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We're rounding out the third week of Origin composer George Oldziey's campaign to create a new album of Wing Commander music. The current tally is very nearly at $17,000. That's enough to ensure the project moves forward, which is great! As we previously reported, George has already scheduled time with the orchestra in Europe to record in August. However, it would be amazing if the live choral addition were added in as well. For that, we would need about $5,000 additional over what's been contributed so far. I still think it's very doable with all of your help! You can learn more about the project and pledge for a copy of the music when it's released here.

Here's a sample of reorchestrated WC4 track that George has already recreated on paper. The sound you hear is a digital recreation below, so the final result with live musicians will be even better!

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Let's compare the Wing Commander 3 ship selection screen across ports! Here's the PC/Mac, 3DO (two screens instead of one) and PlayStation versions of the Arrow...

Three Hellcats V, primed, prepped, etc.

Thunderbolt!

The Longbow is largely cut from the 3DO version; it only appears as an option very rarely! (I found it in Delius 3, will have to chart it all out someday soon.)

And the mighty Excalibur:

There's an Easter egg in the PC version: if you hit ALT-S at this screen then it'll display specifications over the ships. None of the lore mentioned here matches anything else!

One discovery from the 3DO version is that the Hellcat, Thunderbolt and the Excalibur get six mines per hardpoint! But the mostly absent Longbow doesn't. The Thunderbolt mine loadout is the default for the Torgo 2 minelaying mission even though you don't actually use them.

The PC version assigns you a custom Longbow loadout for Torgo 2

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AllTinker has a new bit of Wing Commander joy to share today. He's remastered the iconic Wing Commander opening track. It's a beautiful tune to listen to on its own, but this also supports his Confederation enhancement of WC1. Give it a listen below!

Hi folks, I've been battling against real life a little but work continues on the code & art. I have something slightly different to preview today - another side-project to the side-project; can't help myself - I've mentioned before that I'm interested in having General MIDI versions of the earlier game soundtracks, which would allow rendering with soundfonts or GM modules like the Sound Canvas (ala Privateer, WC3 etc.). In working towards that, rather than going directly from MT-32 to GM, I've been pulling apart the music and reorchestrating it in a more traditional sense first. Here's the first track I feel is ready enough to demonstrate:

I've made a

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CountvonSchnaps has a brand new Wing Commander sketch, and this one is a bomber! He's created a Longbow named "Sledge Hammer" for the war effort. It's a chunky beast with lots of gorgeous details to look over. There's also an extra turret up top to fend off the Kilrathi. It was just published to DeviantArt yesterday and already has 80 Favorites, which seems like a lot. It's really nice to see the Wing Commander love out there! You can find his previous destroyer and cruiser takes here.

As per the results of the previous poll a Wing Commander design was in order. As such I picked the Longbow torpedo bomber. I played Wing Commander a lot and I did like the designs of the fighter and other ships in there. Kilrathi ships felt really alien and the story in which you could interact also appealed to me.

I did make a few alteration as to its design. It now has a turret and 3, instead of a 2 man crew. A

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There's a new update for the Wing Commander album campaign! If you didn't know, live orchestras can be difficult to book. Top talent often requires deposits and schedule commitment months in advance. Thanks to your early and generous support, composer George Oldziey was already able to secure a date in August, so the effort remains right on track. You can get in on the project yourself here!

Greetings all. As a result of your amazing generosity in pledging to this campaign we have more than passed the initial goal of recording with the full orchestra. Just to update you, I've booked August 19th of this year to travel to Budapest to record all the music! Because of this I will easily be able to meet my original projection of getting the final products to you by October. There will of course be editing and mixing involved, followed soon thereafter by creating the physical rewards.

The Budapest

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Last month LOAF put together an exhaustive writeup about the many Kilrathi emblems and symbols depicted over the years. In the spirit of completeness, here's a couple more than have surfaced since then! If you see any more we missed, let us know!

@kingmakeress had me looking through the 3DO version of Victory Streak where I found this forgotten oddity included alongside the Kiranka claw symbol!

These Kilrathi medals from the TCTG are worth considering as well!

Find the original post here if you want to learn all about Kilrathi iconography!