The Video Game Revue

Wing Commander

At one time, I believed that Wing Commander had single-handedly invented the space-combat sim genre, and that it was an early pioneer in crafting a virtual 3D space that the user could explore. I have since learned about earlier games, most notably Elite, that have a much more legitimate claim; however, Wing Commander remains a remarkable game. Although it wasn't the "very first" space combat sim, it was certainly a landmark game title (and series) that captured the imagination of many loyal fans.

One of the things that impresses me about Wing Commander is how cinematic it is, especially for its time. WC unfolds like a movie with fairly lengthy cut-scenes inbetween levels featuring a lot of plot and character development. These elements do not exist entirely apart from the "action" portion of the game, however: if a character dies during a mission, that character's storyline is cut short and the next scene will be a funeral service for that character. If you fail an important mission, the following cutscene often depicts the consequences, such as a peaceful science colony being ransacked by the enemy. Even when your character is killed, resulting in "Game Over", you are treated to a funeral cut-scene in which your commander makes a speech about you (one that may vary depending on what part of the game you are at) and your remains are cast into space. The cinematic nature of Wing Commander is practically never broken, and the resulting experience is incredibly immersive.

Also helping the immersive quality of Wing Commander are the cutting edge graphics and sound. Of course, by today's standards the low-resolution sprites subjected to scaling and rotation do not make for a convincing 3D space environment, and the MIDI music is unlikely to get a gamer's blood pumping (excepting, of course, old fans of the series)--but at the time, those effects were state of the art. Near the start of the 90's, a Roland or Creative Labs sound card was an expensive commodity, and it would be several years before the first Voodoo 3D graphics accelerator card was released. Back then, a math co-processor was a good thing to have in a gaming machine, and 4 MB of RAM was a lot. By such standards as those, Wing Commander is hot stuff. I remember struggling to build a boot disk that removed most of my system drivers just to free enough base memory to run Wing Commander 2. But I digress--the point is that Wing Commander's state of the art graphics and sound made it all the more cinematic and immersive.

When I first played Wing Commander, it seemed to completely take over my life. I felt very much as if I was a part of the game, which made it very easy to get lost in the storyline and develop personal attachments to the other characters in the game. A lot of modern-day game productions could certainly take a cue from this old classic.

posted by Parappa @ 1:53 PM