I made an oopsie on the last video. In that one I said the WC1 Lasers were mounted on the wings and the Neturons were loaded at the front, but in actuality, according to the games and the blueprints its the other way around. Since I considered this a fairly big mistake, and the video was only live for one day, I rerecorded the lines and redid the video FX to show the proper positions. Thanks to viewer arugulatarsus for pointing that out to me. For those who saw the last video, you don't need to rewatch this one, it's practically the same content.
My original comment from the last vid: Things learned during the making of this video: - The Rapier doesn't get called the Rapier II (or Rapier Mark 2) until WC2 according to the WCBible. Wish I bothered fact checking that before I was 5 minutes away from finishing the upload of this video last night. That's why I'm uploading on Sat. morning. - Normals>AutoSmooth is a miracle option for 3D faces that shade in weird ways. - Glow Maps are used for the Emissions setting in Blender. - Transparent Videos are a thing, but only if you encode in Quicktime. - Freespace Open actually does read the material settings of models brought into the game, at least to a certain degree. It makes things super glossy if you're not careful. - "Sun" Light is far better then point light for more dramatic lighting effects if angled properly in the 3D workspace when creating rendered images. - Blender has a love-hate relationship with DAE models it seems. Some faces on the model dont show up and need to be reconnected manually, or using MeshLab. The worst offender was the missing cockpit for the F-44G. I ended up just copying the cockpit canopy from the F-44C and modded it to fit on the G. - Freedom Flight was not just about the Firekkan campaign solely, it was also about a hostage rescue from Ghorah Khar.
I really like a lot more the ship desings of Wing Commander 1 and 2 over 3 and 4, it's really evident that 3 and 4 ships were made that way because of the low poly limitations.
These videos on WC are amazing. Its bringing back memories of that awesome game. I remember getting a Creative Labs Soundblaster, and having WC2 bundled with it. Games like WC and then, afterwards, Freespace 1 and 2, were my all time favorites.
Great job! The Rapier was a good ship! Still PREFERRED the Excalibur tho! THAT was the ULTIMATE WC ship ever imo! However, I am not familiar with some of the canon references at the end with the Landreich Union & their fleets & chasing the Nehpilim to THEIR territory! And NO mention in the interim re the UBW faction? They used a LOT of cast off Confed military tech/materiel!
The later references about the Rapier in the Nephilim War came from Star*Soldier, a digital pdf "magazine" that the developers of Wing Commander Arena had online (conveniently now found at the WCCIC). It had a bunch of timeline fluff and a paragraph for each Rapier variant in the game which I tried to incorporate. Now, I know Arena's gameplay isn't exactly well-regarded due to it's departure from the WC roots. But from what I can tell the community has embraced Star*Soldier as canon so I just rolled with it. As for the Rapiers in the Union...well, it seemed like a "weird" area canon-wise. The only canon info that I knew of about Union Rapiers came from the WC4 novel, which took a bunch of creative liberties that directly contradicted the game. Particularly the fighters used. So the only thing I felt comfortable saying was essentially "Yeah, the UBW had Rapiers", and just left it at that. Although in my own head canon the UBW had a bunch of WC1&2 ships, but they just weren't seen during the Black Lance incident.
I find the Broadsword very fun to play. Flying by a capital ship and using the side and then the rear turrets to punch a hole in their shields was very satisfying.
Fantastic work. Thumbs up. 😃 By the way: If you'd like to do some Privateer and Armada stuff: I've imported the original models from the 3D Archive into Blender and modernised the shaders to work with Eevee and Cycles. And these models still look awesome. 😃
Wow that's cool! I briefly tried to work with the original 3D files hosted on the CIC but I didn't get very far. Fortunately with Klav's models it wasn't really an issue, a little work and the results looked phenomenal.
@@MacsLore EA were the 1s WHO wrecked it in the 1st place! (Like everything ELSE they touched! ) SAME as Microsoft, whatever they bought out, turned to SHIT once they tinkered with it! If it aint broke...
@@MacsLore I also wish, but as long as EA has the Star Wars license, they have no real reason to return to Wing Commander, since Star Wars is a license to print money and Wing Commander nowadays is "What was that? Some game my dad/grandpa played back in the 90s?"
I always hated missions with the Rapier. First of all the front view was really narrow. Then the armor was really thin, a few hits and you dead. Then the weapons are a joke. The two laser guns do no damage, and the two neutron guns have a really short range.
How? The fact that the fighters in the game are Rapier IIs rather then Rapier Is means there had to be an older fighter model named Rapier. If memory serves the movie Rapier Is were originally produced around the same time as the Scimitars so them being retired slightly ahead of the Scimitar isn't that odd
I've just picked up wing commander II from GOG and oh boy is the F44G Rapier II a god awful fighter! Because of it's huge intrument panel and it's canopy mounted speed and fuel guages, It's viewport is TINY, on full guns you are afforded only 3 shots before it's gun capacitor is depleted, and (unlike the Epee, Sabre and Broadsword) it doesn't come with I.T.T.S. These things taken together means that hitting anything with this thing is entirely a roll of the dice, it is impossible to lead your target and keeping it in the viewport to actually see where it's going at the same time.
Like fuck 13.5 tonnes..... More like 50-60. A late war British World War Two fighter weighs 7 tonnes and was just under ten metres long. 13.5 tonnes.... noobs.
Unfortuantely I'm not sure how much I could really say on it just by itself. But it might be covered along with the other TCN Fighters of WC3 in a future video.
Man, we need either a new Wing Commander game, or a reboot.
I want Wing Comander 3 and 4 but just with updated current gen graphics :)
@@rockybeats8682 That would be cool.
Pfft, I would even want the first two, just polished a bit and with widescreen.
@@everythingsgonnabealright8888 that would be awesome as well.
@@travisbishop782 I may get flak for this, but if Squadron 42 ever comes out, it should be a Wing Commander-esque game.
I made an oopsie on the last video. In that one I said the WC1 Lasers were mounted on the wings and the Neturons were loaded at the front, but in actuality, according to the games and the blueprints its the other way around. Since I considered this a fairly big mistake, and the video was only live for one day, I rerecorded the lines and redid the video FX to show the proper positions. Thanks to viewer arugulatarsus for pointing that out to me. For those who saw the last video, you don't need to rewatch this one, it's practically the same content.
My original comment from the last vid:
Things learned during the making of this video:
- The Rapier doesn't get called the Rapier II (or Rapier Mark 2) until WC2 according to the WCBible. Wish I bothered fact checking that before I was 5 minutes away from finishing the upload of this video last night. That's why I'm uploading on Sat. morning.
- Normals>AutoSmooth is a miracle option for 3D faces that shade in weird ways.
- Glow Maps are used for the Emissions setting in Blender.
- Transparent Videos are a thing, but only if you encode in Quicktime.
- Freespace Open actually does read the material settings of models brought into the game, at least to a certain degree. It makes things super glossy if you're not careful.
- "Sun" Light is far better then point light for more dramatic lighting effects if angled properly in the 3D workspace when creating rendered images.
- Blender has a love-hate relationship with DAE models it seems. Some faces on the model dont show up and need to be reconnected manually, or using MeshLab. The worst offender was the missing cockpit for the F-44G. I ended up just copying the cockpit canopy from the F-44C and modded it to fit on the G.
- Freedom Flight was not just about the Firekkan campaign solely, it was also about a hostage rescue from Ghorah Khar.
Man, your diligence and integrity are exceptional. Great work.
Your WC content is so good, I don't mind watching it twice. Great job!
Holy cow! you remade it!!! :)
You always knew you were bagging some cats when you strapped into a Rapier.
I really like a lot more the ship desings of Wing Commander 1 and 2 over 3 and 4, it's really evident that 3 and 4 ships were made that way because of the low poly limitations.
Hey mate, I am very new to your channel, but I am absolutely loving the Wing Commander content!!! Please keep up the awesome work!!! 🤘🤘
NICE to see a fellow Aussie Wingnut here!
I remember playing the original game and how cool it was to finally get a Rapier
It's like the B-52 of the Wing Commander universe. They just keep updating it and throwing it back into the fray.
This is nothing short amazing.
I remember in WC some pilot said something like,”She may have the shields of God, but she has the armor of a hornet.”
Good to see Chris Roberts is keeping up the long tradition of screwing up game balance with shiny new ships to invalidate the old ones.
Need a video on the Concordia and the Sabre(beautiful ship, not given enough credit). Great videos. Keep it up!
Really great video. I hope you do more Wing Commander ships and fighters.
These videos on WC are amazing. Its bringing back memories of that awesome game. I remember getting a Creative Labs Soundblaster, and having WC2 bundled with it. Games like WC and then, afterwards, Freespace 1 and 2, were my all time favorites.
I was so pumped when you unlocked the Rapier!
Great job! The Rapier was a good ship! Still PREFERRED the Excalibur tho! THAT was the ULTIMATE WC ship ever imo!
However, I am not familiar with some of the canon references at the end with the Landreich Union & their fleets & chasing the Nehpilim to THEIR territory!
And NO mention in the interim re the UBW faction? They used a LOT of cast off Confed military tech/materiel!
The later references about the Rapier in the Nephilim War came from Star*Soldier, a digital pdf "magazine" that the developers of Wing Commander Arena had online (conveniently now found at the WCCIC). It had a bunch of timeline fluff and a paragraph for each Rapier variant in the game which I tried to incorporate. Now, I know Arena's gameplay isn't exactly well-regarded due to it's departure from the WC roots. But from what I can tell the community has embraced Star*Soldier as canon so I just rolled with it.
As for the Rapiers in the Union...well, it seemed like a "weird" area canon-wise. The only canon info that I knew of about Union Rapiers came from the WC4 novel, which took a bunch of creative liberties that directly contradicted the game. Particularly the fighters used. So the only thing I felt comfortable saying was essentially "Yeah, the UBW had Rapiers", and just left it at that.
Although in my own head canon the UBW had a bunch of WC1&2 ships, but they just weren't seen during the Black Lance incident.
@@MacsLore Ok, I will look it up on CIC. I had never played Arena as I never owned any gaming consoles!
Wing Commander is such a underrated sleeper hit
I don’t think you understand what “underrated” means, as it was one of the best selling space combat games ever.
Wonderful documentary, hope some day could watch one about the Saber, Broadsword and Morningstar
raptor and dragons are the coolest fighters from this game!
I find the Broadsword very fun to play. Flying by a capital ship and using the side and then the rear turrets to punch a hole in their shields was very satisfying.
Lovely!!!
Please do the epee, the ferret the broadsword, the crossbow and claymore!!🙏🙏🙏🙏
Man the nostalgia hits hard, please do a video on the Sabre.
There is definitely some Rapier-G in the Excalibur.
Fantastic work. Thumbs up. 😃
By the way: If you'd like to do some Privateer and Armada stuff: I've imported the original models from the 3D Archive into Blender and modernised the shaders to work with Eevee and Cycles.
And these models still look awesome. 😃
Wow that's cool! I briefly tried to work with the original 3D files hosted on the CIC but I didn't get very far. Fortunately with Klav's models it wasn't really an issue, a little work and the results looked phenomenal.
@@MacsLore If you'd like, I can send you the Blender-files I have of the Privateer models.
The rapier is proof that some things get meaner as they get older
'Amazing maneuverability at 10dg per second'
*Laughs in real world F-16 30+ dps ITR and over 16 dps STR*
Super cool! Are there any VR experiences for the Wing Commander Universe? That would be cool.
I wish. The only slight hope is that with the success of Star Was Squadrons, EA *may* consider going back to Wing Commander in the future.
@@MacsLore EA were the 1s WHO wrecked it in the 1st place! (Like everything ELSE they touched! ) SAME as Microsoft, whatever they bought out, turned to SHIT once they tinkered with it! If it aint broke...
@@MacsLore I also wish, but as long as EA has the Star Wars license, they have no real reason to return to Wing Commander, since Star Wars is a license to print money and Wing Commander nowadays is "What was that? Some game my dad/grandpa played back in the 90s?"
Maybe you should do one on the Scimitar. The bane of TCSF pilots.
I always had good luck with the Scimitar
I always hated missions with the Rapier. First of all the front view was really narrow. Then the armor was really thin, a few hits and you dead. Then the weapons are a joke. The two laser guns do no damage, and the two neutron guns have a really short range.
Yes. Much preferred the Raptor
Where do you get all of the extra lore?! This was an amazing niche surprise.
Stupid as hellcat replacing the rapier, wth devs! The rapier will always be the best looking and best fighter ever.
Why is there no mention of the CF-117B Rapier?
The movie lore about the Rapier is almost impossible to reconcile with that of the game.
How? The fact that the fighters in the game are Rapier IIs rather then Rapier Is means there had to be an older fighter model named Rapier. If memory serves the movie Rapier Is were originally produced around the same time as the Scimitars so them being retired slightly ahead of the Scimitar isn't that odd
Kongou approves
I've just picked up wing commander II from GOG and oh boy is the F44G Rapier II a god awful fighter! Because of it's huge intrument panel and it's canopy mounted speed and fuel guages, It's viewport is TINY, on full guns you are afforded only 3 shots before it's gun capacitor is depleted, and (unlike the Epee, Sabre and Broadsword) it doesn't come with I.T.T.S. These things taken together means that hitting anything with this thing is entirely a roll of the dice, it is impossible to lead your target and keeping it in the viewport to actually see where it's going at the same time.
Skill issue.
Like fuck 13.5 tonnes..... More like 50-60. A late war British World War Two fighter weighs 7 tonnes and was just under ten metres long. 13.5 tonnes.... noobs.
Would love to see something on the Hellcat V
Would love to see something on the Hellcat V
Unfortuantely I'm not sure how much I could really say on it just by itself. But it might be covered along with the other TCN Fighters of WC3 in a future video.