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2008.284 (October 10, 2008)

[# 3292 | 10/10/2008]

Saga Translated
The Wing Commander Saga team has good news for German-speaking users -- a group named Mind Crusher Studios has done a complete set of high quality translated voiceovers for the German release of the project! Back in the 1990s Origin realized how important fast, quality localization in French and German was for Wign Commander titles - it's great to see fans taking the same road today. A video sample of the new dub is available here (49MB AVI).

Star*Soldier Gloss: Page 59
This is the Star*Soldier gloss for the recruitment page:

CONCEPT: This page was something I always wanted to see but done on the cheap. I'd love to see a beautiful painted World War 2 style recruiting poster someday... but, time and budget. Although those are near and dear to my heart, this is actually based on a more modern army advertisement -- those "look what a great time soldiers have!" sort of things. I don't think it needs much discussion -- it has all the cliches: see the galaxy, serve your country, etc.

REFERENCES-

• The image is a piece of Privateer 3-turned-Privateer Online concept art. It actually shows a Border Worlds fighter attacking a freighter... but I fudged the description a bit (I kept the fighter name, though!). I don't know if anyone remembers, but the image element of the freighter was the first thing from Privateer 3 we ever saw... way back in 1995. It appeared online as a result of some 3D rendering conference and was labeled 'Origin Systems'.
• "Goddard System" - Goddard was home to the planet destroyed by the Sivar weapon in The Secret Missions.
• "419th Fighter Wing" - Part of my 'higher numbers please' concept for fighter organization - also, WCNews.com's LOAF's birthday!
• "Stelkta" - Stelkta was Goddard's moon and home to the berths which launched the TCS Lexington in Wing Commander Armada. I chose both it and Goddard for this vingette because there was an elaborately included moon in the reused concept art.
• "Crusader" - The Crusader was a Border Worlds design for Privateer Online. I didn't want to contradict the concept art (which, honestly, wasn't originally supposed to be a Crusader - it was repurposed from a previous project by the Privateer Online team for their pitch to EA) so I just kept that name. After all, there are American squadrons that fly British Harriers...
• "Landreich probe" - I took the idea of defining a freighter as a probe from Wing Commander IV. There's no actual war between these powers, but relations must be frosty. They did come into open conflict some years back, though, as explained in the timeline section (a story Andrew Keith never got to tell).
• "country" - I really like the idea of referring to the Confederation as one's country. It's something these giant space Federation settings rarely do.
• "citizenship" - Honestly not a StarShip Troopers reference -- more of a French Foreign Legion sort of a thing because I liked the idea that there were now Kilrathi serving with the Confederation military. It's a changing galaxy...
• "holodisc action scenario" - Oooh, metagame. Will the Space Force send you a copy of Wing Commander? (Largely a reference to that United States Army recruiting game from a few years back... but also a nod to the fact that Wing Commander I & II are actual games in the Wing Commander universe, per the Ultimate Strategy Guide.
• "Vega and Epsilon" - This was added at the request of the Producer, who didn't want to imply that the Confederation had any control over the area seen in Arena. I thought about cutting the whole ad, but it was something I wanted to see too much to do that.
• "Long Live the Confederation" - The 'corny' expression from Action Stations, akin to "God bless America".

Vasator	Kilrathi Gauntlet	Hornet	150
powell99	Kilrathi Gauntlet	Stiletto	0
FireFly	Convoy Strike	Wraith	2880
scamander	Confed Gauntlet	Wraith	707
aditps	Convoy Strike	Morningstar	400

2008.283 (October 9, 2008)

[# 3291 | 10/9/2008]

From Mass Drivers to Mass Effects
According to stories at Gamasutra and Gamespot, the folks at Bioware recently name-dropped Wing Commander in a recent speech at the AGDC 2008 conference in Austin, Texas (Wing Commander's birthplace). The subject was influences on Mass Effect and its style of cinematic storytelling.

Gamasutra:

Next was "The Renaissance," with titles in the early '90s such as Wing Commander and Rebel Assault making things a "fantastically exciting time", as Walters put it. Marino noted some of the key games later in the '90s, including the "watershed moment" of Half-Life, with 3D characters interacting and speaking to the player in real-time.

Another World and other games like it gave rise to the early-'90s Renaissance period, in which designers began to scale back the text and convey more through technology. Examples of games that took advantage of these techniques include such classics as Myst, Wing Commander, and Rebel Assault. As Walters noted, the industry was both imitating and innovating during this period--taking sensibilities from the film world and riffing their own creations for what works well in interactive properties. Valve's Half-Life was another "watershed moment" for cinematic design, noted Walters.

Star*Soldier Gloss: Page 58
This is the Star*Soldier gloss for the back issues page:

CONCEPT: Another late addition - simply the result of thinking 'what else do magazines have...' in order to fill an empty page. Note that each of the previous issues corresponds to the date of a 'main' Wing Commander game!

REFERENCES-

• "Next Month" - I should be clear about this - there was never going to be a 'next month'; this is all to sell the illusion. I did start a second project that went out with the DLC - a 'full' Joan's Fighting Ships book. It would have had all the classic designs, all the ones mentioned in passing, others to fill out the gaps... and, especially, the new ships added to the game. I experimented with doing line drawings of ships, wrote some copy and... that was that.
• "Joan's Fighting Ships, Vega Sector Update" - A nod to the original Claw Marks, which featured a 2654 Vega Sector Update way back when. I like the idea that each Star*Soldier focuses on a different region of space.
• "Fury... Warrax" - I wanted to make canon the various Privateer 3 designs/names (note the 'II' added to the Hurricane, because of Action Stations).
• "Ghosts of the Vacuum" - From the movie 'Ghosts of the Abyss' (... which I actually didn't like at all). The real focus here is (finally) making the 'Jutland' name official.
• "Ghorah Khar to Vukar Tag" - We actually don't see a Jutland at Ghorah Khar, so that's a story for someone else. Vukar Tag references the TCS Gettysburg, which was the original Jutland-class ship. The name/design was created to explain why the Gettysburg was more like a carrier than a cruiser.
• "TCS Philippine Sea" - Simply another naval battle.
• "Looking Back, Part II" - I know, this is the part of the timeline you actually wanted to see.
• "Burning Battle" - I'm going to get in trouble for telling this one. When Gaia was first tasked with coming up with the backstory for Arena they came back with something... genuinely strange. It centered around the odd belief that the war with the Kilrathi had ended in the "burning battle", whatever that is. It had no mention of... anything else in the existing Wing Commander continuity. I was asked what I thought of it and I kind of gritted my teeth and said gosh, that's great for a first true, but...! Well, here's the second half: EA asked them to try again and within a day there was a new pitch which was so full of continuity that you couldn't believe it -- it had Vance Richards and Stiletto and all sorts of classic ships. It was clear that somebody immediately sat down and played the games and read the novels in a matter of hours (and you never got to see any of that!).
• "Interview With a Vampire" - Hah-hah. See, the F-109 is the Vampire, I consciously avoided mentioning that in the b... eh, you get it.
• "Lieutenant Colonel Jean Talvert" - That's Stiletto from Wing Commander Prophecy. I guess she hasn't quite made Wing Commander yet...
• "Laser Bolts vs. Ammunition" - Just another wink at a continuity issue - when are Marines supposed to use energy weapons and when are they supposed to use projectiles?
• "April 2654" - Wing Commander I!
• "Gilkarg" - Prince Thrakhath's father, as named in the Kilrathi Saga manual (and Action Stations).
• "failed push for Earth" - That's the Wing Commander movie! See, in two sentences I connected it to the events of Wing Commander I...
• "April 2665" - Wing Commander II!
• "Riddle Wrapped in an Enigma" - Because those systems are in the Enimga Sector! Get it? Get it? Aww.
• "plants" - Ooops, typo. Should be "plans".
• "Ghorah Khar, Fiddler's Green and beyond" - I always like looking at the greater campaign from a viewpoint other than the carrier you're serving at in the game. The stories made this less and less easy as time went on, with Blair ultimately becoming the center of the universe in Wing Commander IV. In this case, the rest of the galaxy is watching Thrakhath attack Ghorah Khar and other systems... and not all the intrigue aboard the Concordia (whereas to the player, the strike on Fiddler's Green was just a single mention).
• "October 2669" - Wing Commander III!
• "PEACE IN OUR TIME" - The end of the Terran-Kilrathi War! (And a famous Neville Chamberlain quote, to suggest that maybe we haven't seen the last of those space cats).
• "Also: stunning Steltek discovery" - The events of Privateer, which happen at the same time as Heart of the Tiger.
• "July 2673" - Wing Commander IV!
• "War is Good For Business" - This is a Ferengi Rule of Acquisition.
• "Landreich and other border worlds" - I'm playing with the longtime confusion over just how the Landreich and the systems we see in Wing Commander III are related. Remember, the UBW doesn't exist at this point - so there's no proper noun to use here.
• "February 2681" - Wing Commander Prophecy!
• "INSECT INVASION?!" - I think this is exactly how most players felt when they first heard the storyline to Wing Commander Prophecy.
• "TCS Eisen" - One last nod to the Midway's co-carrier... and Jason Bernard. (Again, perspective: humans at the time know that the Eisen is going into Kilrathi space to intercept the Nephilim... they don't know what happened to Midway!)

2008.282 (October 8, 2008)

[# 3290 | 10/8/2008]

+4 HP for Wing Commander
Blitz has an interesting fan project in the early stages of development - a 2D Wing Commander RPG to be creasted using a system patterned after the classic 'Unlimited Adventures' CRPG toolsets. To achieve his goal he's looking for team members who are good with 2D sprites -- or anything else that might be useful (sound, ship graphics, etc.) You can access his site (and contact him) here. He adds: "I know a ground base WC game is different but I am trying to edit/trick the game eng into letting me use fighters to add space combat to it including cap ships."

Star*Soldier Gloss: Page 57
This is the Star*Soldier gloss for the classifieds page:

CONCEPT: This one should be self-explanatory; many Wing Commander manuals have had short classified sections and they've always been so much fun... so, why not a full page? It increased in size as time went on - it originally shared a page with the Crusader movie advertisement. As I had so much fun writing more and more in-jokes, long overdue facts and nods to fans the Crusader picture became a half page and then a quarter page and then its own separate page.

REFERENCES-

• "Patriots, the True Terran Militia" - This is mostly a play on the word militia, using it in the modern 'crazy people with guns' sense instead of the 'National Guard in Space' we see in Privateer.
• "Lancers, Pirates, Kilrathi, Nephilim and others" - Hopefully this comes off as properly crazy, as the wars with all but one of these groups have since ended.
• "the center must hold" - A variation on Yeats' Second Coming, quoted in Wing Commander IV (things fall apart, the center cannot hold).
• "filho@circe.government" - Ed Filho, one of the alt.games.wing-commander posters. The fact that this is being organized on Circe (where such a conflict had already been seen in Wing Commander IV) and by a government official of some sort is also telling as to the state of the galaxy.
• "HELP!" - The idea here (and elsewhere) is to mirror the Privateer mission postings. This one is especially relevant because it describes a mission you can fly in the game itself (sort of).
• "safety on Circe" - The joke is that Circe probably isn't very safe, given the immediate preceding classified advertisement.
• "ninja@avalon.government" - Named after NinjaLA, from the online community; he went on to win the Arena art contest with a sketch that was then presented to the team at Gaia. Avalon is a spinward sector (opposite the Terran-Kilrathi border) on the Wing Commander Universe map.
• "Single Orange Kil" - Admit it, you wanted to see a Kilrathi personal ad. The joke is that it's essentially the same as a human one -- I only regret not being able to use nonsensical abbreviations instead of the actual wording (SOK, LM and so forth).
• "Wing-Cat" - The term comes from Wing Commander Armada, where you are assigned Danthrax as a wingcat at one point.
• "Lair Mate" - Term from Wing Commander III, used by Thrakhath to describe Angel and Blair's relationship.
• "blood-feud against Qarg" - Even here we have the background Kilrathi conflict developed a slight bit -- the Som'mers must be fighting the Qarg.
• "Maxims of Xag" - Bits of quoted wisdom, as seen throughout Action Stations.
• "Sivar" - Kilrathi God(dess) of War introduced in The Secret Missions.
• "no hairlesses" - Another jab at/explanation of those crazy movie Kilrathi (which do have hair, for the record... just not overly much of it).
• "d'shrill@som'mers.clan" - Here's our obligatory asommers reference! The Som'mers clan was originally referenced in the Kilrathi Saga version of Victory Streak, where Bloodmist inexpicably becomes Bhuk nar Som'mers instead of Bhuk nar Hhallas.
• "Path to Sivar" - Hey, Kilrathi religion is a scam!
• "Priestesses" - The key take-away here is that the Priestesses of Sivar (introduced in Secret Missions 2) are still running/benefiting from the Kilrathi situation in 2701. Taking down the Empire didn't really harm the actual puppetmasters... and that seems like it should matter.
• "DO NOT APPROACH NEPHILIM DERELICTS" - A classic public service announcement, based on the trouble with Nephilim disease being passed around in Wing Commander Secret Ops.
• "Military Governor Masterson" - This is actually a tribute to a Wing Commander fan and not the librarian from Privateer's Oxford series... but I made the same connection after I wrote it and wasn't entirely sure how I felt. I also think that just the title, Military Governor, is important (it was used in the United States for governors appointed by Congress to run territories... or states in rebellion).
• "Jetlag corporation" - Jetlag is another Wing Commander fan; his high resolution scans of CCG artwork were a huge help in my work here. This note is another take on a Privateer mission assignment - with the added kicker that it's a reference to Privateer 2! The concept is that the Tri-System has been discovered... but that it's very far away. Think of it as being like the early expeditions to China or the Americas -- we're sending out convoys that can take years and years to reach the new world without being sure of what they'll be able to find or bring back.
• "Isaac System" - One of the three systems in Privateer 2's Tri-System.
• "Hopper flights" - Hopper Drives were the technology that preceded jump drives - they're a slower and more dangerous FTL solution... but one that works when no jump lines are available/explored. They were introduced in the Confederation Handbook.
• "Titan Alloys, Pleasure Borgs and more" - All commodities from Privateer 2's commerce system.
• "Unexplored region" - Here's teh deal: Origin's canonical FAQ says: 'Privateer 2: The Darkening takes place in an isolated section of the Wing Commander universe. The Tri-System is not currently a part of the Confederation.' Too many people take 'isolated' to mean 'unconnected' -- it doesn't. All I had to do was get the Tri-System far enough away and I could reference the two. Still, I wanted to be especially cautious for the future, hence 'unexplored region'. Privateer 2 itself is still another ninety or so years off.
• "jbiermann@jetlag.corporation" - That's Jetlag, the fan.
• "Governor Muprhy" - A nod to Wing Commander artist Sean Murphy, who is great with fans and in actually should not be assassinated by a crazed member of the tourism industry.
• "Bistango System... ruins" - Per Victory Streak and Wing Commander III, Bistango X (pronounced 'ex' - thanks, Barbara) is home to beautiful ancient ruins (which were attacked by the Kilrathi at one point). Think about various Greek ruins being delcared off-limits when it became clear that tourism was damaging them...
• "omatta@watchmaker.corporation" - Octavio Motta aka Delance from alt.games.wing-commander. 'Watchmaker' plays tribute to an old joke about the company that owned Delance.com years ago. It's also a genuinely creepy sounding name for an evil corporation.
• "Free to Good Home" - Another classifieds section trope, free kittens. I hope no one feeds the Weirdos to their pet spacesnake (and yes, I realize that it's odd that someone is giving away pets in a monthly magazine for hired killers...).
• "Discurian Ovizard" - I hope it's clear what I'm naming here. In 'Lords of the Sky' (WCATV) the second act begins with footage of a lizard swallowing a huge egg and then reacting to a Scimitar entering the atmosphere by changing color and running off. I love the sequence.
• "Stealthy, eggchomping space weirdos" - The exact terminology used for them in a WCNews.com update!
• "creid@dioscuri.science" - Chris Reid, founder of WCNews.
• "WAR MEMORABELIA" - Here's a more appropriate advertisement for a mercenary magazine.
• "Kilrathi claw knives" - A special type of Kilrathi knife prized by victorious Marines, per End Run.
• "Yan tails!" - The Yan were the group the Confederation fought in the century before the Kilrathi emerged, per Action Stations. Before this we weren't entirely sure they were an alien species... but if they have tails!
• "ears, ears, ears" - Again, the marines in End Run collect Kilrathi ears (although human soldiers have done this throughout history, too).
• "spork@ivanscollectables.commercial" - This doesn't reference anything. Spork is just a funny name.
• "BOUNTY MISSION" - Yet another Privateer-style mission assignment. These make sense in the context of our magazine, at least.
• "Telamon survivor" - Telamon was where Tolwyn's forces tested the gen-select bioweapon in Wing Commander IV, devastating an entire population. Note that Telamon wasn't actually the name of the planet - that was FT957. Again we see the idea of hunting down Lance survivors as being like modern day Nazi hunting, which is an idea we must credit the Wing Commander Aces club for.
• "analik@vega.civilian" - Singer Anna Nalick. The Vega Sector was the original Wing Commander 'space' - note that Telamon is actually located in Engima Sector.
• "Have You Heard the Truth? Local Church of Man..." - These are the Retros from Privateer, and they're still proselytizing!
• "non-believers for combat missions" - ... and they're still hypocrites! More importantly, though, they're still around: they survived the shakeup that was Privateer: Righteous Fire.
• "deacon7@churchofman.religious" - This brings up some interesting thoughts. Is this a simple joke, or is the futuristic group that assigns domain names either unreglulated or so independant that they assign terrorist organizations their own .religious subdomains? Or is there a 'legal' Church of Man?
• "Used ships available!" - Here's the entry you all love - I realized I could quickly give designations to all the hitherto unorganized fighters in the Wing Commander universe. And so I did! I believe that with very few exceptions all of the Wing Commander ships should line up in 'design' order now. Note my big mistake: forgetting the Hellcat! Someday we'll get a better view of that WC3 screen to confirm whether or not it is the F-86...
• "F-36 Hornet" - The Hornet was easy, I took it straight from the series bible. Note that the Scimitar's biblical designation has since been contradicted canonically so was not included here.
• "F-38 Talon" - Taken from the Standoff mod.
• "F-71 Stiletto" - Taken from the Standoff mod.
• "F-98 Phantom" - Fans had given the Phantom a much lower designation, and with good reason - the thing sucks. That said, Armada's fiction claims at one point that it's a new ship... so it's part of our '90-series' of fighters. I'm envisioning that the F-9X designs make up the complements of the best-equipped carriers in the last days of the war.
• "F-95 Morningstar" - Taken from the Standoff mod.
• "F-97 Wraith" - Taken from the Standoff mod.
• "A-14 Raptor" - From the series bible.
• "A-15 Gladius" - Taken from the Standoff mod.
• "A-20 Banshee" - Derived from the fact that Banshees are absolutely brand new in 2669, in Wing Commander Armada.
• "crazyjoe@shipsmustgo.corporation" - Nod to Joe Garrity of the Origin Museum and to insane car dealers everywhere.
• "How few remain!" - Here's our nod to the Piglrims from the Wing Commander movie, which are (per the elaborate history in the Confederation Handbook) formally the McDanielite church. "How Few Remain" is an alternate history novel from a few years back - I wish the phrase came from somewhere great, because it evokes a great sense of generation-fading whistfullness.
• "Ivar Chu" - Ivar Chu McDaniel was the father of Pilgrim theology and the part of the first group to travel to another plain of existence.
• "McDanielist" - I already explained this, but I just wanted to point out how clever Chris McCubbin and friends were in creating the background in the first place. Their entire basis for the Pilgrim religion comes from the fact that without planning anything of the sort intentionally the Wing Commander Prophecy map makers included 'McDaniel's World' on their star map placed near several 'religious sounding' system names (things like 'Faith'). The whole Pilgrim backstory flows from making that connection...
• "crossbearer@mcdaniel.reserve" - Because they wear distinctive Pilgrim crosses (and so do I!). I can't say for sure what the reserve is - did the Pilgrims leave behind agents to convert future humans or is this a group that has formed in the years since 'Pilgrim Truth'?
• "BIG CREDS" - Scam scam scam! Do not sell your Steltek artifacts! They are valuable! This is the equivalent of those 'cash for gold' advertisements you see on late night TV. (Steltek artifacts were the mcguffins that began the Privateer story... and many, many cancelled Wing Commander stories planned to use them as the WC equivalent of Known Space's Slaver stasis boxes.
• "lmonkhouse@oxford.archaeology" - Dr. Monkhouse was the scientist who discovered the initial Steltek artifacts in Privateer. Oxford was that game's university planet where they were studied.
• "ACTORS WANTED" - An uncharacteristically mean swipe at Steven Petrarca, the actor who played Lance Casey in Wing Commander Prophecy (and then refused to voice the role in Secret Ops).
• "ascendant@digitalholovid.productiosn" - Ascendant is Chris Roberts' current production company, Digital Holovid was the fictional one from the Kilrathi Saga manual.
• "Duty, honor, adventure" - Just a reminder that the Free Republic of the Landreich, which appears in a good portion of the Wing Commander novelizations, is still out there. Frankly, I'm kind of tired of fans mythologizing these guys -- but there you go.
• "Glory to Kilrah" - The Kilrathi want to... rebuild Kilrah? Crazier things have happened! This was actually the plot of a Privateer 3 concept, although it would have involved a Steltek tool
• "murragh.cakg@noktak.clan" - Murragh was the Kilrathi Prince from False Colors; we learn in this manual that he is now in exile.
• "FIREKKAN UNIONIST PARTY" - Am I the only one who felt bad about the fact that Fleet Action breaks the Firekkans away from the Confederation and that they're never returned? We worked our butts off in Secret Missions 2 to save them! I've always wondered if Firekka was eventually conquered by the Kilrathi at the end of the war - there are a few lines to suggest this is the case circa 2669... like the availability of tasty Firekkan roasts in Armada.
• "T'kirsa Customs House" - T'kirsa is the 'second' Firekkan system introduced by the Wing Commander Universe map. In earlier days, a custom house was a government office where paperwork for ingress/egress into a country takes place. The name is probably best known today as the name/location of Hawthorne's introduction/prequel to The Scarlet Letter.
• "AMAZING NWE GUN MOUTN" - The Kraven Mk. IV was the 'super gun' in Privateer 2... and here we see its anscestor!
• "johnmaddox@kraven.corporation" - John Maddox is presumably an anscestor of Bill Maddox, the Texas cowboy who introduces the Kraven Mk. IV in The Darkening.
• "PATROL MISSION" - Really simple - this is a nod to how I made about five million credits in Privateer. You take three 'patrol the whole system' missions in Perry at the same time and you make quite a profit.
• "BOUNTY OFFERED" - More background on the Kilrathi Civil War - we can see that the Sihkag and the Qarg are fighting especially hard.
• "WANTED" - More Black Lance background, inspired by that great 'car sales' poster of the 'Dragon' (WCIVPSX advertisement).
• "F-107 Lance" - A designation for the 'Dragon' from Wing Commander IV! My theory which goes against the popular fan opinion is that there's an ordinary fighter model of the Lance serving with the Confederation fleet. Imagine it with slightly less sleak lines and painted in ordinary Confederation colors. (For those unfamiliar with the elaborate history here: Wing Commander IV calls the ship the "Dragon". The novelization retcons this - they're called Dragons informally, like the A-10 Thunderbolt II is the 'Warthog'. The actual name of the ship is the 'Lance', because per the script it is derived from the Excalibur program, and the covert ops variant is the 'Black Lance' (think 'Black Panther, Black Wasp, etc. from Wing Commander Secret Ops). In turn, conspiracy has no formal name - "Black Lance" is derived from the familiar fighter, while the actual group is 'The Project' (or '212'). All of this makes sense and, as such things go, is a very clever set of supporting retcons... but it's a huge shock to anyone who has only played Wing Commander IV.
• "anonymous@212.squadron" - 212 was the designation for The Project in Wing Commander IV; this advertisement is a Nazi wanting engine parts for his Messerschmitt (I don't think this actually happened). Remember that Tolwyn had seeded small pockets of Lancers throughout the galaxy in the hopes that they could reorganize should he fail in his initial attempt.
• "JACK OF ALL TRADES" - The Vindicator, my favorite fighter from Wing Commander IV, makes a rare appearance! This actually references the Strike Commander manual, which has an A-10 pilot in similar (if more dire) straights. 'Jack of all trades' is a criticism of the Vindicator, which is certainly a 'jack of all trades, master of none' fighter.
• "mason@borderworlds.government" - I do not believe this references anything.
• "BOUNTY OFFERED" - Here's the opposite take on the Qarg/Sihkag fight.
• "HAVE SHIP, MUST TRAVEL" - From 'Have Gun, Will Travel,' one of the great 1950s Western shows.
• "Hari Sector" - The vast expanse of worthless space first seen in Fleet Action; the Kilrathi conquered the thousand worlds of the Hari in a three year war of extermination... but the planets were all lifeless and devoid of resources.
• "lemmings@vukartag.civilian" - Lemmings is another nod to a Wing Commander fan. Vukar Tag is the Kilrathi world attacked in End Run (and visited in Milk Run). The idea that there's a civilian presence on the former reserve-world home of the Emperor's mother is interesting.
• "FREE FURNITURE" - We jump back to abject parody here, with another classic classified ad.
• "Nephilim Infected Zone" - I would like to see this fleshed out someday; is it an area ruined by Nephilim bioweapons or does it have to do with the plague seen in Secret Ops? I believe I borrowed the name from Starship Troopers' Arachnic Quarantine Zone.
• "jefferson@camelot.industries" - Camelot Industries was the company Flash flew as a test pilot for, per the Wing Commander III novelization. They also, apparently, designed the Broadsword!
• "BOMBER PILOTS NEEDED" - Here's confirmation that the Confederation built more Behemoths! Why? Only time will tell.
• "TCS Gargantuan" - What a great name - just another word meaning something huge, like Behemoth.
• "menace to navigation" - A reference to the flimsiest excuse in science fiction history, from the last episode of Babylon 5.
• "weapon of mass destruction" - We throw this phrase around an awful lot these days and apply it to pretty much anything that mildly inconveniences us. Eight mile long space gun that blows up planets? That's an actual weapon of mass destruction.
• "david.terrell@gemini.government" - Admiral Terrell, the credits-reader from Privateer! This gives him an official first name, which comes from the background for the aborted Privateer television show.
• "MANTU SPOTTED" - It wouldn't be arcane Wing Commander lore without a reference to the Mantu, the since neutered 'evil' aliens which posed a background threat in several Forstchen novels. For those unfamiliar: way back in 1991 Dr. Forstchen was already interested in what would happen 'after' the Kilrathi War. He spoke to Origin and agreed to 'hint' at a greater threat than the Kilrathi, which were eventually called the Mantu. When Wing Commander Prophecy came around the manual retconned the Mantu as being a perceived threat by the Kilrathi but not actually a danger to humans - allowing the Aligned People to become the next big heavy.
• "TCS Tsiolkovsky" - The Tsiolovsky was a science ship first referenced in Secret Missions 2 and then reported lost in Wing Commander II. That's never followed up - until now, where we learn it was apparently destroyed by a Mantu warship. The interesting thing here is that it suggests that the Mantu could be more dangerous than the ICIS manual lets on.
• "vengeance@aussi.hrai" - Vengeance was the callsign of a Kilrathi in Word of Honor (WCATV), but I'm pretty sure that's a coincidence. The actual reference here is "Aussie.hrai", implying that despite Hunter and Kirha's deaths their 'clan' lives on somehow. Did Hunter have a son? Kirha? Who knows.
• "WHO KILLED THE INVISIBLE SHIP?" - From that 'Who Killed the Electric Car' documentary that's all the rage these days. Just a simple joke about conspiracy theorists (and not a suggestion that the Confederation and Empire got together to prevent eachother from developing stealth fighters for nine years).
• "rburns@hope.civilian" - RFBurns was a Wing Commander fan who was also somewhat of a conspiracy theorist. Hope was the new sector created for a cancelled Privateer Online attempt.
• "GOT SPEED?" - I really, really hoped people would start having space races in Wing Commander Arena. Ah, well.
• "mmahadeen@avalon.civilian" - Needaham, from the Standoff team (their musician).
• "centicredits" - A subunit of currency!

2008.281 (October 7, 2008)

[# 3289 | 10/7/2008]

Tarawa Me a New One
If you joined in on the Tarawa hat production organized by McGruff then you already know how cool they look... but if you missed out, here's your chance to see the end result. A limited run of these TCS Tarawa ship hats was created for (and by) interested fans - and they turned out great! Be sure to keep watching the forums for similar projects in the future. Thanks to BrynS for the blue pictures.

Star*Soldier Gloss: Page 56
This is the Star*Soldier gloss for the third weapons page:

CONCEPT: See the previous post!

REFERENCES-

• "Paulsen Kinetics" - Paulsen Kinetics was a company mentioned in the Wing Commander Secret Ops fiction; it was probably there intended to reference the arms company owned by the family of Captain Hugh Paulsen (as mentioned in the Wing Commander IV novelization).
• "aren't just for salvage ops anymore" - This explains the change in role for the tractor beam (in Arena you use them to grab other fighters during combat).
• The images are all from the Privateer source renders: the tractor beam is the tractor beam, the Sonar is a software package, the cloak is thrusters, the power core is an engine, the turret is a Galaxy upper turret, the flares are ECM pods and the fusion batteries are jump drives.
• "Blackfish Cloak" - Blackfish was the name of the 'full' Confederation cloak, from the WC:CCG. "Shroud" was the sensor cloak used by the Excalibur.
• "destroyed the Tiger's Claw, Concordia and Behemoth" - We see cloaked fighters destroy the Tiger's Claw in the WC2 intro and the Behemoth in Wing Commander III - their involvement in the final fate of the Concordia is new!
• "in space, all cats are cloaked" - From the expression "at night, all cats are gray".
• "Wingleader One..." - These are the first sentences on the back of the Wing Commander I box.
• Some mistakes - there's no label for 'power cores'... and it occurs to me now, a year later, that there should have been some contact information for the store.

2008.280 (October 6, 2008)

[# 3288 | 10/6/2008]

HotT Skits the Issues
Heart of the Tiger is back!... with his unique form of fan art. Some of his past hits include... uh, this, this, this, this and of course... this. Oh, and this. And that's that. He says:

I decided to move away from the usual Peanuts skits for now.

Vampires: This fighter, while powerful, was just too darned manueverable. I know I'm not the only one who overshot and over-compensated everytime I had to target something. First time I ever had to take Dramamine just to play a game. ('No-doze', but that was during my FF_VII craze )

The Ebay Skit: Eh, happens more often then people think. *LOL*

Star*Soldier Gloss: Page 55
This is the Star*Soldier gloss for the second weapons page:

CONCEPT: See the previous post!

REFERENCES-

• The missile graphics are also all from the original Privateer's source models. The ones that aren't familiar are ones that were cut from the game - the torpedo model was an antimatter torpedo and the "Vampire Missile" was originally the "EMP Missile".
• "Terran Standard" - I think End Run actually says the language of the fleet is English...
• "Dragonfly Technology" - Another reminder that there are massed-missile technologies in Wing Commander.
• Missile specifications are from earlier games. Costs are from Privateer.
• "Rarest high tech weapons" - Because almost no one knows what a Vampire missile is.
• "Oldest targeting missile" - References the Victory Streak description about Heat Seekers being invented in the 1950s.
• "Killing blow to any fighter" - I included this because in Arena your torpedoes are giant slow dumbfires for hitting other pilots.

Wallpapers Files SETI@home Music Cheats Links

Added nineteen wallpapers. Recent files added. CIC group stats updated. Dozens of tracks added. Prophecy Advance and WC IV Playstation cheats added. Fifteen links removed, ten updated, fifteen added.

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