Hey, someone wrote Daria/Wing Commander crossover fanfic.
Note to self: kill (self).
Hey all, Raptor here.HTL continues with part seven of my Into The Inferno series, with the rather self descriptive title "Scramble!". As you saw last time, the characters' musings on their situation had been interrupted by a scramble alert. This chapter picks from there. Please send any and all comments back to yours truly.
The story is at: http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~theraj/archives/ch177.htm
Best, Raptor
Hello all,BSD? Sourceforge!? I sure hope you SlashDot people are still reading.
as some may already know I have been working on a WC:A style MMOG, Eternal Vigilance.I would like to announce that yesterday I got the beginnings of the game working. The client can now login to the server and logout and the structure is in place for the up and coming parts of the game.
It is currently being hosted at sourceforge and the source is released under the BSD license. The project page is http://sourceforge.net/projects/etern-vigil/ and the project web site is http://etern-vigil.sourceforge.net/.
I put up some screen shots and am ware that the graphics are currently somewhat lacking. But, inquiries are being made so as to get them improved.
Also, I put up the current working system map. I know it is rather social and if too much so, let me know and I'll tone down inter-system connections.
....being a great fan of wing commander and starfleet command I thought hey it would be cool to command a bengal class strike carrier in this game. So I learned how to mod starfleet command and downloaded a 3D-modeller a week ago. I made a triangle and then another and voilà, here’s my very first model and it works in starfleet command BUT I’d like to know some things: is the shape correct? (I used the drawings from claw mark’s but they seem to be a bit inaccurate), do you like the textures and did I anything with this ship what’s not canon?Every opinion is welcome.So the first two pictures are from the game, the second two are screenshots from the 3d-modeller
LOS ANGELES, Feb 25 (Reuters) - Video game publisher Electronic Arts Inc. will close down its Austin, Texas studio, home to the "Ultima Online" franchise, by the end of April, the company said on Wednesday.They even acknowledge that we're slightly ahead of the hard news sites:
Rumors had spread in recent days across Internet fan sites devoted to Origin games like "Ultima" and "Wing Commander" that the Austin studio was to be shut down.Fair and balanced WCNews indeed! I'll be in Austin for a completely unrelated reason at the beginning of April, if anyone wants to get together and take a last look at the place.
For twenty two years Origin Systems set the tone for the computer gaming. Ultima, Wing Commander and dozens of others set the gold standard for which the rest of the industry could only hope to catch up. This era has finally come to an end as Electronic Arts readies an announcement that it will shut down the Austin-based Origin studio.
This is not the end for Ultima or Wing Commander. Ultima Online will now be run from California, and development of Ultima X will continue on the west coast. Hopes that another Wing Commander game would be developed in Austin were dashed long ago; the longtime belief that a California-based EA team would develop the next Wing Commander title may, ironically, be bolstered by this news.
What it is, however, is a tremendous moral loss on all fronts. Origin Systems will always be the ultimate symbol of gaming's greatest days, and its dissolution to a faceless corporate entity is, sadly, equally symbolic of the world today. Origin entertained, challenged and inspired our generation in a way that seems impossible today. Though the individuals who developed our games long ago moved on to greater careers, the very existence of the company itself continued to stand for something special; something amazing.
The CIC will continue to dedicate itself to Origin's legacy - we will redouble our efforts to archive anything and everything related to the company. We will strike to make the world remember what Origin meant. I wanted to end with a quote - something pithy and literary to express the meaning of such an ending. I came up with only this:
Note: Our FTP server limits the number of concurrent connections from a single computer so everyone can get a fair download speed. If you try to download too many files at once, your browser will show a generic, uninformative error message. It may appear as though the file is missing, but you just need to wait for a download to finish before starting a new one.
If you downloaded any Privateer tracks from our music section in the past, you will want to make sure that you have the best versions. We've always had the Detroit and Perry themes available for download, but Mad Hatter's tracks are far better quality. Over the last few months we've added entirely new or enhanced recordings of Prophecy and WC3 music. We now have close to 500 megabytes of MP3s on our FTP. Make sure your Wing Commander music library is up to date.
My writing partner Frank De Palma and I knew a story editor who was consulting for Electronic Arts. Electronic Arts and Origin were looking for professional screenwriters who could write the screenplay for WING COMMANDER III, which was going to shoot several hours of live-action dramatic scenes. They liked our work; we were hired. Fortunately, we seemed to "understand" (or quickly learned) what interactivity might add to a narrative, leading to our winning several awards for the work in WING COMMANDER III and to our participation in and development (with others) of WING COMMANDER IV.
Well, I saw Chris' comment in the news about the lack of new models lately so here are a few that I made a while ago, complete and otherwise. It's been a while since I did any WC related stuff, but these models were for a site I was planning on making with models for anyone who needs them. It's still something I want to do some day.I can understand that sentiment. These are some fun ships with some personal touches. His unique style and coloring is neat for a change. Feedback on the designs are welcome here.
Barring some sort of horrible accident, the new versions of Wing Commander Academy should be complete by tonight! I've captured the first twelve episodes, and am in the process of archiving and encoding them as I write this. The original estimates have held true: the web-release DivX episodes are between 210-230 megabytes each... and the unedited raw episodes (DV format) are 4.3 gigabytes each. Hades has provided some more comparison screenshots:
GameSpy is running something called "Title Fight! The Ultimate Gaming Grudge"... which is, essentially, a glorified series of "best game" web polls. That's where we come in - Wing Commander III and Privateer are both options in the Space Simulations category! Unfortunately, TIE Fighter is beating both by a significant margin right now. The "an admiral defected! now another one! now another one! now another one!" game is beating Wing Commander III? That's unpossible... go show that third-tier gaming news site that Wing Commander fans mean business! (Thanks to Genz44 and Vance for letting us know!)
(Not that it matters... I'm sure Privateer will end up getting more electoral votes!)
- Episode 01 - Red & Blue (66466 k)
- Episode 02 - The Last One Left (64092 k)
- Episode 03 - The Most Delicate Instrument (62812 k)
- Episode 04 - Word of Honor (68996 k)
- Episode 05 - Lords of the Sky (60432 k)
- Episode 06 - Chain of Command (64846 k)
- Episode 07 - Expendable (75868 k)
- Episode 08 - Walking Wounded.avi (66698 k)
- Episode 09 - Recreation.avi (70538 k)
- Episode 10 - On Both Your Houses (67298 k)
- Episode 11 - Invisible Enemy (58880 k)
- Episode 12 - The Price of Victory (63248 k)
- Episode 13 - Glory of Sivar (67618 k)
The quest for full res Wing Commander Academy is finally coming to a head! Thanks to a new Analog-to-DV bridge, I now have three Academy episodes (4-6) in high resolution format! I have raw 4.2 gigabyte versions stored for future use... and am producing ~200 megabyte DivX;-) releases which will someday soon find their way to the internet! For now, here's a comparison shot from "Chain of Command" (left old, right new):
If you wanted to get a custom CIC Polo shirt, let us know right away. We'll take regular orders in a short while, but if you would like your name or callsign printed on the shoulder, your order must go in with the regular production batch which will be started soon. Otherwise the shirts are standard black polo style with the main CIC logo and url on the left breast. Standard cost is $20 with a bit extra added for customization, overseas shipping or the largest sizes.
Full details and answers to your questions can be found here.
Edit:. Got a bit of an update here.
The Custom/Pre-order Deadline has been extended till MONDAY Feb 23rd. Even if you don't want a custom shirt, pre-ordering guarantees a shirt in your size. We will only be ordering limited quantities of the smaller and largest sizes.And to clarify, payment wouldn't necessarily have to be in by then.
Wing Commander IV Poster: These posters were given out only to Origin employees, gaming shops (mostly in Europe - American stores got a Blair standup!) and through a contest at Origin's web site. Copies of Wing Commander IV sold outside the US used this black artwork as their box covers... while we got the confusing red packaging. A rare find indeed! (Current Bid: $10, 5 days left)Go spend some money!Wing Commander Prophecy Poster: These posters were given out as promotional materials at industry expos in 1997 and were otherwise only available to Origin employees! If anything, this is even rarer than the WCIV poster... I'd certainly love to get a look at that credits block at the bottom! (Current Bid: $10, 5 days left)
Wing Commander 1/2 & Official Guide: In early 1994 EA sold a pair of 'twin packs'. One paired the Strike Commander and Privateer CD releases, and the other combined the deluxe editions of the first two Wing Commander games. Privateer/Strike Commander was the more popular of the two... making WC1/2 harder to find for sale today! This copy is shrinkwrapped, which may be of interest to some collectors. (Current Bid $3, 5 days remaining)Whew! That's all for now - though Rhea Shelley is also selling numerous other games and more RPG material than I've ever heard of existing in one place. You can find a complete listing of these auctions here! I suppose I'd also be remiss without mentioning that he's got a copy of Wings of Glory for sale... one of the most unappreciated games ever made! If you enjoyed any of the 'talking heads' Wing Commander stories or any of the other Origin flight sims, you owe it to yourself to pick up a copy of WoG! We'll keep you updated as more auctions show up.Privateer 2 Deluxe: This is a rare game indeed. Several months before Privateer 2 came out, Origin's website advertised that you could purchase a "Deluxe Edition" straight from EA's mail order service. It was to include the hint book, a poster, a cloth patch and a copy of the original Privateer CD. Everyone was very excited... until they called the EA Store and were told that the deluxe edition had been cancelled. That would have been fine... except it wasn't cancelled at all. If you called EA's store and asked for the support department instead of ordering, they would actually check their inventory and place an order for you. Since no one knew this, very few people got copies of P2 Deluxe... outside of copies sold at Origin's company store. Many of the contents of unsold P2 Deluxes (cloth patch, poster, etc.) were later resold as part of the Windows 95 rerelease of the game. It's not visible from the picture, but this is a "big box" - like the Ultima 9 Dragon Edition, if anyone is familiar with that more recent release. (Current Bid $3, 5 days remaining)
Prophecy Gold w/ Guide: Prophecy Gold, for those unfamiliar, is a collection including both Wing Commander Prophecy and the Secret Ops followup. It also includes an updated version of the manual, adding some additional fiction and some of the ship specifications that were unavailable when the Prophecy documentation went to print. If you don't have a copy of WCP:G, now is the time to get in on it - the game is slowly increasing in general value, and looks like it could be the next Kilrathi Saga! (Current Bid $3, 5 days remaining)
Privateer 2 w/ Guide: If you win this auction, be sure to ask Mr. Shelley to sign the included Official Guide for you - he's one of the playtesters that the book quotes throughout. (Current Bid $3, 5 days remaining)
Kilrathi Saga: This is a mint, still in its shrinkwrap edition of The Kilrathi Saga. KS is probably the most sought after item among casual Wing Commander fans... since it allows you to play the original three DOS games in Windows 95. KS also includes a beautiful manual, set up as Col. Blair's 'scrap book' containing items pertaining to all three games. But heck, the game would be worth it just for that beautiful cover artwork. This auction is sure to run high! (Current Bid $41, 5 days remaining)
Srike Commander/Privateer & Playtesters Guides: This is the second of EA's 1994 'twin packs'. It's slightly more common than WC1/2 set... but you also get more for your money! Strike Commander and Privateer are both their CD versions... which include full speech and, in the case of Strike Commander, additional 3D sequences. (Current Bid $3, 5 days remaining)
Wing Commander III Tin: This is the "Premiere Edition" of Wing Commander III. Only 2,000 copies were made and sold through EA's store. It may look like it's missing the "WC3" sticker on the tin... but that's actually how it was made! For whatever reason, a large number of WC3 Premiere Editions never recieved their sticker... so many that EA actually issued an apology to Premiere Edition buyers. (Update: this auction actually includes the sticker... unstuck on its original wax paper! I've never seen one like that for sale before.) (Current Bid $3, 5 days remaining)
UK Privateer 2 w/ Patch: Here's one that's rarely available in the US - the British version of Privateer 2, featuring a beautiful piece of alternative artwork as the cover. Grab this one before I do! The "pirate clan" patch is also included in this auction. The patch was given out to team members and included as part of both "Deluxe" editions of Privateer 2. I've never understood why they chose the "Chirichan Pirate Clan" as the theme for the patch... but they did! (Current Bid $3, 5 days remaining)
Underworld/Wing Commander II: Back in the early nineties Origin had two big lines, each with their own separate fanbase. Ultima people played Ultima games and Wing Commander people played Wing Commander games... with very little overlap. How do you get one interested in the other? Release a line of unlikely-paired 'two for one' game packs! With this plan in mind, Origin sold "Ultima VI and Wing Commander" and a "Ultima Underworld and Wing Commander II" CD sets. This auction includes the Ultima Underworlds hint book... so you can see how the other half lived. (Current Bid $3, 5 days remaining)
Wing Commander IV w/ Guide: There isn't much to say here - this is a perfect copy of Wing Commander IV, which is great for anyone interested in starting a Wing Commander collection. It's shrinkwrapped and everything! Does anyone remamber that long, difficult delay for Wing Commander IV? We all expected it to be out on December 8th, 1995... and that morning Origin's website posted a press release announcing that it was delayed until February 12th. Longest two months of my life! (Current Bid $3, 5 days remaining)
Secrets of the Wing Commander Universe Book: This was a circa 1993 unofficial Wing Commander guide... but unlike some of the cheap WC3 and 4-specific guides, SotWCU was a beautiful piece of work. It's well written, well illustrated and was very clearly a labor of love for a true wingnut author. It includes a background of the Wing Commander universe, a comprehensive ships guide and specific strategy guides for every game up to Privateer. This is the only printed guide that includes information on Special Ops 1 and 2. (Current Bid $3, 6 days remaining)
Privateer Playtesters Guide: This is probably the most sought-after of the English-language Wing Commander guides! (Possibly not the rarest number-wise - that honor falls to the Armada guide). The Privateer Playtesters Guide includes maps of all the systems in Gemini, with the percentages the computer uses to determine random encounters at each point. If you're still paying off your Centurion, this is the rare useful strategy guide. (Current Bid $3, 6 days remaining)
Collection of Manuals: This is a lot of mostly Origin product manuals... including the much desired Kilrathi Saga booklet and the beautiful Voices of War (Armada). It also has Strike Commander's Sudden Death magazine, which any fan of Wing Commander 1's Claw Marks should appreciate. (Current Bid $3, 6 days remaining)
Collection of CDs: This is a lot of various individual CD-ROMs... including a Wing Commander IV/Crusader demo disk! The Wing Commander IV demo pits you against pirate fighters and frigates in a 5-15 minute gauntlet. It has a neat easter egg, too - target Dekker's shuttle when you takeoff for about twenty seconds, and it'll drop an extra stormfire gun for you to use! This lot also includes a copy of The Seventh Guest, which included an award winning score by Wing Commander 1 & 2 veteran Fatman. (Current Bid $3, 6 days remaining)
Wing Commander Deluxe w/ Official Guide: Here's a copy of Wing Commander Deluxe and the official guide. More importantly, however... if you're coming to Dragon*Con in the future, you need as many cheap copies of Claw Marks as you can get your hands on. We've managed to besiege Aaron Allston with more and more Claw Marks autograph requests each year, and the trend must continue! (Current Bid $3, 5 days remaining)
The biggest game publisher on the planet continued its expansion today...Quote from GameSpot. The games that NuFX has produced have been pretty fun, so here's hoping they get all the resources necessary to keep it up.
Hey all, Raptor hereHTL continues with another chapter in my "Into The Inferno" series, which follows Battlegroup Valkyrie and its allies through the big Finale battles. This chapter changes direction quite radically from the last one, which focused on strategy and politics, the big picture. This one looks more at some of the pilots' feelings about the situation, and their reasons for doing what they do. Please send any and all comments back to yours truly.
The story is at: http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~theraj/archives/ch176.htm
Best, Raptor
Here at the CIC, we'd like to wish you all a happy Valentine's day and we hope everyone has a great day. To celebrate, here's the Love Arrow!
The one and only reason why I bought it was that it contains Elizabeth Barondes, in other words my most favourite female WC character ever, Tamara "Panther" Farnsworth. :-) The significant bonus is, that she's wearing exactly the same hair-style as we know from WC4. :-)He's got a bunch of other pictures here.Panther won the "Miss WC" contest held by Berserker79 a long time ago, so I thought there might be more of the people who could enjoy at least the screenshots as much as I did the whole thing in movement. ;-)
Wing Commander Galactic Conflict has gotten a bit of a face lift. They've got an actual website in addition to their role playing forums now. It provides a little background and cleans things up a little, though not all the links do something yet. They'll also be focusing more on Kilrathi conflict in the near future with their game.
Sylvester has started up a new WC role playing game called Wing Commander: The Second War. It takes some wacky liberties with the WC universe, but if you're looking for outrageous weapons and more Kilrathi, that's where you should go.
I noticed you reported about the Allegiance source code being released to the public, but you left out an important detail: the Allegiance community has already started delving into the code, and they've set up a CVS mirror. Go to http://www.freeallegiance.org/ to see the work that's already being done, and to play the game for free.The FreeAllegiance website certainly looks interesting... plus, their stubby little fighter is adorable. You can discuss Allegiance at Crius.net here.
I haven’t seen Tomb Raider... I’ve only seen the trailer for Resident Evil... The House of The Dead movie won’t be out until later this year... I’ve only seen bits of Wing Commander on cable...Who picked this guy to write the game to movie article? A couple of the movies on his list aren't that bad (and he's seen them). If you'd like to check them out, you can find the article here.
If you curious about the latest legal flare-up, Smart has put together a little manifesto against his publisher here.
When I sign a contract, it is to do three basic things.Those are indeed the three things he signs on to do.
1. Develop the game as signed on
2. Support the game
3. Provide the marketing materials, manuals etc
4. Deliver the game
This is a tremendous opportunity for EA to create new characters for fighting games that can be exploited through our global merchandise licensing machine to fuel sales in many other product categories.How's that for business language? Apparently upcoming Marvel comics will introduce the new EA characters that will appear in the fighting game. I just keep imagining Hobbes in a mask, cape and tights fighting Superman. You can find the announcement here.
It's just one of my many hobbies, music making. I just saw (and loved) the movie for the first time last year, and that's when I used the samples and made the songs, just like that. Freelancer and Babylon 5 were like that too. If I hear something noteworthy of putting on a music, or I think a music should be in a particular part of a game, I do my best to put what was in my head to reality.
MH: Well, I mean, originally I was hoping that I could just direct this and not have to be in it, but they really wanted me to be for obvious reasons. I'm pragmatic about that. If it helps the project for me to be in it of course I will, but if it is a situation where they don't want me in it, but want me to direct, that would be very appealing. Then you could just concentrate on the one thing.
Are you a former Ultima Online subscriber? Do you live in the San Jose or San Francisco areas? Do you want a $100? All you have to do is tell the Origin team what they should do with the next Ultima Online project! Origin, through a contracted research firm, will be conducting focus groups Feb. 4 and 5 in Sunnyvale, CA (near San Francisco and San Jose). There will be six groups, with 10 to 12 people in each.You can find more information in Stratics' new post here.If you are interested in participating, call Nichols Research at 1-408-773-8200, ext 2020 or email erecruiting@nicholsresearch.com. Mention "Project #C3032" when you contact them.
The TCS Santa Cruz takes up an Orbit around Earth, matching the orbit of the move. She is flanked to her left and her right, and slightly trailing, by her twin cruiser escorts her. Above her and below her, in the same triangle formation, are her three corvettes, and outside of them, her destroyers.You can visit the official Galactic Conflict site here.She waits in a position that will allow her to drop into a lower orbit, slingshot around Earth, and fire along straight towards any attacking fleet with just a slight adjustment to her course...
The year is 2367. Thirty-two years have passed since the Great War. As Terrans and Vasudans struggle to rebuild their civilizations, civil war erupts in the Polaris system. A rogue Terran admiral declares war against the Vasudans, threatening the stability of the Alliance. Without warning, the Shivans return, and Terrans and Vasudans face annihilation at the hands of their Great War nemesis.You can preorder a copy for $49.95 here. Sound expensive? Soon you'll be able to add the WC Saga mod to it.Due to popular demand we are re-releasing a limited production run of the "Sci-Fi Sim of the year edition" of Freespace 2 available only at our online store.
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