I was playing some Everspace 2 and while it sure is pretty and feels pretty good there was something lacking that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. I’m only 20 hours or so into it but I just felt like it wasn’t quite living up to my memories of Freelancer.
Now I last played Freelancer over 15 years ago so I was sure that I was just seeing this through a heavy mist of nostalgia, so I reinstalled the old game, installed the HD mod and a few other user made tweaks and loaded it up. The opening scenes were definitely nostalgic but once I started to fly missions properly again it became crystal clear, nope Freelancer still kicks the shit out of every other space game I’ve ever played since.
Elite Dangerous, Rebel Galaxy Outlaw, Everspace 2, Spacebourne 2, EVE Online, (edit adding more I’ve played here: Chorus, Star Citizen, No Mans Sky) they all have strengths but nothing feels as good as the grand daddy Freelancer.
Freelancer just got everything right. First and foremost are the controls. Combat is just so much fun because of it. It might not be the most strategic combat system, it might not be the most realistic, but boy is it fun. It's responsive and immersive, the weapons feel great to shoot and sound amazing. The only other game that came close was Aquanox in this regard.
It's not trying to be too much, most of the game is rather simple but to the point. The UI gives you all the information you need but doesn't overload you.
The progression was spot on. You spent enough time in each area to get familiar with it but you moved on before it had a chance to get boring. Same with your ship progression. You got new ships at a decent rate. The mix between free exploration time and furthering the story was right. The spacing between points of interest was just right, big enough that you could feel the vastness of space but not too wide to spend endless time traveling. Especially the difference between traveling amongst established lines and going "offroad" was right.
Freelancer just focused on what is important and delivered on it. There are a few areas it could have been more. Especially faction diplomacy and economy is an area that in a game released today would feel too shallow. But it didn't matter for Freelancer because it delivered where it matters and that was a fun space shooter game.