BlogLearn historical details about development

In this section of the Wing Commander Saga webpage, you can find historical details about development of Wing Commander Saga.

Know Your Shipmates: Confed Capital Ships - Entry 4: Pelileu

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2010.24.06

For this update, we like to show off a vessel that wasn’t seen in the games but mentioned in the novels: the Confederation troopship. We’ve read about Marine troopships in novels such as End Run, False Colors, and Price of Freedom, but we’ve never had a chance to see what they actually look like.

We intended our vessel to be the same class of the troopship mentioned in the Price of Freedom novel. In the novel, the Pelileu-class assault transport TCS Louis B. Puller deployed the Marines that “rescued” Tuesday Brody from the Border Worlds in the Tyr System. As the sharp eye can see, our concept of this ship is a larger derivative of WC Armada’s Belleau Wood-class transport.

One of the largest troop carriers in service, the Pelileu-class embarks a regiment of over two thousand Marines and a battalion of combat vehicles including assault skimmers, hover tanks, and artillery walkers. They are all deployed to battle by the troopship's own complement of shuttles, dropships, and landing craft. Lastly, it has enough supplies and equipment for its Marines to participate in sustained combat operations for up to 30 days. A planetary assault force would consist of multiple troopships working together, but they require proper escort when deploying for operations.

-Tolwyn

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Viper missing in action

FROM: Commodore Katarn, CICCONFEDFLT
TO: 1st Lt Bryan "Viper" Swift
DATE: 2010.09.06

1st Lt Bryan "Viper" Swift, currently listed as M.I.A., you are hereby requested and required to contact fleet headquarters as soon as possible.

If you are reading this, Viper, give us a call.

-Cdre Katarn

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Know Your Shipmates: Confed Capital Ships - Entry 3: Caernaven

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2010.02.06

This week, the Saga Team would like to show off another vessel: the Confed frigate. This ship is accounted to have various lengths and sizes depending on the game source material and novels. For simplicity’s sake, our frigate is the 2669 variant of the post-War frigates seen in service with the Confederation and Border Worlds Fleets during Wing Commander 4.

The Caernaven-class frigate is an ubiquitous escort vessel widely seem among both the front and rear lines. The Swiss army knife of the Terran fleet, it is configurable and adaptable for any mission at hand. Not only is it fast and nimble, its laser batteries, missile launchers, and rocket pods serve as effective deterrence against Kilrathi fighters and light raiders. From assuming a traditional convoy escort role to system patrol duty, this venerable warship still performs whatever role it is assigned with the quiet dignity of a seasoned soldier.

-Tolwyn

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Know Your Shipmates: Confed Capital Ships - Entry 2: Southampton

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2010.23.05

For today's update we would like to showcase our final version of the Confederation Southampton-class destroyer. It is the smallest capital ship with true offensive capabilities in the Confed fleet and serves as a mainstay warship in the Terran Navy. These versatile and multi-purpose vessels can be found as part of larger battle groups or in destroyer squadrons or alone, competent in both a standup fight with other hard-hitting warships or assisting in anti-aircraft duties. Very well shielded and armored for its size, they are capable of engaging in ship-to-ship combat with either its powerful energy weapons or its array of missile batteries. In addition, these fast and maneuverable warships can run down any capship in the Kilrathi arsenal.

-Tolwyn

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Know Your Shipmates: Confed Capital Ships - Entry 1: Clarkson

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2010.08.05

Have you missed us? We're sorry for the long hiatus in our updates. We have been continuing to work on development since our last update, and now we bring you are latest, albeit belated, development update for Wing Commander Saga. This week we would like to talk a little bit about how our texture style for Confederation warships has evolved as the game development has progressed.

We knew from the moment on when we redesigned our Kilrathi warships that we were going to need to do the same for the Confed counterparts to maintain coherence in our visual style. In early concepts we wanted to stay away from a traditional military look, so we started off with a worn down metal texture. We were still learning the tech at that point, so we weren't solid on what could and could not be pulled off easily so we went with something a little on the safe side.

We went forward with this concept, getting it modeled, skinned, and in game. But, as often happens, we can’t often see existing problems until you get an asset in the game. We realized that the worn down look wasn't working. So we made some adjustments and variations to the base map which made a marked improvement. In a twist irony, as time went by and the texture work began to get more fleshed out, the product became more and more military looking (which we were originally avoiding).

At that point in time we also added sophisticated armor plating. We actually had a good foundation to build upon thanks to the work done on the Kilrathi textures. We wrote a simple Photoshop script that creates armor plates in a matter of minutes (thus saving us a lot of time).

Finally, we added specular, glow, and normal maps. Normal maps are one of my personal favorites. Basically, normal maps are used to greatly enhance the appearance of our low poly models without using more polygons. This technique allows us to create highly detailed, impressive models with very small impact on performance, allowing Saga to look and play great on a wide variety of machines.

This is a great example of not knowing until we needed to know it. In developing a project like Saga, assets are going to have to change as the game evolves, grows, and changes. As such, any assets we made at the beginning often times just don't quite fit when we get to the end. So we have to keep ourselves flexible. After all, in the end, it's about what's best for the game and the player.

Our next big big focus, now that the assets for the first part of the game are finalized, is to start preparations for the closed beta test. That’s right, we said beta test. This is a big milestone for us. Once these preparations are complete, we will put a beta test application form online.

Now that we're closing in on the end, we are hoping to be able to update our website more regularly. In the near future we plan to do some updates on the story and talk a little bit about our characters; so as the development winds down we'll be talking less and less about the process and more and more about the game itself.

-Tolwyn

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New Poll

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2010.25.02

Our old poll asked which new feature you are looking forward to the most. "Widescreen support" won our tally, "high res cutscenes" and "better AI" came in second and third.

Since Wing Commander Saga takes place during the Wing Commander 3 timeline, you can bet there are a lot familiar vessels along the way. That's where our poll this week comes in. There are a lot of possibilities: Bhantkara-class, Dubav-class, Dukara-class, Fralath-class, Fralthi II-class, Hvar'kann-class, Kamrani-class, Ralarrad-class, Ralaxath-class, Sha'kar-class. Vote now and then hit the 'Write comment' link to tell the world how you decided.

-Tolwyn

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Know Thy Enemy: Kilrathi Supply Base

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2010.10.02

We would like to thank everyone who voted for our website during this year's competition at the Wing Commander CIC. We hope our efforts to keep you up to date on the progress of our project are helpful, and we are committed to continuing to keep you informed throughout the development process.

Award 

For this week's update we would like to showcase our rendition of the Kilrathi supply base. These bases are scattered throughout the war zone and serve as staging points for Kilrathi capital ships to conduct repairs, and rearm themselves, and replenish their supplies. They have docking facilities to accommodate a single capital ship and a hangar bay that accommodates a small squadron of fighters. While they are not as powerful as larger Kilrathi starbases, the logistical support and refuge they supply for Kilrathi forces make them both a threat and an important target in the Confederation's war efforts.

 

-Tolwyn

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Intro CGI Preview

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2010.14.01

Welcome to the latest Saga news update! We are excited to ring in 2010 and are looking forward to a great year. This week we would like to share six pictures of our rendition of the intro sequence. Please bear in mind, that the CGI scenes are not final yet, so they don't represent the quality of the final product. You'll be seeing more of our cutscenes as we continue pushing out media. These pictures are just an appetizer.

-Tolwyn

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Facebook us!

FROM: Rear Admiral Tolwyn, CINCWEAPONSDIVISION
DATE: 2010.05.01

Here's yet another all-important shameless plug. You can now follow Saga on Facebook. We are using our Facebook profile to provide quick updates on the work Saga's team is doing and will also use it to release some exclusive content. If you have any questions, just add a comment and we promise to read what you have to say.

-Tolwyn

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