Starflight

The Good
The Sega Genesis port of the DOS game Starflight is most probably the best version of this stellar game. The graphics got a major boost, and all the content is here.

Scientists in your home colony have just discovered that your system's sun is going to go nova, and so you are given a barebones ship and the task of finding other colonizable worlds....But there's more to the story than that. It's quite good, I won't spoil it.

Essentially, this game plays a lot like Star Control 2. You explore a truly massive sector of the galaxy, entering over 270 solar systems, and exploring over 700 planets. You can land on these planets to mine for minerals, capture specimens, and occasionally find rare and useful alien artifacts, which can be used to endow your ship with extremely useful alien powers. As you make money, you can upgrade your ship, your landing craft, and hire and train better crew members. There are several alien races to contact and deal with, and you can make friends or enemies of them by your actions.

The Bad
The sound and music are good but unremarkable. The ending isn't spectacular, but you don't really play this game just so you can get to the ending. The game can be difficult if you're not careful, but that's probably not a negative point for most people.

The Bottom Line
This game is truly staggering in size, enormously addictive, deep, and non-linear. Certainly one of the best Genesis games out there, not to mention one of the better PC-to-console ports I've seen.

The Good
This game provides a freedom that other linear games do not. The story is there, and the items are placed. Should you stumble across them, they're yours. (I've actually done this). The story is ready for you to unfold as you figure it out.

Another thing I really enjoyed about this game is the way to acquire things. You mine planets for valuable minerals, and return them to Arth for money.

The Bad
The bad parts of this game are, due to it's nature, it doesn't have much replay value. The ending is pretty unsatisfying, and there could have been more about the Uhlek to go into. The music is mostly non-existent, but what is there is good. The sound sucks, but I blame that on the Sega, not really the game.

The Bottom Line
It's a space adventure game where you can meet other races and get information via use of diplomacy. Sometimes you won't like what alien races have to say, and sometimes they won't like your response to what they have to say... unless you're a pushover. There's a lot of map to explore... It's a fun game. Recommended.