Descent: Freespace the Great War (Official Strategy Guide)

Rating:
Summary: Great
Review: Gives good mission descriptions, walkthroughs. The game is great, the book makes the perfect companion for the game. One problem with the book is the first section. I found the ship descriptions to be mostly useless, except for the speed information. The mission tree was great, allowing players to experience all levels of the game.

Rating:
Summary: Great
Review: I found this book well-written and posessing good overall appearance, but lacking in useful content. Over 1/3 of the first part, which introduces the craft and weapons, is mostly the same information that can be found in the user's guide or on the freespace web site. Although the mission descriptions are good, they are not detailed enough to really present new, winning strategies. There were no references to awarded medals, and how to earn them all, and I noticed that at least several "hidden" objectives in some missions were not mentioned. 90% of the strategy and mission content was information I already knew from playing the game for about 20 hours. Overall, though not a bad book, I would not hold very high hopes for learning alot more about the strategies.

Rating:
Summary: Not a bad guide, but lacking in content
Review: I found this book well-written and posessing good overall appearance, but lacking in useful content. Over 1/3 of the first part, which introduces the craft and weapons, is mostly the same information that can be found in the user's guide or on the freespace web site. Although the mission descriptions are good, they are not detailed enough to really present new, winning strategies. There were no references to awarded medals, and how to earn them all, and I noticed that at least several "hidden" objectives in some missions were not mentioned. 90% of the strategy and mission content was information I already knew from playing the game for about 20 hours. Overall, though not a bad book, I would not hold very high hopes for learning alot more about the strategies.

Rating:
Summary: A near perfect try, for newcomers in space sims.
Review: Official strategy guides of simulations or space combat simulations (like in our case) have a certain layout. Have used enough of them and be- lieve my saying. The work at hand, is a good to very good guide but it has some defects that make it fail the perfect 5 star rating: Colour. What's the matter ? Are they jealous of flushing, or they think readers can't recognise colours ? We want ship stats and pictures from the game and we want them in colour. Mission branching. Is not present. It's better to say where the player is led to by a certain outcome, and show it by a tree diagram, than to say alternative missions and just lay down words. Picture it to us. Describe to us the alternative mission in a separate chapter. Also, where are the loosing game paths ? Where is the backstory ? It's good to cut into the chase, but a portion of those who buy these books, need a backstory, a reasoning of playing in a certain way. Also a nice touch to exhibit the multiplayer missions, but since we get Acts and different cut scenes that get us into the story, it would be good to picture this information here (look at Official Guide to: Wing Commander 4 and Wing Com- mander 3 with the ISN inserts to get my meaning). Why I wrote the defects ? The book is complete to all other aspects and there's no need to re-tell them: ship stats, foe presentations, weapons, mis- siles, strategies, hints, mission descriptions and briefings, winning notes, just everything. Seems finally that writtings a perfect guide is not dif- ficult, but needs a better planning and a PC gamer attitude towards the final product.

Rating:
Summary: A near perfect try, for newcomers in space sims.
Review: Official strategy guides of simulations or space combat simulations (like in our case) have a certain layout. Have used enough of them and be- lieve my saying. The work at hand, is a good to very good guide but it has some defects that make it fail the perfect 5 star rating: Colour. What's the matter ? Are they jealous of flushing, or they think readers can't recognise colours ? We want ship stats and pictures from the game and we want them in colour. Mission branching. Is not present. It's better to say where the player is led to by a certain outcome, and show it by a tree diagram, than to say alternative missions and just lay down words. Picture it to us. Describe to us the alternative mission in a separate chapter. Also, where are the loosing game paths ? Where is the backstory ? It's good to cut into the chase, but a portion of those who buy these books, need a backstory, a reasoning of playing in a certain way. Also a nice touch to exhibit the multiplayer missions, but since we get Acts and different cut scenes that get us into the story, it would be good to picture this information here (look at Official Guide to: Wing Commander 4 and Wing Com- mander 3 with the ISN inserts to get my meaning). Why I wrote the defects ? The book is complete to all other aspects and there's no need to re-tell them: ship stats, foe presentations, weapons, mis- siles, strategies, hints, mission descriptions and briefings, winning notes, just everything. Seems finally that writtings a perfect guide is not dif- ficult, but needs a better planning and a PC gamer attitude towards the final product.