End your week with a nice blast from the past: a German PC Games magazine with an EXTENSIVE preview of Wing Commander IV! The cover features an awesome clear shot of the Kilrathi guard seen in the background of Wing Commander III and the exhaustive preview is full of rarely reproduced Wing Commander IV set photos and concept art.
Eagle-eyed ship spotter Doug Lee has found a squadron of familiar Wing Commander designs in an unlikely place: a mobile game called Stellar Patrol: Galactic Conflict! The top-down space game features a host of familiar Wing Commander designs... and even uses a Rapier as its app icon! This is likely not a case of licensing the IP from Electronic Arts as Stellar Patrol also includes a number of other familiar science fiction ships like Battlestar Galactica's Viper, Star Wars' A-Wing and Firefly's... Firefly. It's a fun little phone shooter reminiscent of Subspace. If you'd like to check it out, you can download Stellar Patrol for free on Android or iOS. Better hurry and get to it before the lawyers!
There's great news out of the Through the Moongate: the first stretch goal has been reached, which means that there will be an extra chapter looking at the developing of Wing Commander II! Here's the official word:
A million thank yous to all our backers who made another achievement possible! We will have the pleasure to work with Siobhan Beeman, Ellen Guon Beeman, and other Originites on the Wing Commander 2 chapter, which will be delivered as a digital download to all backers from Honesty tier and higher. We are excited to dig into and tell many yet unknown stories of another legendary game from Origin!
The project has added a second strech goal which would add a rare Ultima print for backers at the Sacrifice (50 euro) level or higher. There are three days left, so if you want a copy for yourself you can pledge here! There are three days left on this one, so get in quick!
We'd like to congratulate Wing Commander CIC founder Chris Reid and his wife Lacey Reid on the birth of their second daughter Lillianna Jane. Since Wing Commander fans love specifications, Lillianna was born this morning at 5:07 am Seattle time, her length is 19.7 inches and her mass was 6 pounds 15 ounces. Her yaw, pitch and roll are 70, 75 and 70 degrees per second respectively and her matter/anti-matter engine is capable of converting spaceborne hydrogen into nearly unlimited afterburner fuel. Congratulations on number two, Chris and Lacey; everyone on the CIC team loves you both and is very happy to know you're raising our next generation of space heroes!
We recently reported that Wing Commander SNES artist Mike Winterbauer had launched a Kickstarter to create a physical portfolio showing the creation and use of his cover painting. We're happy to report that the $500 funding goal has been reached... and then some! As of this writing, the project has already brought in pledges for over three times the original goal. Congratulations to Mr. Winterbauer and good work to the Wing Commander community.
One of the first questions about the campaign was: how can I get EVERYTHING? To that end, he has added a new "Ultimate Wing Commander" pledge level. For $230 you get the book, the metal sign, the magnet, the six prints, the art card, the canvas print and the giclee print! If you love the Wing Commander SNES painting as much as we do that's a heck of a deal. You can join the campaign or adjust your pledge here. There are still three weeks to go... so who knows, maybe we could hit that $6,000 stretch goal that gives an additional art card to every backer!
Veteran Wing Commander artist Alan Gutierrez has updated his DeviantArt page with three of the astronomical paintings he created for the Wing Commander card game's nav points. One of them has even been repainted digitally for more detail! An in-depth look at Mr. Gutierrez's Wing Commander card paintings is available here. Check out his updated nav point paintings:
The Through the Moongate Kickstarter campaign is funded which means we'll be getting a thoroughly researched book that tells the history of the development of Origin Systems' Ultima series. There's even better news, though: the first stretch goal is in sight and it will add a chapter with new details about the making of Wing Commander II! Here's the official word:
Once we reach 25,000 Euros, which is currently only 3,000 Euros away, every backer at the “Honesty” tier or above will receive an ebook containing an extra chapter from Through the Moongate Part 2. This chapter covers the development of Wing Commander 2, and includes in-depth interviews with the Director and Assistant Director of the project, Siobhan Beeman and Ellen Guon Beeman. Siobhan and other team members are interested in sharing their viewpoints of the Wing Commander story, and presenting some new insights that haven’t been published previously.
As of this posting there are nine days left in the campaign and the Wing Commander II stretch goal is just 850 euros away! Let's show everyone how much interest there is in hearing the Wing Commander story... you can pledge for a copy of Through the Moongate here.
Follow or Contact Us