Wing Commander related material at the Internet Archive

BrynS

BrynS

Mr Kat says...
I was using the Wayback Machine over at the Internet Archive a couple of weeks back and noticed that amongst the Archive's various sections there is one dedicated to Computer Chronicles, which I'm sure that some or perhaps many of you will remember was a television programme (broadcast from 1983 to 2002) covering general purpose computing -- it's sister show was called Net Cafe'. I believe it was quite widely syndicated in the US and in many other countries.

The Computer Chronicles section seems to be in the process of archiving and uploading the show's episodes (available in number of compression formats) for streaming and offline viewing, as when browsing archived episodes by year, it is apparent that specific years are absent. With this in mind I set about searching the existing archives for any related Wing Commander video clips and material.

So far, I've managed to locate three segments containing references (I think the episodes concerned were uploaded at various points during the past 10 months or so), namely an interview with George Sanger AKA The Fat Man, a gameplay overview of WC3 with Mark Day and a brief gameplay overview of WC2. I would think it fairly probable that additional Wing Commander related material may surface as the back library of Computer Chronicles episodes is uploaded to the archive, given the period covered by the show, i.e. 1983-2002. So, IMO it would be worth checking up on this portion of the Archive every few months!

Anyway, below are the links to the episodes concerned, as well as two versions (Full Resolution and Half Resolution) of the specific Wing Commander related segment on that episode.

All segments are encoded using Xvid -- for the latest stable Xvid binary go here. Alternatively, you can use the DivX Codec amongst others. If using IE6, the usual right-click and "Save Target As" procedure will download the files or if using Mozilla/FireFox, right-click and "Save Link To Disk" to download.


Computer Chronicles: Space and Astronomy Software Episode Production No: 946
http://www.archive.org/movies/details-db.php?collection=computerchronicles&collectionid=episode_946




Wing Commander 2 Segment

wc24jh.jpg


WC2 Half Resolution (320x240 Xvid, 2m:00s) 7.82MB

WC2 Full Resolution (640x480 Xvid, 2m:00s) 31.3MB




Computer Chronicles: Greatest Computer Games Episode Production No: 1218
http://www.archive.org/movies/detai...chronicles&collectionid=CC1218_greatest_games




George Sanger, AKA The Fat Man Segment

thefatman9wa.jpg


Fatman Half Resolution (320x240 Xvid, 3m:00s) 10.4MB

Fatman Full Resolution (640x480 Xvid, 3m:01s) 46.1MB




Wing Commander 3 Segment with Mark Day

markday1pr.jpg


WC3 Half Resolution (320x240 Xvid, 3m:40s) 13.0MB

WC3 Full Resolution (640x480 Xvid, 3m:44s) 58.6MB



Enjoy!


BrynS
 
I also noticed these Wing Commander game previews while searching through the Archive for other Wing Commander related materials. They are in the Videogame Previews section -- a collection of more than 2,200 custom-created videos from the period 1993-2004. The two major sources of content for this collection were the Video Pipeline website, which provided previews to retailers and distributers for promotional purposes and Kikizo.com, a UK-based games website that has been archiving games-related footage for a while.

VIDEO GAME PREVIEWS
http://www.archive.org/movies/collection.php?collection=videogameprev



WING COMMANDER TRAILERS


1. WING COMMANDER: SECRET MISSIONS

wingcommandersecretmissionsove.jpg


5.5MB WM8 - To download go here


2. WING COMMANDER ACADEMY

wingcommanderacademyoverview3k.jpg


4.0MB WM8 - To download go here


3. WING COMMANDER ARMADA

wingcommanderarmadaoverview7ry.jpg


3.6MB WM8 - To download go here


4. WING COMMANDER III: HEART OF THE TIGER

wingcommander3overview3tv.jpg


7.9MB WM8 - To download go here


Enjoy!


BrynS
 
Loaf, do you know if he' s still working for EA or has he moved on?

Cheers,


BrynS
 
He's no longer with EA. After Prophecy he started Daylight Productions, which did the WCIV and WCP DVDs... and then they were sold to a French company and he moved on again.
 
Edx said:
Why do people keep thinking the Fat Man did Wing 3 music!

Ed
Click to expand...
Well, at least as far as the above Fat Man segment is concernced, the narration does not specifically refer to Wing Commander 3, just Wing Commander, i.e. the series, although the corresponding graphic sequence at that point in the narration is from a scene in Wing Commander 3 (Scramble Take-off sequence), which could be misleading to the casual viewer.

I would have thought that a possible reason for the inclusion of a WC3 scene (instead of WC1 or WC2) as a point of reference regarding the Fat Man's Wing Commander association could be due to the editors of Computer Chronicles having access to related footage for a different segment airing in that same episode, i.e. the WC3 overview with Mark Day -- it was probably easier for them to use a bit of that footage than search through their film archive for any footage of WC1 or WC2 (which they do have).

As to why there is a more general perception that the Fat Man did the Wing 3 music as well -- I don't know.

I think that George Oldziey did a great job with the Wing Commander 3 music in particular. I hope he gets round to resampling and/or compiling his various Wing Commander creations in his updated home studio!

Cheers,


BrynS
 
That particular segment, the WC3 scramble, uses the music from the WC1/2 take-off sequences which was composed by the Fat Man.
 
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