This is where you come in: in Freespace you take on the role as a rookie pilot in the GTA fleet and move on from there on in fighting the enemy forces, first the Vasudans and later on the Shivans. Controlling your craft is easy and the flight model feels very responsive, much more so than in any of the Wing Commander games we must say. And the fact that Freespace can be played with a keyboard or mouse without any hassles is nice too as not everyone has a big expensive joystick at their disposal (nor does everyone want one either), albeit this type of game is best played on your own (an oddity in today's games).

The basics of the game are quite simple and for those that have little experience with this type of game there are a few training missions embedded within the campaign to help newbies with controls and learning how to engage/disengage etc.... It might be good to run these through even for seasoned pilots if you're not already accustomed to Freespace's unique interface.

Once in-flight, the controls and gauges start to look familiar. You've got speed gauges, shields (later on in the game) and of course a reticule so you can aim and then bang things up pretty badly. When in mission you're always presented with a bunch of objectives to be met. Whether you do meet the objectives or not doesn't really matter as long as you don't die you can still progress to the next level. But, as Freespace features a branching storyline your effectiveness in accomplishing the set goals, be they search and destroy, recover artifacts or defend allied forces, have a direct influence on the next mission.

In addition, there are a whole host of different tactics to master in Freespace. A wide range of enemy ships spread out over the 40 missions are included in the campaign. Each has its own unique features and hence different strengths and weaknesses. Taking down a freighter does require a different approach from stopping a bomber on a bombing run. To effectively dispose of enemy cap ships is quite tricky at times requiring that you come up with special tactics based on what type of defenses said cap ship has.