Never really played freelancer or the other game, but I remember I used to spend quite some time on x-wing alliance :) The game still does not run in xp64. I got it to work with compatibility mode on. I think you have compiled the game without strictly specifying it is 32 bit, so 64 bit systems think it's native 64 bit…
Ok, my first impressions: The HUD doesn't relay information to the player in a intuitive manner. Some sort of visual element to indicate to the player how much health they have and making it more visually significant would be useful. The bonuses would be better announced by placing them near the center of the player's view…