Dark Star One
During the holidays, my brother gifted me with a copy of Dark Star One. When scorpionis saw that I got a new game, she cried out in joy, "Thank the Gods! Now maybe he'll stop playing Freelancer!"
Then I showed her the game. "No, honey. This is the sequel."
DS1 isn't a traditional sequel in which the same people or company produce another updated version of an older game. Digital Anvil built Freelancer, but the Microsoft borg absorbed it before the promised sequel was produced. The Ascaron label produced DS1, and as far as I know, no one from Freelancer had any part of it. (I also don't follow industry gossip, so I could be very wrong about this.)
Anyway, the rundown is very familiar to the Freelancer crowd. You've got a spaceship and lots of excuses to run around kicking ass. The VR is sweet and the universe is so incredibly detailed that it slows my computer to a crawl. (Must get new video card.) If Heaven is like where you are right now, only better, DS1 truly is heaven for Freelancer players. Better handling and control (joystick now an option), better combat opponents, and (somewhat) more realistic physics and economics models. Best of all, play is much more free-form, allowing more fun shoot-em-up time between the storyline action set-pieces.
I just hope that the large number of "systems" in the game makes up for otherwise limited number of upgrades and trade goods. The lack of a MMO may limit the longevity of the game's support, but since I hardly ever play MMOs, it doesn't disappoint me too much.