14 DAY TRIAL // The fan-made project Wing Commander Saga: The Darkest Dawn has been cleared by video game publisher Electronic Arts for public launch and those who love the space simulation franchise will be able to play the game on March 22.
Anton aka Tolwyn, who is the project leader working on Wing Commander Saga: The Darkest Dawn, has told Gnome’s Lair that, “A big thank you has to go to our fans for their extreme patience over the long development period, as well as to Chris Roberts, Origin, and EA for their generosity in allowing Saga and other Wing Commander fan projects to be released and distributed.”
Wing Commander Saga: The Darkest Dawn was first thought up by fans of the series about ten years ago and they were very careful to integrate it into the established narrative cannon of the franchise, even using information that was only introduced in the associated novels and other tie-ins.
The story will be set somewhere between the events of Wing Commander 2 and 3 and will introduce a new cast of characters.
The game will be created using the Freespace 2 engine, which has been made free for all those interested, and will include 55 new missions, 70 pieces of cinematic content and about 11,000 lines of dialog.
Most of it will be illustrated by a cast of 60 voice actors, which means that there are more than 9 hours of voice integrated into the game.
The Wing Commander series was famous for both the gameplay mechanics and for the story, which was delivered via extensive live action cutscenes.
Video game publishers like Electronic Arts tend guard their intellectual properties very carefully and rarely allow fan-made projects, regardless of their quality, to be released.
The fact that Wing Commander Saga: The Darkest Dawn is coming out probably means that EA has no plans to reboot the series.
