In 1996, I had an Acer Aspire computer. It was green.
It came with a flying game, in which you flew over mountains and shot at bad guys. They flew some kind of ships that weren’t planes.
As far as I can remember, the game had no end. You just flew around, got shot at, and shot ships down. You didn’t have any missions or anything and you never landed. You just blew up if you took too many hits. Or you could accidentally crash into a mountain.
For some reason, I want to experience this game again. There was something peaceful and simple about it – or maybe I’m just reminiscing about my peaceful and simple post-college life.
Anyway, I don’t know what the game was called, and all searches for “Acer Aspire game” turn up nothing.
Anyone have any ideas? Or even better – a link where I could play or download the game?
The game I’m looking for wasn’t Tyrian, or at least not that version of it. The environment was 3-D, and you had a POV out the cockpit. The mountains and enemy ships were very clearly polygons; this was just the beginning of those kind of graphics.
If you scroll down on that link you sent me, astro, you’ll see something that looks somewhat similar, in brandonkeys’ post. He calls the game Descent. I don’t think that’s it, either – he says that it was published by Interplay, while I think my game was some kind of Acer-only creation.
The little gameplay video in that link shows chapters and missions and a backstory, and my game had nothing like that. There was no afterburner option or anything fancy in the controls.
The graphics look very similar, though. So maybe my game is a cousin, or even an ancestor, to Terminal Velocity.
The demo to Terminal Velocity had no missions or chapters I don’t think. I seem to remember it being just an endless level where you went around shooting basically regenerating enemies until you got bored. At least that’s what my memory tells me, it was years ago (obviously)
There were three games of this sort I know of: Hellbender, Fury3 and Terminal Velocity. Two of them were mission-based and were pretty much the same game (although one had free airspace while the other used more canyons). The third one had open airspace and caves, and could be distinguished from the others by your ability to slow to a complete halt.
I just downloaded and played Terminal Velocity, and it really feels like the mystery game.
It doesn’t quite match up with my recollections, but between my faulty 15-year-old memory and the demo version lacking some of the effects, I think I have to declare this mystery solved.