Solar Winds I and Solar Winds II are top down, space-based action games released in 1993.
In Solar Winds, Jake Stone a bounty hunter goes through several missions and uncovers a secret coalition between the government of his home solar system and a race of unidentified aliens. Upon further investigation, he finds out that, in fact, there is more than one solar system involved. And what is really happening is that three easily-provoked races are being held by a more technologically advanced race in a small cluster of solar systems, and kept there by a force field around them. Hyperdrive technology has been sabotaged, and the 'keys', jump points between solar systems, kept secret.
In the second game, Solar Winds II, Jake Stone, again is trapped in a galaxy. Seven systems have been set up by members of the same race that rescued him and each system contains a species. They are monitored and pushed and prodded, and through a series of jobs that take you from one system to another you are contacted by the same resistors that rescued Jake previously. They help smuggle him outside of the barriers in order to destroy the controller and free all the captive races.
This Video Game contains examples of:
- Bounty Hunter: Jake Stone.
- Deflector Shields: Energy can be allocated to one of four shield arcs. These serve as hitpoints, thus the energy is lost.
- Duel Boss: One of the battles in Episode 1 is against a ship that looks exactly like your own.
- Faster-Than-Light Travel: Once given a mission to another star system, you get a hyperdrive to speed things up. It costs energy to use.
- Guide Dang It!: Good look figuring out how to progress through Episode 1 without a walkthrough. This is really not helped when you eventually get the ability to travel really fast between stars and have to find the correct stars to visit - and in the correct order.
- La Résistance: There's a group of rebels fighting against the government of Jake's solar system. You'll eventually join up with them.
- Sequence Breaking: It's theoretically possible to beat Episode 1 without using the hyperdrive by simply waiting a really dang long time.
- Unwinnable by Design: There are many possible actions that will close off the plot in Episode 1. The first is choosing to kill the target of your first mission rather than delivering him, although you can at least remember or search planets to regain the plot. See also Guide Dang It! above.
- Wide-Open Sandbox: Episode 1 is structured like this, requiring a bit of exploration around the starting solar system.
- A Winner Is You: Don't expect anything big and dramatic for beating the game.
