BarneyStinson: When I was about 10, I played Starflight for countless hours on Sega Genesis. I just downloaded Starflight and it appears to be a different game, although the storyline and general content appear to be the same.
I'm taking it the Genesis version was different?
Starflight on the Genesis took a number of features from Starflight 2 and Star Control 2, namely artifacts having more of a purpose, being realtime, and having some more elaborate ship upgrading options. It also has at least one annoying bug that prevents you from... properly defeating one of the enemy races?
They ARE pretty different, but they're both good and totally worth checking out. You might like SF2 more, though -- as I said, the Genesis version took some of its features from /that./
I DID hear that the Genesis version had a lot of text/story content removed, but I've found no indication that this is actually true.
(Genesis version is arguably harder, btw, because planetary events do more damage, and for me at least... I'm pretty bad at Star Control style combat).