Kickstarter campaign has launched!
Wow... you must have been bored :). Actually the scenes without music/sound were either duplicates and/or the sound from a different file was played when that movie was played, (if my memory serves me correctly). As for the letterbox... you actually see more in the letterbox format than you would in "full-screen" as the movie scenes in WC4 were actually shot in 35mm film and the aspect ratio of film is different than that of a computer monitor and/or TV. To make the film full-screen we would have had to perform what is refered to as a "pan & scan" which would actually crop the image thus losing some of what was shot. The same thing happens when feature films are formatted for television, which is why many DVD's come in the original letterbox" format so the viewer can experience the orignal theatre presentation. As for the Borderworlds poetry...!!??? Sounds like an easteregg from one of the artists or TDA's on the project.
We're still alive and kicking *twitch*The call for new team members is *temporarily* closed - it might open agian, but I need to hear back from one person first. Sorry if I didn't notify your site about it. We had more than enough applications and "reconfirmed/reassigned" team members almost immediately after the openings were posted. We have two texturers, one modeller/cowebmaster, and me, the webmaster/pr guy/oddball. I'll have to take care of the HW conversions. The person I am still waiting to hear back from is both a modeller and a texturer.
Kruer is setting a java/dhtml menu up for me, which is why I haven't put the redesign up yet. I reconsidered the design since the menu will look soooo MUCH better than the amateur custom gfx menu I had before. We hope to conferance, distribute work to team members, and be back to making stuff by the end of this week.
Incidentally, I have gotten Kruer his own Gamespy ftp account, so keep an eye on his WC model archive at our site - he told me he has some new models that he may be finishing in the next couple of weeks.
Crusader 2Joe Garrity (of the Origin Museum) also added to our original list...
Crusader Online
Lords of Ultima
Star Wars Online
Privateer Online
Privateer 3 (two or three times)
Wing Commander Online
BattleCry
Wing Commander: Strike Force
Jane's F-18 (1995)
Jane's F-15 (1996)
A Wing Commander First Person Shooter
A Wing Commander C&C Clone
Golf Commander (I shit you not)
Cyclone Alley (a Paul Steed game)
1. There was an advertisement in the 1989-1990 Origin catalog for a game called "BEYOND 2400 A.D.", with a 'comming soon' statement under it. The order form even shows that it could be ordered in two formats (IBM and AppleII I think)...I could find no records of it's actual existence anywhere...2. There was an insert in the box to Knights of Legend ( see www.originmuseum.com for a picture of it) that stated that Origin would be coming out with add-on disks for the game to be sold only thru direct channels. I am assured by TomMage (a BIG Ultima/Origin fan) that no add-ons were ever released.
Welcome to Game Three, Week Five Trivia. We play each week. Every Monday two main questions and one bonus question are posted to alt.games.wing-commander and listed at the CIC. Please email answers to CReid1701@aol.com or ChrisReid@wcnews.com. Be sure to include a name you would like to be known under for the Scoreboard that will be up soon. Have your answers in *before* this coming Sunday (December 3, 2000) to ensure your answers are recorded. Answers submitted early may be returned and you may be able to fix incorrect answers, time permitting. Main questions answered correctly are good for 5 points, bonuses good for 3.-------
Answers to Questions from Week 4 (starting November 20, 2000):Question 7: What is a relatively unique object in the Sol System that has a major effect on jump points in the Ulysses Corridor?
Answer: ScyllaQuestion 8: What is a relatively unique object in the Enimga Sector that has a major effect on jump points throughout the sector?
Answer: The Enigma Sector Black HoleBonus 4: What is a specific object in the Vega Sector that can have a major effect on jump points in the Ariel and Caliban Systems?
Answer: The Caliban Nebula
"Object" was a loosely defined term in these questions. We were looking for specific names for each object.------
New Questions for Week 5 (starting November 27, 2000):Question 9: What was a planet or base that Geoffrey Tolwyn engaged in intelligence/spy/reconnaissance work on?
Question 10: What was a planet or base that Winston Chang engaged in intelligence/spy/reconnaissance work on?
Bonus 5: What was a planet or base that John Dekker engaged in intelligence/spy/reconnaissance work on?
Submissions are due by December 3, 2000.
------
Please email answers to ChrisReid@wcnews.com and do not post directly to the Newsgroup. Thanks,
And the latest in LOAF's search for obscure Japanese Origin games brings us... Strike Commander Plus! Seriously, is there anyone out there from Japan who might help me find out more about Wing Commander games released there? I'd be your biggest fan!
...something to say about "Final Conflict" - as you might know I wanted to publish a 640x480 version of the movie. But that's not looking that good up to now - why?? Well the first thing is that this resolution needs VERY VERY much time - and the next is, that my Athlon 750 ThunderBid seems to be too slow (!!???!!!) for playing this movie with 25fps. Well... I think that means we'll cancel the 640x480 version, because you would need a very fast processor and Videocard to have good playback... (because the details of the movie will be very high !!)But I'm already thinking about some solutions. Well - if we don't need to produce a 640x480 version, we could improve the 352x288 version (with some very good details :) !!!)
Welcome to Game Three, Week Four Trivia. We play each week. Every Monday two main questions and one bonus question are posted to alt.games.wing-commander and listed at the CIC. Please email answers to CReid1701@aol.com or ChrisReid@wcnews.com. Be sure to include a name you would like to be known under for the Scoreboard that will be up soon. Have your answers in *before* this coming Sunday (November 26, 2000) to ensure your answers are recorded. Answers submitted early may be returned and you may be able to fix incorrect answers, time permitting. Main questions answered correctly are good for 5 points, bonuses good for 3.-------
Answers to Questions from Week 3 (starting November 13, 2000):Question 5: Where is a place the Morningstar Heavy Fighter was tested?
Answer: Canewdon System and Ayer's Rock were good popular answers.Question 6: Where is a place the Excalibur Heavy Fighter was tested?
Answer: Kentari and Jupiter were good popular answers.Bonus 3: Where is a place the Wraith Medium Fighter was tested?
Answer: The most common answer was the Terran Confederation Space Naval Academy Simulator.Answers should have ranged from specific points in space, planets or simulated locations.
------
New Questions for Week 4 (starting November 20, 2000):Question 7: What is a relatively unique object in the Sol System that has a major effect on jump points in the Ulysses Corridor?
Question 8: What is a relatively unique object in the Enigma Sector that has a major effect on jump points throughout the sector?
Bonus 4: What is a specific object in the Vega Sector that can have a major effect on jump points in the Ariel and Caliban Systems?
"Object" is a loosely defined term in these questions. We're looking for specific names for each object.
Submissions are due by November 26, 2000.
------
Please email answers to ChrisReid@wcnews.com and do not post directly to the Newsgroup. Thanks,
So what did I notice? Well a few things... for instance, while most screens are the full width of the screen and in "letterbox" format, odd bits of scenes (such as the start of SC_3370A.VOB) aren't the full width of the screen. Whereas odd bits of other scenes (I only actually noticed this in SC_2490A.VOB) were completely full screen. Would have been nice if the whole disk was full screen like that, but I guess we'll make do with like 10 seconds of full-screenness :) Oh, and some scenes just don't have any sound (SC_2470C.VOB among others)Anyone remember the introduction to the Speradon missions where you see the inside of the shipyard and it's making Bearcats? Well it isn't in WCIV DVD. Oh well.
Also there's some odd text on the screen during at least one briefing. LOAF says that it was included in the unofficial hintbooks as "Border Worlds poetry", but since I don't have those hintbooks, I'll just paste what I could read of it here:
"...down the the spiralling drains of desire drowning dying to breathe your air before the darkness settles in. Ahh. if I could wake next to the golden green pools of your eyes in the liquid hazel dreams of my imagination someday in the distant near future you ????? return to me in my dream once..."
Hi there,I might need some plugins for my movie: Final Conflict. If you could help it would be great. I could use the following plugins for 3DStudio Max 3 !!!
- space effects like nebula or anything that could improve the environment and let space looking better...
- plugins for light effects (for laser shots and engines)
- plugins for any kind of explosion (particle explosion, ...)
- any plugins for effects with video post
- any good looking effects for space movies
- effects for comet and asteroids
- effects for damaging ships (for example when an asteroid collides with a ship)Thank you for your support !!!
Best Regards,
The mod right now will replace the 14 flyable ships for StarLancer with ships from wing commander; mainly ships from Wing Commander 4. Later on I hope to convert capital ships to SL and once the mission editor comes out, to turn the mod in to a total conversion with new missions and a custom storyline set during the events of Wing Commander 4.Other things such as new music, new sound effects, new cgi movies etc would be added-on onces the above main ideas are finished and the ablities become avalible.
First, I will mail CDs of Academy to anyone who sends me two blank CDR's and postage. Send the CDs to me at...
Ben Lesnick
2323 San Antonio St. #2204
Austin TX, 78705
Please drop me an e-mail as well, so I can get an idea of how many CDs I'll be making.
Second, I will also try to upload WCA episodes to anyone who sets up an FTP site and mails me the login. This will be on a first come, first serve basis and I will be listing the order in which I plan to upload them here at the CIC -- so set up those logins and get them to me fast, if you want to be first!
Strike Commander II
Phoenix Force
Arthurian Legends
Tank Commander
Prowler
Pac Strike CD
Lost Vale
Bioforge Plus
Hardcore
Armor
Silverheart
WC3 and WC4 Saturn
WC4 3DO
Privateer II
Firehorse
WC3 M2
Here's a third picture I took at the faire -- Origin Director of Communications David Swofford. You all may remember him as the guy who has answered most of our important questions over the last few years.
Due to recent complaints by several people, I have upped the limitations on the number of connections to my server to 20 connections (vice the previous 7), though a 4Kbyte/connection max speed limit is in effect.In theory, this means that each connection is limited to 4kbytes/sec. However, as it is a busy site (about a quarter of a terabyte [249GB] moved so far, overall), this theoretical max speed limit may not be attainable, depending on the traffic.
I apologize for any inconvenience a slow connection may cause, but as my site is running off of my personal ADSL connection, I only have limited bandwidth (256kbit upstream). Please keep this in mind, and do not start multiple simultaneous downloads. Repeat offenders will be banned from accessing the server.
If you have any comments or questions, please feel free to write to us.
Death
Death@wcnews.com
And from the UO Faire, here's a picture of LOAF and Origin's LadyMOI. Ah, who am I kidding, I just want to get my picture on all those crazy Carly fan-sites.
Because I couldn't get much original Sounds from Maniac and Casey, I will change the storyline of "Final Conflict" - or let's say the voices. Maniac and Casey will still fly in the movie, and Maniac will of course say some funny words. In the battle-scenes, Maniac and Casey will play a big part as well.
The main actors will be replaced by my voice and voices of my friends (German version). That will make the story more interesting, because I don't use the original sounds everybody already knows... (and we have more freedom with what we say, because we don't need to stick to original sounds of WC (which are hard to get))
New Questions for Week 3 (starting November 13, 2000):And the answers to week 2 are as follows... you can check your score here.Question 5: Where is a place the Morningstar Heavy Fighter was tested?
Question 6: Where is a place the Excalibur Heavy Fighter was tested?
Bonus 3: Where is a place the Wraith Medium Fighter was tested?
Answers may range from specific points in space, planets or simulated locations.
Please email answers to ChrisReid@wcnews.com before November 19, 2000.
Question 3: Who was someone that participated in an important battle over McAuliffe, and what was their specific role?
Answer: Many people chose to discuss Winston Turner's exploits in the initial 2629 blitz. The second most popular answers centered around Tolwyn's role in that battle or an engagement five years later.Question 4: Who was someone that participated in an important battle over Earth, and what was their specific role?
Answer: People who did not pick Tolwyn for Question 3 picked his command of the fleet in Sol during the big bad Battle of Earth for their topic. Actually Duke Grecko's role in the suicide bombing of the Hakaga Carriers was extremely popular, especially among players who've played in previous games.Bonus 2: Who was someone that participated in an important battle over Vukar Tag, and what was their specific role?
Answer: Lots of Bears and Banbridges here, depending on whether the players wanted to talk about the fleet battle or fighter engagements. There were some nice Chekova and Grecko answers as well.
As the TCS Midway, pursued by the Nephilim invaders, jumps into the G'wriss, the Union of Border Worlds too, is bracing itself against the coming storm. The Militia is assembling its fleet... but not all Militia ships are to Be present.
The Border Worlds Defence Ministry has long believed that there's no need for strike carriers - like the Bengal-class BWS Dauntless - in the Militia. Instead of joining the rest of the fleet, the Dauntless is heading for the scrapyard. Most of its fighter squadrons have already been transferred off, to other ships. Even now, the Dauntless awaits a rendezvous in Kurasawa System with the BWS Intrepid. The Intrepid will take the Dauntless' last squadron of Scimitars. Lt. Colonel Johann Daniels, in command of that squadron, knows that his Pilots will soon see action against the Nephilem invaders. He only wishes that when the time comes, his squadron could still be operating off the Dauntless, not off some decrepit escort carrier.
But sometimes, it's better if wishes don't come true...
The big news from the UO Faire was, of course, that Origin has announced their new UO client -- Third Dawn. Read all about it over at Computer Games Online.
The event itself was a lot of fun -- lots of interesting seminars and such, even for a casual player like myself who didn't understand half the conversations he took part in. It was really great seeing the UO community come together for this... someday, I swear, we'll do a Wing Commander Convention. Everybody there was very cool to this old WingNut -- despite my lack of experience. I'll probably post a few pictures as soon as I get my film developed.
And of course a big final thanks to Joe and Paula for sending me -- your number one status certainly extends beyond the realm of Origin memorabilia!
Today is Veterans Day... please take a moment to honor those who have served to keep the real world at peace.
The mod team has been reduced from two dedicated members and supporting members to one dedicated team member with supporting members. The main technical member, Scheherazade, has become interested in several Q3A projects. He has basically decided to move on to them, as he was making little progress on the port to HW:C. Instead of dropping the mod, Voidsurfer (me) has officially taken over the leadership of the mod, with permission from Scheherazade. This won't matter much to some sites, since they have always thought that I was the leader anyway, despite my repeated protests ^_^
Repeat, only one person is seriously dedicating a lot of time to the mod now!
I have to learn to model and texture starting from NO previous experience, and I am very busy with college. The project is still on my "to do" list, but I may not be able to produce high quality work for some time. For now, I am interested in trying to do this myself, both as a learning experience and for the personal control over the mod's development. It is possible that I will ask for help later, but I am *NOT* asking for help at this time. I know that various WC models are available, but I would prefer to learn how to make my own before using them.
After some careful consideration, I have decided that the port to HW:C will be put on hold indefinitely; future releases will still be for HW. While HW:C has a better interface and more gimmicks for modders, it has less ships and more weird special abilities that don't exactly apply to the WC universe. HW:C is good for modding, but not for the FA mod as it is currently planned. I am very inexperienced with serious modding work; HW would be easier for me to work with as all the tools and editing info are clearly available. Additionally, I am aiming for fleet diversity, and for that I need to have the larger fleets in HW (HW has ~27 ships per side, as opposed to HW:C's ~18 - ~18; HW:C actually ~30 for the beast side, but to my current knowledge some need to be "infected" to be available unless research is turned off).
As we have most of the strike craft done, future development will focus more on capital ships. I'll get the remaining strike craft in at some point, and will probably do one of them in the process of learning how to mod.
Two issues: the first is that I am seriously considering the replacement of the Perry Naval base (confed mothership) and the Concordia (confed carrier) with the Concordia (mothership) and the Tiger's Claw (carrier). It just doesn't make much sense to have a space station moving around deep space in fleet combat, much less hyperspacing. However, the Concordia and WC3 Dreadnought (kilralthi mothership) are not capship builders. I'll probably have to bend the rules a little by making oversized "super" versions of these ships to accommodate capship construction. Feel free to drop by the forums on our site and comment.
http://pub18.ezboard.com/bfleetaction
The second issue is that I am going to heavily favor WC1 and WC2 ships in the future releases. I dislike many of the capship designs from WC3 and WC4 (the mod doesn't feature WCP).
I am going to post a zip version of the current release up in the next day or so, as I have been receiving some messages from people that have had problems with the self-extracting archive.
We hope to have them available again soon! Interested in becoming a WCA mirror? (Women will find you more attractive) Contact us!
News from the Fleet Action mod for homeworld!
The mod will not be ported to HomeWorld: Cataclysm, as previously expected...
They are considering replacing Perry Naval Base with the Concordia as the motership, and using the Tiger's Claw as the carrier. Feedback is being requested at their forum.
They are now focusing development on frigates and larger ships, having almost completed work on strike craft.
(And we'd never have known this were it not for the ever-wonderful ATFW).
During a Cybernet segment entitled "How to become a games programmer" it featured some interviews with prominent games developers (mostly from LucasArts) and clips from various games. I really wasn't paying much attention until a clip from WC4 appeared. It was the scene where the Intrepid was battling with the Vesuvius and the St. Helens jumped in and took over the battle. At that point the clip ended and switched to a comment from the head programmer at LucasArts.
Question 1: What year was the TCS Tiger's Claw commissioned?
Answer: 2644Question 2: What year was the TCS Midway commissioned?
Answer: 2680. Prophecy began very early in 2681.Bonus 1: What year was the FRLS Independence commissioned?
Answer: 2670
Anyway a lot of the basic models are done, but some of the textures do need work, as it can be seen. I suppose the help of anyone with the ability to create good bmp images to use as textures on the .opts would be welcome greatly.Although we don't have a title for the TC yet, there are some things that we do have set in stone in terms of story.
The series is first set in early 2667 in Gemini, with the player cast in the role of a certain Matthew Robert "Coolhand" Tarkington, a newly recruited militia pilot.
The events basically lead up to the Battle of Terra, with some slight differences between the "canon" WC timeline, and this one. Mostly however you'll be playing a small part in a war escalated beyond anyone's worst nightmares.Tarkington ends up playing a larger part in the war than he ever dreamed of, in several key engagements including the Battle of Vukar Tag...
Hopefully the multi-region/96 ships per region limit in XWA can be fully exploited to make the battles seem real. (BTW I'm not sure how many of you noticed, but yes, the name of the main character is a referrence to the Jake Grafton books. The character is even set to be a distant descendant of Toad and Rita Tarkington.)
New Questions for Week 2 (starting November 6, 2000):Question 3: Who was someone that participated in an important battle over McAuliffe, and what was their specific role?
Question 4: Who was someone that participated in an important battle over Earth, and what was their specific role?
Bonus 2: Who was someone that participated in an important battle over Vukar Tag, and what was their specific role?
Be sure to elaborate a bit on their role.
Please email answers to ChrisReid@wcnews.com before November 12, 2000.
I'm just uploading the little animated intro-sequence of Wing Commander - The final Conflict. The movie is 352x288 pixels and 32 seconds long. I'm sorry, that the sound quality is not that good. First, I wanted to upload the file without sound, but I think we need a little bit sound for testing. The sound that is played now in this intro will not be the final sound !!!! And the effects will be replaced with higher quality sounds...
Please tell me what you think - write to:
Describing the story as "wildly inaccurate," a Westwood official told Gamers.com it's no secret the company is working on a persistent-world RPG, and that it has registered the domain name for Earth & Beyond, the game's supposed name. While CVG's story says that Westwood will formally announce the game at E3 next year, Westwood told us that an announcement will be made before the year ends.
I just started rendering the last frames of the Intro-animation. But I've got a little - problem. The homepage is NOT ready - I didn't even had the time to start it. But the intro-movie (animated WC-Logo) will be ready TODAY !!!
Just some news about a little intro of Final Conflict (animated Wing Commander Logo). While I'm writing this message, the computer is rendering an improved Starting Sequence !!!!! (800 frames !!! - 32sec) Stay tuned !!! Let's say... in 48h you'll be able to download this test-file !!!
Wing Commander Academy is back and better than ever! All 13 episodes of WCA have been re-recorded, re-edited and re-recorded to allow you to view this excellent show at the highest possible quality!
The Academy episodes are being hosted by Death -- thanks; we owe you big-time! They were recorded, edited and encoded by LOAF.
Please remember that there are only a limited number of connections at any one time, so if the server is busy simply try back later. Please do NOT link directly to the files from your own web site -- instead, link here or to the front page -- and remember to give credit to Death and the CIC.
To view these episodes, you will need to install the DivX;-) codec, which is available here.
First I would like to say thanks for putting my mod on your website, I guess you liked the story I had planned. Well you deserve a reasaon why it has not been updated. First, I didn't get as much help as i needed and I got a job in the industry so it was very hard to work on a mod By myself and do my work on our games. Since then I have founded my own company. After we get set up in our new offices we start our first game, LOL, and yes it's a space sim - something very new and good and something no one would ever expect, there are people that want to do the Mod again, but no plans as of yet but may be in the future. And plans to talk to Origin to buy the Wing Commander Fanchise, but we are still talking about it. If we do decide to do it we would first talk to Chris because I personaly would like him involved in the game. So WC:Lost Universe might come back.Plus, if anyone would like to have my idea tell them I still have all the stuff I made for it, so just tell them to email me.
I just wanted to thank everyone for their enthusiasm about this language project... I'm hoping to put up a 'notes' page later today that will include what we already know from the games and what we've worked out so far. Stay tuned!
Oh, and a silver florin for me for locating another furball for the Kilrathi List -- Krihakh. If you can tell me what game he's from, you get a GOLD STAR.
Hi there,Here's the storyline for my movie: Wing Commander - The final conflict
Wing Commander - The final conflict
5 years after the last conflict with the aliens, space seems to be quite. The Confederation-fleet only needs to fly patrols. Even the last attacks of Kilrathi - they tried to attack colonies, are a thing of the past. Casey and Zero - still stationed on the Midway have been promoted for their fight against the aliens... and Maniac??? He's still his greatest fan and the "best pilot" of the Confederation (that's what he says).
One day Casey, Zero and Manias are flying a simple patrol across 3 Nav-points. Suddenly they receive a SOS-signal of a confederated convoy. It is under attack !! The tree pilots immediately fly to the attack point, but they are too late. At that moment, Maniac receives a transmission - it is the prophecy ("There shall come a time...")!! Maniac only says: "What the hell???" - it is really strange, because the last war was 5 years ago. But Maniac should soon get the answer to his question. Casey, Zero and Maniac immediately return to the Midway and report
their strange experiences.
In the next 8 hours the answer to Maniac's question arrives. 5 different Confederation-Systems are under attack - under attack of Kilrathis !!! A squadron of fighters is launched immediately to attack the enemy. But the Kilrathis have already mobilized a very big fleet. During the 5 last years, they were able to make a new home, called "New Kilrah". Now the cats only want one thing: Revenge !!!
The Midway's assault fighters (including Casey, Zero and Maniac) have to retreat. In a desperate fight against the big Kilrathi-fleet, the Midway tries to crush all cats. But the enemy fleet is too large and so even the Midway has to retreat.
Meanwhile... nearly all Confederation-systems have been attacked by the cats. 70% of the colonies are destroyed. The Confederation fleet only consists of 20% of its previous strength. And the Midway - is always under attack... At last the whole Confederation fleet (or at least what's left of her) has to retreat to the final defense point - EARTH...------------------
By the way - if anybody has good-quality sounds of Maniac, Casey or Zero ... and so on... (I could use both - English AND German versions !!) - please contact me !!!Best Regards
Alexander Grober
Hi there again,Here are some news for WING COMMANDER - The final conflict:
- Storyline will be completely published on Thursday
- movies will be published in two versions
- Version 1: 352x240 MPEG1 directly burned on CD - viewable on TV !!
- Version 2: 640x480 MPEG4 High quality movie for PC Owners- At first the movie will be rendered WITHOUT any sound !!!!
- After that, the movie will be published (german language)(at first I didn't want to publish an English version... but for all English WC-Fans...)
- At last, the movie will be published in ENGLISH (I might need help there)But please notice, that I'm still writing the storyline, and I'm right at the beginning of making the movie.
I know you guys want more details, but I can only say, that it might take a very long time until the
movie is ready. You have to create a lot of scenes - then have to select sound files... and so on...
But what I can definitly say is, that the movie will be ready until September 2002 (latest launch-date) !!!
I already thought about the number of frames I have to render... that will make 45000 frames for 30min !!!
Well ... there's a lot of work left. (Last weekend I rendered 800 frames for the animated logo !!)Best Regards,
Alexander Grober
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