From this point on, you are free to do whatever you want.ĭue to your starting with a bad ship, you start without the jump drive. The backstory is told in the manual, and it explained that you inherited an old ship from your grandfather, and after the “Scarab”, the ship you worked on got ambushed and badly damaged, you decide to start working as a privateer. The story is set in the year, 2669 sometime after Wing Commander II, and instead of a Confed pilot, you play as a “privateer” (canonically known as Grayson Burrows, but you can enter your name), the newest freelancer in the Gemini Sector. It was designed by Joel Manners, and it was helped by Chris Roberts, who at the time was working on Wing Commander II, Strike Commander and Privateer. The game uses a vastly improved Wing Commander II engine, with some features that were also used in Strike Commander, a different Origin game. The working title for the game was “Trade Commander”, and at one point Origin Systems considered naming all of their games with the suffix “Commander”. Released in the Fall of 1993, Privateer had an interesting development history. It can be looked at as Origin Systems take on open-ended gameplay, and their take on the legendary Elite (1984).

Wing Commander: Privateer or simply Privateer.

After the success of Wing Commander II, the franchise received its first spin-off game.