Freedom Force (2002 video game)
Freedom Force is a real-time tactical role-playing game developed by Irrational Games and published by Electronic Arts and Crave Entertainment in 2002. The player guides a team of superheroes as they defend Patriot City from a variety of villains, monsters, and other menaces. The game's budget was $2 million. A sequel, "Freedom Force vs The 3rd Reich", was self-published in early March 2005. The games were made available on Steam on May 29, 2009. Plot. Fleeing Lord Dominion and his invading forces, Mentor heads towards Earth in a small spaceship  containing many canisters of the mysterious Energy X. Lord Dominion's ships pursue Mentor and destroy his craft just outside the Earth's atmosphere; the blast scatters containers of the substance over the metropolis of Patriot City. Energy X strikes many of the city's inhabitants, giving them superpowers that echo their personality traits (for instance, Minuteman's staunch patriotism and El Diablo's fiery temper) or draw on the situation they were in when energized (e.g., The Ant or Nuclear Winter). Most of the game is set in Patriot City, but a number of other locations and time periods  are used, including magical realms, prehistoric times, and realms entirely removed from time and space. The game involves a diverse roster of characters embodying traditional comic book archetypes and paralleling popular DC and Marvel properties. Comic book tie-in. From January to June 2005, the story of the first "Freedom Force" game was retold in a six-issue comic book miniseries published by Image Comics. This series was scripted by Eric Dieter and featured Jack Kirby-influenced artwork by Tom Scioli. Dieter also wrote the series "bible" and served as community manager for the official website's forum, ""Freedom Fans . Reception. The game received "universal acclaim," according to the review aggregation website Metacritic. "GameSpot" named it the best computer game of March 2002. "Freedom Force" won "Computer Gaming World"s 2002 "Strategy Game of the Year" award. The editors of "Computer Games Magazine" named it the ninth-best computer game of 2002, and called it "the superhero game fans have been waiting for". It also received the magazine's "Best Voice Acting" award. "GameSpot" presented it with its annual "Best Story on PC" prize. "Freedom Force" was also nominated for "PC Gamer US"s "2002 Best Roleplaying Game", "The Electric Playground"s 2002  Best Strategy Game for PC and "GameSpot"s "Best Music on PC", "Biggest Surprise on PC" and "Best Graphics (Artistic) on PC" awards. Sequel. "Freedom Force" was followed by a sequel, "Freedom Force vs. the Third Reich," releasing only three years after the original game initially released.