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Earth & Beyond Shaking Things Up
Despite rumors of its mediocre success, EA's massively multiplayer space sim Earth & Beyond has instigated the kind of sweeping changes to the universe that you'd expect from a persistent world with steady support. The aliens that provide the main antogonist for the game have successfully invaded key areas shaking up the balance of the game. You can read about the latest updates to the universe here.
Humanity suffers a stunning blow as the V'rix draw first blood and seize the mighty Progen Citadel of Praetorium Mons. Primus planet lies in ruins after a V'rix assault captures the base that was once home to Primarch Kahn himself. Amid the carnage, the leadership of the Progen lies in shambles, with the head of all Centuriata, Legatus Var, missing in action. The war continues in earnest, as the struggle to control the Ancient Gates comes to a head. While Jenquai forces fight a desperate battle against the invading V'rix and their deadly hive weapon, Terran EarthCorps forces square off against First Emissary Merjan in her bid to do the impossible and open the way to Aquitaine sector. Meanwhile, shadowy conspiracies and fanatical zealots make their plans to seize power. Players will face hard choices as they choose sides in the galactic struggle to control the fate of humanity.
The game has also held another Fan Gathering in Indianapolis. Good for them. Although E&B was the game EA cancelled Privateer Online in favor of, I'd much rather it succeed than fail and show EA that space sims are a less viable genre. Among other things, we'll be giving away copies of the game (including the first subscription month) at the CIC Birthday Party August 10.
[ChrisReid] [# 4854] [Discuss]  
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Update published on 7/30/2003. View all news from that day.
Wing Commander CIC - Visit the front page
Official news, fan projects and topics of particular interest to Wing Commander fans.
- Wing Commander Universe Squared
- 2010-09-08 -- Chuckles is taking a closer look at the Wing Commander universe map for the WCPedia project. He's converted the Akwende Projection included with Wing Commander Prophecy and realigned it to create a direct perspective. The result is that trapezoidal sectors in the "back" are more squarish now.
- XBox Live Price Increasing
- 2010-09-08 -- Microsoft announced last week that the price of XBox Live will increase from $50 to $60 in the US as of November 1, 2010. A similar price increases will take place in Mexico, and single month subscriptions are going up in Canada and the UK (although annual subscriptions remain unchanged). Since opening in 2002, the service has expanded significantly to include movie and television rentals, Netflix streaming, social media services and video chat.
- DirectDraw Hack 1.0 Released
- 2010-09-07 -- sol_hsa has completed his DirectDraw upgrade ddhack! It now works with all Kilrathi Saga games - Wing Commanders 1, 2 & 3 - plus the Windows version of Wing Commander 4. The program has come a long way since the initial release that added bilinear smoothing to the classic graphics.
- Paper Commander's Rapier Complete
- 2010-09-06 -- Péricles has finished his latest paper model, the Rapier II Blade from Wing Commander Arena. The authentic Arena meshes were used to design this ship, and the general shapes from the game appear especially well suited for construction. Hopefully this means we'll see more designs soon.
- Collateral Destroyer Brought into 28th Century
- 2010-09-05 -- JasonRocZ has completed another new ship for Collateral Damage. The ship bears a striking resemblance to the classic Southampton destroyer from Wing Commander 3, but it also tastefully incorporates numerous elements seen on Wing Commander Arena's battlecruisers. His current story concepts revolve around one of these warships falling into mercenary hands.
- DragonCon Starting to Wrap Up
- 2010-09-05 -- It's been a very productive Sunday for Team CIC at DragonCon! The morning started with a chance to talk with Wing Commander Freedom Flight author Mercedes Lackey and her husband, former Origin artist Larry Dixon. Both are enthusiastic Wing Commander fans.
- Holding the Line Back on Track
- 2010-09-04 --
Members of the HTL team are trying to wrap up the long-running fan fiction story. Wing Commander: Holding the Line began in January 1999 as a play-by-email campaign of the Aces Club. It continued strongly for many years, but the last chapter was released in 2007.
- DragonCon Continues
- 2010-09-04 -- Woohoo! Lots of stuff happening here, but no big news to report. LOAF told the president of Baen that they need to reprint more Wing Commander books.
- DragonCon Begins
- 2010-09-03 -- Team CIC has made it all the way to Atlanta for DragonCon 2010. The convention doesn't really get going until mid day Friday, so there'll be lots of crazy pictures to come. I'd post more now, but we're off to get our Freedom Flights autographed by Mercedes Lackey!
- WCPedia Planning Pow-wow Pending
- 2010-09-03 --
Dundradal and the team working on the WCPedia have been making great progress, and now they're putting together what will come next. They will be holding a planning session in #Wingnut later this month to shore things up. There will also be multiplayer Wing Commander games going, and Dund's even got some prizes up his sleeve.
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