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''Escape Velocity Override'' is a space trading simulator game written by Peter Cartwright, with the support of his school-friends, and developed by
Ambrosia Software Ambrosia Software was a predominantly Macintosh software company founded in 1993 and located in Rochester, New York, U.S. Ambrosia Software was best known for its Macintosh remakes of older arcade games, which began with a 1992 version of Atari, ...
for the
Apple Macintosh The Mac (known as Macintosh until 1999) is a family of personal computers designed and marketed by Apple Inc. Macs are known for their ease of use and minimalist designs, and are popular among students, creative professionals, and software ...
. It is the sequel to ''
Escape Velocity In celestial mechanics, escape velocity or escape speed is the minimum speed needed for a free, non- propelled object to escape from the gravitational influence of a primary body, thus reaching an infinite distance from it. It is typically ...
'' with an extended version of the original game engine, but Override has an entirely new story line set in a different, larger universe. ''Escape Velocity'' and ''EV Override'' were written for the classic Mac OS, and therefore run natively only on
Mac OS 9 Mac OS 9 is the ninth major release of Apple's classic Mac OS operating system which was succeeded by Mac OS X (renamed to OS X in 2011 and macOS in 2016) in 2001. Introduced on October 23, 1999, it was promoted by Apple as "The Best Internet ...
and earlier. However, the third game in the series, ''
Escape Velocity Nova ''Escape Velocity Nova'' (a.k.a. ''EV Nova'' or ''EVN'') is a video game developed by Ambrosia Software in collaboration with ATMOS. It is the third game in the ''Escape Velocity'' series of space trading and combat games. It was released on Ma ...
'', supports plug-ins (released with Ambrosia's authorization) that simulate the first two titles using the new game's engine. Since ''EV Nova'' was made for both
Mac OS X macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and lapt ...
and Microsoft Windows, Override - through Nova plug-ins - is also playable on those platforms.


Gameplay

The player controls a ship represented from a bird's-eye point of view in third person. Most of the game takes place within this view, where the player can interact with ships and stellar objects within the star system they are presently in. There are over a hundred star systems in the game, all connected to one another by a series of hyperlanes. The player can utilize the lanes to perform a hyper-jump to a nearby system, which takes one to three days depending on their ship's mass. Players can land at planets, stations, and some other stellar objects. Here, if the location is inhabited, they can access a mission computer to take jobs, purchase new ships, trade commodities, refuel, customize their ship with various weapons and outfits, and go to a spaceport bar to hire escort ships, watch the news, gamble, and sometimes receive additional unique missions. Not all services are available at all locations. However, all inhabited locations have a mission computer and refueling option, and all stellar objects that can be landed on serve as a haven for the repair of the player's shields and armor. The star systems of Override are controlled by various governments, each with a different disposition towards the player. Most start off as neutral with the player, though some may restrict access to their planets and stations and still others may be openly hostile and attack the player on sight. The player, however, can change their status with various governments. Taking missions for a government, attacking their enemies, and destroying pirates ("renegades") boosts status, whereas helping opposing governments, attacking a government's and their allies' ships, and pirating civilians will lower their legal rating. Also, affecting the legal status of one government will directly affect those of its allies and inversely affect its enemies. Having a high legal rating will give the player access to missions for that government (which, in turn, can unlock that government's ships and outfits). On the other hand, a low legal status will cause the government to restrict access to their ports and even cause them to attack the player on sight. Like its predecessor, EV Override is fully open-ended and does not force the player to get involved in any of the game's plots, nor does it make a player continue a plot once they're in it. Players have the option to take the storylines and cause their actions to have a major impact on the galaxy. On the other hand, they can also simply become a commodity trader, cargo runner, or pirate and leave the galaxy to fend for itself. Players can purchase (or capture) and outfit many ships in the game as they see fit, allowing for many methods and styles for playing the game. Also, once they become powerful enough, players also have the option of forcing worlds to pay them daily tribute by destroying their defense fleets. This, however, may cause serious drops in their legal status elsewhere, and causes bounty hunters to start chasing them.


Reception

''
Next Generation Next Generation or Next-Generation may refer to: Publications and literature * ''Next Generation'' (magazine), video game magazine that was made by the now defunct Imagine Media publishing company * Next Generation poets (2004), list of young ...
'' reviewed the Macintosh version of the game, rating it four stars out of five, and stated that "The gameplay is similar to that in the first version, but the scope and design behind the new final frontier override any comparisons." ''
Macworld ''Macworld'' is a website dedicated to products and software of Apple Inc., published by Foundry, a subsidiary of IDG Inc. It started life as a print magazine in 1984 and had the largest audited circulation (both total and newsstand) of Macin ...
''s Michael Gowan praised ''Escape Velocity''.


References


External links

* * * {{Ambrosia Software 1998 video games Ambrosia Software games Classic Mac OS games Classic Mac OS-only games Space trading and combat simulators Space opera video games Video games developed in the United States