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We've got a couple of impressive mega enhancements from ODVS to share today. His big video upgrades for WC4 & Prophecy take the high quality DVD editions and magically transform them into HD resolution. These are more than just upscales as new digital material is being generated to create crisp upgrades, but there's still a limit on what can be done. Nevertheless, ODVS keeps trying to push the envelope and reach even greater heights. The first video is another experiment at taking the low res 160p WC3 footage and cranking it all the way up to 1080p. Then he builds on these same techniques to grow a 360p WC4 clip all the way to 4K. The YouTube version doesn't quite do it justice, so you can also download the sample here (70 meg mp4).

I thought I'd apply some of the new techniques I've figured out working on the Wing Commander IV remaster and revisit the Rollins scene from Wing Commander III to see

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SpaceX made history today by being the first private company to launch astronauts into orbit. We love looking at all of the fantastic sci-fi space ships that frequently appear in the news, but it's worth pausing for a moment to appreciate just how special it is when those ships are real. The CIC has been following the incredibly ambitious SpaceX plans for ten years since we first reported on their ground breaking unmanned launch in 2010. Now it's 2020 and there are people in space right now flying the Dragon capsule. That's just fantastic. The exciting liftoff was streamed live to millions of people, but the crew is still up there beaming back tremendous footage. You might have missed this fun clip where they show off the interior cabin below. Feel free to drop by the #Wingnut Discord tomorrow morning as we watch the ship dock with the International Space Station!

Here's a nice recap for anyone

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If you had fun watching Wing Commander composer George Oldziey perform jazz live a few weeks ago, you’ll be excited to hear that he’s got a live piano set planned for tonight! Just hit up this Facebook event and join the fun! Sorry for the short notice, but he’ll be going for a good 90 minutes. The party should be automatically archived as well. There should also be a virtual tip jar if you’d like to support Mr. Oldziey as an artist that’s been affected by a lack of live music gigs due to the coronavirus.

Hey guys. This isn’t terribly Wing Commander-ish, but I thought I’d let you know that I’m doing an hour and a half of solo jazz piano music tomorrow on FB live from 5 to 6:30 PM PDT. Here is a link in case you want to share with the Wing Commander universe.

Thanks,

George

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Shout out to this outer space pineapple person who appears in multiple Wing Commander Academy episodes. Like many of the show's supporting characters, he's voiced by Mark Hamill! Further research has revealed that his name is FALCON. The other pilot is TRIPOD, which is probably one of the better callsigns to get.

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Hello Everyone!

While working from home, we’re finding that the passage of time can start to feel a bit abstract. Earlier this week, we announced that No Man’s Sky is coming to Xbox Game Pass in June, and it made us reflect on the fact that somehow, it’s already been about two years since we brought No Man’s Sky to Xbox One! It doesn’t feel like that long, but it’s been so rewarding to watch that new community of players start their own journeys with the game and develop new social hubs in the universe.

Next month, we’ll also be updating the game to support release on the Windows 10 store. In the meantime, we wanted to write a little about the recent community activity both in and outside the game, with players creating incredible fan art, unlocking new game content, and participating in weekly missions.

Community Research

The Quicksilver Synthesis Companion has commenced work on the blueprint for a new collectible

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agiar2000 posted a neat video of what happens at the end of the TrainSim in Wing Commander 1. Everyone plays at least one short-lived round just prior to Enyo 1, but a lot of pilots never go back. There's a high score board you can place on, but you can also get to the end after four missions. Running through them all nets a score of more than one million points, which would put someone in first place with plenty of room to spare!

The clip should start at 9:30 so you can see the happy conclusion.

Did you know that it is possible to win in the training simulator in the 1990 DOS game "Wing Commander"? I didn't until I accomplished it. I only recorded the last 10 minutes because I was using a 10-minute "instant replay" recording feature that constantly records a rolling 10-minutes.

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From across the quadrants, Captains of all species and creeds understand the value of occasionally pushing themselves to the limits – to find out just how far their equipment, and their willpower, can take them, and just how much fight they can muster when the situation is at its direst. Screw your courage to its sticking place, and dive headlong into these classic tests of mettle – dare to face the No Win Scenarios. This Event will include multiple TFOs previously featured individually in a combined Featured Event that will allow players to choose their preferred test each day, while earning Daily Progress toward a new grand prize reward. Defend the Kobayashi Maru in a starship-based simulation in a hazard-strewn space environment, or take on wave after wave of randomized enemy encounters within the dangerous confines of the Arena of Sompek. Participating in this Event will give all players the

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Event – Galactic Red Alert: Join in on an all new week-long event, Galactic Red Alert, where Captains can earn daily progress by participating in all available Red Alert events. All of our Red Alert will be returning for this event including: Borg Red Alert Elachi Red Alert Tholian Red Alert Tzenkethi Red Alert Nakuhl Red Alert Rewards: Players will be able to earn their Daily Progress once every day. Any of the above Red Alerts may be played as much as you like each day. Accruing a total of 5 days’ worth of Daily Progress will allow you to claim all of these rewards: An Ultimate Tech Upgrade. A Specialization Point Bonus Rewards: After claiming the Grand Prize, you will unlock the option of earning additional Dilithium Ore each day, beginning at 8,000 Dilithium Ore for the first day’s completion, and increasing for subsequent

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Here's a couple of unboxing videos for Wing Commander Movie action figures by Nerd4Life. These are Blair in his flight suit and the Kilrathi General. YouTube has a pretty good real time auto translate option now, so if you blow up the videos and turn that on, it's possible to get the message behind what he's saying. I have to say that I almost jumped out of my chair when he ripped the plastic shell off. Not everyone is as terrified about tearing the cardboard it seems, and perhaps the glue has lost some of its stick after twenty years. I'm not sure I ever had the heart to open any of my own figures. At one point I did separately purchase opened ones on eBay to avoid violating my originals!

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Star Trek Online is running a special weekend event where you can earn bonus Dilithium Ore by playing content throughout the game! It’s time to hit the drills, Captains! The Dilithium Ore event runs from 8AM PT Thursday, May 28th to 10AM PT Thursday, June 4th. During the event, bonus Dilithium Ore will be provided for the following content: Vlugta Asteroid Field: 100% Bonus Dilithium Ore for Daily Mining Missions 100% Bonus to all Rich Dilithium Claims Fleet Dilithium Mine: 100% Bonus Dilithium Ore for Daily Mining Missions Everywhere else in the game 50% Bonus Dilithium Ore Dilithium rewards from completing Event Reputation Projects no longer receive a bonus. This excludes Event Reputation Projects Please note: The Dilithium Weekend does not effect rewards from the Endeavor system. We hope you enjoy this special event and we’ll see you in-game!

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Temporal Anomalies have opened a hole to an alternate universe, one with a fantastic sale, Captains. But this Flash Sale will only be available for a limited time – from 10am 5/26 - 10am 5/28 PT, on Console. Hurry and grab yourself some items at a one of our largest discounts ever, before the portal shuts and it’s all lost. Today’s Flash Sale is: Save 30% on Research and Development Packs and Duty Officer Packs! Don’t wait! The Flash Sale Anomaly can be gone before you know it! .share-footer a { margin: 20px 10px 10px 0; background: url(d7afaaa14e96d0d973f76157ae31ec5b1466398539.png) no-repeat 0 0; opacity: .5; display: inline-block; height: 60px; width: 60px; padding: 0; border: 1px solid transparent; -webkit-transition: opacity .3s; transition: opacity .3s; } .share-footer .TI { background-position: 0 20%; } .share-footer .YT { background-position:

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EmuMusicFan has a new teaser for a spinoff effort from his graphic novel project. Much of his previous work was to artfully recreate the Action Stations story, but we also knew he was working on a Melek character. Based on his latest sketch, fellow Wingnuts have successfully guessed that he's experimenting with WC4.123106, a fantastic piece of fan fiction released in 1996-1997. He's added a few characters as well as poses that will help him illustrate it further. You can let him know what you think at the CIC Forums!

After an original part used in tandem, a test part from The Price of Freedom novel version was added. The part depicts something that happens after Melek asked Blair for help and got a response, and Blair was invited to board the Kilrathi ship.

For my level, Melek's bowing pose is a little difficult to draw. But there was a real sense of accomplishment in actually drawing it. His

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Earlier this weekend we reported on some collaboration to integrate ODVS' significantly enhanced video with the upgraded WC4 game engine that Pedro and team are working on. This was a test to see how 60 FPS video would work to sync with the high frame rate of the gameplay. I think it looks pretty good. Some people find the hyper real sensation off-putting, but I think it fits better here than in other places. The team says it's unlikely that they'll go with the high motion cutscenes, but it's still pretty cool to see here. And this is one fantastic scene to rewatch!

This came off the back of a conversation with Pedro - he said since I've been remastering some of the WCP CD-ROM videos and upping them from 15fps to 30fps, could I up the WC4 DVD videos to 60fps? So I thought I'd give it a go

It's certainly interesting - but it possibly falls prey to the dreaded "Soap Opera Effect". However, in doing

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Development on the WC4 Fan Remake has been generally slow of late, but Pedro has a few neat updates to report. He's done some testing with ODVS' fantastic enhanced video with great results. It'll be a perfectly complement to the gameplay updates that have been at the forefront so far. There has also been some discussion on new features like modern gamepad controller support as well as improving some of the development tools as well. There's still quite a bit of work to go, but it's good to hear the team is still on it!

To be honest development paused for a while, but I came back to it last night, did a few fixes; tested it with ODVS' AI upscale. It looks good, don't worry we'll be incorporating the best possible video when the time comes. I did make some progress on a particle editor, but Rear Admiral Tarsus is offering to help out with tools (which I am super grateful for). We have a potential

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Teepublic is a site that makes custom shirts, hoodies, mugs and other goods with contributed art. It's mostly intended for things like corporate giveaways or a venue for selling indie art, but occasionally some unlicensed merchandise slips through - and boy, does it deliver today! Once a piece of art is uploaded, the site makes it easy to translate that imagine onto something else like a sticker, phone case or pillow. And with the coronavirus pandemic still in full swing, they've now added face masks! A handful of fairly random WC designs is available, which includes a Kilrathi taunt face, a couple famous logos and even the Hot Wing Commander. They're $15, which is on the higher side, but not bad considering how shortages persist. The company also donates a medical grade mask for each novelty one purchased. Links to the ones we could find are below - let us know if you see any other good ones.

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Hailing all Captains! We are pleased to announce a sale on Lifetime Subscriptions from now May 23rd at 8am PT to May 25th at 10am PT, slashing the price of these subscriptions on all platforms by half! Now is the perfect time to pick up a Lifetime Subscription to STO! Enjoy all the rewards that come with being a Lifetime Subscriber. With exclusive species unlocks like playable Talaxian Species, instant access to all Lifetime Rewards, there are dozens of reasons to become a lifetime subscriber today! For more information on all the great rewards that come with being a subscriber, check out our blog here. For information on how to claim and use your Lifetime Rewards, click here. PC Captains can click here to purchase a subscription. Console Captains can find the Lifetime Subscription in the Zen Store in game. Retail inclusion effective September 23, 2010. Lifetime subscription covers your

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We've got a fun documentary about our favorite genre of video games today. space.games.film was put together to explore the history of these types of games and how they evolved around the turn of the century. It also touches on the recent resurgence of the space combat sim and where they're going from here. Chris Roberts was interviewed for the production and his quotes are used throughout. There are also numerous German space sim developers/fans on camera, so I'd recommend blowing it up full screen and taking advantage of the closed caption translations. I haven't finished it yet, but I like what I see so far! Here's the trailer, and the full film is below:

Hi Wing Commander CIC team!

I'm Dominic, filmmaker and computer games nerd. With my colleague Patrick I made "space.games.film", a documentary about the history of space games and the passionate developers behind them. For this film we shot

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The entire Galaxy is going to Red Alert! Next week, we’re launching a new week-long event, called the Galactic Red Alert. From 5/28 @ 8am PT – 6/4 @ 10am PT, all of our Red Alert events will be returning at once on PC, as the Final Frontier is caught in a massive invasion on all sides. During this event, you’ll be able to play the following content: Borg Red Alert Elachi Red Alert Tholian Red Alert Tzenkethi Red Alert Nakuhl Red Alert In addition to their usual rewards, these Task Force Operations will also grant daily bonus progress. You’ll receive one Daily Progress each day for completing one Red Alert – doesn’t matter which one – on any character on your account. After you receive five daily progress, you’ll be rewarded with a package containing the following, once per account: An Ultimate Tech Upgrade A Specialization Point You can also purchase this Grand

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It’s Memorial Day Weekend, and that means our players in the US get an extra day to just stay home. What’s that? We’re all staying home anyway? Well, maybe we can sweeten the pot with a sale for you this weekend, how does that sound? From 5/21 @ 8am PT – 5/26 @ 10am PT, we’ll have two major sales going on in the C-store: All items in Mudd’s Market, including the new Mudd’s Stealing Time Bundle, will be 50% off! All Ships and Ship Bundles will be 20% off! And that’s not all, Captains. There may be another, more secret sale happening this weekend, so keep an eye on startrekonline.com! .share-footer a { margin: 20px 10px 10px 0; background: url(d7afaaa14e96d0d973f76157ae31ec5b1466398539.png) no-repeat 0 0; opacity: .5; display: inline-block; height: 60px; width: 60px; padding: 0; border: 1px solid transparent; -webkit-transition: opacity .3s;

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General: Resolved an issue that was preventing some promotional Fleet Modules from being accepted by Ship Vendors. "Khitomer in Stasis" is no longer eligible to be chosen via Random TFO, at any difficulty level. Resolved an issue that prevented Klingon superweapons from animating during activation in the Dyson Sphere Adenture Zone. Resolved an issue in the "Future Proof" mission group, so that when accessing missions from sector space, the mission start and continue buttons show at the top of the button list and are in gold text. Resolved an issue that prevented correct Bridge Officers from appearing on the TOS Constitution Bridge.