All Good Things

That's right, folks, it's the last of our exciting Secret Ops team interviews for a while... there's a good chance we'll get a few more soon, so check back. Here's Pete Shelus, programmer...

What was involved in programming Secret Ops? How much of a jump from WCP is it?

Secret Ops is sort of an evolutionary step from Prophecy. One of the first things we did was modify the existing Prophecy code base to allow for the episodic mission system. We learned a lot doing that, and we are already working on some new ideas to make the episodic system even better for future releases. The rest of the programming consisted of resolving issues that remained from Prophecy, adding and improving game functionality, and optimization.

Do you see a multiplayer WC game in the future?

Multiplayer WC is something that we would certainly like to see. We're spending a great deal of time working out exactly what would make a great multiplayer space combat game. It's a little tricky building something that will be fun because space is a very empty place. Combat usually regresses to just 'jousting' with the other players, so we're reassessing the game mechanic and the environments in which you fly in order to make sure that the multiplayer Wing Commander experience is a great one.