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Wing Commander 3 Reaches Ten Year Milestone

Posted by Zonk on from the oh-dear-we're-getting-old dept.

An Anonymous Reader writes "The Wing Commander CIC is reporting on the tenth birthday of the classic PC game, Wing Commander 3. "Much like Wing Commander 2 with the sound card and Wing Commander Prophecy with the 3d accelerator, Wing Commander 3 encouraged a legion of PC gamers to go out and buy a CD-ROM drive for hundreds of dollars. In little over four years we went from a handful of floppy disks to a stack of CDs. Once computers had their CD-ROM installed, systems with only 8 megabytes of RAM sufferred 5+ minute load times before the missions. Still, we happily waited for one of the most incredible gaming experiences ever." Though the game obviously looks dated by today's standards, it's held up remarkably well as a vehicle of adventure and storytelling. It's amazing that it's already been ten years."

11 of 104 comments (clear)

  1. The Memories by Razman · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I cannot believe it has been ten years already!

    I hope some games, like movies and music, are remade, with better graphics and such, hopefully without destroying the game we all came to remember. ;)

    though it seems like space flight sims are not a popular as they used to be.

    Wing Commander/Mech Warrior have all died off it seems.

    1. Re:The Memories by sick_soul · · Score: 2, Informative

      There's a remake project for WC game "Privateer". Seems open source.

      Wing commander 1-3 have been remade (but long ago) by Origin into the Wing Commander - Kilrathi Saga product. Seems they did not much more than slow down the game for less ancient machines though.

  2. Elite by Kardamon · · Score: 2, Informative

    My favourite classic space sim remains Elite, which is 20 years old this year.

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    -- Qu'est-ce que la propriété intellectuelle? It is thought control.
  3. Oh, the horrible acting... by eviltypeguy · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Oh, the horrible acting...

    But, it had John Rhys Davies, that makes it good right?

    Oh, and Mark Hamil too!

    But, the worst line from an actor in this game:

    "Disintegrate me, so I may join my comrades..."

    *dies laughing*

  4. Prophecy by superstick58 · · Score: 2, Informative

    I didn't play wing commander 3, but i have many fond memories of WC Prophecy. The missions and space dogfighting were great, and an added bonus, Mark Hamill! Heh well the gameplay was still good.

  5. My question for the director... by Aero · · Score: 2, Funny

    If you hadn't gotten Mark Hamill to play Blair, would the final mission still have had the player flying down a canyon to drop a world-destroying bomb on a small target?

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    We can believe in you for 3 minutes, but beyond that, even the King of All Cosmos can't be expected to wait.
  6. Actually it was Windows 95 by Qrlx · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'm pretty sure it was Windows 95, and the 20-some-odd floppies required to do a clean install, that had people buying CD-ROM drives. The fact that the floppies were guaranteed to fail on disk 6, 7, or 8 after you used them a few times didn't hurt either ;)

    I mean, I'm sure there are a few people out there who bought a CD-ROM drive just to play Wing Commander III, this is the same small yet profitable sliver of the market which buys GeForce 6800s to play DOOM III. But for the mass market, it was Windows 95 that led the consumer, grumbling, to the realm of the 2x Mitsumi.

  7. How goes the war against the humans? by egarland · · Score: 2, Funny

    How right they are about Wing Commander 2 and the sound card. I remember working to get a friends brand new SoundBlaster 16 working with Wing Commander 2. I listened to the opening enough that I now have engrained in my brain the phrase "How goes the war against the humans?" which almost always meets with puzzled looks when used. It's especially funny when talking to people who deal with desktop support.

    For those who don't remember it I found an mp3 of the opening.

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    set softtabstop=4 shiftwidth=4 expandtab nocp worlddomination
  8. Heh by M.C.+Hampster · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I actually bought "Return to Zork" on floppies. Rather than real full video, you just had these strangely animated pictures.

    Want some rye? 'Course you do!

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    Forget the whales - save the babies.
  9. Games don't keep me awake all night anymore. by bromodrosis · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I can remember coming home from the bars and playing this until 3 or 4 AM then getting a few hours of sleep and trudging off to work again. WC 1, 2 and 3 lost me weeks of sleep.

  10. Re:Hobbes! by Slider451 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I, too, was shocked and disappointed when Hobbes turned. He was always my favorite wingman.

    Looks like Origin is responsible for producing more than a few IT pros. Between tweaking bootdisks, soundcards, and CD-ROM drives for the WC series, and 10-base-2 and early 10-base-T cards (NetwareLite, anyone?) for Doom deathmatches, I was all set to start my IT career in 1994.

    Thanks Origin and id!

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    Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.