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ODVS and the WC4 Fan Remake team have a great new article on the technical process of remastering the gameflow rooms. It turns out that this step is a lot different than upscaling or even using the AI-techniques that have allowed him to significantly enhance the video quality so far. The animations and how they interact with each setpiece are their own unique puzzle. How did they solve this issue? Read the full article at WCRespace to find out! There'a also an example video of their impressive output below.

As part of the ongoing Wing Commander IV Resmastered project (Wing Commander IV: The Price of Freedom – Remastered), I've upscaled and remastered all the game's rooms, environments and sprite animations using ESRgan AI/Deep Learning. These are a few samples, along with comparisons to the original 640x480 room visuals.

You might think that remastering the rooms and sprite animations for Wing

Quote from Wing Commander News-Bot

PC Gamer has posted a new article about the coolest cockpits in gaming. There's a lot of new stuff in there, as you might expect, with some of the slickest UIs from Star Wars Squadrons, Titanfall 2 and Rebel Galaxy Outlaw throughout the piece. There is precisely one retro throwback though: the Hornet from Wing Commander 1. It's hard to argue it's not among the most iconic cockpits in gaming history, but it still doesn't show up in that many modern articles. The author chose a 16-color Amiga screenshot for the piece, which is an interesting decision, but they all look good. Wing Commander just has so many great choices. You can find the full article here.

F-36 Hornet (Wing Commander)

One of the all-time classic cockpits. Seeing your legs tucked under the console, and your hand wrestling with the flight stick as you fly and fight, gives you a real sense of being squeezed into the pilot's seat of a

Quote from Wing Commander News-Bot

It's hard to believe, but today marks nine years since the official unveiling of Chris Roberts' Star Citizen to the world. Due to the pandemic, the festivities have been virtual, but that means everyone has easy access to all the content they've prepared. The party is primarily being hosted over on Twitch and RobertsSpaceIndustries. I've posted one developers panel below so you can get a taste. Lots of SC fans are going into further the detail of all that, so I'll just leave you with a cool behind-the-scene pic from Sandi Roberts. It shows Chris in his Tiger Claw hat and WC crew jacket while getting ready for the reveal in October 2012!

Here's a couple more throwback pics - we were young!

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Embarrassing discovery: “grimalkin” is a real word which means cat, often a witch’s familiar. This means I have been missing a joke in Special Operations 2 for THIRTY YEARS. Paladin renames a captured freighter the Grimalkin for the titular special operation. I always assumed it was just a second Kilrathi name because the cats knew the Gamal Gan had been captured!

Additionally: I learned this not by noticing it in Shakespeare or Hawthorne but because ballroom_blitz got me PYEWACKET, an old children’s book about a gang of cats. We’ve been reading a bit before bed each night!

Quote from Wing Commander News-Bot

This is a followup to last month's killboards post.

I wondered if there was any difference in the starter kill board in Wing Commander III. Here's the PC version, with no entry for Blair since I hadn't entered my callsign yet:

Sure enough, the values change from port to port! Here's the PSX version and the Macintosh version (which really surprised me!):

But the best discovery here was the 3DO port which starts with drastically higher numbers... and a different 'saying' for the total?!

Ones I've seen:
- Fragged Kitties
- Macavity's Fate
- Total Kills
- Our Favorite Cats
- Kitties Flambe
- Roasted Kitties
- Cat Chow
- Road Kill
- Neutered Kitties
- Kitty Pate
- Kitty Litter
- Life Impaired Cats
- Toasted Kitties
- Feline Fatalities
- Toast
- Spammed Kitties

The Wing Commander III novel even adds a little kill count related backstory for Flint, who has supposedly scored 18 kills in her lifetime and is trying to reach 22 to

Quote from Elite Dangerous Galnet News-Bot

*Pilots' Federation ALERT*
Work on the Proteus Wave in the HIP 22460 system has concluded, according to an announcement from Azimuth Biotech.
"This is Salvation. The core mechanism of the Proteus Wave is now fully assembled. Under my guidance, specialists are performing checks at the selected site on HIP 22460 10 b. Additional power capacitors are also being installed to improve energy transfer management."
"Over the next few days, the Proteus Wave will be calibrated within one of the Thargoid structures, the unique properties of which will greatly amplify the weapon's signal. This breakthrough was only made possible due to decades of xenological research conducted by Azimuth, alongside pioneering theories on cross-species interfaces."
"Commodore Halloran reports that even greater numbers of Thargoid vessels have arrived within the Proteus Wave's effective range. But it is now absolutely

Quote from Wing Commander News-Bot

ODVS has a nice treat for German Wing Commander fans (of which there are many!). With the help of Bernd Vollbrecht and Dr. Gerd Naumann, he's redone the audio for the WC4 Remastered trailer. It's a wonderful video, and now more people can listen to it in their native language! You can download the playable demo for the WC4 Fan Remake yourself here (900 meg exe).

Here's a little something for German-speaking Wingnuts, courtesy of MrCoffeeee:

Quote from Elite Dangerous Galnet News-Bot

*Pilots' Federation ALERT*
The class 3 experimental weapon stabiliser is now available following Azimuth Biotech's delivery initiative in LHS 1163.
The corporation's PR division confirmed the release of its new product in a press release:
"This variant of Azimuth's experimental weapons stabiliser is now widely available for purchase. By redirecting and absorbing internal stresses, it allows a ship to carry a total of five AX weapons rather than the previous limit of four. The class 5 variant of the stabiliser, which permits two additional AX weapons, is scheduled to reach the market next week."
"Our manufacturing partners were able to begin this rapid production cycle thanks to receiving great quantities of meta-alloys, insulating membranes, HN shock mounts and beryllium. Pilots who delivered these materials can now collect their rewards from the Glorious Prospect megaship in the LHS 1163

Quote from Wing Commander News-Bot

I'm not sure if it's the hectic week or staying up late to watch the new episode of Picard, but I've got a headache and need something to relax to. Fortunately, Scribbler has dropped a double dose of his Wing Commander 2 ambiance/ASMR videos. The new clips are a nice contrast with each other: the dark red comm room and the light breezy Concordia lounge. I especially like that the lounge has piano music inspired by Jazz. Check them out below!

Today we return to the lounge of the carrier ship TCS Concordia. A little more luxurious than a strap like the Tigers Claw. Enjoy the peace from the war among comrades, with a drink. Entertained by the piano sounds of "Jazz". Rest and chill. Who knows what else is to come at this time.

In this file we return to the Caernarvon space station. A remote outpost of the Confederacy. Ideal for making money without the dangers of war. Except for a few minor skirmishes

Quote from Wing Commander News-Bot

Electronic Arts' Origin store may finally be no more, but EA is still selling a select sampling of Wing Commander games directly through their website. There are a few differences between these and the digital copies available from GOG.com, however. For starters, only Wing Commanders 1-4 and Privateer are available, and WC1/2 are split up into two separate packages. Each game is $4.99 rather than $5.99, but they go on sale much less often (and WC1/2 is $10 rather than $6). These are also designed to run via the EA launcher for Windows, whereas WC1-3/P1 for GOG are designed to load on Mac as well. But if you happen to have an EA library on your PC, this new sale can't be beat. It's very rare for the frequent GOG sales to exceed 75% off, and this 90% discount is from the lower $4.99 retail price. That means Wing Commander games for LESS THAN FIFTY CENTS GUYS! It looks like you might have until

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Happened across a pretty interesting Chris Roberts interview; from the June 1995 magazine of Hyper, an Australian magazine. A lot of discussion of the Hobbes decision. Mention of the Privateer TV show, too!

This January 1991 review of Wing Commander from Rave magazine is pretty interesting, too. Talk of the abandoned internal Amiga port... and the screenshots are all from the rolling demo!

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Chronocidal Guy's new Excalibur 3D print has come together nicely. We got a good status update on the component pieces last month, and now we can see how nearly everything has come together. Here he's put together a lengthy rundown of the latest updates. If you'd like a copy of his printing files to test build your own, let him know!

Progress update, all the parts are printed, and I think at least the digital part of the model is something I can call "done" after about 20 years.

The big upgrades for this were mainly the larger size and the cockpit, but the larger scale made a lot of smaller details possible that wouldn't have shown up on my smaller models if I had tried to print them. I do think the model will be better if using a liquid resin printer, but I'm very happy with how well the ABS turned out.

One of the biggest things I changed were all the greeblie panels. I did my best to estimate how

Quote from Wing Commander News-Bot

Today we've got an exciting update to Wing Loader to share! Destro is back with a major overhaul to the project. As you may recall, Wing Loader is a mod to The Kilrathi Saga to fully add original (Sega CD) speech to the PC version of WC1. As the years have gone by, the scope has expanded to add things like the new Secret Missions from SWC and the bonus SM1 intro from the SNES. A huge upcoming development will be the addition of enhanced WC3 video to a future release. In order to facilitate that update, Destro has significantly streamlined and improved the functional code of the existing material. You can download the latest update here (350 meg zip) and follow the latest at the CIC Forums. You can also find detailed installation instructions here.

Version 0.90 - (Engine Re-Write) Released!

Wing Loader aims to create the most definitive version of Wing Commander possible by supporting the most

Quote from Elite Dangerous Galnet News-Bot

A suite of new Supercruise Overcharge Frame Shift Drives entered the market earlier this week alongside several other upgrades to the new modules.
To celebrate the company's recent success, Dr. Namin Tirel, Achilles Aerospace's Head of Research and Development, offered a rare interview to Vox Galactica:
"It boggles the mind, truly. We were working in secret on what would eventually become our Supercruise Overcharge technology for over a year now. We had mountains of data and plenty of theories still to test, but we were struggling to make headway on anything that had real practical application. When we got hold of some of the actual parts of the Thargoids' drive-like technology, all that time, energy, and financial investment finally paid off. We were able to make huge strides in a short time frame, as you're now seeing."
"We purposefully made these drives difficult to modify as they're still

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When your website is made up of nearly 15,000 news articles, over 2,000 static pages, hundreds more dynamic pages, all of them interlinked, some upkeep is required. Rarely-viewed content that looked fine in Internet Explorer 4.0 may not render as elegantly in modern, standards-abiding browsers. Reorganizing that one section may have broken some of the crosslinks from another section. This is a super-condensed overview of some of the fixes and improvements that we've made since last year's anniversary. Much of this was behind-the-scenes work that won't be immediately noticeable to visitors, but will hopefully result in a better overall experience.

• Visual improvements:
  • Improved styling of the Games and Universe flyout menus.
  • Dozens of articles and other pages converted to the new layout.
  • Multitude of minor tweaks to navigational elements and page templates.
  • Additional metadata to improve

Quote from Star Trek Online News-Bot

The San Francisco Giants are entering the Final Frontier, and Star Trek Online is coming along for the ride! On August 26th, members of the STO development team will be at Oracle Park for Star Trek Night with the Giants, and you could be there, too! We’re giving away four tickets to the event, and two Discovery Era Constitution Class Cruisers as well! All you have to do to enter is fill out the form below. In addition, anyone who purchases a ticket (or receives one from this contest) will receive a Star Trek messenger bag, and the chance to meet the developers of Star Trek Online and score Star Trek: Discovery holographic bridge officers. VIP ticket holders will also receive a Picard bobblehead, and the opportunity to take a photo in STO’s lifesize Captain’s Chair. For more information, please check out the Giants’ website. Take us out to the ball game, Captains, and we’ll see you

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To tie into yesterday's WC4 Remake news,

DefianceIndustries

continues to pump out some very impressive post-war ship designs. He's got two new flavors of the Arrow up today, including the rich Confed green and red/blue Pirate variant. They'll fit nicely with his

Black Hellcat

,

Southampton destroyer

and

Caernaven frigate

. Be sure to zoom in on these to see all the great detail. They might look like typical Arrows in the thumbnails, but they're pretty slick up close!

It's a quiver full of arrows! Well ok maybe 2 isn't really that many. We have two flavors of F-27 on the menu today, the WC4 Confed green version (now with extra arugula) and the under gunned but over-painted Piratical version: which really doesn't get nearly enough love in my opinion, either WC4 where I think it only cameos in a single mission; or in fan productions in favor of more distinct ships like the Razor or Demon.

Quote from Star Trek Online News-Bot

We’re excited to announce that we’re making upgrades and changes to some of our ships in an upcoming update, aimed at increasing clarity and player satisfaction with a few sets of starships. For details on these exciting changes, read on! Temporal Destroyer and Science Vessels – now completely Temporal! Originally found in the Temporal Lock Box, the Temporal Destroyers and Science Vessels are the game’s first starships flung through time to end up in the hands of players. Since the release of the Temporal Specialization, players have been clamoring for Temporal Operative versions of these starships. But a timeline change is imminent, and these ships will be changing with it. In this upcoming update, the commander seat on the Tier 6 versions of these ships will be updated to have the Temporal Operative Specialization, and the ships will gain access to the Molecular Reconstruction

Quote from Elite Dangerous Galnet News-Bot

A campaign to deliver food commodities to the Chamas system has been declared a success by its organisers.

The Fortunes Corsairs efforts to acquire various foods for a glamorous reception were well received. The event, attended by various system officials, appears to have achieved its aim.

Silas James of the Chamash Foods conglomerate released the following statement:

"Due to the overwhelming support from Fortunes Corsairs and other independent traders, the delicious feast helped make our fundraiser a tremendous success. Construction of the new asteroid base will begin immediately."

Contributors to the initiative can now collect their rewards from Denton Dock in the Chamas system.

Quote from Wing Commander News-Bot

Freespace 2 shipped on September 30, 1999, so GOG is having a big space game party to celebrate the game's twentieth birthday. Their Interstellar Sale discounts games like Space Quest, Wing Commander, System Shock, Homeworld, Masters of Orion, the X series and more by up to 85% off. As an extra bonus, Freespace 2 itself is FREE for the next 36 hours, so jump on that quick! While it's no Wing Commander, FS2 got good reviews and continues to have a following after all this time. Also something about beam weapons. Plus there's a handful of Wing Commander mods, not the least of which is the technically impressive WC Saga project. If you haven't given the game a try for one reason or another, the price is right this time! Thanks to FredDude for the tip!