Im in complete agreement.
Good to hear from someone with a sensible and realistic point of view for a change.
What a brat. You were proved wrong *specifically* about this subject in another thread, so you crawled away with your tail between your legs here to bring it up again. I certainly hope you end up banned -- we don't need plain old defeatism here and we certainly don't need I'm-more-special-than-the-cause defeatism.
Now hear this, those that find such things adorable: this boy is a troll, of the *most* pure variety. He is here to tell you that your hopes and your dreams are wrong. He is here to make you unhappy because he will find pleasure in doing so. The basis upon which he says these things is *simply* that he doesn't like the idea that you are excited, that you are content, that you are a good and friendly and intelligent community. He has no inside information, he has no secret contacts, he has no clue - his "realism" is whatever he can say that most quickly hurts you, simply the fact that he does not like your happiness.
Can I, then, promise you that a new Wing Commander is being developed? That one will be developed in one year? In two years? In ten years? I certainly can not. I would have no ground to stand on. I have never - and will never - make empty promises to string you along. We alone are Wing Commander... for now.
What can I say, then, if I can't lie to you? I can say that I have been personally involved in four attempts in as many years to develop a new game. One of these, Wing Commander Prophecy for the GBA, was published. Another was a television series, for which the staff here helped develop the pitch. The other two were attempts by Electronic Arts proper to revitalize the series. EA knows Wing Commander has always meant profit - they want as much as anyone to have another succesful series, and they have made many attempts since 1998 to figure out exactly how to bring it back.
Neither of these projects went beyond the early design work, but a considerable amount of effort and money went into what was done. The attempt is being made -- not just once, but over and over. It will eventually stick. EA will find a middle ground upon which they can sell a new game. They have many questions which stifle development... does it need to have FMV? Games don't, these days - will it still sell? Does it need to have Wing Commander's Gene Roddenberry, Chris Roberts? Can a space sim be risked at all? Freespace 2 and Tachyon suggest they can not. How do we get over the no-joystick barrier? Is there a buying public that is still interested in space games? Is there a group of people nostalgic for the old games today? These things *will* be figured out. If not by Electronic Arts, if you must all rely on silly post-modern pop cynicism about evil corporations, then by the next startup that builds a million-selling space game... and w hen that happens, you know Wing Commander will be back in minutes.
That's all very sexy, my secret life, my inner knowledge of secret projects. It means *nothing*. As I said, you are Wing Commander - you people developing fan projects, making fan models, drawing spaceships, finding old magazine articles for the archives, helping people play the original games on new computers, designing web sites, writing fan fiction, dressing up at conventions, introducing your own children to the series... just like Star Trek fans in the 1970s made it possible for the show to return, you are making it possible for Wing Commander to live on. You're the reason at least four professional productions have contacted me -- not the other way around. Do not quantify your success by knowing what Electronic Arts is thinking - certainly do not quantify it by believing what some cynical child thinks-without-fact.
So, in short, dear internet jerk, we don't want your kind here.
?
