2007.343 (December 9, 2007)

Official XBox Mag Still Loves Arena

AD saw some neat Wing Commander Arena mentions in the Holiday 2007/#78 issue of the Official XBox Magazine. Arena shows up in "The 360's Best Games" feature because of its high review score in the August 2007 issue. It also gets mentioned in the new review of the Battlestar Galactica XBLA game. The piece notes that BSG's single player portions are "ridiculously short" and marks the game down for its lack of maneuvers, power-ups, AI and unique modes. They mistakenly credit Battlestar's 16-person multiplayer, but such large battles are only available in two Arcade games so far - Wing Commander and Undertow. The review concludes with this:

At 800 Points, Battlestar is cheap, but in a sky already patrolled by the superior Wing Commander Arena, these toasters don't stand a chance.

The Art of Wing Commander Arena - Part Thirty-Seven

You've seen this image before, but there's a story behind it: it was developed very late at the behest of the Official Xbox Magazine. They wanted a cool splash image to include when they reviewed the game... and then they used it as an index background instead! You can find several different resolutions here.

This is part of a series of beautiful Wing Commander Arena concept images graciously provided by Gaia Industries. You can find the original article here. You can thank the guys at Gaia by picking up Street Trace NYC on Xbox Live Arcade!