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Playstation: "Let's do a weird print campaign for our port of Wing Commander III."
3DO: "Hold my beer."
Dead Fish
The unusual "French Fancies" ad was only part of a strange early EA/3DO marketing campaign. An unused Wing Commander cockpit shot is pictured bottom middle in the
spread. Not to be outdone, it was also accompanied by the "EA Lard" concept.
Jun
…Dennis Mull has some fun new Wing Commander additions. Both of these are Privateer bundles, but it's interesting to see how they're from opposite ends of the Privateer multipack spectrum. The first set is highlighted by the QEMM memory manager, which would hypothetically help you get the necessary memory freed up in order to run the game. It came with the floppy disk version of Priv as well as the Origin title ShadowCaster. The second box is a higher end collection with the CD versions of both P1 and Strike Commander - complete with full speech and expansions. I love how visually distinct both are from each other with the purple/rainbow star combo on one side versus the clean white lines on the other. They're two very different ways to add Privateer to your collection!
Today I received a box with some nice items: One of them is the Qemm & 2 hot games bundle including #WingCommander Privateer and
Apr
…DefianceIndustrieshas debuted his Bearcat, and it's a beauty! Wingnuts overall have a bit of a love/hate relationship with the heavy fighter, but I've always been a fan. I love the aggressive stance from the head on perspective as well as the substantial engine cluster. It's hard to have a conversation about the ship without dragging in discussion about its wide-spaced guns, but they sure look cool. We really don't get to play with the ships nearly enough, and if we ever got a game where the Bearcat got more play time, it'd probably have a different gun loadout with better beam convergence anyhow.
Oh speaking of Bearcats...This is oddly one of my favorite Confed designs, it's clearly an evolution of the Hellcat but there's some definite Excalibur influence as well. Also on paper, it's actually quite a nice fighter; she's fast, nimble, and has better shields and armor than her big sister. About
Oct
…CountvonSchnaps has a new sketch: a wonderful Tallahassee class cruiser like the TCS Coventry in WC3. I really like what he's done with colors, paneling and detail across the hull. It adds some rich character! He originally drew a Southampton destroyer, which we highlighted last year. I missed the cruiser addition until Dragon1 pointed it out this week, but I'm happy to be able to share both now!
A redesign (slightly) of a cruiser featured in Wing Commander 3 and 4: the Tallahassee Class cruiser. Sporting 11 turrets (2x dual barrel heavy antimatter turrets, 1 x dual barrel tachyon gun turret and 8 laser cannons) it also has a front mounted axial gauss cannon and a torpedo/missile launcher. Similar to the Southampton it has a hangar bay located at the back which can house a full wing of fighter; typically, 4 Arrow light fighters and a shuttle.It is fun to make ships like these, in a sketchy and
Aug
…The new Flag Commander update with realistic starscape backgrounds is live! As we mentioned last month,
L.I.F.got some neat skybox software and has been carefully adding cool scenes to the
Homeworld Remasteredmod. Grab the update with the pretty backgrounds
here. Here's some gorgeous examples and creative flavor text!
The Concordia wasn't exactly the first ship I'd have thought about when it came to pull a gut punch like this one, but I was a pilot, not a brass, so there I was, flying escort in my trusty Sabre. Sure, we were going to be cut off from reinforcements or easy retreat, but the Cats wouldn't see us coming, if Intel didn't mess up too much on that one.
It was a long shot that ultimately paid off big, since I'm able to write about it now. A science officer briefed us about some strange astrogation phenomenon that involved a couple of jump points in interstellar space that somehow got
Aug
…Shot97 has snapped a fun preview from a 1990 edition of Dragon Magazine. At this point in time, the game was still sporting its Wingleader title after Squadron was nixed due to potential copyright concerns. Ultimately Wing Commander was selected over all. I love how the Kilrathi are called "vicious militarists" and the Friend or Foe missile is held up as a "deadly" weapon. And thirty years later, we're still trying to make ray tracing a thing!
Also coming from Origin is Wingleader. Mankind is locked in a deadly war with the Kilrathi in the 27th century. Battling these vicious militarists are the daring pilots of the Terran Confederation. With his faithful wingman flying at his side, the fearless Wingleader battles with Kilrathi aces in heated deep-space dogfights. The game features Panaview, 3-D technology that employs highly detailed, ray-traced, bit-mapped images modeled in 256 VGA colors.
Jun
Today dczanik shared a very slick interpretation of young Angel. The design started as a 3D model, but he finally turned it into a more artsy graphic. Let him know what you think at the CIC Forums!
Hey guys! I did a paint over a 3D model I sculpted years ago. It's of a young Angel. Originally I was going to make a 3D model of her WC1 character, but liked the look of a younger Angel. I thought you would enjoy it. Hope you like it! Here's the original model:
It was used for Howard Day's Wing Leader characters. But I really wanted to finish it in the way I wanted it to look so I finally got around to finishing it. And I made a 16 bit look for those that prefer the old pixel graphics:
Here's a few original shots to compare: WC1, Claw Marks, Super Famicon Claw Marks and WC2.
Jun
…Phil's Computer Lab is a great YouTube channel focused on reviewing older tech. A while back he made a handful of tweak guides for Wing Commanders 1-3 and Privateer. In the clips below, he's also set up a series of reference videos to demonstrate how the original Wing Commander would be expected to run on actual 386 hardware: SX25, DX25, DX33 and DX40 machines. He lays out the other major components and BIOS settings and then lets them go!
These would have been common mid to higher end systems when the game was new, so prospective players can get a sense of what the developers' intended performance levels were. Unlike most of the series, the original WC did not come with a frame rate limiter that normalized play as computers got faster. A great many slowdown utilities and emulators have been implemented since, but they don't all work perfectly. It can sometimes be tricky to calibrate the right
Nov
The Vega Sector fleet continues to grow.
DefianceIndustrieshas turned his attention to the Tiger's Claw, and he's taking an interesting perspective on it. The goal is to merge some of the differences between the in-game sprite and the line art from Claw Marks. There are lots of different versions of the Tiger's Claw that show up here and there, and each has its own interesting aspects, so this is pretty cool to see!
The WC1 parade continues. Line-art accurate Bengal for all. You'll notice several differences between the line art and the final Sprite model. The three biggest ones I found are the tapering at the bow is more pronounced, There are only 5 engines instead of 6, and overall the vessel isn't very tall, it's more squat than the final version. But, I kinda dig the '80s ball style turrets and the more detailed stern. I'll texture it when time permits.
Nov
The
WC1 sprite refreshthat Unnamed Character, Goliath and Howard Day are working on was a big hit last month, so here's a closer look at one of the stars. These are the full 1024x1024 frame shots used for the upgraded Bengal. They're higher res than the upgraded assets in engine so you can really get a good look. It's been more than a
decadesince Howard first debuted this model, and it still holds up amazingly well. This iteration also has some updated light effects that really make it pop. These are just six of the 62 frames that make up a WC1 ship - you can find the rest at the
CIC Forums.
Re-renders with some material tweaks for goodness
Oct
RedBahamut has put together a pretty epic remaster of one of George Oldziey's famous tracks. This is the music that sets the stage for escorting the Behemoth in Wing Commander 3. At five and a half minutes, it's a lengthy composition too! Give it a listen below.
I make remix of old video game music because I like it and it's awesome!Oh, and if you're wondering about the thumbnail, the answer is that "the universe keeps... expanding." Here's the full spread ad:
Feb
Another genuine treasure in the mail today: that time the Kilrathi Emperor met Putt-Putt. (What a compilation!). This set includes Wing Commander 3, the WC4 Demo and Super Wing Commander all in one box!
Sep
…Awesome! We don’t stop to appreciate that Wing Commander Prophecy somehow managed to out-map Ultima.
Honor_KA: To all my Wing Commander fans and to those playing Star Citizen. Look what I just found doing some summer cleaning.
Here’s a born digital version of you want to pour over all the references and in-jokes. They even named some systems after especially handsome and well-liked fans!
The map was developed by John "Captain Johnny" Guentzel. He was a designer on Prophecy and Secret Ops who was also, as you can tell, a huge cool nerd. In 1997, Origin put a beta version on the WCP site for fans to comment on… and of course I saved it!
It was also the basis for the map used in the Wing Commander movie intro. Longtime Star Citizen fans may remember that this used to hang behind Chris Roberts in videos! This particular version was nicely relit by Klavs:
Shocking but true: this was NOT the first time a Wing
Aug
The WC4 Fan Remake team is back with a thoroughly exhaustive overview of their recent progress. If you have any questions at all about the latest and greatest happenings with the project, this new video below has the details! It's full of information and beautiful WIP content. You should check out the clip for the full experience, but there is also a new article at WCRespace too with a bit more info... including a target release date! You can also find the recently updated playable demo here!
Happy Birthday, Wing Commander CIC!As we don't have a new demo to release for this year's celebration, we thought that instead we'd share an in-depth update on the current state of the project: where we are, where we're going and, crucially, when we plan to get there!
Feb
AircPirateNinseihas completed his enlarged flying
Hornet fighter. This update has a larger wingspan to fit more effective control surfaces and a larger powerplant. He'll be getting it airborne soon, and we can't wait to see! There's a lot of talent and skill that's obviously going into this. Follow the development at the
Flite Test Forums.
The Hornet with a wingspan of 1000 mm (39.37 in) is ready2fly! :)The AUW is 513 g (18.10 oz). The Dry Weight (without battery) is 370 g (13.05 oz).The battery is a Turnigy nano-tech 4s with 1300 mAh.
Nov
…We've shared lots of great pictures of Dennis Mull's Wing Commander collectibles as he's added to the hoard piece by piece. He's arranged a few new shots recently that show off how he's managed to track down different versions of some items. This can be a really daunting task, and I truly applaud the fans willing to go through the effort to hunt down editions available in different countries or languages. He starts off with some nice Privateer 2 and Prophecy spreads:
Privateer 2 German, English, Italian, Spanish, Greek, Polish and Special Edition Release:
He's also got United States and Australian Kilrathi Sagas as a whole bunch of Hit Squad WC1 releases.
He's even got a nice variety of Chris Roberts' Starlancer made by Digital Anvil. I love how they're such different shapes and sizes. Lastly, I wanted to be sure to include this lineup of Brute Force copies. Brute Force was a Halo-style first
Aug
We're going to kick things off with a bang thanks to Fek'Leyr Targ!
"For the CIC's 20th birthday, I felt that a simple 'happy birthday' was not enough for an occasion of this magnitude. So I decided to take the opportunity to improve my animation skills by creating this small gift for all of you to enjoy as a mean to show my appreciation for this awesome community as well as saying 'happy birthday' and 'thank you'."Meshes, Textures and Sound Effects: Origin Systems (Privateer 3D Archive)
Music: Nenad Vugrinec
Production and voice: Fek'Leyr Targ
Jun
…DefianceIndustrieshas switched over from his recent streak of big flashy stations and capships to put together something from the other end of the spectrum. This is his take on the stealth Hellcats that we see pop up in the Wing Commander 4 novel. He's managed to pull off a neat hull effect that blends the standard gray durasteel with some kind of low profile coating. The result is pretty neat and helps make the case for the Hellcat remaining in service with the Black Lance into the 2670s.
After the war, the boys over in R&D and Special Projects started slapping a cloaking device on anything with wings. They were obsessed with trying to close the gap between us and the fur balls; even after their disarmament at Torgo they still had a big lead on us in cloaking technology. So when we heard Douglas was shipping us a new model of Hellcat to test out we were a bit...skeptical is probably the best word
May
…Fans have recently rallied to save The Tick after its cancellation by Amazon Studios last week. The superhero show stars François Chau, among many others, who played Vagabond in Wing Commanders 3 and 4. He's been a big voice in the campaign to bring the show back, and he's gotten some major support from Mark Hamill. Far from being a lost cause, the show's creator and cast have announced that they are signed on for more episodes, and their production partners are reportedly looking for another network willing to air a third season. Amazon Prime subscribers can catch the highly rated show for free on Prime Video. Mr. Chau continues to be active in a wide variety of sci-fi shows from Stargate SG1 to Lost to The Expanse to the new X-Files, but it's neat to see him remember his Wing Commander roots like this!
Hey Mark! This is your old pal Vagabond from our Wing Commander days. A big thanks for your
Sep
Here's a funny little easter egg from Wing Commander IV: the pirate helmets (which you only see in a monochrome VDU postage stamp in the actual game) are the Confed helmet prop vandalized... with ROBERTS crossed out and replaced with "TRASHED"!
