Wing Commander™ 1+2

(Wing Commander is famously "cinematic", but I'm going to just talk gameplay) WC1 is a game that works that really shouldn't. It is insanely frustruating. You will die. A lot. And for the longest time you won't know what you're doing wrong. That should make for an awful game, and I was within minutes of demanding my money back. But if you perserve you start to realise - your craft can't take much damage, and the game world has strict rules that it will applly even if it's unfair. So unless you know what to avoid, every now and again enough opponents shoot you from outside your field of vision at the same time, and you'll suddenly die. Once you unpick the way the game works, it's a blast. You learn to work with the game's rules and you can destroy hordes of enemy craft. But still, WC1 can be very frustating. Your wingman might die through no fault of yours, or you'll dodge into another starcraft you couldn't reasonably have seen; and if you die it takes ages to get back into the action. Also considering how easy it is to die, they really should've had checkpoints. But the tension - wow. At the end of a few missions my hands were shaking - because while you can fail through no fault of your own, you will earn every success. It's a rush that explains why this game has such a cult following. WC2 fixes some of the issues in WC1. Two big improvements - your wingmen can't die in-game, and there's a "try again" button when you fail. They also mix up the formula enough with the addition of tailguns that you have to update your strategies, it's not just more of the same. So if you're thinking of buying this, my advice is this: - it will be frustrating, but that's part of it. You'll get better, and there's a reason this is a cult classic. Check forums for tips. - get a non-fancy joystick. They're quite cheap now, and it's basically impossible without it. - if WC1 is driving you spare, skip to WC2. But the story is better if you play them in order.

Back when games were action interspersed with cutscenes instead of cutscenes interspersed with action.

To be honest, if you aren't willing to put up with the ancient gameplay quirks that come from 2D sprites representing 3D objects in space that you're supposed to be aiming at while travelling and turning at a speed dependent on how many objects are in your view range (getting down to a pitiful fraction of the full speed in many encounters), the first game might need to be passed over. But parts of its presentation are impressive even today, and the storytelling of the series is a great focus from the start. There are several possible branching paths for the story and the missions to go depending on how good or bad you do, with cutscenes and chats among the pilots for it all. This game is incredibly hard if you want to stay on the "best" path, but quite fun if you can look past its age. The second game improves on the first in almost every way except story branches, and makes the gameplay much smoother, so it's easier to start with. Way more (good) cutscenes and story. Still stupid hard though, if not harder. If you want to taste the beginnings of the genre, it's still ready for you, but less dedicated gamers will probably enjoy the third game or later classics like Tie-Fighter and Freespace 2 infinitely more.

Wing Commander 1 is arguable the game that started PC gaming. Sure, there were PC games before WC1, but those were poor ports from other platforms. This was as far as I know the first PC exclusive that made non-PC gamers green of envy. And fortunately for them, the game was later ported to other platforms as well with varying results (I actually like the Amiga version of WC1 more than the PC version). It's also the first game I ever played with a branching story depending on how you play the game. If you succeed with a mission or if you failed have an impact on the story, which is pretty darn cool. It is very unfortunate that the extra WC1 Secret Missions aren't included, though.

ist dieses Paket nun mittlerweile unvollständig. Dabei hat man so darauf gehofft, dass WIng Commander auf aktuellen Systemen wieder erhältlich ist. Super ist das Angebot, endlich wieder Wing Commander zu erhalten, aber gerade die Secret Mission`s und Secret Operation`s gehören dazu. Die Hoffnung besteht nun, hier sie als Extra Pack zu bekommen.