Wing Commander Movie Night: Battlestar Galactica

The Wing Commander movie club has taken the Starcar home from Rylos. But we're already planning to head back to space: this week we're going to be watching Battlestar Galactica (1978)! You likely know Battlestar Galactica either as a television show made immediately in the wake of Star Wars' successs or as the edgier, longer-running 2000s TV series. But it was also a movie! The original 1978 pilot film was so expensive that Universal cut a theatrical version which was a notable success in a variety of markets--even in the US after the show had aired on TV! You can join us this Friday via Discord to watch along.

It might be easier to list everything Wing Commander didn't borrow from Battlestar Galactica. Chris Roberts and the original development team were big fans of the show and knowing both IPs it quickly becomes aparent that there was a LOT of inspiration particularly for the first two Wing Commanders. From ships to uniforms to the famous Tiger's Claw bunks Battlestar Galactica's lush production values rubbed off every heavily on Wing Commander. Chris Roberts has frequently credit Galactica. In the 1991 Wing Commander I & II Ultimate Strategy Guide:

Roberts had always been fascinated by science fiction movies and television shows, especially those like Star Wars, Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica and Return of the Jedi. He liked the action elements of space combat, the dazzling special effects, and the variety of characters the creators had imagined in future worlds. He wanted to bring those elements to the computer.

... and then in 1999 when he was promoting the movie to Sci-Fi Teen magazine:

"I grew up like every other kid," he recalls, "loving movies like Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica on TV and science fiction in general. I originally created Wing Commander to give me the same experience and feeling I got when watching those films and TV shows, but while playing a game instead."

Wing Commander I artist Denis Loubet has noted the inspiration for the original Wing Commander's launch tube:

Loubet: I did the Battlestar Galactica launch tube effect with a series of multiplane background images, and I did the carrier-launch deckhand silhouette after watching a lot of old WWII footage of carrier launches.

And Wing Commander II director Siobhan Beemam has noted the series' extensive inspiration on Wing Commander in general:

Dammit! And also of course the original Battlestar Galactica. Wow, I'm bad at Twitter. BSG was a HUGE influence on everything in WC, right down to the bunkroom, but you can see the direct inspiration in Viper --> Ferret and Cylon Raider --> Dralthi.

The Confed starbases in WC2 were inspired by two things: the Cylon basestars from the original BSG, and Starfleet Headquarters from the old "Starfleet Technical Manual" from Franz Joseph Designs.

There's even a Battlestar Galactica game from Wing Commander veterans! The team at Warthog that crafted Privateer 2 went on to create an original Battlestar Galactica space sim for the Xbox and PlayStation 2 in 2003!

We expect to notice a lot more this time around, though! Plenty of later Wing Commander productions have nods to BSG... the Japanese Sega CD port even names the player Starbuck!

Where can I find a copy of the movie for the watch party?

Battlestar Galactica is a case where there are multiple versions of the film and it can be a little confusing to get the right one. We are watching the theatrical version which has a run time of 2h5m. If your copy is 2h19m then that's the television cut. The theatrical cut of Battlestar Galactica is currently available for purchase digitally on YouTube; it does not seem to be listed on other services in the US at the moment. If you would like a physical copy, the movie was released on UHD in 2023 and remains in print in a variety of formats around the world. It is included in the "Definitive" release of the complete 1978 series but not the "Remastered" collection. If you are not able to locate a copy please stop by the Discord and ping a CIC staff member before Friday's showing.

How do we watch the movie together?

It's pretty low tech! Simply join the Wing Commander CIC Discord on Friday and we will be chatting (in text) along with the film in the main channel. Everyone who wants to join in should bring their own copy and we will count down to play them together at 10 PM EST. Everyone is welcome and we encourage you to join in the conversation; sharing your thoughts helps make the experience better for everyone!

Wing Commander Cartoon Party: The Warrior King

November 16, 1996: eager young wingnuts turned on the USA Network to watch the latest episode of Wing Commander Academy, typically the third of four action shows aired in a block. But on this particular Saturday what we found was... Mortal Kombat? Had Wing Commander Academy been cancelled, pulled early? No, it turned out the episode was airing a half hour later. But it was a pretty crazy one, with Michael Dorn playing a... space viking?

Thus we were introduced to the Warrior King saga, an entirely insane (and unpromoted) cartoon crossover between four licensed IPs: Street Fighter, Savage Dragon, Mortal Kombat and Wing Commander Academy. The four shows went together to tell the story of the Warrior King, the aforementioned space viking, as he sought a magic orb that would restore his destroyed homeworld. Each show followed the rules of its universe, and the familiar characters and settings never actually explained... that it was all about the Warrior King!

Well, this coming weekend we're going to recreate that confused excitement with plenty of commentary from our crew of Wing Commander historians. So JOIN US on Saturday, April 5th at noon Eastern for a cartoon party as we group watch the entire Warrior King saga! So stock in some sugary cereal, wash your most comfortable pajamas and plan to spend 90 minutes enjoying one of the craziest things that has ever happened.

Where can I find copies of the shows for the watch party?

You will need to download the four episodes from the CIC before we start! We're also going to kick everything off with the classic Looney Tunes short Duck Dodgers in the 24½th Century which was referenced several times in the original Wing Commander. Here are the links:

• Duck Dodgers in the 24½th Century
• Episode 1 - Street Fighter - The Warrior King
• Episode 2 - Savage Dragon - Endgame
• Episode 3 - Mortal Kombat - Resurrection
• Episode 4 - Wing Commander Academy - Recreation

We've also uploaded a zip of all five shows together for ease of downloading. You can get that here.

How do we watch the shows together?

It's pretty low tech! Simply join the Wing Commander CIC Discord on Friday and we will be chatting (in text) along with the film in the main channel. Everyone who wants to join in should bring their own copy and we will count down to play them one at a time together starting with the short at noon EST on Saturday. Everyone is welcome and we encourage you to join in the conversation; sharing your thoughts helps make the experience better for everyone!

Take it to the Streets

Street Fighter: The Animated Series is coming to BluRay! This is of interest to Wing Commander fans because the set will include the first part of the USA Network 'Warrior King' crossover. The episode, unsurprisingly titled "The Warrior King", includes the short prelude sequence that shows the beginning of the story that stretches across the four shows (the others being Savage Dragon, Mortal Kombat: Defenders of the Realm and Wing Commander Academy).

The new release will include a variety of extras including artwork, storyboards and commentary tracks from fighting game experts. The set is being put out by Diskotek, a boutique physical media publishing company that has been making a name for itself lately with high quality, feature-laden releases of esoteric properties. Maybe they could put out Wing Commander Academy someday! The set is due May 27th for an MSRP of $39.95.

Street Fighter: The Animated Series has previously been released on DVD and was available briefly on BluRay as an extra in the 2012 Street Fighter 25th Anniversary game released for the Xbox 360 and PS3. We'll compare the discs once this one is available and let you know if there's any improvement in picture quality on our episode! Amazon users can preorder this new version here.

Explore Crius Hospital

Treatment Background

A cryopod containing Vell Ricaud II, a male humanoid, was found in the wreckage of the Canera in Mendra City. His two decade-old custom-built Shernikov Medical Equipment Cryo Nine Series pod saved his life and limited his physical injuries, leaving him the only survivor of the crash. The damage to the pod started the thaw cycle from his deep cryonic sleep. Rescuers brought Ricaud to Astravin Medical Centre (AMC) in Salusberg where Dr. Yvan Loomis began clinical resuscitative procedures. Dr. Janna Frevel and Nurse Douglas Pemtur were present when Ricaud regained consciousness. Tests conducted during resuscitation revealed that Ricaud was suffering from the Amyotrophic Ossicular Degeneration (AOD, also called Amytrophic Ossicular Syndrome or AOS) virus, which impacts structural tissue. He was given the self-viral treatment program for AOD as soon as he was thawed and his bone marrow corrected itself in roughly a week.

Ricaud was incorrectly identified by the hospital staff as Lev Arris, the name on the cryopod. After he regained consciousness he was found to be suffering from Anterior Amnesia that was likely caused by accelerated depassivity from twenty years of artificial sleep. Because of this cryo-associated memory loss he was unable to recall his own identity and continued to go by Arris. In the two weeks following the crash, Doctors performed Bathycephalic scans and a Hypercutaneous Cephalic Remedial Leucotomy but they did not improve his memory. The loss of long- and short-term memory is common with trauma sustained in cryo. Dr. Frevel expected that Ricaud's memory was likely to return but she could not predict a timeline. She cautioned him to avoid stress which could prolong the amnesia.

Ricaud subsequently went through mental and physio therapy for his injuries. He responded well to freeform recovery therapy, quickly returning to excellent shape. He underwent a standard counseling program for his memory loss. The hospital performed an identity check but found no records beyond a credit account that was established one week after the crash. Counselors advised him to watch for e-mails and other messages and to travel as much as possible to try and locate his birthplace or home. At the time of the assassination attempt he had been expected to be released from the hospital in twelve days. When Ricaud resurfaced at Hermes Off-Planet Control On-Site Emergency Medical, Astravin Medical Centre forwarded him a Rehabilitation Guide for Anterior Amnesia with information to assist his recovery and billed his account for their services.

Astravin Medical Centre at Crius Hospital

Astravin Medical Centre at Crius Hospital is a private hospital owned by the Crian Medical Institute with focuses on neurology and herpetology. It is located in Salusberg in Crius' northern hemisphere. The facility generates perishable vaccine packs which are sometimes delivered to other planets in the Tri-System.

NAME: Crius Hospital
OWNER: Crian Medical Institute
EMPLOYEES: 2145
LOCATION: Salusberg, Crius
BUSINESS: Medical Care
BACKGROUND:
One of the newest and most respected medical establishments on Crius. Dealing mostly with private patients, the AMC specialises in neurosurgery and herpetology, and does take specialist cases on free of charge. One of its most notable traits is its use of radical 'freeform recovery therapy', which seems to have cut trauma recovery times almost in half.

Crius Hospital Locations

Over the course of Privateer 2, we see a surprising eight different sets that make up Astravin Medical Centre. They appear in the introduction, the flashback to Lev's conversation with Dr. Frevel that directs you back to Crius, the interactive scene with Dr. Loomis and then again in the Dr. Graham Gould cinematic mission where you pick up a package. The portions of the hospital that we see are primarily located in two different areas: an entrance and a hospital reception area on the ground floor and the war reception area, solarium and terrace where Arris is on the fifth floor (the receptionist sends visitors to "5A" and the script directions read "This is elevated five or six storeys above ground level, and there's a railed, open terrace outside it"). We also see an operating room and a conference room which do not have their locations specified. The setup is thus to allow the terrace seen in the flashback and the escape to be elevated in a way that the ship used to transport Arris can hover in place.

The booth database and the Official Guide both establish Crius' role as the "hospital planet" to explain why it offers cheap medical supplies and houses locations like the Surgeon's Blunder Bar and Sherinkov Medical. This is actually not connected to Crius Hospital: Lev is there because the Canera crashed on Crius and not because it's a planet with a focus on medical facilities! Though perhaps its medical facilities are why Malakai was transporting Lev's cryopod on the Canera to Crius in the first place.

NAME: Crius
SYSTEM: Hom
ATMOSPHERE: Ultra clean, natural
DIAMETER: 7,961 Miles
6,594,576,712
BACKGROUND:
The Crian Planetary Flag shows a skiing doctor rampant on a mound of deceased streptococci, which tells you just about everything you need to know about the place. Crius has been a centre for medical excellence ever since the first settler, Jenkum Diddlybitz, stepped out onto one of the many imposing glaciers, breathed deeply in the crisp, fresh air, and promptly collapsed with a triple intestinal prolapse, a consequence of a particularly virile bacilla native to the planet. Ninety percent of the first settlers died of various unpleasant diseases, and the survivors have been battling infectious death ever since, simultaneously building some of the cleanest, whitest hospitals you've ever seen. Popular with mountain sports fanatics and the terminally ill, Crius is a pleasant place both to live and holiday, with the uncrowded conditions making for some of the Tri-System's cheaper real estate. The only problem with the place is the company; after a while, beery rugby-playing doctors, technicoloured snow surfers and vacant, grinning nurses tend to irritate somewhat. Still, Medical Supplies of all varieties are cheap and plentiful, and they do a great line in restorative liver, heart and lung surgery. I wish the genito-urinary specialists didn't have such cold hands, though. <255>

CRIUS (NAV 4)
Crius became the medical center of the Tri-System quite by accident. Early settlers were first draw by the beautiful Crian alpine landscape. However, these glacial mountains harbored unseen peril -- hard bacteria not found anywhere else in the Tri-System. In order to make the planet habitable,considerable time, effort and research were devoted to conquering these intractable germs. In the process, research labs, medical universities and hospital complexes came to dominate the planet.

First Floor

Entrance: The Entrance is seen only briefly when the first two Assassins arrive. It consists of a double doors and then a railed bridge over a lower level of the hospital which isn't visible (in a cut scene, two women are seen in this area, more on that below).

Hallway: The Hallway set has the dark wooden rails on one side and then windows and buttresses lining the other. It is equipped with "slidewalks". The Hallway does double duty as both the route leading from the entrance to the Hospital Reception Area and one which leads from the Hospital Reception Area to other parts of the hospital (including the Solarium and the Conference Room depending on the scene).

The guiding lights are explicitly different colors although this is not clear in the final cut because the footage of the first assassins following a green one were not included. The SFX for the green one were not completed in the existing footage but you can see the on set light used for the refection in screenshots.

Fifth Floor

Ward Reception Area: The War Reception Area is outside the Solarium. This is where Nurse Douglas was shot. Hallways go off in several directions and a bridge similar to the one at the entrance rises over a lower level. There is a curved nursing desk with the same white desktop computer as the Hospital Reception Area and a neon green transparent laptop-style computer.

Terrace: The Terrace is the outside area overlooking the ambulance bay and the rest of the city. It is where Dr. Frevel is killed by the assassins and Lev is loaded into an escaping spacecraft. It is also where the flashback conversation with Dr. Frevel is conducted. The large 'oculus' window which is shattered in the fighting is the centerpiece of the set. The Terrance is open directly to the Solarium.

Unknown

Operating Room: The Operating Room is where Lev awakens. The set itself isn't visible at all, there's only white in the background. But we do see Lev's hospital bed and three interesting pieces of medical equipment. Dr. Loomis initially scans Lev with a black instrument with a lightbulb on the end and then she does something with a long blue instrument that seems to have rubber testicles. Then they wheel in a device with a metal component on one side and tanks containing four brightly colored liquids.

Conference Room: When Lev returns to Crius to look for Dr. Loomis the receptionist directs him to the Conference Room. He travels down to the end of the Hallway to her right and then turns right. He is then seen opening a door with an illuminated wall panel. The dark railing can be seen outside the conference room door. The side across from the room seems to be columns with backlit walls. The room has a rounded, dark donut-shaped conference table with at least seven metal chairs around it. There seems to be a smaller, organically shaped light table to the left of the room with some kind of glass structure on it.

Crius Hospital Characters

Dr. Yvan Loomis (Douglas Fielding): Dr. Loomis is the neurosurgeon who initially thaws Lev although he is not seen until he returns to the hospital looking for more information about his identity. Dr. Loomis started his holiday before Arris regained consciousness with plans to return at the end of the month. When Lev returns to visit him, he is working in the Conference Room.

Loomis, Dr. Yvan
47
Crius
Senior Neurologist, Crius Hospital
Graduated second in his class from the 1st Crian Medical University. Showed a special aptitude for neurology, and is now one of the most respected practitioners in his field. Pioneer of three major neurological techniques: Hypercutaneous Cephalic Remedial Leucotomy, Hypothalamic Analgesic Stimulation, and Bathycephalic Surgery. The last of these techniques was co-developed by his assistant, Dr. Janna Frevel (deceased).

Criminal Record: None.

Dr. Janna Frevel (Hetty Baynes): Dr. Frevel is the assistant neurosurgeon who is present when Lev first regains consciousness. Later in the introduction, we see her counseling him about his missing identity during physio in the Solarium. When Lev returns to Crius he has flashback to speaking to her on the Terrace. She is killed by the first group of assassins when they arrive to capture Lev. She seems to be particularly caring about Lev although he doesn't seem especially impacted by her death.

Frevel, Dr. Janna
29 (Deceased)
Crius
Neurological Consultant, Crius Hospital
Graduate of the Ledellan Medical Institute. Had practised at the AMC for 6 years under Dr. Yvan Loomis as assistant neurologist, and was rated one of the top 30 Bathycephalic surgeons in the system. Very recently killed during the abduction of a Ser Lev Arris. Sadly missed by the medical fraternity.

Criminal Record: None.

Dr. Graham Gould: Dr. Gould e-mails Lev Arris to start an optional cinematic mission on disc 2. He asks you to pick up a perishable vaccine pack from Astravin Medical Centre and deliver it to Interplanetary Aid on Anhur. He does not appear on screen.

NAME: Douglas, Nurse Pemtur
AGE: 31
PLACE OF BIRTH: Crius
PROFESSION: Nurse, Crius Hospital
BACKGROUND:
Had worked at the Astravin Medical Centre in Crius hospital for over 10 years following his graduation from Nursing college. Very recently killed during the abduction of a Ser Lev Arris. Sadly missed by the medical fraternity.

Criminal Record: None.

Receptionist (Lynn Thompson): The receptionist works at the Hospital Reception Area. She operates a machine which directs people to their destinations inside the hospital. She directs both sets of assassins to the Solarium where Lev is undergoing physio. In a cut scene, she flirts with the first assassin. When Lev returns to visit Dr. Loomis, she directs him to the Conference Room. When he returns to pick up Dr. Gould's vaccine pack, she is holding it for him.

Extras

Scene 2 - Intro

• Female Patient (at exercise bars)
• Female Doctor with Face Shield (at exercise bars)
• Male Doctor with surgical hat & mask (walking in front of Lev & Frevel)
• Bandaged Patient (in gyroscope)
• Male Doctor with surgical hat & mask (walking behind Lev & Frevel)
• Bearded doctor with surgical hat (walking in hallway w/ first assassins)
• Male Doctor with face shield & Bandaged Patient (talking in hallway w/ first assassins)
• Female doctor in habit (walking in hallway w/ first assassins)
• Male Doctor with face shield (walking in hallway w/ first assassins)
• Male Patient with Moustache (standing in hallway w/ first assassins)
• Unidentified (end of hallway w/ first assassins)
• Bandaged patient (solarium doing arm pulls)
• Female doctor in habit (hallway w/ second asssassins)
• Male Doctor with face shield (hallway away from second asssassins)
• Male Doctor with face shield (hallway walking w/ second asssassins)
• Male Patient (hallway w/ second asssassins)
• Male Doctor (hallway w/ second asssassins)
• Male Patient (hallway w/ second asssassins)
• Three Patients (knocked down by explosion)

Scene 7 - Dr. Loomis Introduction

• Male Doctor in Face Shield (behind Lev in Reception)
• Female Doctor & Bandaged Patient (talking in hallway)
• Bearded doctor with surgical hat (walking in hallway)
• Female doctor in habit (walking in hallway)
• Male doctor in face shield (walking in hallway)

Scene 62 - Dr. Graham Gould Vaccine Pickup

• Female doctor in habit (as Lev enters)
• Male Doctor in Face Shield (as Lev enters)
• Bearded doctor with surgical hat (behind Lev in Reception)

The Assassins

Assassin #1 (Ade Sapara) & Assassin #2 (Fairmang Singhateh) are Rhinehart's agents that have been sent to rescue Vell. He later explains that "I didn't tell the idiots to trash the whole place, just to get you out of there…" A line in which Assassin #2 mentions working for Rhinehart was cut, making the connection more difficult to make early on; additionally, the CCN entry for the New Crius Examiner conuses the matter by mentioning only that -Kindred- assassins have been posing as assassins. Another misdirect is the fact that their escape ship is a Kindred Blade (which, obviously, Rhinehart would also have access to).

Assassin #3 (Amanda Pays) & Assassin #4 (Su Lin Looi) are Kindred agents sent by Kronos to assassinate Vell. Assassin #4 had a cut line that "the Old Man's gonna go ballistic" which was meant to tie them to Kronos.

The Vehicles

The ship which Lev uses to escape the hospital is only seen briefly and unfortunately has not been discovered in higher resolution. It is an earlier cinematic model of the Kindred PL4B Blade light fighter. The script describes it as "largish scoutship-type craft".

Here is the Blade as it appears in the game. It also appears in civilian colors in a US print ad for the game!

Two futuristic ambulances are briefly glanced 'below' the terrace during the flashback scene. This SFX shot was included to show viewers that the location is higher up in the hospital in preparation for the escape.

Lev's cryopod is not seen at the hospital but several hints are given relating to it, including its age and the fact that it is custom built. These are intended to help you locate it in the ship database later.

Behind the Screens

You can compare the development from script to storyboard for each scene at these links:

• Introduction
• Flashback
• Dr. Loomis Intro
• Dr. Loomis Choice A
• Dr. Loomis Choice B
• Dr. Gould Pickup

Several cuts were made to the introduction in post which removed scenes shot in the hospital. An earlier edit of the scene has been recovered and is available for viewing.

In the first cut, the first two assassins speak to the initial receptionist after they arrive at the entrance. One of them flirts with her and pretends to be a reporter from the New Crius Examiner (still referenced later in the final edit after they kill Nurse Douglas). As they exit down the hallway, the other assassin teases him and they mention working for Rhinehart. One unusual thing about this scene is that immediately after entering the hospital the assassins look down to their left and then right and each time see a young woman seemingly on a lower floor of the hospital. My best guess is that this is addressing the script direction that "one is looking around him alertly, as if watching the other man's back" but it is oddly unexplained in the text as these women do not appear again! One of them even has a completed SFX element as she is following a blue 'location' orb.

SC.26 INT. HOSPITAL RECEPTION AREA -- DAY

RECEPTIONIST: Yes?
FIRST ASSASSIN: It's new right?
FIRST ASSASSIN: The hair style. I love it.
RECEPTIONIST: Oh, it's fairly new I suppose...
FIRST ASSASSIN: It's perfect. I do a little.... fashion reporting, you know, when I ain't covering more serious stuff..
RECEPTIONIST: Are you guys...journalists?
FIRST ASSASSIN: Brains as well as beauty. We're with the New Crius Examiner. Here to interview a Ser Lev Arris. Is he around?
RECEPTIONIST: I'll just check.

SC.27 CLOSER

RECEPTIONIST: Section five A, gentlemen. First slidewalk on your left, follow the beacon. See you.
FIRST ASSASSIN: Not unless I see you first.

SC.28 WIDER

SECOND ASSASSIN: Fashion reporting?
FIRST ASSASSIN: I thought it was a nice touch.
SECOND ASSASSIN: Yeah, well we'll get a nice touch from Rhinehart if your flirting screws things up.
FIRST ASSASSIN: It ain't flirting. It was just adding a little color to the performance.

A couple lines between the receptionist and the second pair of assassins where she mentions that reporters were already looking for Lev were, logically, snipped.

SC.33 INT. HOSPITAL RECEPTION AREA -- DAY

RECEPTIONIST: My, he's popular today.

SC.34 CLOSER

FOURTH ASSASSIN: Popular?
RECEPTIONIST: A couple of reporters just went through.

Finally, an exchange between the two surviving assassins that mentions "the old man" (Kronos) was cut from the end of Lev's escape:

SC.54 ASSASSINS THREE AND FOUR

THIRD ASSASSIN: A clean, surgical strike, that was our brief, wasn't it?
FOURTH ASSASSIN: The Old Man's gonna go ballistic.

SC.55 WIDE - THE TWO MEN. THE SKY

THIRD ASSASSIN: There goes my beautiful career.

Here are some photos of the hospital sets under construction from the game's first press junket.

The Making of Privateer 2: The Darkening promotional video has a number of shots of the hospital set behind the scenes:

Appendix: Unusual Terminology

Privateer 2's writing uses a number of newly created terms resulting in an intentionally 'off' sense when medical issues are being discussed. By breaking these down into their component words we can guess at their meanings:

Bathycephalic: Lev receives a Bathycephalic scan to treat his amnesia and Dr. Frevel is noted to be a Bathycephalic surgeon. Bathy means deep and cephalic means related to the brain. A deep brain scan/deep brain surgery!

Hypercutaneous Cephalic Remedial Leucotomy: A Hypercutaneous Cephalic Remedial Leucotomy is the surgical procedure administered to Lev Arris in the hopes of restoring his memory. Hyper means high or above and cutaneous refers to the skin. Percutaneous means a procedure administered through the skin so hypercutaneous would seem to indicate one that is conducted outside the skin. Cephalic refers to the head. Remedial means it is a procedure intended to be cure or repair and a leucotomy is a lobotomy. So Lev was given an outside-the-skin lobotomy!

Anterior Amnesia: Anterior Amnesia is the side effect of Lev's long cryosleep. Real amnesia is typically classified as either retrograde (where you can't remember things before a point) or anterograde (where you can't remember things after a point). Lev's amnesia seems to be closer to retrograde but is perhaps distinctive in some way. Anterior refers to the front of something.

Amyotrophic Ossicular Degeneration: AOD is the virus that caused Lev's parents to freeze him twenty years ago. It was cured slightly before the start of Privateer 2. It is said to impact connective tissues and bone marrow. It is treated with a self-viral process. Amyotrophic refers to a malnourishment of the muscles (best known as the A in ALS) and ossicular refers to the tiny bones of the middle ear. The disease is also occasionally called AOS instead of AOD, sometimes by the same characters. We suspect the S stands for Syndrome.

Herpetology: This is a real term but worth pointing out that Astravin Medical Centre is specifically focused on neurology, treating the nervous system, and herpetology, the study of lizards.

Depassivity: Lev's medical record uses this word. De means removing or reversing and passivity is inaction, so the intent is probably to refer to his change in state from cryopreserved to functioning. That said, US version changes the term to decrepitude.

Appendix: Lev Arris' Medical Records

We have three different versions of Lev Arris' medical records which each add small amounts of new information! Each one is presented from a slightly different time: the American and European manuals seem to have been written at different times during his hospitalization and the version on the back of the European box is written after the assassination attempt. The most interesting change between them to me is the fact that the US version, the last written, adds the specification that Arris' species is humanoid!

American Manual

CRIUS HOSPITAL MEDICAL REPORT

NAME: Ser Lev Arris
AGE: 30
SEX: Male
SPECIES: Humanoid
DIAGNOSIS: Anterior Amnesia
CONSULTANTS: Dr. Janna Frevel, Dr. Yvan Loomis

RECENT HISTORY:
Ser Arris's condition was probably caused by accelerated decrepitude due a long artificial sleep in frozen state. This was further complicated by trauma sustained from the wreck of the Canera.

The patient was pulled from the wreckage of the Canera following its impact just short of the landing bay at Mendra spaceport. Although the cryopod had shielded the patient from severe injury, damage to the pod started the thaw cycle, meaning the patient was already partially revived before clinical resuscitative procedures were begun.

From tests conducted during resuscitation, the subject was found to be suffering from Amyotrophic Ossicular Degeneration. This was cured with the self-viral treatment program specific to this disease.

It is presumed that Ser Arris was put into suspended animation some years ago when it was found that he had the AOD virus, which until recently was incurable. The subject is in excellent shape and is making a speedy physical recovery. However, restoration of his long- and short-term memory cannot be predicted. Bathycephalic scans and a Hypercutaneous Cephalic Remedial Leucotomy were carried out but no improvement noted.

Subject received standard counseling program. However, as an identity check turned up no records, he was advised to pay particular attention in the near future to e-mails and other messages from people he may not know. It is possible that a relative, friend or associate may be trying to contact him. As his birthplace/home could not be discovered, it was also suggested he take every opportunity to visit various locations on the planets he might visit.

European Manual

MEDICAL REPORT

NAME: Ser Lev Arris
AGE: 30
DIAGNOSIS: Anterior Amnesia
CONSULTANTS: Dr. Janna Frevel, Dr. Yvan Loomis

SYNOPSIS:
Ser Arris's condition was probably caused by accelerated depassivity from a long artificial sleep, after being pulled from the wreckage of a recent Cargo ship disaster at Mendra spaceport (See CCN database for details). Subject was initially found to be suffering from Amyotrophic Ossicular Degeneration, which was cured with a programme of self viral treatment. It is presumed that Ser Arris was put into suspended animation some years ago when it was found that he had the AOD virus, which at the time was incurable. However, the subject is now in excellent health and is making a speedy physical recovery. The return of his long and short term memory, however, cannot be predicted at this time, even after Bathycephalic scans and a Hypercutaneous Cephalic Remedial Leucotomy were carried out. He has responded well to mental and physio therapy and it is the consultants opinion that the subject will be ready to leave hospital in 12 days.

European Box

NAME: Ser Lev Arris
AGE: 30
DIAGNOSIS: Anterior Amnesia

RECENT HISTORY:
Ser Arris's condition was probably caused by accelerated depassivity from a long artificial sleep, after being pulled from the wreckage of a recent Cargo ship disaster at Mendra spaceport. After a satisfactory physical rec the subject was kidnapped in a violent attack on the hospital resulting in a number of fatalities. The subject seems to have escaped his kidnappers, and is now in possession of a spaceship, trading and fighting his way across the galaxy, seemingly in search of his lost identity.

Appendix: Rehab Guide

One of the European manuals for Privateer 2 takes the form of the Crius Hospital Astravin Medical Center Department of Neurology Rehabilitation Guide For Anterior Amnesia. You can download the full booklet here.

Conclusion

I have always dreamed of a fandom that obsesses over the unnecessary details in our universe. Here specifically I think of the 1977 Star Fleet Medical Reference Manual which was one of those nerdy Trek reference books written from whole cloth; just a book about how Dr. McCoy worked! Maybe this kind of update could be the start of something similar; someday we'll have guides to how Dr. Frevel uses her brain flashlight and her space stick! So that's that! Can you think of any details we missed that should be included? Let me know on the forums! I know it's an odd tribute but my mom has always supported my odd passion for Wing Commander, from buying me the original game to sending me off to see the movie premiere and thinking nothing of it. When you are happy, when things are good, you should celebrate them and thinking in depth about Wing Commander is how I celebrate!

Reminder: #Wingnut Movie Night Tonight!

This is a reminder that we have another fun #Wingnut movie night planned on Discord this evening! The ongoing theme will be movies that inspired Wing Commander in some way. Tonight's film is The Last Starfighter (1984) which inspired the Raptor fighter in the original Wing Commander. You can find details on that as well as how to watch along with us in the announcement post here. The movie will start about 7 PM PST/10 PM EST but feel free to drop by and hang any time!

After Action Report: Planet of the Apes

Greetings WingNuts,

Maybe I'm biased because I love Planet of the Apes but we loved Planet of the Apes! It's a fantastic film: the script (by the great Rod Serling!) is a vast improvement on the original novel, adding cutting then (and sadly now)-current social commentary that at no time feels like a weight. The cast is amazing, the cinematography is still stunning and the ape costumes that the entire thing hinges on are pulled off perfectly.

To compare to Wing Commander III we thought we'd put together a quick rogue gallery showing all the Kilrathi costumes from the game as clearly as possible that you can compare to the ape costumes. You can find some great behind the scenes photos of the workshop that built the Kilrathi here.

There are three basic types of apes in Planet of the Apes: chimpanzees, orangutangs and gorillas. This lets the costumes start to distinguish between different characters pretty clearly…

... although the designers were also adept at making individual hero masks distinctly different from one another.

Meanwhile, there are a total of six unique Kilrathi designs in Wing Commander III:

The Emperor

Prince Thrakhath

Baron Melek

Ralgha / Hobbes

Guard

And the generic Kilrathi pilot. On the flight side there are helmeted VDU shots of Thrakhath, the generic Kilrathi pilot and Ralgha in both his Confed helmet and a Kilrathi one (he mysteriously has this during his escape from the Victory). They are most easily identified by their eye color (red, orange and blue, respectively) which are visible in the 3DO port and when the footage is reused in later games (Prophecy uses them interchangeably; you can sometimes pick out Ralgha's blue eyes!). This is the only place the pilot head appears.

Here is a quick survey of Kilrathi appearances beyond the named characters. In most cases these are digital duplications of the guard figure.

Introduction: Angel is escorted in by a pair of guards and the Emperor is flanked by two more. There are additional guards surrounding the arena and a digitally created crowd with hundreds of Kilrathi in various shots. There is one close up of three Kilrathi from behind cheering but their faces are not visible. One seems to be wearing blue.

Flagship Scenes: There are three guards visible in the background on the bridge of Prince Thrakhath's flagship in two scenes.

Winning Endgame: There are four guards with Melek when Blair is captured. He also has a guard behind him when he signs the treaty. There is a group of four Kilrathi in the crowd; they were taken from a single shot, recolored and duplicated. The intent seems to be that they are unique characters; one wears orange, one red, one yellow and one purple.

Losing Endgame: There are four guards with Thrakhath when Blair is captured. A Kilrathi foot is seen crushing a human skull on Earth.

New, Even More Savage Dragon

We're improving the Warrior King experience! If you familiar, back in 1996 the USA Network had a totally unexpected cartoon crossover: a newly created character, the Warrior King, traveled through an ongoing story across all four of their action-oriented kids shows: Street Fighter, Savage Dragon, Mortal Kombat and finally Wing Commander Academy. Over the years, Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat and Wing Commander have all been released on home video... but Savage Dragon has not.

Years ago, I tracked down an off-air dub and digitized it so we would be able to watch the complete story. Then came Peacock, which offered Savage Dragon (and Wing Commander Academy) for streaming. Sadly, that was short lived and Savage Dragon isn't online for commercial streaming anymore. Luckily, I recorded the crossover episode from Peacock so we now have a significantly cleaner copy! Download it here (477M).

Let Me Tell You a Storyboard…

We have a small treasure for you today! We've acquired a set of storyboards used to develop the Wing Commander Academy intro sequence. This covers the original animation created for the intro. Like many cartoons of the era, Academy's intro was a combination of high quality bespoke animation mixed with a series of quick clips from the show. These storyboards even include several intended shots that didn't make in into the final version! Let's take a look...

These first three pages do not appear in the final version (although the transport shot is similar to one we will see later). It would've been interesting to see Thrakhath's dreadnaught so early, too!

It's not clear what "photo ID inserts" would've been but we're guessing it would've been images of the real Mark Hamill, Tom Wilson and Malcolm McDowell.

You can find another breakdown of the Academy intro which shows the origin of the reused clips here.

GOG Preserves More Games

In November, GOG announced something called the "GOG Preservation Program" which aims to make sure the site's most popular offerings are constantly updated to remain available on ever-changing modern operating systems. This week they've added both Wing Commander 1 + 2 and Privateer 2: The Darkening to the program.

As promised, another wave of classics joins the GOG Preservation Program!

To preserve gaming history, we’re adding horror, action, and strategy icons from legendary franchises—ensuring they remain playable in their best versions and yours to keep forever.

Let’s welcome...

Silent Hill 4: The Room – being the only PC version with previously missing content restored.

F.E.A.R. Platinum – honoring Monolith’s legacy by ensuring this legendary FPS horror lives forever.

And alongside them, even more masterpieces:

Vampire: The Masquerade - Redemption
Tomb Raider: Anniversary, Legend, Underworld
Alone in the Dark 1, 2, 3
Fallout 2
Deus Ex GOTY Edition
Ultima™ 1+2+3, 4+5+6, 8 Gold Edition
Wing Commander™ 1 & 2
Jagged Alliance 2
Privateer 2: The Darkening
Port Royale 3
Alien Breed + Tower Assault
Cannon Fodder 1 & 2

Find all 26 new additions here.

Which of these classics will you revisit first? Let us know.

The GOG Preservation Program is only growing—with regular updates, continuous improvements, and our unrelenting commitment to making games live forever. Expect new games being added each month.

And if your all-time favorite isn’t available anywhere, head to the GOG Dreamlist, vote for it, share your story, and help us bring it back to safeguard your gaming legacy.

Vote here.

It’s your passion for these games that keeps them alive—thank you for being part of this journey. See you soon!

They join Wing Commander III and the original Privateer which were already covered by the program. The system is vote-based, so get out there and show them that we want WC4, Prophecy and Secret Ops, Academy and Armada... added to a list? Cynics might call this 'supporting products they continue to actively sell' and those cynics would be right except that there seemingly haven't been any been any material changes made to these game packages. Some of them--Privateer 2 in particular!--have been in very bad shape for years and all of them have inferior configurations which have been endlessly documented by players and which could be easily fixed in minutes.

Wing Commander Movie Night: The Last Starfighter

The Wing Commander movie club has returned from that horrible Planet of the Apes with a shocking revelation. But we won't spoil that, so instead we'll just prepare for next week's fantastic space outing: we'll be watching The Last Starfighter (1984). You can join us this Friday via Discord to watch along.

The Last Starfighter is a movie that Wing Commander fans are likely to know because it tells a favorite fantasy: a man becomes especially good at a space arcade game which turns out to have been a recruiting device for real space war! That storyline has been referenced ad nauseam in pop culture in the decades since so much so that you probably know the story even if you've never seen the movie itself… a bit like Citizen Kane for nerds. And there's lots to appreciate even if the final film doesn't quite come together like Planet of the Apes, from one of the earliest uses of CG for VFX to a very delightful world that welcomes you right in with space combat and weird aliens.

… and there's little question that it was in the minds of the developers of at least the original Wing Commander. One of the game's four flyable ships, the A-14 Raptor, was based very closely on The Last Starfighter's Gunstar fighter… down to the Porcupine mine dropper which references the film's "Death Blossom". We'll want to see these fighters in action to compare them to the ones we flew in the Vega Campaign!

Where can I find a copy of the movie for the watch party?

You can download a copy of The Last Starfighter from the Internet Archive. It is also currently available for rent or purchase on all the standard services. If you would like a physical copy, the movie was released on UHD in 2023 and remains in print around the world. If you are not able to locate a copy please stop by the Discord and ping a CIC staff member before Friday's showing.

How do we watch the movie together?

It's pretty low tech! Simply join the Wing Commander CIC Discord on Friday and we will be chatting (in text) along with the film in the main channel. Everyone who wants to join in should bring their own copy and we will count down to play them together at 10 PM EST. Everyone is welcome and we encourage you to join in the conversation; sharing your thoughts helps make the experience better for everyone!

WC4 Fan Remake Adds Fancy Modern Nebula Effects

A nebula was just a palette switch in ’96, even by ’99 Freespace 2 had made WC4’s nebulae look incredibly dated.

As always we aren’t polishing before moving on so that we can get the complete game up and running ASAP, but we thought you might like a glimpse at the volumetric fog in its current state. I think it’s already a huge improvement, and the simplicity of the effect doesn’t feel out of place as a replacement for the old palette change.

New Poll Zeroes in on Kilrathi Saga Sketch Art

Reminder: #Wingnut Movie Night Tonight!

This is a reminder that we have another fun #Wingnut movie night planned on Discord this evening! The ongoing theme will be movies that inspired Wing Commander in some way. Tonight's film is Planet of the Apes (1968) which was a reference for the Kilrathi costumes made for Wing Commander III. You can find details on that as well as how to watch along with us in the announcement post here. The movie will start about 7 PM PST/10 PM EST but feel free to drop by and hang any time!

After Action Report: Run Silent, Run Deep

Greetings WingNuts,

We're back from the depths of viewing Run Silent, Run Deep and it was a solid experience! Despite the age and the subject matter, it was a taut film loaded with compelling character relationships and a satisfying story. And while everyone is happy that it's (probably) the last submarine movie of the series we didn't have any real complaints about the film itself! One thing it has over Wing Commander is that it gives all of this room to breathe instead of needing to devote much of its run time to the 'Top Gun' part of the story.

Now let's talk about how it is Wing Commander! When we first started looking at the reference to "Silent Running" in the original Wing Commander movie treatment I suspected that there was an additional mistake: that Chris Roberts was not thinking of Run Silent, Run Deep but the somewhat more prestigious Enemy Below. Enemy Below was released a year prior to Run Silent, Run Deep and it is indeed a source for many of the submarine movie tropes that are now standard. But I was wrong about the reference: we found that Wing Commander was, indeed, greatly inspired specifically by elements of Run Silent, Run Deep.

The real meat of this movie is the conflict between the sub's captain, Richardson (Clark Gable) and executive officer, Bledsoe (Burt Lancaster). Richardson is an Ahab figure out for revenge against the Japanese destroyer that sank his previous command and Bledsoe represents the other tack but is ultimately forced into achieving the same ends. This conflict is very similar to how the crew of the Tiger Claw was imagined, headlined by the divide between Captain Sansky and Commander Gerald. Run Silent, Run Deep and Wing Commander put these interpersonal shipboard conflicts through several similar beats across their respective stories. (Note that in most cases the similarities were reduced in the Wing Commander movie's final edit; we are considering these next few points from the perspective of the rough cut.)

The message from Captain Richardson to his crew after the ship arrives for combat in the (forbidden) Bungo Strait is extremely similar to the one Captain Sansky broadcasts to the Tiger Claw crew after the arrival in the Ulysses Corridor. Both roughly mark the start of their film's second act.

SANSKY (V.O.)
(over intercom)
This is the Captain. AS most of you have guessed, we just made one hell of a jump. Actually we've just taken a little short cut into the Ulysses Corridor... If you don't already know, that's where the Pegasus Naval Base was attacked and destroyed. The main Kilrathi battle fleet is in the Quadrant and headed for the Charybdis Quasar. In eleven hours, it will be in position to jump into Earth space.Our mission is to find the Kilrathi, assess their capacities and plan of action, and if necessary, stop them. We're the only Confed ship in the sector, people. We can count on no help and no rescue. We can only count on each other. That is all.

There's also the 'debriefing mystery' scene. In Run Silent, Run Deep, it takes place after Tokyo Rose reads off the names of the ship's crew. Bledsoe goes below to ask if any message has been sent from the ship to account for this. In Wing Commander, it happens after the reconnaissance flight where Sansky and Gerald debrief Blair on the bridge and ask the computer if there has been a similar message to the Kilrathi.

SANSKY
This is sterile conjecture. The Kilrathi are aware that Rapiers don't fly around in deep space without a carrier close by.
(To Blair:)
Tell me about this "communication" you claim to have heard.

BLAIR
(Eyes on Gerald:)
It was a ULF signal emanating from the vicinity of the Tiger Claw, sir.

SANSKY
(To the Tiger Claw A.I.)
What about it, NAVCOM? Were any communications sent from this ship?

AI VOICE
Negative, Captain. There were no transmissions sent by the Tiger Claw.

Finally, there's the fate of Captain Richardson and Captain Sansky. Richardson takes ill in the third act and must be replaced by Bledsoe while Sansky is wounded during the battle and left bedridden until his treason is discovered. In both cases we cut back to the captain wounded in bed, listening to his subordinates fight the battle differently than he had intended.

The USS Nerka and the TCS Tiger Claw both make use of their chart rooms as a way to move action away from the bridge. Again, it's not completely clear in the final cut of Wing Commander but if you watch carefully several of the bridge scenes are actually in the smaller chart room visible to the back of the set. In Run Silent, Run Deep, the chart room (and the captain's office) is down a ladder from the bridge.

Both ships also take damage to their torpedo rooms in advance of the final battle, forcing them to find a different way to conclude the battle. And as we saw in Das Boot, the torpedo room sets are pretty similar!

Finally, both movies also give us tragic crushing scenes! In Run Silent, Run Deep a loose torpedo rolls onto a sailor during the destroyer charge attack and in Wing Commander a Rapier falls and crushes one of the deck crew during the initial Kilrathi ambush. This shot was actually intended for Wing Commander's depth charge scene, showing the fate of two of the shooting script's 'lower decks' characters.

Salutes!

Vagabond says that we have better things to do than practice our salutes... but we don't have better things to do than collect salutes! We went through the games to pick out as many salutes as we could find--and they make great reaction images online! Can you find any of the ones we missed? Let us know and we'll add them to the collection!

Wing Commander I & II

In Wing Commander I you and Colonel Halcyon salute at medal ceremonies and funerals. Wing Commander II just has the wide shot at funerals.

Wing Commander III

WC3 has plenty of salutes, typically when characters are arriving or leaving the Victory.

... Blair also salutes in all 39 briefing videos, too. Eisen usually does as well, athough if he's annoyed he makes a point of not doing it. Blair salutes Tolwyn throughout the game but Tolwyn only retruns the salute once, before the Behemoth is destroyed. And then Rollins joins in only in the last missions off the Victory, either before Kilrah or Earth.

Wing Commander IV

Wing Commander IV is full of dramatic salutes, from the drunk in the bar on Nephele to Tolwyn leaving the Intrepid.

There are endless salutes during the transitions, too!

Wing Commander Prophecy

Like the original game, most of Wing Commander Prophecy's salutes are related to medal ceremonies.

Wing Commander Academy

Wing Commander

Finally, there are plenty of salutes in the movie! One scene even has Blair saluting Captain Sansky twice.

Strike Commander Remake Stuns

This is the kind of e-mail you like to find in your inbox: Rémi LEONARD is working on a modernized remake of Strike Commander and there's some wonderful progress to see! Strike Commander was Chris Roberts' major project after the original Wing Commander, a combination of a realistic F-16 simulator and an interactive movie styled after an '80s action flick. It was a great game but one that's often forgotten today.

Hello, I am Rémi LEONARD, currently developing a remake of Strike commander, i wanted to report somes updates in case you are interested.

The project is going well, I have implemented somes of the mission scripts logic (thanks to the mission design documentation of wing commander IV found on CIC. The game is starting to be playable, with the possibility to complete somes missions. I have released a gameplay video of the first mission on my youtube channel.

Strike commander Remake Gameplay First Mission

Feel free to take a look :)

Best regards
Rémi LEONARD.

You bet we're interested! Strike Commander is a wonderful game that deserves a lot more attention than history has given it; I often remark that it's too bad there's not a "Strike Commander News" site equivalent to ours. I can't wait to see more of Rémi's work, I bet it will end up making the game much more accessible to new players!

New Wing Commander Album Digitally Released!

Greetings all. The CD master is about ready to submit for replication. We are currently in the process of deciding on the best way to master the vinyl version. The artwork is complete for both products. We are VERY close to finishing the physical products for volume 2, but in the mean time, here are links to the digital files.

They are in FOUR formats; high resolution WAVE and FLAC files as well as MP3 and AAC compressed files.

Of course these are for all of you who so generously backed this project. I truly hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed orchestrating and recording them. My sincerest gratitude to all of you.

Wing Commander Movie Night: Planet of the Apes

The Wing Commander movie club is home from the (check notes) Bungo Straights and we can confidently say that yes, the Wing Commander movie does owe quite a bit to Run Silent, Run Deep. This week, we're taking the DEDFLASH space/time cruiser back to the future… the distant future of the original Planet of the Apes! You can join us this Friday via Discord to watch along.

The original Planet of the Apes sends Charlton Heston to the distant future as a lone astronaut stranded on a… well, planet of apes. Adapted from Pierre Boulle's novel by the brilliant Rod Sirling, Planet of the Apes' mix of clever plotting, allegory and action helped set a new standard in quality for science fiction blockbusters that had previously been treated more like childrens' fare. It's bold and engaging even when the entire world already knows the twist ending!

With regards to the Wing Commander connection, we normally pick movies that are mentioned as influences in interviews or other behind the scenes narratives. This is one we picked out from a photograph! Look carefully at this image from Wing Commander III's creature workshop which shows the construction of one of the game's Kilrathi masks. One of the references they're using is the album art for the Planet of the Apes soundtrack with a picture of Dr. Zaius! Oh, Dr. Zaius!

Fans suspected as much long before these photos ever surfaced, though; you can't look Wing Commander III Melek in the face without being reminded of those classic apes! If anything, it's more of a surprise that they're using so much material from Wing Commander II as reference.

Planet of the Apes also shares a ship name with Privateer II, the Icarus… but it's not one that's mentioned in the movie. Cool ship, though!

Where can I find a copy of the movie for the watch party?

You can download a copy of Planet of the Apes from the Internet Archive. It is also currently available for rent or purchase on all the standard services. If you would like a physical copy, the movie was released on Blu-Ray in 2008 and remains in print around the world. If you are not able to locate a copy please stop by the Discord and ping a CIC staff member before Friday's showing.

How do we watch the movie together?

It's pretty low tech! Simply join the Wing Commander CIC Discord on Friday and we will be chatting (in text) along with the film in the main channel. Everyone who wants to join in should bring their own copy and we will count down to play them together at 10 PM EST. Everyone is welcome and we encourage you to join in the conversation; sharing your thoughts helps make the experience better for everyone!

Wilford Working Notes

Last year, we had occasion to put together a set of working notes on Downtown, celebrating the legacy of a lesser known Wing Commander character to display some of the depth of established lore players might not be familiar with by putting together a thorough in-universe biography and walking through some of the common continuity issues surrounding him. With the recent passing of actor Peter Jason, we thought it would be worthwhile to put together a set of notes on Admiral (or is it Captain?) Wilford.

Character Biography

This writeup is done in the style of a wiki entry and takes into account all existing sources in an attempt to construct a singular story. It does not represent the specific intent of any one author; details on the development of Wilford's character and a discussion of the various changes to the story that have occurred over the years are discussed in further sections below the history.

Daniel Eugene Wilford

"Telamon is such a frontier system that their planets have retained their original discovery numbers, but it's still part of the Border Worlds Union -- all systems are equal in our eyes. If there's a fire to put out there, let's do it." - Vice Admiral Daniel Wilford, UBWN

Daniel Eugene Wilford was a Terran Confederation Space Navy and Union of Border Worlds Navy officer who served during the Kilrathi War, the Back Lance Affair and the Nephilim conflict. Wilord was second in command of the UBWN during the Border Worlds Conflict and captained the TCS Midway during the first battles with the Nephilim.

Wilford's parents were on the first colony ship to settle their planet in the Outer Worlds. Around 2611, he was the first child born on the planet and grew up 500 miles from his nearest neighbor. As a teenager, he passed his college entrance exams with flying colors and was identified by the newly organizing Border Worlds Joint Planetary Defense Force as a candidate for ROTC training. The BWJPDF was formed to coordinate frontier planetary militias against the threats of criminals, terrorists and Kilrathi saboteurs. In the interests of building their own corps of trained officers, they negotiated an agreement with the Terran Confederation military to allow the training of non-citizens as military officers. In 2629, Wilford was commissioned as an active duty Terran Confederation Space Navy officer.

The original intention was that Wilford would serve a four year training tour and then return to the Border Worlds. As the Pilgrim War carried on and the war with the Kilrathi began and expanded, the length of the tour doubled and then tripled. Wilford rapidly rose to the rank of Captain and ultimately served throughout the entire Kilrathi War. He distinguished himself serving in both staff and command assignments and was regarded as an especially capable commander who took interest in supporting his subordinates. During his TCSN service, Wilford married and around 2663 fathered the first of four children. Around 2668, Wilford served aboard the TCS Tarawa under Captain Jason Bondarevsky before the False Peace. Around 2669, he was assigned to take over Enigma sector command and briefed on the black budget research taking place in the Axius System.

When the war ended, he retired from the Terran Confederation Space Navy and retired back to his home in the Border Worlds. Although he initially intended a permanent retirement, he was quickly convinced by Admiral Vance Richards to return to work for the Joint Planetary Defense Force in order to apply his wartime experience to building a modern force. He was commissioned as a Rear Admiral and put in charge of the new fleet's operations. He would prove to be an essential reason the Border Worlds were able to hold out until evidence of the Black Lance conspiracy could be presented.

Thanks to Wilford's leadership, the JPDF was able to quickly develop an effective navy using surplus Confederation weaponry, equipment provided by the Free Republic of the Landreich and unorthodox conversions of obsolete equipment. Within three years, the Border Worlds fleets had been organized into multiple fleets built around six effective carriers and an ever-increasing force of capital ships. Wilford prioritized building experience, seeking to onboard retired veterans of the Kilrathi War in both enlisted and officer roles. He also actively instigated asymmetrical force modifiers including remote jump drives, manned insertion pods and more.

As tensions between the Confederation and the Border Worlds came to a head in 2673, Wilford was made Vice Admiral with orders to organize and then fight the newly-formed Union of Border World Navy to withstand the expected invasion. He would be the second highest ranking officer in the fleet during the conflict, reporting directly to Admiral Richards. Wilford made his flag aboard one of the escort carriers provided by the FRLN with plans to fight from the front. On August 21, he took over full tactical command from Richards.

The first days of the conflict were marked by constant movement from system to system as Wilford rallied forces to deal with the hotspots emerging across the frontier. It quickly became clear that the Confederation intended to precede a full scale invasion with a variety of smaller incursions and flare-ups which would divide and reduce the Border Worlds military. These ranged from backing rebel forces in the ongoing Circean civil war to direct fighting at Lennox to experimenting with a system-blocking jamming device in the key fuel-producing system of Peleus. To counter this, Wilford divided his forces, dispatching the Outer Worlds Fleet built around the BWS Intrepid to help deal with situations. When Colonel Christopher Blair took command of the BWS Intrepid, Wilford became his direct superior and provided the ship its orders directly. He also commanded the Border Worlds marine forces, dispatching Lt. Colonel Dekker's company to the battle in Lennox and then attaching them to the Intrepid. His constant movement proved to be a challenge in organizing his broad commands; he was often unavailable for real time communication and relied instead on issuing orders via recorded messages.

While passing through the Orestes System, Wilford ordered Blair to deal with the situation in Peleus and was pleased by the results. With some of the immediate crises prevented, Wilford decided to make a bold gamble: commit most of his forces to a fleet action in the Speradon System. Speradon was home to covert Confederation factories and support facilities which had been established in the Border Worlds advance of the intended invasion. Wilford reasoned that striking these would claim the initiative, stymie the Confederation's plans to quickly execute the war and provide equipment and munitions desperately needed by the Border Worlds. He ordered the Intrepid to rendezvous with him at Lennox and enlisted Lt. Colonel Tamara Farnsworth, with whom he had served aboard the Intrepid, to plan the three-pronged action. He ultimately transferred his flag aboard the Intrepid for the battle.

Wilford personally fought the Intrepid through the action, suffering several major hits during the successful attack on the factory complex. Afterwards, he coordinated the Intrepid's capture of the first Black Lance "Dragon" fighters. The operation at Speradon was a significant success but it backfired in some ways: the Confederation presented it as further evidence of Border Worlds aggression. Wilford's next task was a dark one: coordinating the medical and military response fo the attack on Telamon. Wilford traveled to Telamon aboard Intrepid and oversaw the work himself. He and Colonel Blair planned the spy mission to Axius and when Blair returned he orchestrated the delaying action through Orestes. Though exhausted by the responsibility and breakneck pace of the race to Earth, Wilford never faulted. He is generally recognized as being one of the most essential figures in the crisis.

With the bilateral peace accord achieved, the Confederation and the new Union of Border Worlds worked quickly to establish a good relationship. They agreed to a compact increasing military exchange and cooperation and allowing officers of all ranks to transfer between militaries should the need arise. Commodore Blair, now Senior Operational Consultant on the Megacarrier Program, recommended to Senator James Taggart, head of the Armed Forces Committee, that Wilford be offered command of the first of the new ships as a symbol of the alliance. Wilford accepted and returned to active duty service in the Terran Confederation Navy as a Captain commanding the TCS Midway (CVX-1). He retained the rank of Rear Admiral in the Union of Border Worlds Naval Reserve.

The Midway was commissioned in late 2680 with orders to test the megacarrier concept using a hand-picked crew. Wilford's tasks would include developing doctrine for commanding a warship twice the size of those used during the Kilrathi War and directly commanding the carrier's expanded Science Division under Lt. Commander Aurora Finley in addition to the usual Navy and Space Forces contingents. He also authored the "From the Captain's Desk" introductory column for Waypoint!, the carrier's onboard Space Force newsletter. In November 2680, Wilford commanded the Midway through her first combat, an operation in the Valgard System to eliminate the Demon's Eye Pack pirates that had been terrorizing the Epsilon Sector.

Wilford was in command of the Midway when the Nephilim emerged at Kilrah. Wilford ordered the Miidway's marine expeditionary unit to investigate the wreck of a Kilrathi cruiser which it was discovered was destroyed by the previously encountered aliens. Over the next weeks, Wilford commanded the Midway behind enemy lines as the invasion unfolded. Working alongside the TCS Eisen, the Midway took on the aliens and pushed their fleet back to Kilrah before destroying the wormhole gate. During the campaign he took particular interest in the career of Lance Casey. He awarded Casey the Flying Cross and Pewter Planet and recommended him for the Silver Star, a promotion to 1st Lieutenant and reassignment to the carrier's elite Black Widows squadron. He eulogized several pilots killed in action in the G'wriss System and approved Commodore Blair's both request to return to the flight roster and his decision to board the wormhole gate.

The difficult campaign left Wilford exhausted and unhappy. After the destruction of the wormhole gate, he returned home to the Border Worlds on leave. The time off helped restore his happiness and he was pleased to return to command the Midway for her victory tour of the Sol Sector. Wilford again fought the Nephilim in the Sirius System, pitting Midway against an enemy carrier group that was attempting to establish supply lines. Midway's Science Division was responsible for determining that if the second wormhole in Proxima were completed it would remain open for the life of the system's binary stars.

Personality

Wilford was particularly proud of his naval service and his colonial heritage. As the first captain of the Midway, he relished the opportunity to show off the ship. He was a man of action, anxious to serve in times of crisis. He was physically imposing and extremely hard driven, focusing on his task before anything else. Colonel Blair noted that he seemed to have exhausted himself by the time of the Telamon attack and that his body seemed to be failing him by the final hours of the race to Earth. He preferred command to staff assignments and was particularly fond of leading from the bridge. He was not easily rattled, having seen a great deal during his lengthy career. He was not a strict observer of military protocols; during the Border Words conflict he often wore cardigans with only a rank pin rather than a uniform.

Wilford was known to be easy going and a dedicated mentor with a reputation for adopting and nurturing promising young officers. He was not particularly timely, arriving late for his own briefing at Speradon. This often prompted his subordinates to attempt to stand out. He did not meet Colonel Christopher Blair during the Kilrathi War but always wanted to.

He is a coffee drinker.

Family

As of 2681, Wilford is married and has four children. The first of his children followed in his footsteps and entered the Terran Confederation Naval Academy as a Union of Border Worlds exchange student in 2681.

Decorations

Wilford wore five ribbons during his service as captain of the TCS Midway.

Behind the Screens

Wilford was played by famed character actor Peter Jason. His character was originally created for Wing Commander IV to replace Captain Eisen as the 'commander,' allowing Eisen to reappear in the third act and save the day with the Mt. St. Helens. He was notable in that all of his appearances were shot separately from the rest of the cast. Like Khan in Star Trek II, he always communicates with the Intrepid via viewscreen (see issues below for a discussion of the greater continuity).

Sadly, he was then called to replace Captain Eisen on the production side in Wing Commander Prophecy. Jason Bernard, who played Eisen, tragically died in October 1996. This effectively left the 'captain' role open for the next game. Instead of simply create a new commanding officer, the Prophecy team decided to bring back Wilford for the role.

Issue: What is his rank?

In Wing Commander IV, Wilford is a Vice Admiral while in Wing Commander Prophecy he is a Captain. While this results from the change in the character's role between games (discussed above), it is presented as intended and was not ever a continuity error! While Wilford is an Admiral in the Border Worlds Navy, he is only a Captain in the TCSN. In Prophecy, he has returned to his original service and rank to command the Midway. This is covered explicitly in Origin's Official Guide to Wing Commander Prophecy and is also mentioned by Paladin in his letter in the Prophecy Gold manual's Secret Ops addition.

That said, there is some confusion around his UBWN rank: the Prophecy guide refers to his permanent rank as Rear Admiral rather than Vice Admiral. This may not have been as intended but it is actually how the Vice Admiral rank works in the United States Navy: it is tied to a specific position and is applied only when an officer is so assigned. Wilford was a Rear Admiral who was made a Vice Admiral while he was in charge of the UBWN; when he went inactive (or was otherwise reassigned) he reverted to Rear Admiral. Note also that Geoffrey Tolwyn has the same issue: he was referred to as a Vice Admiral in The Secret Missions 2 but a Rear Admiral much later.

Issue: What is his first name?

Unlike the rank issue discussed above, this is a genuine error. While it is not spoken in the game itself, the Wing Commander IV credits refer to him as Daniel Wilford while Origin's Official Guide to Wing Commander Prophecy calls him Eugene Wilford. This is an issue specific to the guide rather than a broad desire to change his name or imply that he is a different character; both Wing Commander Prophecy's credits and the in-fiction ICIS manual refer to him as Daniel.

Captain/Admiral Wilford suffers from an issue common in Wing Commander lore (though he is an outlier in that it most frequently impacts characters created by Dr. William Forstchen) which is that a later source failed to note that his first name had already been established. For the lack of a better alternative, we propose a standard rule for these situations which says that multiple names are recorded in the order they were decided creatively. Thus Wilford would be Daniel Eugene Wilford, Banbridge would be Wayne Spencer Banbridge and Kruger would be Maximilian Hans Kruger.

Issue: Where was Admiral Wilford during Wing Commander IV?

In the game itself, Wilford completely disappears after ordering the Intrepid to Axius. He simply isn't mentioned again and the surprise of Captain Eisen arriving in the Mt. St. Helens causes the player never to wonder what became of him. In the novel, he arrives aboard the Intrepid for the attack on Speradon and never leaves (unlike Tolwyn in Wing Commander III, he does not take command from Blair). In continuity, he is presumably aboard the Intrepid during the final race to Earth… just standing somewhere else!

Query: What are his ribbons and other costume parts?

In Wing Commander IV, Wilford wears a light blue officer's tunic. His insignia include two Union of Border Worlds shoulder patches, a black WILFORD name tag, two silver collar pips, a silver ADMIRAL rank bar consisting of five squares in a plus shape and a 'wings' pin.

In Wing Commander Prophecy, he has a light blue officer's uniform with black shoes and a black belt. His insignia include two Unified Space Command shoulder patches, a grey WILFORD name tag, two silver collar pips, a solid silver CAPTAIN rank bar and five ribbons in three rows.

We have not been able to identify the source of the ribbon on the first row. It seems to be white/red/light blue/white. The other four seem to be genuine United States military surplus. The second row is a Joint Meritorious Unit Award (with the frame removed) and a Philippine Defense Medal. The third row is another JMUA and an Army of Occupation Medal (worn backwards).

GOG Needs a Shooter Promo

In a shocking turn of events, the Wing Commander games on GOG have been included in yet another big sale! This month's theme is "Shooter Game Promo," which frankly isn't really trying that hard. This time around everything is a whopping 75% off, or $1.49 per package. That's about as cheap as it gets for these releases! You can find all the games at the links below or indexed here.

Reminder: #Wingnut Movie Night Tonight!

This is a reminder that we have another fun #Wingnut movie night planned on Discord this evening! The ongoing theme will be movies that inspired Wing Commander in some way. Tonight's film is Run Silent, Run Deep (1958) which was one of the sources for the Wing Commander's submarine and crew drama elements. You can find details on that as well as how to watch along with us in the announcement post here. The movie will start about 7 PM PST/10 PM EST but feel free to drop by and hang any time!

After Action Report: Silent Running

Greetings WingNuts,

We have watched Silent Running and agree that it's an interesting movie but that it doesn't quite come together (like Wing Commander?). The special effects are incredible, the sets and costumes are excellent, the setup is an excellent story… but it never quite comes together into anything satisfying. A lot of that comes down to the lead, we thought, who ends up being somewhat difficult to root for. It's a movie I'm glad to have seen but it's definitely more cult than classic.

This will be a short report, though, as the movie had no known creative connections to Wing Commander beyond being incorrectly referenced in the film's original treatise. But we did note a few little genre connections! One little coincidence is that both films have acts set in ring systems! Silent Running's director famously used the film as an excuse to do the Saturn special effects he had envisioned for 2001: A Space Odyssey. Meanwhile, Wing Commander's second act battle is set in the "rings of planet 415" in the Dakota System.

The premise of the movie–flying forests out into space to preserve them-did remind me somewhat of one of the copy protection facts about the Goddard colony from The Secret Missions:

Goddard is famous for its Conservation Forest, spread out over 12500 square km. An estimated 7225 varieties of Terran trees have been transplanted to Goddard to prevent their extinction on Earth.

The repair droids that become characters had me thinking about the droids in the original Privateer which kind of work the same way. You get one tiny, static image of your repair droid… but it's your friend every moment you're in the cockpit!

By the way, one fun fact that I love and will preserve here is that in Italy the movie was presented as a sequel to 2001 called 2002: The Second Odyssey. They made some minor changes to connect it to 2001's lore including an introductory voiceover and replacing the ship's computer with the same voice actor that performed HAL (in Italy). And while that seems pretty weird, there is a strong creative connection behind the scenes, with Silent Running directed by Douglas Trumbull who did the SFX on 2001. But then I don't see how that would be like Wing Commander!

Goodbye Thomas Lee

Sad news: Game Developer is reporting that veteran Origin artist Thomas Lee has passed away after a battle with cancer. Early in his storied career, Mr. Lee worked as an artist on a range of projects from The Sims 2 to Final Fantasy IX. Later, he entered the business side of the industry as a development executive where he was fondly remembered. And his game career started in our universe!

In March 1994, Origin was staffing up to cover the unprecedented development needs of the Wing Commander III project. They were desperate for artists, TDAs, quality assurance personnel and more. One of their advertisements caught the attention of Thomas Lee's brother, James Lee, at William Paterson University in New Jersey. James applied for a job as an Advanced Graphics Specialist and during the hiring process ended up getting his brother the same job on the strength of his experience with ALIAS.

The Lees' job was to help build the huge amount of textured 3D models that would populate Wing Commander III's missions. That meant building everything from spaceships to tanks to storage containers and skyscrapers… and building them under the extreme technical limitations of Wing Commander III's early 3D engine. Using the processes and techniques that Paul Steed had developed for Strike Commander and operating with the new style for Wing Commander developed by project art director Chris Douglas, Origin's team of "graphic specialists" worked endless miracles to build a new world.

The entire process was a learning experience. No one was doing real time textured 3D in games, no one was putting the amount of assets into a game that Wing Commander III needed. In the process, the young team members developed a set of first-in-the-industry skills that would propel their careers forward for years. Many would later refer to the experience as "Origin University". Thomas Lee seemed to recognize that, happily remembering those early days when sharing George Oldziey's orchestral project on Facebook:

Our condolences to Mr. Lee's family and friends, this is a true loss. We will close by noting that he lives on in a small way you wouldn't consider: he's credited alongside several other members of the Wing Commander III art team as an interior artist in the Victory Streak manual… which is presented in universe! That means that there's always going to be another Thomas Lee working on art aboard the TCS Victory six hundred years from now. And through that–and his work–we'll keep his memory alive.

Border Worlds: Flag vs. Roundel

The topic of Wing Commander IV's texture files recently came up and a question came up: what's that spiky logo on the side of the Vindicator? If it's intended to be the Border Worlds logo, why is it so different from the circular 'phoenix' seen elsewhere?

The answer is that it's a roundel which represents the Union of Border Worlds Navy! It differs from the more familiar Border Worlds logo which represents the entire Union of Border Worlds. Compare the United States flag to the roundel used on military aircraft, for instance:

The Border Worlds roundel is actually more common than you think. It appears throughout the game, including on many Border Worlds ships (including all the fighters):

It even shows up inside the Intrepid where it's intended to match the FMV... unfortunately the texture is mirrored incorrectly!

It's also pretty distinct in gameflow, where it represents an available mission briefing on and again shows up clearly on the Banshee.

It even appears on two ships cut from the final game but left in the files: a Border Worlds space station and an R-type shuttle in Border Worlds livery.

Its similarity to the band Metallica's ninja star logo also can't be ignored!

The 'flag' logo appears throughout the game, too. It's on the uniform shoulder patches, in the Intrepid's UI and shows as the default comm video for Border Worlds capital ships! I've always liked the amount of thought that went into the logo, with the colonies, a moon, appearing with a phoenix rising from the Confederation star.

The logo must predate the union, though, as it actually makes an appearance in the background of the Wing Commander movie! It's displayed on one of the Tiger Claw's bridge monitors and can be seen most clearly behind Captain Sansky when Blair delivers the message from Tolwyn. It's easier to pick out once you've seen it in BTS footage.

A Brief History of The Darkening

One of the most rousing debates in the history of the Wing Commander fandom is over Privateer 2: The Darkening's name. Many remember that the game was announced as 'The Darkening' and only became a Privateer game close to its release. We aren't here to relitigate the debate over whether that was right or wrong; instead, we're going to try to answer a specific question: when were the multiple decisions to change the name made? To do that, we've put together a brief timeline of Privateer 2's development that we believe tells the story.

Privateer II: Dark Side - Mid-1994 to February 1995

Producer Erin Roberts pitched what would become Privateer 2: The Darkening to Origin in mid-1994. Erin had joined Origin several years earlier, coming from his home in England to Austin to assist his brother finish development of the original Wing Commander. He would go on to join the famed Strike Commander team as Associate Producer. He quickly gained a reputation for being effective in the role, someone with the rare capacity to balance managing a team and moderating the demands of the studio and corporation. He would go on to again serve as Associate Producer on the original Privateer and then as Producer on the Privateer CD-ROM release. During this final project, he famously got so fed up with Electronic Arts cancelling and then restarting development that he stopped checking his company email and had the team finish the game in peace. It would go on to sell well and to form the basis of several major OEM deals; it still generates profit today in digital release! Instead of again joining his brother on Wing Commander III, Erin wanted to return home to England. Electronic Arts had a growing presence in Manchester and he reasoned that with his experience and connections he could build a team that would produce Origin-quality games in Europe instead of Texas. He pitched this idea alongside a new game the team would build, a sequel to Privateer.

At the time, Origin had something of a hub-and-spoke system for financing game development. They would invest significant amounts of money in high risk projects from proven creators and then amortise those high budgets with spinoff games that would reuse technology and other assets. Wing Commander begat Wing Commander II, Ultima VI begat Worlds of Ultima, Strike Commander begat Wings of Glory and Pacific and so on. Erin's pitch was for a second Privateer game that would take advantage of the updated RealSpace engine being created for Wing Commander III. His project would take the bones of Wing Commander III and then, just as the original Privateer built itself on top of Wing Commander I's 3space engine, build a new Privateer where you could trade, dogfight and travel anywhere in an area of the Wing Commander universe. Additionally, the game would use a to-be-determined amount of current buzzword Full Motion Video that could be shot on a much tighter budget in the United Kingdom.

Origin, familiar with Erin's work well beyond his family connection, approved the project and the earliest development of Privateer II began in Manchester in the second half of 1994. Erin quickly assembled a world class team and production of the game began in earnest. The first task was to produce a proof-of-concept prototype which would prove to the powers that be that the new team was capable of adapting and improving on the Wing Commander III engine. This work would be the first step to securing funding for the intended FMV shoot. One offshoot of this work was that the team created a model of the original Privateer's Talon for the demo; it would be added back to the game for a special mission once it was again made part of the Wing Commander universe! As expected, the team proved themselves and Electronic Arts opted to budget three million dollars for the film shoot. It is not known precisely when the title was decided but by January 1995 the project was known as Privateer II: Dark Side.

The game was announced (but not shown) at Winter CES in January 1995. Electronic Arts happily boasted of the promising project just starting to take shape, promising members of the press that they would see the game and its intended-to-be-spectacular film portion later in the year.

• June 12, 1994 - Wing Commander Privateer CD-ROM released.
• Late 1994 - Production of Privateer II: Dark Side begins.
• January 6, 1995 - Privateer II: Dark Side is announced at Winter CES.

The Darkening - February 1995 to May 1996

Erin Roberts would spend the next eight months pulling double duty producing both the game in Manchester and putting together the star-studded film shoot at Pinewood Studios. FMV was new and at this time nothing on the scale of Privateer II had been attempted. Roberts was responsible for putting together the director, actors, below the line talent, the studio and more. He also worked directly with (and hired) screenwriter Diane Duane to build the story and the world (a duty shared with the team in Manchester that wrote the game's incredible breadth of text material while the live action material was being shot). It was during this time that the decision was made to step away from the Wing Commander universe: the technology and the idea was so promising that it seemed like it could stand on its own. The name was changed to simply "Darkside" (Draft 5) by April and by the time the shoot began in May (Draft 7) it was known as "The Darkening". The game was still a Wing Commander III technology spinoff but it was no longer expected to take place in the same world.

Another major reason for the change to "The Darkening" was that Chris Roberts, then deep in development of Wing Commander IV, was interested in doing a Privateer sequel himself. This wasn't a case of his stealing the project from his brother; rather, Electronic Arts was looking at Wing Commander IV and interested in pushing a larger, connected multimedia IP going forward. This would lead to things like the animated series and the card game but it was envisioned at first in much grander terms. Chris began development of a fascinating idea to make two Privateer sequels (Privateer 2 and 3) with a TV show that would take place between them. Players would follow one character on TV over the course of the season as they played the first game; then the second game would conclude the overarching story with both characters teaming up. It was a fascinating idea and it got so far as to be passed to a studio in Los Angeles for further development… but in the end it was more transmedia than was possible at the time. Still, Chris continued to plan to follow Wing Commander IV with a second Privateer game and eventually went into preproduction with a story by famed fantasy author Tracy Hickman.

Meanwhile, Electronic Arts conducted the first press junket for The Darkening in July. They allowed reporters to visit the sets at Pinewood Studios during the shoot and then to meet the team in Manchester to see how the game portion was being completed. This resulted in a swath of long form articles praising the imaginative production from July to November, mostly in the European press. These were mostly missed by Wing Commander fans at the time because, of course, they didn't mention Privateer. The game was fully "The Darkening" at this point and so a lot of this was completely ignored. Origin issued a November 1995 press release to support this media push listing the intended release date as simply 1996.

Then, a major change that would delay the game into the second half of 1996: around Christmas the team decided to drop the Wing Commander III engine. They believed it had been pushed to its limits by Wing Commander IV and was not conducive to the game world they wanted to build. Instead, they licensed BRender and converted existing work to the new engine. Two months later, Wing Commander fans would be forced to notice The Darkening when an advertisement for the game was included with the Wing Commander IV play guide…. Promising a now scrapped spring release date. Manchester's marketing artists began the initial development for its visual presence, complete with mockup advertisements and box covers for "The Darkening".

• February 1995 - Preproduction for the film shoot begins.
• April 7, 1995 - Draft 5 of the script is completed; it is called "Darkside".
• May, 1995 - The film shoot begins. Draft 7 of the script is titled "The Darkening".
• July, 1995 - First major press junket (at Pinewood).
• November 1, 1995 - Origin issues press release about the film shoot
• December 1995 - Wing Commander III engine dropped
• February 12 1996 - Wing Commander IV released

Privateer: The Darkening - May to July 1996

And then, some big changes. Chris Roberts left Origin in May 1996 which effectively ended work on his version of Privateer 2 (the Tracy Hickman storied game). The Darkening's next big press exposure was at E3 1996 where it made a big change as well: it was announced as Privateer: The Darkening. Privateer: The Darkening. Marketing artwork, starting to resemble the final version, was created bearing this name and Origin put out this press release. This came as a massive shock to the Wing Commander community which at this point was familiar with the project from the WC4 announcement but which wasn't particularly engaged with it beyond an interest to see what a beloved developer had put together. Frankly, there were a lot of upcoming space sims in 1996! But now this one was a Wing Commander game and the Usenet and #wing-commander went wild!

NEWS RELEASE - Contact Media Relations Department

For immediate release
Contact: David Swofford or Teresa Potts
Origin Media Relations

Privateer: The Darkening Debuts at E3

Los Angeles, Calf., May 16, 1996 - ORIGIN Systems® takes the Privateer® gaming experience to a new frontier with its first European interactive movie.

Privateer: The Darkening creates a new dimension in the Privateer universe by offering SVGA graphics and sophisticated gameplay including several hours of live action video. The Darkening is expected to ship during the holiday season on CD-ROM.

Privateer: The Darkening adopts and enhances the superlative gameplay of the original Privateer, ORIGIN's award-winning space exploration/action game which shipped in 1993. Choose for yourself whether you're in the mood to trade goods, be a scout, bounty hunter, escort, courier or reconnaissance agent. Up to 18 different ships and a wide variety of technology upgrades let you decide which ship can carry the advantages and weapons you'll need in your new career. Hire wingmen and cargo ships to help you blaze a trail across the galaxy as you take on hundreds of missions. As in all ORIGIN Interactive Movies you take control of the lead character, in this case Lev Arris (Clive Owen), and guide him through a multitude of adventures and missions. Its Origins most action-packed interactive movie to date!

Privateer: The Darkening features a top-of-the-line cast starring noted European actors John Hurt, David Warner, Jurgen Prochnow and Clive Owen, as well as American actor Christopher Walken. Filming for The Darkening took place over a six-week period last summer at the famed Pinewood Studios outside of London.

The Storyline

Lev Arris awakens from cryogenic storage, a coldsleep that might have lasted for as long as ten years. He was allegedly suffering from a disease for which (10 years ago) there was no cure. His pod has been pulled from the wreckage of a star-freighter called Canera, which was mysteriously attacked by ships of an unknown origin. He has lost his memory and is now faced with rediscovering his identity by interacting with dangerously devious and sinister characters, some of whom are out to kill him. Arris must endure a roller-coaster journey of bribery, corruption, deception and violence. However, the decisions you make will decide his plight.

ORIGIN Systems develops and publishes state-of-the-art entertainment software. To date, the company has released more than 50 titles, including the award-winning Ultima, Wing COmander, and Crusader series of games. ORIGIN is based in Austin, Texas, and is a wholly owned subsidiary of Electronic Arts (NASDAQ: ERTS).

###

ORIGIN, ORIGIN Systems, We Create Worlds, Privateer, and Ultima are registered trademarks and The Darkening, and ORIGIN Interactive Movie are trademarks of ORIGIN Systems, Incl. Electronic Arts is a registered trademark of Electronic Arts Inc. All other trademarks are property of their respective owners.

Well he helped produce Privateer and so The Darkening is very much like Privateer. I think we may even call it Privateer 2. And, you know, it's going to be very much in the Privateer game format. But a lot better designed and thought out and care taken on the gameplay itself. The characters and story haven't got anything to do with Privateer, though. But it looks really, really cool. So, I think it's going to be out this Christmas. I think it's going to do really well.

What we learn here is that the debate over what to name the game was going on for some time before fans had any idea. Most interesting is this clip from a Chris Roberts interview in the June 1996 issue of PC Action. This was most likely shot at ECTS in April before he left Origin and it suggests pretty strongly that he was pushing for the game to be renamed Privateer 2 at that time. Which makes quite a bit of sense: Chris would've wanted to support his brother's project and he was the decider for everything creative and technical about the Wing Commander IP at the time. It wasn't purely a faceless Electronic Arts executive insisting on the change… it was the executives running Origin like Chris Roberts, people whose direction we have always implicitly trusted. (It's also believed that Chris did an uncredited edit on the Privateer 2 intro sequence around this time, again simply to assist his brother's project.)

• April 14 1996 - ECTS; Chris Roberts speaks publicly about possibly renaming the game Privateer 2.
• May 1996 - Chris Roberts leaves Origin to found Digital Anvil.
• May 16 1996 - E3; Origin announces the game as Privateer: The Darkening

Privateer 2: The Darkening - July to December 1996

Less than three months later, the powers that be at Origin changed their mind again. An updated version of the E3 press release was posted to Origin's home page retitling the game Privateer 2: The Darkening. Six weeks later, it was shown at ECTS under that name. And in December the game shipped first in Europe and then the United States.

• July 31, 1996 - The game is officially renamed Privateer 2: The Darkening
• September 8, 1996 - ECTS; the game is shown as Privateer 2: The Darkening
• December 13, 1996 - The game ships in Europe.
• December 28, 1996 - The game ships in the United States.

What does this all tell us? The simple story that the game was 'The Darkening' and then it became 'Privateer 2' right as it was released is true only in the broadest sense. In the end, the game was in development from idea to release for about thirty months and for fifteen of those it had Privateer in the name. That said, the change happened when only a small amount of the setting had been established and so much of the game was indeed created without thought for it being part of the Wing Commander universe.

THAT said, there's no moral to the story, you should decide for yourself how you feel about Privateer 2 and the decision to change its name yourself, understanding that the latter was made without the input of the team that bled to make the game happen. My opinion will always be that Privateer 2 is an incredible game and a worthy addition that expands the Wing Commander universe in some very necessary (if unexpected) directions. At the same time, there's no question in my mind that the internal issues that caused the rift between the Manchester and Austin teams were completely valid… but again, their cause wasn't the team that worked so hard to build the game in the first place.

Wing Commander Movie Night: Run Silent, Run Deep

The Wing Commander movie club has swung back around from the outer planets to finish Silent Running. This week we're going back to World War II for the 1958 submarine film Run Silent, Run Deep. You can join us this Friday via Discord to watch along.

Run Silent, Run Deep is a 1958 action/war film about an American submarine captain desperately pursuing revenge against the Japanese destroyer captain that sunk his last boat. It stars Burt Lancaster as Clarke Gable as the captain and XO at odds over the battle and alongside the previous year's The Enemy Below helped establish the standard beats for a submarine movie. It was directed by Robert Wise who would go on to helm Star Trek: The Motion Picture and it was also heavily referenced in Star Trek's Balance of Terror.

As we discussed last week, Run Silent, Run Deep is almost certainly the movie Chris Roberts meant to reference when he described Wing Commander thusly in the film's initial treatment:

Space combat in this universe follows the tradition of naval warfare in the Pacific during WW II. The two opposing sides maneuver around strategic planets and jump points, playing a deadly game of Silent Running-esque cat and mouse, with certain doom to whoever's located first.

So we will be looking at the film in a pretty broad sense! It will be especially interesting to see how it establishes a lot of the submarine 'tropes' that Wing Commander will continue to use four decades later. The internal chaos aboard the American submarine is also worth looking at as a prototype the Tiger Claw's embattled warriors.

Where can I find a copy of the movie for the watch party?

Run Silent, Run Deep is currently available for free in the US on YouTube. It is streaming on several free services including Roku and PlutoTV. You can also download a copy from the Internet Archive. It is also currently available for rent or purchase on all the standard services. If you would like a physical copy, the movie was released on Blu-Ray in 2024 and remains in print around the world. If you are not able to locate a copy please stop by the Discord and ping a CIC staff member before Friday's showing.

How do we watch the movie together?

It's pretty low tech! Simply join the Wing Commander CIC Discord on Friday and we will be chatting (in text) along with the film in the main channel. Everyone who wants to join in should bring their own copy and we will count down to play them together at 10 PM EST. Everyone is welcome and we encourage you to join in the conversation; sharing your thoughts helps make the experience better for everyone!

Surprise Uniforms Surface

A Reddit user named BackpackTwo recently posted something pretty interesting to the r/wingcommander subreddit: a photo of some costumes from Wing Commander Prophecy! They explained: "I worked at Origin in the late 90's around the launch of WC Prophecy so I had a few pieces of memorabilia that i had forgotten about when cleaning out the closets." Lucky person! These are Terran Confederation Navy uniforms worn by Seth Walter as comm officer 1st Lt. Anderson and Mindy Hester as science officer Lt. Commander Finley. A great, high resolution look, especially valuable for anyone interested in making their own costumes!

And the Winners Are...

Our first winner for Fan Project of the Year 2024 is WC4 Remastered! Excitement remains high for the fan remake of The Price of Freedom, and the steady drumbeat of comprehensive updates gives Wingnuts high confidence that their patience will be rewarded (in about a year)!

Our second top spot is taken by the combination of AllTinker's two contenders: Originator and Confederation! The Originator tool is a phenomenal program used far and wide to hack into WC code to learn its secrets and extract assets for modern projects. The Confederation endeavor is quasi-related undertaking that leverages this kind of knowledge to enhance Wing Commander 1 with modern updates while retaining the original charm.

Finally, Mac's Lore Videos/Art had a very strong showing this year as well! Wingnuts love his comprehensive WC videos, but there's also plenty of wallpapers and other treats sprinkled between the longer form content to keep people excited.

Announcing the Hall of Fame Winners

Perhaps with little surprise, we are happy to announce our Hall of Fame winner is Klavs! It's been not quite a year since Adam Burch's passing, although we can say definitely that this untimely shock was not the reason for his boost in the polls. Rather, his decades of dedicated service to the community and legacy of assets left to the fans make him a clear winner. Once again, Klavs, we salute you.

Reminder: #Wingnut Movie Night Tonight!

This is a reminder that we have another fun #Wingnut movie night planned on Discord this evening! The ongoing theme will be movies that inspired Wing Commander in some way. Tonight's film is Silent Running (1972) which inspired... maybe nothing in Wing Commander You can find details on that as well as how to watch along with us in the announcement post here. The movie will start about 7 PM PST/10 PM EST but feel free to drop by and hang any time!

After Action Report: Alien

Greetings WingNuts,

We all love Alien! Is there anyone that doesn't love Alien? It holds up so well today, despite how 'slow' the first half is compared to movies today. But you aren't bored slowly creeping through the Nostromo's empty rooms for minutes and minutes at a time… if anything, the quality of the visual world building around you makes you wish you could stop and look around. And then once the movie gets going, you're in.

The biggest connection to Wing Commander is that both Wing Commander II and the Wing Commander movie referred to the Ripley character in adapting Angel. In both cases, it's clear what they were trying to do… but making your love interest a stronger female character doesn't approach Alien's treatment of Ripley as the lead. In the case of Alien, the character wasn't gendered until casting, leaving her the sum of her actions. Wing Commander couldn't really get there!

Here's John Hurt as Kane in Alien and as Joe (Kane!) in Privateer 2: The Darkening. Despite the seventeen years between the two roles he's effortlessly charming in both.

Of course, we've also got the famous seats! Ron Cobb designed these acceleration seats for the Nostromo's bridge and then the Wing Commander II team… borrowed… the design for all of the rear cockpit views!

But that's not the only piece of Ron Cobb art Wing Commander borrowed: Privateer's Galaxy freighter is a tribute to Cobb's Nostromo. The ship is often obscured in the final film…

... but looking at the original concept art makes the connection pretty clear!

Alien also created visuals that are 'tropes' today, imitated unconsciously countless tiems. A little example: the alien being 'spaced' at the end of the film is the standard for something being thrown out an airlock. Here it is in the first episode of Wing Commander Academy!

The Wing Commander movie's official magazine features Peter Lamont talking a little bit about how H.R. Giger's biomechanical sets (seen in Alien on the space jockey derelict) was both an influence and something to specifically avoid for the Kilrathi ship sets. In the final movie, you see so little of them as to make it hard to compare!

As the plot evolved, they became more bionic, or bio-mechanical, though not as much as H.R. Giger's stuff. These were different creatures, not oxygen breathers; they lived in an atmosphere of green mist. Their controls aren't screens but long slits of moving lights which look almost cat-like."

Although the word "bio-mechanical" has been used over the years to describe countless ALIEN knock-offs, Lamont was careful not to fall into that trap with the Kilrathi sets. "Look at Giger's work, like the early ALIEN, and you'll find a lot of repetition [in other films]. We wanted to keep away from that. These ship interiors looked almost like entrails, and the set decorators had a great time creating it."

And then there's the alien itself! It would be a stretch (well, a lie) to say that Alien's magnificent creature inspired Wing Commander's rubber Kilrathi… but Alien did inspire the final edit of the Kilrathi which sought to follow in that film's footsteps by reducing the amount you actually see the Kilrathi to simple flashes until the climax. Wing Commander was shot with multiple cutaways to the Kilrathi planning their attack and that was all dropped in the hopes of making the awkward costumes seem scary. Alien had pioneered this but it wasn't to hide a faulty creature… they had a perfect life form and they knew how to present it!

Lost Origin Music Album Discovered

This is a fascinating little discovery that is about thirty years in the making: a previously unknown promotional album that includes music from Wing Commander III and several other Origin games! It's called Electronic Arts Music Sampler Volume Two and it was produced in 1995 to promote EA's ever-increasingly-professional music departments across four studios. In addition to Wing Commander III, it includes tracks from Bioforge, Wings of Glory, Pacific Strike, Ultima VIII: Pagan and the unreleased Prowler!

Here are the eight Origin-related tracks:

3. Credits/Theme (Wing Commander III) - George Oldziey & Randy Buck

4. Big Band-O-Rama (Pacific Strike) - Paul Baker

9. Medley (Wings of Glory) - Lara Barratt

14. Pagan Medley (Ultima VIII) - Nenad Vugrinec

17. Medley (Bioforge) - John Tipton

19. On the Prowl (Prowler) - Joe Basquez

21. Desert Planet Combat (Prowler) - Joe Basquez

23. Behemoth (Wing Commander III) - George Oldziey

Want copies of the non-Origin tracks? We've ripped a copy for everyone; you can download the entire album in FLAC format here (376 meg).

Why didn't history ever notice this album? We're not sure how rare it is but we have a theory as to why no one noticed: the cover is IDENTICAL to the original Electronic Arts Music Sampler from 1993! Here's a comparison:

Command & Conquer Source Code Released

Exciting news for one of our sister communities: Electronic Arts has released a mountain of Command and Conquer material for fans to explore including source code, modding access and never-before-seen footage of games while they were in development! You can read all of the details in their announcement.

Source code has been posted to Github for the original game, Red Alert, Renegade and Generals Zero Hour! They've also enabled mod support for several games via Steam Workshop and put out this fascinating video:

Once upon a time, Wing Commander and Command & Conquer, both beloved by fans, were effectively friendly rivals with Electronic Arts pitting Origin and Westwood against each other to develop a space MMO. That battle ended tragically for both studios! But it's nice to see a dedication to putting some of that history right… maybe we could see some archival Wing Commander material someday!

WC4 Fan Remake Deploys New Assets to the Masa System

While it’s still possible we’ll hit the February 12, 2026 target, we’re preparing for a slight delay to ensure we have enough time to polish the visuals. So we may be following in the original’s footsteps and delay the release to hit the 30th anniversary year, though possibly not the exact day.

We plan to have a closed beta by sometime close to the 30th anniversary of the original advertised release date (December 8th this year). The feedback from that build will help determine if we need to adjust our official release date.

Wing Commander Movie Night: Silent Running

The Wing Commander movie club has visited space and attempted to scream; results pending! This week, we're going to be taking another space voyage with the 1972 science fiction film Silent Running. You can join us this Friday via Discord to watch along.

Silent Running is an environmental-themed science fiction film that tells the story of a convoy of spaceships carrying a destroyed Earth's last plant life. It was directed by the man responsible for 2001: A Space Odyssey's spectacular special effects, Douglas Trumbull, on a shoestring budget. Silent Running won critics' hearts but didn't perform at the box office; it has become a cult classic today.

Wing Commander's connection to Silent Running is… pretty much nothing. Here's an excerpt from Chris Roberts' original treatment of the Wing Commander movie where he is trying to explain how he intends for the film to feel:

Space combat in this universe follows the tradition of naval warfare in the Pacific during WW II. The two opposing sides maneuver around strategic planets and jump points, playing a deadly game of Silent Running-esque cat and mouse, with certain doom to whoever's located first.

Now, here's the thing: he almost certainly means Run Silent, Run Deep, a classic submarine movie that has been inspiring science fiction stories since (at least) the original Star Trek's Balance of Terror. As far as we can tell, nothing about the description given here actually ties in to Silent Running. That said, Silent Running is a cult classic with a great message that's well worth our time... so we're going to check it out anyway! (Spoiler warning: we'll check out Run Silent, Run Deep next week.)

There is one small connection to the greater Robertsverse, though: Silent Running's Valley Forge would serve as a significant inspiration for Star Citizen's Endeavour-class science ship. But that's another universe altogether…

Where can I find a copy of the movie for the watch party?

Silent Running is currently available for rent or purchase on all the standard services. If you would like a physical copy, the movie was released on UHD in 2022 and remains in print around the world. If you are not able to locate a copy please stop by the Discord and ping a CIC staff member before Friday's showing.

How do we watch the movie together?

It's pretty low tech! Simply join the Wing Commander CIC Discord on Friday and we will be chatting (in text) along with the film in the main channel. Everyone who wants to join in should bring their own copy and we will count down to play them together at 10 PM EST. Everyone is welcome and we encourage you to join in the conversation; sharing your thoughts helps make the experience better for everyone!

The Strange Creatures of Wing Commander Academy

Eggs are in the news right now and we thought we'd investigate one thing that's driving up the prices. That's right, it's the Dioscurian Ovizard! These adorable twelve-legged lizards show up in "Lords of the Sky" when the cadets first enter the atmosphere of Dioscuri-2. The ovizard eats the egg and is then startled by the Scimitars' thrusters, prompting it to change color and dart away. That's a lot of biology in a few frames!

Here's their home, from the mission briefing earlier in the episode. Note the Easter eggs in this screenshot, references to Forbidden Planet, Alien and Star Trek!

Their name was introduced in Star*Soldier in a classified ad intended to be from a scientist studying on Dioscuri-2:

Free to Good Home: litter of Dioscurian Ovizards. Stealthy, eggchomping space weirdos are all the rage in Sol!
Contact creid@dioscuri.science

One question remains: what made the nest and the egg in the first place? We don't see any other notable animals on Dioscuri-2... but there are some weird skulls decorating the Dioscurian temple!

We do see some extraterrestrial birds (and butterflies!) on Greenhouse later in the show:

Walken Lets Her Ripper

Actor Christopher Walken recently made headlines when he revealed in an interview that he did not watch streaming video and didn't even own a cell phone. Well, this November 1995 Computer Game Review interview seems to suggest that's nothing new--here he says he's never even seen a CD-ROM (after shooting two of them)! This was published as a sidebar to an article about Ripper (which is now old enough that we should call it Bossman) but he talks about his work on Privateer 2: The Darkening, noting that he shot his role there for two days. And look how much fun he's having on the cover!

A small bonus from this issue: a previously unarchived version of the Wing Commander CTCG release advertisement with the tagline "Available Everywhere!"; sadly, this was not true!

One on One Exclusive Interview with Walken

“This guy can convey a character in a situation so well, it’s just unmatched.”
-Mark Semeret, president, Take 2 Interactive.

CGR: You've been very successful in movies. Why get involved with a CD-ROM project, and how did you get involved?

Christopher Walken: “My agent called me and told me [people] are starting to do this now, there’s a lot of actors doing it.”

CGR: You are doing Ripper and you are doing the Darkening with Origin, yes?

CW: “I-did the Darkening, yeah. It was two days over in England.”

CGR: Is this fun?

CW: “It's different. It's interesting. The one I did before (The Darkening) had sets, this doesn't, but it’s interesting.”

CGR: We've had people tell us that doing an interactive project is just like acting in a movie and that it's nothing like acting in a movie. What's your take?

Cw: “Well, I'm reading my lines off a teleprompter, which is nothing like a movie; but that's only because the job came on such short notice and it’s easier to do the teleprompter thing. For me, it’s a little more like Saturday Night Live, where I read off cue-cards.”

CGR: We've also heard it’s a lot like being on stage.

CW: “Yes, except that I’m reading my lines.”

CGR: Did you know anything about interactive media before these projects?

CW: “No, I can't even turn on a computer. I've never seen a CD-ROM.”

CGR: As an actor, is this as legitimate a medium as television, film or theater?

CW: “Sure. You never know what's going to happen to this—this [medium] is obviously something that's just beginning.”

CGR: Do you worry about getting typecast: You seem to tend toward playing the heavies a lot.

CW: “No.”

CGR: Do you have a favorite role that you've done?

CW: “No.”

GGR: Any projects you wish you hadn't done?

CW: “Oh, sure!” (laughs)

CGR: What are you workifig on after this?

CW: “I don’t know. I had a bunch of things in a row. I did the thing in England [the Darkening] last week, and after tomorrow, I’m unemployed.”

CGR: Would you do another interactive project?

CW: “Sure. It'll be interesting to see what it’s like when it's done, because right now it's just people against blue walls. It’s a whole different ballgame, as far as movies go. Maybe that’s where movies will go, with computerized sets.”

CGR: Is it hard to keep what the Wcharacter knows in mind when in a given scene what he knows could change depending on what the player knows?

CW: “No, the lines are different. I guess it's a good thing I didn't think of that.