Sync
Contents
General Info
Released: 15th December 2004
Author: Ransom Arceihn
Missions: 39
Mods included:
StratComm's Hedetet
SCP Required
Story
Two years after narrowly escaping death in an uncharted nebula, three mercenaries are hired to escort a duo of freighters to the Betelgeuse system. It quickly becomes clear that this is no ordinary mission; pirates beset them at every step of their journey, wave after wave, not responding to hails or backing off even when the GTVA steps in.
Then they reach their destination. You lose control of your ship, a subspace tunnel opens ...
Propelled into a distant galaxy populated by beings alien and yet disturbingly familiar, the mercenaries struggle to survive long enough to reunite with the others. But something's waiting just out of sight, watching them, recording their movements as they creep through this starlit graveyard ...
There are many secrets buried here.
Sync is the first chapter of a three-part story.
Sync lacks any sort of introduction. The first mission abruptly drops you into a nebula defending a corvette named Tether from mysterious pirates.
Transcend is set in the same universe as Sync, but does not appear to be a chapter of the Sync storyline.
Comments
Excellent campaign, mission design was mind-blowing. It achieved a sense of spookiness, which is rare in any FreeSpace mod. Despite having nearly no mods, it's no reason to skip this one. Play it; highly recommended.
Very well done, will leave you creeped out by the weirdness abounding everywhere. It leaves a lot of unanswered questions at the end, so you'll be awaiting the next installment quite intently.
Sync is more important for what it proved and showed was possible then anything else. Transcend's predecessor, spiritually at least, Sync was out to prove a lot of things about using the cutscene engine and some newer SCP features. Even as a campaign though, it's well worth playing through. You'll have to forgive BlueFlames there his opinion; Sync is essentially the antithesis of his own work. - Ngtm1r 15:50, 14 June 2008 (CDT)
In contrast to general opinion, I was unimpressed with Sync. The author seems to forget in too many places that FreeSpace is a game, played by a person. Not only are there many, many missions where the player never so much as touches the controls, he's also nearly completely amputated from the story, sidelined as a third-party observer. This is the kind of experience that can make for a good short story or novella, but a good story line is only one component of a FreeSpace campaign. If you like the plot, then it's a good idea, delivered in the wrong medium. Since I don't particularly care for this style of time-travel/parallel-continuity story, I consider it a bad idea, delivered in the wrong medium. - BlueFlames
