There have been plenty of mutterings recently about Hi-Rez wanting to revive Tribes: Ascend, and this is probably the best way to get coverage for it.
In case you’re wondering what “it” is, it’s every Tribes game. Ever. Free. Right now.
The move is designed to promote “over 20 years of the Tribes universe” and just about every game released since the original Earthsiege in 1994 is now available through Hi-Rez’s website.
The list of games includes Earthsiege, Earthsiege 2, Starsiege: Tribes, Tribes 2, Tribes: Aerial Assault, Tribes Vengeance, Tribes Ascend, although the Tribes Ascend download merely links to the website (where the game is free-to-play anyway). The other links are all ISOs, and Tribes 2 in particular requires a CD-key and a couple of patches before it’ll run, although the site supplies all three.
The one notable absence on this list is the Starsiege mech shooter from 1999 that I remember probably far more fondly than I should.**
Still, being able to get your hands on ISOs for the original Earthsiege games and having the original Tribes out for all and sundry is hardly something to complain about. They’re good games and with any luck this might actually drive more people towards Tribes Ascend; skiing in that game is one of the most fun experiences I’ve had in a shooter in the last five years. The rest of it needs a fair bit of work last time I checked it out, mind you.
Update: The original Tribes download also comes with Starsiege, which is a bit strange since the two games were released almost a year apart. But it does mean I’ll be able to play Starsiege again (yay), and I’ll leave my stupidity in full above so you can all enjoy that too.
Comments
10 responses to “Hi-Rez Releases All Tribes Games For Free [Update]”
Oh man, we used to play the hell out of Tribes. Will be definitely giving it another go. Stuff Halo 🙂
I’m fairly sure Starsiege is part of the Tribes download.
Yes, you’re right on that. Posting an update now.
Randomly: you at PAX by any chance?
Nope. Not my thing :P.
No worries. In Sydney at all?
Canberra. In Sydney for the weekend next week though.
True then. Was thinking if it wasn’t too difficult I should buy you a beer/drink (if that’s your thing) as way of thanks.
Haha, think nothing of it mate :).
No worries! Thanks again anyway.
Didn’t Hirez abandon Ascend for all intents and purposes? Deciding to revive a game you’ve killed off won’t make ppl play it if they left because patching stopped for years.
Giant robot games! Back in the day, I had a complete hotas set (CH products!) just to play them. MW, MW2, MW2:Mercs (I spent the better part of a year sitting in Kali chat, just because of Mercs).
Anyone have any luck/idea how to install these on 64-bit Win10? Haven’t played these for ages but got pretty keen when I saw they were providing them. Downloaded them but as expected they’re too old to install properly on Win10-64 even with compat. settings.
I don’t see Tribes 1 after installing Starsiege.
No idea what to do with the Aerial Assault ISO since there is no EXE file and no instructions.
Missing serial key for Vengeance.
Tribes Vengeance CD-2
Error1305.Error reading from file SP-ColiseumTextures.pkg