Silvery Snakeir Sneaks on Scene Update ID Share on Facebook Share on Twitter

DefianceIndustries has taken a break from his recent string of later-era ships to take a stab at the WC Movie's Snakeir. It's not the first take on the design ever, but the film's ships are very underrepresented in fan art, so this is a welcome addition to his fleet. In its untextured form, the render below also allows you to appreciate all the detail of ship. All those heavy turrets are pretty neat too!
Occasionally I take on a project to model things that I find odd, poorly designed, or just plain ugly. Why? I dunno, I think it's really more to explore the process behind it, sometimes working on a thing that I don't like sometimes leads to a better appreciation of it, or reinforces why I don't like it without being overly judgmental. (Probably a bit too philosophical for a thread entitled "eye candy").

Anyway I chose to tackle a ship in the category of "Things that get little to no love" in the Wing Commander Universe: The WCM Snakeir. After knocking around on this one for about a week I've come to appreciate it a bit more. The movie FX shots are so dark that you can't really get a good appreciation for the ship's aesthetic. It's still not my favorite, but I think it gets a bum wrap by-in-large. Anyway that's my thoughts on it, you're free to comment below if you feel otherwise. :)

All Wings Considered - Episode 28 - LIVE! Update ID Share on Facebook Share on Twitter

The latest episode of ALL WINGS CONSIDERED is live now! All Wings Considered is the CIC's first ever streaming variety show which features news, conversation and gameplay relating to our favorite series. This week's Nav Points include:

  • Wing Commander 3 - Blackmane System - let's save and/or take apart a starbase!
  • Book Club Mini - Heart of the Tiger Chapter 16 - Kevin Tolwyn comes to town
  • Learn how the Wing Commander Academy Gauntlet works!
  • McHale's Navy - cruise missiles throughout history

Missed the stream? The replay will be available below once it has been processed by YouTube. You can subscribe to the AWC channel for future notifications here.

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Captain Eisen Still Steering Our Ship Update ID Share on Facebook Share on Twitter

Today marks 23 years since the actor Jason Bernard passed away. Sadly, we've lost a number of friends and familiar faces over the years, but this one still looms large in my mind after more than two decades. 1996 was an intense year for Wing Commander fans. The year started with the launch of Wing Commander 4 and new ports of WC3 were still being released through the spring. The CCG came out in August, Academy television show in September and Kilrathi Saga launched October 15. As evidenced by the current CIC poll, a large number of Wingnuts were coming online for the first time in 1996... and then the news of Mr. Bernard's passing hit like a ton of bricks. Fortunately, this nascent community of mostly invincible-feeling teenagers and 20-somethings were able to come together and collectively share their grief as fans. One such gathering place was the Worlds of Origin memorial, which is archived here. Mark Hamill even recently remembered Mr. Bernard on Twitter with some kind words. While none of us may have known the man personally, by all accounts, he was a remarkable person who continues to be greatly missed.

Final Day for Second Book on Origin History Update ID Share on Facebook Share on Twitter

It's the final stretch for Andrea Contato's second book on the history of Origin, Through the Moongate, from Wing Commander and Ultima VII to Portalarium. The project is nearing its €40,000 stretch goal, which adds an appendix full of personal interviews and anecdotes. Jumping into the €50 (plus ~€25 for tracked shipping to North America) hardcover tier will also be the only way to get Denis Loubet's cool Wing Commander bookmark, so factor that into whether you would like to consider funding the book. It might be the most expensive piece of paper you buy this week, but that just makes it taste better.
1) We lowered shipping cost from Part 1 for many countries. Canada and the US benefited the most from this as we managed to lower the shipping cost by 25-45%. With the introduction of Love tier (i.e. untracked shipping), we have hit rock bottom for shipping prices without subsidizing shipping out of pocket.

2) The next closest stretch goal will add a "last words" section to every type of book (i.e. ebook, softcover, and hardcover). This is an important goal as it gives a voice to so many important members of the community. It's so tantalizingly close, we are 100% sure we cat get it, but only with your help!

3) The softcover and ebook versions were upgraded with photos and will have the pictures they were missing in Part 1.

4) Part 2 has a lot of interesting facts about the eventful period from the launch of Wing Commander, the acquisition of Origin by EA, and its demise. The author, with the help of many Originites, dug deeply into how Origin Systems, Inc. changed after the stellar success of WC. You won't want to miss this!

5) Denis Loubet's bookmark and Manda's artwork printed on cloth won't be available after this Kickstarter. Only enough for the backers will be made. This is your very last chance to get them while you still can!

Freelancer Port Goes on Bug Smashing Rampage Update ID Share on Facebook Share on Twitter

L.I.F. continues to run troubleshooting interference on the Freelancer port and zap any glitches that pop up along the way. He's grabbed some additional screenshots here while going through the campaign, and they look great. The Excalibur and Bearcat are especially awesome. It's still pretty wild to see familiar WC craft parked on the flight deck with Freelancer characters walking around. If you have a copy of FL, download version 1.0 of the mod here (320 meg zip) or here and let everyone know what you think!
The Sabre is a pretty reliable fighter for you right now as you're waiting for Junko to find information on Sinclair. You need to find a Concordia-class carrier, they're sold onboard and will last you all the way till Kusari, where the first planet in which you land sells the Thunderbolt. Also, I'll set things up so that you can buy the Bearcat in your first visit to Rheinland. Then you'll get the Lance on the Intrepid.
So, amusing bug notice: in the large setpiece battle at the beginning of Mission 10, the game seems to take some issue at the way I've configured the carriers, most likely in their collision meshes... cue spinning carriers that will kill your framerate and probably force you to reload from the last autosave a few minutes ago. Amusing, annoying but not entirely game-breaking, as I managed to get through that part. I'll revise the collision meshes to see if it solves the issue.

Good old times, isn't it?

Hong Kong Controversy Ensnares WC Vet Update ID Share on Facebook Share on Twitter

There's been a lot in the news lately about the Hong Kong protests and how various companies are reacting to those that support them, so it was only a matter of time until this story intersected with Wing Commander. Blizzard has been under fire this past week for their punishment of a Hearthstone player who spoke out in support of Hong Kong. The accusation is that they were overly harsh in their response in order to placate China. That whole discussion is far beyond where we're going to go, but the details surrounding Blizzard's response caught our eye. The president of Blizzard is none other than J. Allen Brack, of Wing Commander fame. He was hired in 1994 to help with quality assurance on Wing Commander 3 and continued on through WC4, Privateer 2, Prophecy and Secret Ops. The TCS Brack was one of the first Confed ships to encounter the Nephilim as told in the ICIS Manual. We've followed Mr. Brack's career as he went on to work on Star Wars Galaxies and then World of Warcraft (with plenty of WC-themed easter eggs making their way into the game). So it falls on him this weekend to lay out of the company's position and run damage control. I don't envy him one bit, but it's cool to see how far one Wing Commander vet has gone in the games industry! And it looks like his actions have been at least somewhat well received so far.
One day as I was driving home, I spotted a familiar logo: "We Create Worlds." On a whim I applied for a QA job, never thinking I'd be lucky enough to be employed in the game industry. Imagine my surprise when two weeks later I was an Origin employee! A gamer's dream come true - well, sort of.

Four grueling months later, working seven days a week without a break, sleeping at work, and playing more Doom then I could have ever imagined possible, I helped ship my first game, Wing Commander III. Starring none other than the great Mark Hamill himself!

Amazing Proposed WC1 Trinkets That Never Were Update ID Share on Facebook Share on Twitter

I dug this up after seeing Limited Run Games' extremely cool System Shock re-release: a doc from Wing Commander I's development that lists possible trinkets! I would've loved to see any of these... but miniature ships would've been amazing.
Of course the set of blueprints they decided to go with are hard to beat!
And the Japanese FM Towns port of Wing Commander did include a map poster!
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Turkish VHS Adds to the Mix Update ID Share on Facebook Share on Twitter

The Turkish VHS has been added to our international cavalcade of Wing Commander home video releases!

Turkey also got the film on VCD!
It's always great to come across odd localizations of the Wing Commander film that we missed in the past. On display today we present 'Cesaret Kanatları', as the film is known in Turkey. Roughly this title translates to "Wings of Courage," which I think has a nice ring to it! The Turkish distributor of the Wing Commander movie was Ozen Film, which also distributed the Chris Roberts produced Outlander in that country.
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