Hi all,

I used to play X-Wing and TIE Fighter back when they came out. They were relatively challenging back then, but nowhere near this bad.

I'm on Mission 5 of TOD 1 and I keep getting destroyed by A-Wings. It is impossible to avoid their missiles because they fire them when they're basically right on top of you, giving you no time to react.

They also just keep coming - the bonus goal in that round is to destroy 100% of Gold but even when I switch on invulnerability and wipe them all out, they just keep spawning.

Also, lasers and shields aren't regenerating unless they're on the 4th or 5th level of energy - this can't be right surely? At normal level (3) they should still recharge shouldn't they? I can't remember if it was always like that or not but it seems kind of stupid if "normal" means "choose between enough speed to even attempt to avoid attacks, enough shield to maybe survive one hit of a missile or being able to shoot the attackers".

I'm playing on Normal difficulty but even on Easy, the A-Wings just completely destroy me.

Inb4 git gud. I completed this game in the 90s when I was 13. It's not meant to be this difficult.

Yes, the windows versions are sometimes unbalanced because they were ported straight to the XvT engine, Tie Fighter 98 is not impossible (I remember beating it) but it's undeniably much more difficult in many points.

The first (lower) two energy settings will actually drain laser/shield energy and redirect power to the engines for increased speed. The third (middle) position is the "neutral" position -- you are neither gaining nor losing laser/shield energy (unless you fire or get hit, of course). Only the fourth and fifth (upper) positions will recharge laser/shield energy -- at the cost of lowering your maximum engine speed.

That's what he was referring to?
I might have the correct way to play too ingrained in my mind I guess.

I'm assuming that's what he meant by "Also, lasers and shields aren't regenerating unless they're on the 4th or 5th level of energy".

For the mission with the A-Wings, I'm not 100% sure but I seem to recall something about how concussion missiles in TIE Fighter '98 are much stronger than in the DOS version (because -- as you said -- the game was ported straight into the X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter engine, and apparently concussion missiles are faster and pack more of a punch in that game).

Yeah, the defaul rebel enemies loadout in many missions went from standard concussion missiles to advanced concussion missiles which are more powerful, faster and harder to dodge, because that was the default loadout in XvT and being the port really basic they apparently forgot to correct it when porting the missions to the new engine.