News Collection: On This Day in WC News

2019.331 (November 27, 2019)

Syd Mead to Receive Major Award

LeHah tipped us off about the news that legendary visual futurist Syd Mead will be receiving a highly prestigious William Cameron Menzies Art Director's Guild at the organization's upcoming annual event. Mr. Mead is mostly known for his work on the original Star Trek movie, Blade Runner, Tron and Aliens, but he's actually had his hand in a wide range of products. These include Wing Commander Prophecy where he was responsible for a couple of the new ship designs as well as the Nephilim themselves!

2018.331 (November 27, 2018)

Space Shooter Gets More WC Elements

Centaurianmudpig has released some new samples from his WC-inspired space combat game, Project Aries. The first of the two animated gifs below show off the classic interior cockpit options that you can select during flight. Then there is a demonstration of WC1/2 style flak cannons in action. Finally, there's a clip of a Salthi and Dralthi lookalike escorting a transport.

2017.331 (November 27, 2017)

Cyber Monday Discounts Abound For WC Fans

If you're still searching for the perfect present after Black Friday, Cyber Monday gives you a great opportunity to give the gift of Wing Commander. GOG currently has the Wing Commander series for 75% off, which brings it down to just $11.92 for all DOS/Windows games (you may need to add them to your cart individually). There's a chance that their winter sale could ratchet the sale down even further, but it's already such a great deal that there's not much reason to wait.

2016.332 (November 27, 2016)

New Dimension Added To Flat Universe's Space Combat

Flat Universe has achieved a major milestone! After months of dedicated effort, multiplayer combat has now been successfully implemented. The screenshots below show off the team's ceremonial first dogfight between a Hornet and Dralthi. These new images also show off the game's latest cockpit/HUD elements, which are super sharp.

2015.331 (November 27, 2015)

1990s Chris Roberts Talks Wing Commander, Star Citizen

YouTuber RetroMantic has dug up an old interview with Chris Roberts from 1996, sometime between the releases of Wing Commander IV and the Darkening. He talks briefly about getting into game development and his first commercial projects before moving on to Wing Commander and Privateer. The interview closes with Roberts stating his views on the future of videogames, which he sees moving in two distinct directions: scripted, solo games with a focus on story-telling, and massively online multiplayer, where players set out to achieve some goal of their choosing within a living universe. Twenty years later, the Darkening's Erin Roberts is overseeing development of Squadron 42, a story-driven solo game set in the Star Citizen universe.

2014.331 (November 27, 2014)

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving to the Wingnuts stopping in today from the US! To all others, this is a perfect opportunity to remind everyone about the awesome Pilgrim-themed treat hiding in our archives. The first and second books in the Wing Commander Movie's novel trilogy were released in 1999, but the third was never officially published. However, author Peter Telep recently helped us bring the missing novel to eager fans right here at the CIC.

2013.331 (November 27, 2013)

Workhorse Faldari Gets the Scooby Treatment

ScoobyDoo has put together a new fighter, and once again it comes from the ranks of Tri-System ships that are underrepresented in the universe of fan modeling. This one's based on the Faldari, and after closer inspection, it might appear to be different from the heavy fighter that many of us flew in Privateer 2. That's because - in addition to the civilian Faldari Mk II - there was also a Military CIS Faldari that sported sleeker lines and engine nacelles! There's also a new center-mounted gun added to Scooby's version that gives the ship a little bit of a Banshee vibe.

2012.332 (November 27, 2012)

GOG Officially Supports Windows 8

GoodOldGames has updated its library to be compatible with Windows 8. A small number of games incorporated programming tweaks to work with the new OS, but many games worked automatically and require no redownload to play. A total of 431 games out of 486 on the service now function, including all of the classic $5.99 Origin titles.

Hope You've Got Insurance!

With the long Thanksgiving weekend over, the team over at RSI has gotten back to work. There's a new Comm-Link post entitled "Insurance FAQ and Update" that provides citizens with breakdown of how ship insurance policies will work in the game. For fans who pledged before November 26, your pledge ships will have lifetime insurance policies. Supporters who purchased at least one pledge ship can add additional ships, with lifetime insurance, for the next 12 months.

2011.331 (November 27, 2011)

Academy Armada Anticipating Action

Cybot has put together a whole bunch of models based off the ships of Wing Commander Academy. He's used quite a few source images from the show to make some rather interesting designs. The dashing fleet includes the cartoon Tiger's Claw as well as her escorts and a sleek shuttle. You can download some of these models in Lightwave format here, and if you can assist with their texturing, the ships could appear in an upcoming mod.

Select a Side in Speculative Survey

Today's new poll asks which faction you have the most fun flying for, including different styles of being a civilian. To avoid casting the net too widely and opening up the voting to groups that haven't been options in games (we'll save that for another poll!), the list of choices includes the three major playable nations from the main games and the three primary occupations from Privateer/Arena.Our last poll asked which Kilrathi fighters were the scariest to face in space combat.

2010.331 (November 27, 2010)

Name Noteworthy Nominees Now

It's almost December, so that means it's nearly time again to vote for the Wing Commander Fan Project & Web Site of the Year! First, we need your nominations. Send in who you think should be a contender in either category: as a web site or as a fan project that did great things in 2010. Voting will kick off next month!

Wing Commander IV Storyboards - Scene 152

Scene 152: Seether executes a captured Border Worlds pilot (who was, according to the novel, someone who briefly flew off the Victory at the end of the war).These storyboard images were recovered from a backup CD containing materials belonging to Origin's web development team. They were dated November 17, 1995 and were likely planned for a never-completed web feature.

2009.331 (November 27, 2009)

Download Highlights

Despite chewing through well over a terabyte of traffic so far, we have a lot of upload allowance to spare for the month of November. We have plenty of entertaining files that you may have missed in the past. We recommend a download manager to help the large files along. Below are just a few of our favorites.

2008.332 (November 27, 2008)

Call For Nominees

The annual CIC year-end contests are approaching fast, so now is the time for everyone to submit their nominations. Voting will begin soon for Wing Commander Fan Project & Web Site of the Year. Choices should be based primarily on how much each contender has contributed to the Wing Commander community in 2008. Previous winners are listed below.

Making the Games: Shadow Force Design Document - Chapter 3

This is the second of three 'chapters' of separate Shadow Force Design documents. This document describes how the game 'looks' to a player and how a lot of the in-game mechanics work. This one is particularly fascinating because it tells us that the game actually had a lot in common with Wing Commander Arena - including the types of multiplayer modes and the existence of powerups. That said, the 'align with capship' concept described here is an absolutely unique gameplay element.

2007.331 (November 27, 2007)

You Know The Drill

The month is almost out and all this spare bandwidth will go to waste if you don't do something soon. Today we're reairing Queeg's movie projects. They run for a combined five hours and weigh in at nearly three gigabytes. Grab the XviD codec or VLC player if you can't view the files.

The Art of Wing Commander Arena - Part Thirty-One

In the original concept for Wing Commander Arena ships would be upgradable in a manner similar to Privateer. This is concept art of a modular cannon which could be mounted on the outside of a ship's hull. The style of art reminds me of some of the sketches done for Privateer Online.This is part of a series of beautiful Wing Commander Arena concept images graciously provided by Gaia Industries.

2006.331 (November 27, 2006)

Gemini Gold Updates Splash Screens

John Cordell sent along a title and ending screen revision to be featured in the next update to Gemini Gold. There wasn't a separate screen that popped up when you died in the original Privateer, but the image they've created for this looks pretty sharp. No release date has been set for the next Gemini Gold patch, but version 1.02 is probably several months away.

Ranger's Glory Cockpit Previews Released

Iceblade has released a couple more cockpit designs for use in an upcoming Ranger's Glory update. He hopes to publish the next release around Christmas again. In preparation for this event, the RG FAQ has gotten a slight update. If you haven't been following the story behind this mod, you might consider playing Unknown Enemy.

2005.331 (November 27, 2005)

Complete Your Collection With Wing Commander Academy

It's almost the end of the month, so we've got some spare bandwidth to burn. Apparently a lot of people still haven't seen Wing Commander Academy, so anyone up to a 3 gigabyte download is welcome to check it out. The episodes were originally aired out of chronological order, but we have a guide to help you decide which way to best view the series here. If you originally saw these years ago and haven't seen them since, watching them again now is a great way to spend six free hours.

Garriott Explains Tabula Rasa Changes

When we recently looked at the progress of Origin founder Richard Garriott's Tabula Rasa, the game seemed a bit different. The unicorns and fairies had been replaced by cyborgs and overcast skies. Quarto found an article that addressed the change. I'm not sure I follow their reasoning, but for better or worse, the style has changed significantly.

2004.332 (November 27, 2004)

WC Saga Team Unveils Their Transport

Starman has posted pictures of the latest ship to join the WC Saga fleet, a transport based off of the Wing Commander IV design. In the absence of an official title for the class, WC Saga have dubbed the ship Amadeus class after the civilian refugee transport in the intro of WCIV. The model was created by Starman and Lynx, and is looking pretty good, and you can post your own comments in this thread.

Put WC Saga On Your Desktop

As well as working on transports, Starman also managed to put together this wallpaper for you to put on your desktop.I was a little bored this evening, and then I remembered someone requested a battle-wallpaper. Well, it is not really a battle, but shortly before oneNote that all you see in this picture is from ingame-screenshots, only the fleet and the fighters were two different ones and I merged them later. They perspective may be not perfect, but for half a hours of work I thought it is worth posting.

2003.331 (November 27, 2003)

Happy Thanksgiving!

It's Thanksgiving in the US today, so we've dug up the Christmas lights and started decorating the CIC. You might have to Shift-Refresh in order to see them. LOAF's off to France for the weekend, but the rest of of are still celebrating in #Wingnut. Come visit us if you've got nothing better to do!

Penny Arcade Child's Play For The Holidays

PeteyG thought some of us might be interested in donating games to hospitalized children through the new Penny Arcade Child's Play holiday event.I plan on donating some money via PayPal, but they are also accepting new items sent directly to them. If you can't think of anything to donate, there is always Prophecy Advance and give the kids a bit of Wing Commander cheer.That's a great idea.

2002.331 (November 27, 2002)

Electronics Boutique Gets Prophecy Advance Date

One of the major video game retailers has finally gotten a listing for Prophecy Advance. EB's website has a listing for January 23, 2003 (ship date). You can check it out for yourself here. This is the first we've seen about a 2003 release.

WCPolaroids: Casey (12/24)

Zero and Casey, in the briefing room.

2001.331 (November 27, 2001)

Announcing..

It's that time again!THE ANNUAL CIC FAN PROJECT/FAN SITE OF THE YEAR AWARDS 2002Now that I have your attention using the miracle of large bold fonts, here's the deal: You may nominate either your own site or project, or someone elses who you believe is deserving. The CIC is excluded from the contest. Nominations will run until December 4th.

http://www.oldwcnews.com

Both our News Archives and News Search are now always 100% up to date. If it's no longer on the front page, you can find it there.

2000.332 (November 27, 2000)

Trivia 3 Week 5

Time for Week 5 of the CIC/agwc Trivia game! Check your old scores here. Good luck!Welcome to Game Three, Week Five Trivia.

I'm Back!

I'm leaving home and heading back to Austin right now -- expect me to catch up on any news missed last weekend as soon as I get back to my computer.

1999.331 (November 27, 1999)

A Call to Arms

Another fan project is taking wings (not a pun)... here's the 411. [Editor's Note: the CIC promises never to use the term '411' again].!!!WANTED!!!

Good Work All!

Just a note of sincere thanks to WingNuts everywhere: we were able to survive the first post-movie Thanksgiving without a SINGLE 'Pilgrim' joke! Hoorah!

Civilian Version of Freij Craft Released

'Aeronaut' magazine editor Niff Tiddell reports. Ares Systems yesterday unveiled a new model of the fearsome Freij fighter, the ship that Military organizations all over the system have been so impressed by. The civilian version is slightly less powerful, but still features extremely heavy shields and armour and an unrivaled array of weapon and equipment slots. With all this and incredible acceleration, velocity and afterburner speed as well, the Freij looks set to take the mercenary world by storm.