers who like riveting action in over-the-top settings and colorful characters/adversaries, or for comic book fans who love superheroes, there's something for everyone here.

Windows · by Salim Farhat (69) · 2013

An action-packed romp through a 1960's comic book world.

The Good
There is so much to like about Freedom Force that it is hard to know where to begin. The graphics are outstanding. The characters and settings are colorful and detailed and the animation is well done for the most part. You can easily zoom in and out which makes for some spectacular looking screenshots, especially with the added "action balloons" that say "Zap!", "Whoosh!", "Krak!", etc. just like you were in an animated comic book.

The sound is very well done too, with a good variety of interesting music and sound effects. The voice acting is generally excellent -- it sounds like it is straight out of those old Adam West Batman TV shows.

The gameplay is where Freedom Force really shines, though. The hot keys allow you to pause the game or play in slow motion, and most attacks and movement can be done entirely with the mouse. The enemies are varied enough so you don't get tired of fighting the same foe, and there are a wide variety of strategies that can be used to defeat your enemies, especially since on most missions you can select the heroes (or build your own) that you want to use. Even if you don't use a variety of powers it is still fun to fight just with found objects such as thrown park benches or uprooted lamp posts.

Character development is pretty well done. The built-in heroes are well-balanced and have a variety of powers to play with and customize, and if you get bored or frustrated with the built-in heroes you can make your own with the easy to use character creator. If you really want to customize your hero you can download additional hero meshes and skins from web sites and use them for your characters or even design your own if you have the proper tools.

The Bad
There are a wide variety of ways you can build your heroes, but some abilities are a lot more effective for the character point cost than others. For example, you can complete almost all of the scenario missions with a high-speed guy with a medium damage extreme stun attack. Some statistics are not very useful in comparison to others. Because the hero abilities are not well balanced in some cases (especially the Agility stat vs. Speed or Energy) the most effective characters all tend to kill the same way - by stunning.

Another problem with the game is multiplayer. You can only do deathmatch style play, and it is difficult to control a team of players since you cannot pause as effectively as you can in single player. The worst problem with multiplayer is that there aren't enough point restrictions -- you should be able to restrict the point costs of powers and ability scores as well as the total cost of the hero to keep people from designing boring one-dimensional heroes just to win multiplayer. It is also dissapointing that some of the more interesting powers like Cloning and Cloak of Shadows do not work in multiplayer.

The other problems with the game are minor gameplay issues such as only being able to use melee attacks when on the ground, and not being able to jump or fly when carrying objects, no matter what the strength of the character or weight of the object you are carrying.

The Bottom Line
Freedom Force is an action packed romp through a 1960's comic book. The gameplay is similar to other 3rd person squad-based games such as Fallout Tactics or the combat portions of Baldur's Gate 2, but a lot more refined, especially because the camera can move and the graphics are rendered in 3D not 2D. The environment is fully destructable and usable, so if you are surrounded by a circle of bat-wielding thugs, just pull up the nearest lamp post and bash away. The game features a single-player mode with a wonderfully campy plot and well designed heroes and bad guys. The multiplayer mode allows you to battle with premade or custom heroes in a variety of settings.

Windows · by Droog (460) · 2002

[ View all 5 player reviews ]

Trivia

Awards

  • Computer Games Magazine
    • March 2003 (Issue #148) - #9 overall in the "10 Best Games of 2002" list
  • Computer Gaming World
    • April 2003 (Issue #225) – Strategy Game of the Year
    • April 2003 (Issue #225) – Best Story of the Year
    • April 2003 (Issue #225) – Best Art Direction of the Year
    • September 2006 (Issue #266) – Introduced into the Hall of Fame
  • GameSpy
  • PC Gamer
    • April 2005 - #50 in the "50 Best Games of All Time" list

Analytics

MobyPro Early Access

Upgrade to MobyPro to view research rankings!

Related Games

Freedom Force: Freedom Pack
Released 2009 on Windows
Freedom!
Released 1992 on Apple II
Freedom
Released 1974 on Mainframe
Freedom Force vs The 3rd Reich
Released 2005 on Windows
Freedom Finger
Released 2019 on Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, PlayStation 4
Freedom Wars
Released 2014 on PS Vita
Freedom Poopie
Released 2015 on Linux, Windows, Macintosh
Freedom Cry
Released 2015 on Windows
Freedom Fighter
Released 1987 on Arcade, CD-i

Related Sites +

Identifiers +

  • MobyGames ID: 6047
  • [ Please login / register to view all identifiers ]

Contribute

Are you familiar with this game? Help document and preserve this entry in video game history! If your contribution is approved, you will earn points and be credited as a contributor.

Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Kartanym.

Macintosh added by Kabushi.

Additional contributors: PCGamer77, Sciere, Zeppin, Patrick Bregger.

Game added March 27, 2002. Last modified March 7, 2024.