The mod has been consistently going since 2005, so they've had a lot of time to build up assets! There's a lot of snazzy new features, but everything still aims to integrate with Freelancer's original setting and lore. Mixed success, but it works more often than not. There's a community Discord if you wanted to take a look around or ask questions.
Do you know where that link happened to be? I'm wondering if it could be dredged up with the Wayback machine.
We've got a Discord server if you want to drop by and take a look around. :)
Yep! Discovery alone has been going since 2006, and has had a 24/7 multiplayer server running consistently that entire time (barring minor outages from faults and attacks). Pretty incredible really.
I also don't like thinking about it because I first registered an account on their forum in 2007... really puts the inexorable march of time into perspective.
You can host your own server too, although there's a few steps you need to follow to get FLServer working properly. There's instructions on the Discovery forums for that.
Freelancer is 2003 Microsoft abandonware which still has an online mod community. Most prominent is probably the Discovery mod, which hosts a 24/7 RP server.
BBC Good Food is quite good. The website is basically a big book of recipes, but tailored to all levels of experience.
When they ask you to do something, there'll usually be a hyperlink to an article covering that particular thing.
Often there will also be demonstration videos as well, which can be handy.
That's a hell of a nostalgia trip. Freelancer is probably my all time favourite game, and I had literally a decade of fond memories of Disco before I eventually drifted off.
What's it looking like these days? The pop count and surviving factions were looking a little sad the last time I checked in a year or two ago.
The two YouTube links from Haelian in my summary set up the context for why this is really hard, and then commentary on the actual run itself.
Those last few seconds were absolutely hair-raising, even if we already knew how it was going to end!
See you in 200 hours, enjoy!
Also, if you're playing for the first time maybe don't watch those videos until you've completed at least one run for spoiler reasons.
Don't know if you've tried this before, but there at a few guides for getting the mod working on Linux. This might help?
https://discoverygc.com/forums/showthread.php?tid=147190