I just got back from WarpCon 22 (www.warpcon.com) in Cork, Ireland. WarpCon is an annual wargaming and roleplaying convention held at University College Cork. I go mainly to catch up with friends and maybe do a bit of gaming. This year, one of the special guests was the author Diane Duane (www.dianeduane.com). I was fortunate enough to have several chats with her over the weekend and she (and her husband Peter Morwood). In addition to authoring over 50 novels, it turns out she wrote the screenplay for the computer game “Privateer 2 – The Darkening” for Origin Systems, back in the day.

Privateer 2 – The Darkening was a space trading sim, in the Wing Commander series, with a compelling story of amnesia and misadventure, which was played out in full motion video and it starred Christopher Walken, Clive Owen, Brian Blessed. The game itself was really fun, but the cinematic parts were like a fantastic episode fo Star Trek, or Babylon 5 and were really formative in my journey into sci-fi. Christopher Walken has an office on Hell. The visuals were jammed with science fiction atmosphere, and it was one of the first games to really make good use of green screening.

Luckily, if you have not seen them, the cinematics are up on YouTube, I’ve added 5 to a playlist http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL103704986C9A73FA, but there are plenty more up there. Check them out, and if you get the chance, play the game