Description
A first for me. You must guard the transport Elysim while it undergoes a cargo transfer with the Vasuden Transport ISIS (Simple enough. Or is it!?!)

Storyline:
The "Vasudens" (Mispelled that way throughout the mission) have vital information that we need. So we're going to trade the info in a remote part of space where subspace activity is minimal. For the most part, it's a great story, although execution is way too rushed in the actual mission (Don't blink, you might miss it). The briefing, however, is far from polished. The grid is always slightly askew and icons overlap on some occasions.

Balance:
Ship selection is good, but I find it somewhat odd that Apollos and Hercules ships are not an option. Considering this mission turns into a huge slug fest between capital ships, a Hercules would've been nice. As far as weapons go, you have plenty to choose from with the exception of Hornet and Interceptor missiles from which you can only choose 10. Why not at least 40 so you can outfit Alpha wing with them? <p> The enemy department is a little bit on the side of overkill. This is another Dragon class fighter laden mission, so on higher skill levels it gets pretty darned hard. You also get to go up against bucket loads of Basilisks and Shaitan bombers.

Design:
My single largest complaint about this mission is how the objectives were handled. The primary objective "Guard the Elysium" is completed as soon as the Vasudan transport docks with it. This happens about 20-30 seconds into the mission, so the primary objective is complete that fast. The secondary objective is the only handled fairly well, but making it a secondary gives away the mission's surprise appearance of the Shivans, it should be a bonus objective. And speaking of bonus objectives, the one bonus in this mission is automatically set to true, so... <p> The other big problem is that we have some massive battles going on that might slow your computer down pretty nastily. With two capital ships, and tons of fighters it gets pretty bad. Fighting Dragons is not fun when your frames per second gets dropped like a rock. If some wings on both sides were dropped or shrunk, it'd go a long way to helping the situation. <p> If you play this mission, you might notice a Faustus science vessel jumps in shortly after the Shivan cruiser. The science vessel is hardly a match for several enemy fighters, let alone an enemy cruiser! Sending a Faustus into any battle situation, especially one this big, is just a waste. Other than that, some wings are improperly named, but that's about it.

Gameplay:
I don't think it's very entertaining to fight Dragon class fighters while living a slide show. On top of that, you'll get such a massive amount of fighters and bombers to back you up along with an Orion destroyer, you probably won't lose. The dragon fighters will keep you occupied for a long time (Too long for my taste) but they can't take on a small fleet of friendly fighters, so victory is in the bag.

Other Thoughts:
Very well done sounds, although the Vasudan sounds could be higher quality.