News Collection: On This Day in WC News

2019.218 (August 6, 2019)

Dralthi Getting Upgrades Inside & Out

Attention flying pancake fans! Today's all about the Dralthi. First up, Howard Day has started building the interior cockpit for the Dralthi in Wing Leader. The preview below compares it to the peek we got in Secret Missions 2.

2018.218 (August 6, 2018)

Kilrathi Curiously Carrying Carbines

Interesting error in Wing Commander Academy that I never picked up on before: the Kilrathi soldiers in the last episode all have Confed marine laser rifles! Here’s the correct Kilrathi rifle design used in the rest of the series:If you'd like to learn more about Kilrathi rifles, check out this news post!

2017.218 (August 6, 2017)

Preview First WC4 Track From New Album

George Oldziey's campaign to produce a second album of Wing Commander music is in full swing. We're a third of the way through the allotted timeframe and nearly two thirds of the target amount has already been pledged! While this is great news, we're also entering a period of time where most crowdfunding efforts plateau and stagnate a bit. If you haven't been able to contribute yet, now would be a great time to keep the momentum going.

2016.219 (August 6, 2016)

Shroud Of The Avatar Nears Release; Star Citizen Making Progress

We haven't covered Shroud of the Avatar very much over the years, but Richard Garriott's spiritual successor to Ultima appears to be coalescing nicely as it drives towards a full fledged release. Last week the team conducted its last "wipe" of the pre-release servers, and the world that players are now exploring is the game's final persistent universe. Crowdfunding pledges will also sunset in a couple weeks as the various preorder bonuses expire. A new Star Citizen cross-promotion also caught our eye that offers up some nifty steampunk gear with the SC logo.

2015.218 (August 6, 2015)

Spirit Chosen As Next Loubet Project

Former Origin senior artist Denis Loubet has begun a new Wing Commander sketch. It will feature Mariko Tanaka during some downtime aboard the Tiger's Claw. He (and Glen Johnson) are responsible for the graphical style and character detail in the first WC game, so it'll be interesting to see his take almost twenty-five years later. Once the piece is all complete, one of his lucky Patreon followers will get to keep the physical copy!

2014.218 (August 6, 2014)

Wing Commander 4 Cracks the Sadistic Endings List

Wing Commander 4 has popped up on Cracked's list of "Most Sadistic 'Game Over' Scenes." The Price of Freedom is a really rich field to harvest for this subject. Panther's ending with the newbie pilots is all warm and fuzzy, but the second endgame with Hawk and the Black Lance could be considered quite a downer for pilots trying to fight the good fight - and that was a winning ending! On the losing side, Blair's dishonorable execution is also a punch in the gut, but Cracked chose the less common conclusion to profile here.

2013.218 (August 6, 2013)

Wing Commander Blu-ray Released!

The Wing Commander Movie is now available in high definition on Blu-ray disc! Today's release was finally made possible by Anchor Bay, which republishes cult favorites that may have been overlooked by the major publishers. Many major retailers carry the package online, and specialized entertainment or electronics stores in North America should have physical stock now.After Wing Commander came out on DVD, VHS and DIVX in July 1999, it looked at first like the film may have had its run and then was done.

2012.219 (August 6, 2012)

It's Birthday Week!

The CIC staff has kicked preparations into high gear as days melt away before the big celebration! There's still tons left to do, but everyone is excited for Friday night. We're especially lucky that this year's event falls up against a weekend, so more fans in Eastern Europe, Asia and Australia have a shot at joining the festivities during their early Saturday morning. See you there!

Congratulations JPL and Curiosity!

Late last night, the Mars Science Laboratory mission successfully delivered the Curiosity rover to the surface of Mars! Watching the telemetry live in #Wingnut was exhilarating, and the results are just fantastic. Preliminary images (pictured black & white below) show the rover on flat solid ground, and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter even snapped a shot of the landing vehicle with its parachute deployed. Color photos should start to come in later this week when the robot deploys its camera mast.

2011.218 (August 6, 2011)

Fat Man Discusses Self-Employment

There's been some cool developments in the life of Wing Commander composer George The Fat Man Sanger. He was recently profiled in the Jobs Plus section of the Austin American-Statesman on his success has a video game musician. It's an interesting and entertaining article that you can find here. Fat Man's latest project is a potential gig creating the background music for the Survivor television show.

2010.218 (August 6, 2010)

Hostile Frontiers Getting Cocky

In addition to new ships, Kevin Caccamo has added some cockpits to Hostile Frontier. The first two images show off a Hornet and the third is the beginnings of a Scimitar. It looks like things are carrying along decently well with this project, but Kevin is also requesting assistance with texturing and mission scripting..What needs to be done/We're hiring!

Need Help From Russian Visitors

We are currently working on a small side project and we could really use the help of a few native Russian speakers. If anyone out there is willing to help and has a few minutes to spare, please contact me. Thanks!

2009.218 (August 6, 2009)

Wicked Banshee Under Construction

Deacan found a very cool Wing Commander model over at a German crafters' board. An amazing polystyrene Banshee fighter is being built by elend. What you see below has taken the last couple months, and it's some of the most detailed work we've ever seen. Wings, engines and the cockpit seem mostly together and elend continues to post regular updates.

Making the Game: ICIS Text 2

It turns out we were burying the lead; this second chart of ICIS text actually compares the current version of the game with the original set of briefings.These updates are thanks to John "Captain Johnny" Guentzel, who provided several CD image archives of material used by the Wing Commander Prophecy development team!

2008.219 (August 6, 2008)

Black Day for Blackstar

There's more bad news for SpaceTime Studios. The Austin-based developer has been unable to find financing for their Blackstar space combat game and are being forced to cut their development team in half:Our company has been entirely self-funded the for the last six months while we tried to find a publishing deal for 'Blackstar.' Throughout this period we have held onto our pre-production development team because, honestly, we think they are the best of the best. We have been shopping Blackstar around but - right now, at least – the concept of a SciFi space/ground IP has proven to be a challenge.

Making the Game - Part 93

Today's Wing Commander Prophecy bible update, Series F, represents the second half of the T'lan Meth missions. One cut mission here is fascinating - the Midway would be surrounded by tiny alien probes which the player must destroy in order to stop infinite waves of attacking fighters from honing in on her.

2007.218 (August 6, 2007)

Wing One Update: Track 7 Added

Another track from Wing One is now available for download and purchase from Amie Street. "Strike Mission - Go Get 'Em" will be familiar to anyone who attacked a Ralari back in '54! Keep checking back... we're not even a third of the way through yet!

Ascii Privateer Fixed

Chris Knudsen has your fix - fixer missions, that is. These are, of course, part of his impressive Privateer Ascii Sector project, which seeks to create a Privateer-style game complete with flight engine in a completely text-based environment. For those unfamiliar with the terminology, fixer missions are those offered by a character in a bar (such as Sandoval in the original Privateer) rather than by a mission computer.

Last Chance to Enter EA Giveaway

Today's the last day to sign up for EA's amazing Arena contest. All you have to do is sign up for the EA Arcade newsletter to enter to win a huge assortment of Wing Commander games - and the systems to play them on! Quite a few random sites have advertised this one, and we'd love for a real Wing Commander fan to win it. As usual, this is a US-based contest with a variety of limitations and restrictions, so check out the complete rules here.

2006.218 (August 6, 2006)

Shipyard Structure Complete For Homeworld Mod

The scaffolding for large ship construction has been completed for the WC4 Homeworld 2 mod. Originally envisioned as an addon to a medium size construction base, this structure now separately builds the larger ships in the game. Pictures below reveal a cruiser emerging after completion. The original shipyard bases will now be used to build fighters, bombers and other small scale craft.

Space Sim First Look: Star Wolves 2

Building on the success of Star Wolves, XBow Software and the 1C Company are well on their way towards completing a sequel. Star Wolves 2 is in the later stages of development now and should be finished by the end of the year. What makes this series somewhat special is the integration of RPG elements. Wingmen join the player's "party" and skills are leveled up through combat.

2005.218 (August 6, 2005)

Arbogast Discusses Movie Career

EcranLarge has conducted an interview with Wing Commander movie cinematographer Thierry Arbogast. The conversation covers many aspects of his movie career. Arbogast was also cinematographer for Léon/The Professional, The Fifth Element, Catwoman and many other movies. The article is in French, so you might need the Babelfish.

Classic Gaming Expo 2K5 In Two Weeks

The eighth annual Classic Gaming Expo is now just two weeks away. The event will be held at the San Francisco Airport/Burlingame Hyatt Regency near the foundations of companies such as Apple, Atari and Electronic Arts. Although I don't see too many specifics posted for this year, in the past Wing Commander items have been on display and Team FAT has performed. There will be over a thousand classic gaming artifacts in their museum gallery and many developers will be discussing their industry experiences.

2004.219 (August 6, 2004)

Cyberion Releases His Latest Model

Cyberion is on a roll after releasing his Drayman and Hellcat models. His latest work is the Confed Shuttle based on the WC3/4 design.There are two models, one low detailed, the other high detailed. You can grab the model files here.

Void War Trailer Now Available

Early last month we ran a brief preview of an upcoming game called Void War. The game engine is loosely based on Wing Commander and they hope to include a multiplayer feature supporting up to 32 players. Now the game's developer Jay Barnson from Rampant Games has written to let us know that a trailer video for the game is available on the official site.

That Game Again

I know we've been on about it all week.. but that's because just about everyone in #Wingnut has been playing it all week. The game isn't all Doom and gloom. Well actually it is, but there are a few bits that amused me.

2003.218 (August 6, 2003)

DragonCon Flight Suits Prepped

Monee and Tye have been slaving away in Atlanta to prepare our convention attendees for the Wing Commander portion of the annual parade. They've completed a number of Prophecy-era flight suits and are modeling them below. The suits are somewhat material and labor intensive, so mass produced suits for everyone is out of the question right now, but they've posted a draft tutorial on how to make a set at Crius here. We hope to assemble more detailed instructions or kits for fans to make their own suits in the future.

Freelancer Price Drops Beginning

Although most places in the US still seem to carry Freelancer for $49.99, DemolitionMan in #Wingnut reports that Circuit City has the game for sale at $29.99 now. A lot of us here at the CIC had quite a bit of fun with this Chris Roberts inspired game.

2002.218 (August 6, 2002)

Wing Commander Saga Rolls Out New Models

Gevatter Lars of the WC Saga project has some new models finished. These textures are only temporary.

Unknown Enemy: The Medley

Michael Mahadeen, who's doing the music for Unknown Enemy, has released a 5-minute music sample consisting of his in-game music. You can grab it from their downloads page.

Holding The Line: Chapter 137

Here's Raptor with the introduction to the latest chapter:Hey all, Raptor here.HTL continues with part thirteen of the Tiger Hunt series, "Dulce et Decorum Est." As you saw in the last chapter, the Border Worlds pilots who were fighting to protect their carriers had tried to ambush and destroy the remaining Nephilim bombers. The ambush failed, forcing them into activating a last ditch plan that they had hoped they would never have to carry out.

2001.218 (August 6, 2001)

Four Days To Go!

It's now four days and counting until we celebrate our third year at www.wcnews.com. We hope that as many of you as possible visit #Wingnut Friday evening to join us in counting down.

Trivia 3, Week 41

How does fifty weeks sound for Game Three? Feel free to include your comments on that potential end date with your Week 41 answers.Welcome to Game Three, Week Forty-One Trivia. We play each week.

1999.218 (August 6, 1999)

Wing Commander DVD on Back Order

If you've ordered a Wing Commander DVD from DVD Box Office recently (to take advantage of their free shipping offer), it might be a short while before you get it. Apparently they've sold out, however they are anticipating more in soon. We're currently trying to find a more exact date.It is on back order.

Cross Anticipation Builds

KrisV, recently back from Italy, mailed Tuscany Trading and received the following message in regards to the Pilgrim Crosses.Yes, your knife will be shipped in our next shipment. Keep in mind that the August 3 date was the date that [United Cutlery] was expecting to receive their shipment. It will take them a few days to get the shipment out to their dealers.

Brazilian Movie Release Confirmation

GGmesquita emailed us to confirm that the WC Movie does appear to be coming out around September 29. He called the local Fox reprentatives and they also expect a release about that time. If you'd like to ask them yourselves, Fox in Brazil can be reached at 00 55 11 38723933 (English) and 00 55 11 72955999 (Portuguese). Hopefully we'll receive an exact date soon.

Fiction Site Opens Today

Jumper asked us to mention Wing Commander: The Lexington Operation, a fan fiction project he's now running. You can find it here.

Circus! Circus!

Hal Indigo reports. Roll up! Roll up! The circus is coming to town!