Independence War: The Starship Simulator

The Good
The different perspective: driving a corvette instead of a small fighter, ability to remote control other vessels (you'll need it in some of the missions), many special challanges (the "catcher" one is great), as is the one that you have to crash onboard, decent story and cut scenes. Good graphics even without 3D acceleration support.

The Bad
Many of the missions have "infinite respawn" where you HAVE to destroy the mothership while under attack from the defenders, which just keep on coming and coming no matter how many you kill. Some of the missions are more like puzzles than war. Lack of mid-mission save means you have to repeat the easy parts to get to the "challange", damage control seems to be just a bit too easy.

The Bottom Line
Independence War is a space sim that has you driving a corvette that actually obeys the laws of physics, and a great story to go with it. As the war goes on, you discover a conspiracy that will lead you to make a critical choice... This game is different from the normal space shooters, with less fighting and more thinking. On the other hand, the infinite respawning enemies detract from the effectiveness of the game, among other problems. It is almost a classic...