The Frontier Jones

Man I'm getting a serious jones for a good space game.

But there ain't anything that's even half as good as Frontier was.

And I played Frontier, y'know?

And so I need something with all the good stuff Frontier had, and more.

I need space stations to trade with that become more productive when I increase morale by bringing 'em a stack of porno mags, a six pack, a carton of smokes, a pair of needle-nose vise grips, and a couple house plants.

'Cause I wanna feel like the stuff I do matters and makes my tiny piece of the universe better or worse.

Even if its just simple numbers going up and down like we had in Star Control.

And that's just for bare-bones starters.

I want multiplayer, but not massively multiplayer, 'cause you MMO dev guys always use that Massively Bit as an Excuse For Ruining Every Damn Thing, heh.

Just regular multiplayer, something so that me and Ex-bouncer and whoever can do the wingman convoy escort thing and tow hulks around and salvage wrecks and fight pirates (or be pirates) while we blabber on voicecom is fine.

I like meeting new folks, y'all know that, but I don't actually wanna be bothered by random people from the internet knocking on my door and trying to sell me their shit, and the less of that there is going around, the less freedom I'm infringing on when I wanna do my own junk.

Heck, as long as it ain't Massively, we can use cheat codes heh.

And I want terraforming and upgradeable spacestations and starports and luxury space hotels and colonies of settlers and research and mining and agricultural bases and shit for the Dollhouse Sims People to play with.

I don't care if that stuff is done really good or not, 'cause that's for girls, y'know, just make it an easy thing where you can stamp down Hydroponics Farms and terrain like in NWN or something, and decorate it however ya like with knick knacks and flowers and shit, and then we can all suffer through those player-made-artwork tours and stuff to keep the girls playing heh.

I do want cool Moon Buggy All Terrain vehicles like they had in Star Frontiers, like the colonist had in Aliens, things with Monster Truck Wheels that we can jump craters and race each other with and stuff, though, y'know?

And oooh, hover cycles.

But I can live without that.

I do need to be able to get out of my spaceship and run around with my hilariously defective programmable pet robot and play with all the computer consoles and upgrade my spaceships with salvaged parts in my very own Jay Leno Memorial Spaceship Collection Shipyard and Garage or something, though.

And it'd be cool to be able to upgrade and decorate my Space Junkyard and Garage with Hot Space Chick Calendars and stuff.

Y'know, 'cause that's not girly ahaha.

And I'd like to be able to have a cast of characters, insteada just one, so I switch between 'em on the fly and have 'em specialized for certain things, like a Science Officer Brainiac Researcher Guy with a Space Physics College Education that I had to send him away and pay or trade for, and a dirty hillbilly mechanic in overalls with smudges of oil on his face who knows how to cheat at cards and MacGyver shit together with duct tape, and a kickass Buzz Lightyear Slash Spaceman Spiff With a Raygun guy.

And I don't care if they die permanently and stuff as long as I can hire some new ones or clone up some fresh ones like a bag of popcorn in the microwave or whatever.

But that stuff can be all cutesy and cheap and cheesy and stuff like those singing lollipop-jail midgets from Black & White, y'know?

"We ain't going nowhere 'till we get some more wooood..."

I don't wanna do all that micromanaging garbage, though.

And I need it to not be all stupid with evil alien races like the Phrrrkkkzzzttts and cat people and shit, I wanna fly around our solar system, and go out to Alpha Centauri and take a look at its trinary star system, and I wanna be able to visit each of the stars in the Big Dipper, and get a feel for everything and feel like I learned something (even if I didn't heh).

Don't tell me we can't do that.

And I don't want nothing else, I don't want no MMO pvp or cognitive dissonance RPG Elements or angsty teenie bopper drama queen avatar guild junk or anything.

All I want is a bunch of toys in a sandbox without all the cat shit.

Man, I write these things, and I think about how its just a Feature Creep Version of a Misery Loves Company thing and all that, and I think mebbe I should just delete it, and I usually I do, even after weighing it against the potential good it might do fer me, being evil like this and getting smart internet folks craving the stuff I crave by talking about the smell of steaming fresh bread and chocolate cupcakes and shit.

But thinking about it fer a while is enough to make the Jones lighten up on me a bit, y'know?