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For most classic games I have a DOSBox installation with a C: drive full of games, and I adjust cycles as needed. However, GoG provides a nice graphical front end, so I thought I'd try playing through WC1 using that. I got to the end of the Vega Sector campaign, but at first had trouble...

Yes, the article seems to need an awful lot of putty to fill the gap between WC3 and ME3. If I were trying to do this I would name WC1 as a high point in plot branching, especially because all wingmen can die independently of the plot. However, WC1 also demonstrates why you can't do that and...

Mercenaries by nature have odd backgrounds (and lie about them), so it's safe to assume there were some former Luftwaffe pilots flying in Africa. However, the only other mercenary pilots I've seen the name of are Jan Zumbach (Poland) and Lynn Garrison (Canada). Jan Zumbach's autobiography, "On...

If the scramble animation is to be believed the pilot is reclining on a lawn chair, so wouldn't have a seat back behind them... A Hornet cockpit appears behind Paladin's head in the introduction. Is that introduction a single long video clip, or does it use in-game assets where possible...

True, but that doesn't stop many companies in the present from trying to anonymise their development teams. I should have remembered that this has already happened. Carl Gustaf von Rosen used these propeller planes to attack an airfield full of MiG-17s. Since it's all about the cost of...

Not when your competitors might make them a better offer. In the particular case of Strike Commander they probably could be safely named, but only because Origin employees were pretty loyal back in 1992. In 1984, the first Macintosh was released containing the signatures of everyone who...

Something lost in WC2 as published is just what ISS does. Having a ship called the Robert Peel makes it clear that yes, you're the police force. Not that naming a spacecraft after an 800-year-old politician is likely, unless the ISS is really out of touch with current events. On the plus...

I see this starts with Bluehair and Hunter flying a single easy mission from the Tiger's Claw. I think it was inevitable that this would be cut - too many single-use art assets. However, it's interesting to see the idea written down in 1990. These days, perhaps every second game starts with a...

Quite correct. I should have said "Behemoth", not "Temblor Bomb". The question still is, in their search for planets to destroy, will the Jim Bowie crew have any compunctions about bioweapons? In the conversation between the Challenger, the Jim Bowie and the Sandman, everyone assumes that...

While Saga has a decent number of fighter models, it often felt to me like I was fighting just two types of fighter behavior: Nimble ships that were hard to hit, but exploded quickly once you draw a bead on them. (Darket and Dralthi) Heavy ships that are easy to hit, but take a lot of...

Nice article, but aren't all the WC1 screenshots from the Amiga version? That wouldn't normally be a problem, but this article is all about the rise of PCs as the superior gaming platform.

If you want to build rockets in the US, you don't just have to comply with the FAA - there are also International Traffic in Arms Regulations. If you can put a satellite into orbit, you can drop a bomb on the city of your choice. The reverse also holds - Sergei Korolev and Wernher von Braun...

Well, it's not like you could preserve all the esoteric elements of Ultima (like the eight virtues) while making an action RPG that defines a new sub-genre and becomes a beloved classic in its own right. Why do they take the time to specify "Western RPG"? Yes, I'm aware that certain game...

Yes, I often notice scripting, and it bugs me no end. My biggest peeve is the RPGs where you see a crowd of uniquely named / dressed characters standing around with weapons drawn. You know when you get too close there's going to be a cutscene, and then they'll all attack, and there's nothing...

In most Wing Commander games, any one ship is easy to destroy. The challenge comes when ships are multiplied. This is good game design, because they can be reused in different combinations. The "shoot stuff, and shoot more stuff" gameplay has more variety than at first glance. Yes, you have...

Yes, the existing X-COM timeline is too far into the future. The world of X-COM: Apocalypse was wonderfully creative - but first you had to understand the superscience future, and then you had to understand the aliens on top of that. Then Interceptor moves even further forward. Having every...

Savage Empire came with a map? Years ago I bought a CD-ROM compilation that contained Savage Empire, but it came with almost no supporting documentation. I attempted to map it myself, but gave up given the repetitiveness of the terrain. Maybe I can finally complete the thing. I've seen this...

Very true. It says a lot about us that Doom gave us multiplayer deathmatches almost 20 years ago. Many games in that era also offered cooperative multiplayer, but it just wasn't fun. While the technology was one limiting factor (you really want voice chat), game mechanics didn't adapt. Even...

Yes, this is the problem. I would welcome a Wing Commander FPS, if it acknowledged a unique aspect of the Wing Commander space simulators: the wingmen. It is right there in the game title, after all. Don't make me a one-man army, and don't make me part of an infinite army of tough-guy clones...

From a game design perspective, the purpose of a Confed capital ship is to get into trouble so the player and their fighter have to save the day. (Or, in the case of the Behemoth, the failure to save the day is part of the story.) Capital ships - both friend and foe - can never have enough...