The Art of War

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2009.04.12

-Tolwyn

Tweet Commander Saga

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2009.25.11

Here's our latest all-important shameless plug. You can now follow Saga on Twitter at http://twitter.com/admiraltolwyn. We are using our feed to provide quick updates on the work Saga's team is doing. Our tweets will highlight official announcements and will pointing out items of particular relevance to the project's progress.

At any rate, tweet us if you have anything important to say. Even if you don't, please tweet us, we need love. ;) If you have any questions, just add a comment below.

-Tolwyn

Know Thy Enemy: Kilrathi Capital Ships - Entry 11: Hvar`kann

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2009.20.11

The massive and intimidating H’varkann-class dreadnought is the largest and deadliest warship in the Kilrathi fleet. Its array of heavy beam cannons and missile batteries can lay waste to entire enemy fleets, and its fighter complement is equal to that of several heavy carriers. In addition, its super heavy shielding and armor makes this battlewagon virtually invulnerable to any attack. It is no surprise that dreadnoughts are used as flagships for Kilrathi sector fleet admirals as well as Prince Thrakhath himself.

-Tolwyn

Be a part of creating Wing Commander Saga!

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2009.23.10

In an attempt to represent the scale and drama of the Terran Kilrathi conflict, Wing Commander Saga will feature a huge cast of characters.

For the sheer number of pilots you will interact with when you play Saga, we need to have at least 50 generic pilots, each of which will have a unique voice and personalized lines. We want these lines to be varied and individual, so we have decided to open up a way for us to tap into your many talents to help us create this part of Saga.

Each generic pilot has a set of lines they need to speak. The general theme of each line can be found here. We would invite all of you who wish to write up lines that fit each of these categories. You can submit as many sets of these generic lines as you can.

Feel free to write variations on the theme and to be creative, so long as you do not stray so far from the theme that it becomes confusing.

If we end up using your lines, you will be included in the credits for Wing Commander Saga. So, let the creative juices roll and send us your submissions!

-Tolwyn

New Poll

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2009.18.10

-Tolwyn

Interview on the Red Carpet

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2009.12.10

In a sensational move, guys from Firebrand Radio have somehow managed to secure exclusive access for a lengthy chinwag with our very own Keldor, to chat about all things regarding Wing Commander Saga. An mp3 of the interview is available for free on the FB Radio website! The full version of the chitchat should be ready in a couple of weeks, so stay tuned!

As for our esteemed leader (in other words 'me'), he was sadly unavailable for the interview, as he was holed up at Saga HQ, rumoured to be coming up with proof as to why Michael Schumacher deserves a drive in 2010.

-Tolwyn

Know Thy Enemy: Kilrathi Capital Ships - Entry 10: Dubav

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2009.03.10

This week, the Saga team will like to show off another lost concept art that was found in the official "Making of Wing Commander 3" CD-ROM.

For simplicity's sake, we intend this to be the same class of Kilrathi light carriers mentioned in the Victory Streak manual and the escort carriers mentioned in the False Colors novel. Due to the fact that there is no official class name, the Saga team has decided (for the time being) to call it the Dubav-class (a reference after one of the carriers in the False Colors novel).

This Kilrathi light carrier is specifically designed to operate behind enemy lines for prolonged periods of time. This fast, sleek, self-sufficient escort carrier is equipped with a half wing of fighters and bombers to attack Terran convoys and a loadout of Marine shuttles and bombardment missiles to mount terror raids against Confederation homeworlds and colonies. Notoriously elusive, Dubav-class carriers form the core of many Kilrathi Recon-in-Force fleets, and are normally encountered away from the main front. 

-Tolwyn

More dull stuff

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2009.19.09

-Tolwyn

Know Thy Enemy: Kilrathi Capital Ships - Entry 9: Bhantkara

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2009.10.09

For today's update we would like to showcase our final version of the Kilrathi Bhantkara-class heavy carrier. These mainstay fleet carriers are the backbone of the Kilrathi Navy. Massive and heavily armored, these carriers utilize its full wing of fighters, bombers, and support craft to the utmost against the Confederation Navy. Any major attack, fleet action, or campaign will most likely be launched from one of these carriers. Even though it only has mediocre shielding and armament, these carriers are almost always seen in large battlegroups with four to six supporting capital ships. In addition, these carriers outnumber their Terran counterparts by a wide margin.

-Tolwyn

Code the Code

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2009.27.08

It's been a while since our last status update, but that doesn't mean that nothing has been going on. In fact we've been working very hard and I think it's about time we brought you up to date with all the changes that have been added to the engine recently.

As most of you know, we are using the FS2 Open engine. Unfortunately, The current official version of FS2 Open (3.6.10) doesn't have all the features that Saga requires. For this reason it seems very likely that we'll be waiting until the 3.6.11 build is out before releasing Saga. This isn't really a problem, since it seems that official release of FS Open will be released in a few months time.

FS Open 3.1.1 will allow for the following features:

1. Support for more cutscenes - The game will now be capable of playing cutscenes before or in place of briefings, debriefings, etc. We know that Saga will use this to some degree. Whether we'll ever be crazy enough to drop text based briefings completely and go for only cutscenes before and after each mission is another matter. It would be a lot more work, but it is possible now.
2. Balancing changes - AI can now use glide (a.k.a. Shelton Slides), both to attack you and to break out of circle fights. Until now only human players could use glide. Javelin HS missile will finally function as in the original games. Issuing a disarm/disable order will no longer result in a capital ship being protected (e.g. ignored by other friendly units). The last issue gave us a lot of grief during the last few months, so it is nice to see this one finally fixed.
3. Turret changes - A whole variety of changes have been added via subsystem flags to allow weapons to act more like those in the original games. These include making turrets return to rest positions when not in use (no more turrets sticking out at unsightly right angles) and having them prioritize enemy craft better rather than just shooting at closest enemy in range. This will make capital ships much smarter and deadlier allies and foes.
4. Voice code improvements -Changes to the built-in messages system mean that the cap on the maximum number of messages in a mission was removed! Each pilot can now have an unique message for each option! In addition AI pilots will now occasionally say something after their own kills or if you're doing very well. These changes increase the amount of voice acting we'll need for the game but it should be worth it, and will give a voice chatter environment much more like Wing Commander.
5. HUD changes -Changes to the HUD system include but are not limited to wire frame target view, multicolored radar blips, new callsign feature, and custom gauges.
6. Fiction viewer -Our fiction viewer has long been crippled by a serious problem that would result in large amounts of text being cut off. This issue has been finally been dealt with.
7. Code optimization -Various profiling changes have been made to catch memory bottlenecks, therefore the game should run 5-10 FPS faster now.
8. Auto-aim - Now the Excalibur's weapons will be able to use auto-aiming, just like in WC3.
   
9. Something - ...

-Tolwyn