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Introduction: The Kilrathi war is over, the Confederation has entered a new era of
peace. Mankind has triumphed, but all is not well. 40 years of war cannot be erased
overnight. The post-war military scale down has left many veterans without work or skills
for civilian life. The fringes of the Confederation are in disarray and to top it off,
pirates who seem to be from the Border Worlds are attacking Confederation shipping and
killing with extreme prejudice. The Border Worlds are the planets colonized by humans or
other species which are too far out to fall under Confederation control. However, the
Border Worlds were one of Confederations staunchest allies during the war with the
Kilrathi, so care must be taken in handling the situation. The Confederation Great
Assembly must take action to hold this new Confederation together before everything
dissolves into chaos.
 If you thought Wing Commander
2 or 3 had a good story line, you will love this. Origin spent an estimated 10
million dollars on this game and it shows. The story line graphics are outstanding, the
actors are great, and the story itself is comparable to that of an actual movie. In fact,
you have 6 CD's worth of story line, and all of it good! In addition, you have the more
options to make decision in the story line. The decisions are bigger that just what to say
to someone, they include the option to defect to the Border Worlds, the option of which
sector of space to fly missions to, and what to tell the Great Assembly in the end--and
your life depends on saying the right thing. As far as simulator flying goes, it is good
also, although not a whole lot different than WC 3. The Hellcat and the Longbow
are back from WC 3 but the rest are new, with some really funky special weapons
like a "scatter" ion gun, a fission cannon, a Stormfire gun which shoots actual
ammunition, and a plasma gun.
Wing Commander 4 seems to have everything
going for it. The graphics are good, the acting is good, the story is good, this is
definitely a must have game if you are a Wing Commander fan. You are given so many
options to alter the story line as you go along, you almost get nervous that you are
making the best choices. There are many new weapons which makes for a real arsenal at your
disposal. Notable actors are the same as in WC 3, Mark Hamill (Star Wars),
Tom Wilson (Biff from Back to the Future Raiders of the Lost Ark), Jason Bernard
(forget a movie for sure, but Eisen from WC 3, and you will recognized him from
several movies), and Malcolm McDowell (Star Trek: Generations). You also get to
choose your wingmen from all the pilots on board, not just the main characters.
The only things I found that were off par was the
fact that it forces you to defect to the Border Worlds rather than giving you the option
to stay with the Confederation. If you do not defect when you first have the option, you
fly a few more missions with Confed. Then you are given the option again, if you do not
take it this time, you face a mission which is a no winner... game over. Also, there is no
romance to chase this time around. Although the acting and story is better, I sort of
liked having the budding romance in the works like in WC 2 & WC 3. In
addition, I found the autoexec.bat and config.sys configuration had to be fiddled with in
some cases or it had a tendency to crash on you.
--Brent Hegarty |
