There's been a lot of pre-release hype going on for Grindhouse, the Robert
Rodriguez / Quentin Tarantino double feature coming April 6. So it's fitting for
a movie that imitates B movies from back in the day, where the poster was
usually better than the movie, that Entertainment Weekly had Rodriguez and
Tarantino pick their favorite posters.

Tarantino of course picked the Pam Grier starrer Coffy, and the sick Swedish
revenge film They Call Her One Eye, but he also picked posters that had the
great hand drawn art we don't see anymore, like Dark of the Sun (what an amazing
billboard it must have made on Hollywood Boulevard), and It's a Mad, Mad, Mad,
Mad World (with a classic illustration from Mad Magazine's Jack Davis).

Rodriguez's choices are more mainstream, but no less cool, as well as iconic.
The first Evil Dead with a rave from Stephen King. The original Dawn of the Dead
with its famous tag-line, "When there's no more room in hell, the dead will walk
the earth." Escape From New York, with the severed head of the Statue of Liberty
laying in the streets. The polished jewel air brushed art of The Road Warrior.

Check out all their favorite poster picks at Entertainment Weekly's website, and
TwitchGuru's tribute to the classic posters of yesteryear right here:

http://www.ew.com/ew/gallery/0,,20015648,00.html

http://www.twitchguru.com/2006/01/17/adventures_in_the_poster_trade/

I'm a huge Guitar Hero fan.  Forget the Wii and all that wand-waving garbage, the Guitar Hero games have it all over Nintendo.  They offer one of the most unique video game experiences around right now.  Today EA and Harmonix announced Rock Band, and it's the game that we all knew was coming.  It's Guitar Hero, but with drums and singing as well.  I'm not sure how they will manage the singing part, but I have faith that they can pull this off, and it might be the greatest thing ever.  Here are some snippets from the press release.

"Harmonix, developer of the blockbuster Guitar Hero(tm) franchise, MTV: Music Television, a division of MTV Networks, a unit of Viacom (NYSE: VIA, VIA.B), and Electronic Arts (NASDAQ: ERTS) today announced Rock Band, an all- new platform for music fans and gamers to interact with music like never before. Rock Band will allow gamers to perform music from the world's biggest rock artists with their friends as a virtual band using drum, bass/lead guitar and microphone peripherals, in addition to offering deep online* connectivity. Built on unprecedented deals with the world's biggest record labels and music publishers, the music featured in Rock Band will span all genres of rock and include many of the master recordings from the biggest songs and artists of all time. Rock Band is slated for release on PLAYSTATION(R)3 computer entertainment system and Xbox 360(tm) video game and entertainment system from Microsoft(R) in holiday 2007."

"Our vision for Rock Band is to completely change the way people interact with and enjoy the music they love," said Jeff Yapp, EVP, MTV Program Enterprises. "By joining forces with EA and the music industry's largest record labels and publishers, we are striving to create a groundbreaking new platform that allows people to connect with their favorite music and artists in ways they never have before."

Official Site:  http://www.rockbandgame.com/

"Company of Heroes" was that rare game that took me completely by surprise.  I was not looking forward to a World War II-themed RTS at all, until I played the demo on a lark.  It completely blew me away.  Everything from the graphics, the sound, the way the units move, the presentation, it was all gold.  You'd think that the lack of variety in the units would hamper the enjoyment, but this is WWII after all and they didn't have stealth tanks and Mumakil back then.  "CoH" really doesn't suffer much from a lack of variety because the units have a lot of personality.  Watching the infantry move through the maps and engage enemies while taking cover is one of the best parts of the game. 

I was pleased to see that THQ announced "Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts" to be released later this year.  The press release states that it's a standalone expansion, so maybe I can convince all my deadbeat friends to get it since they won't need the original game to play it.  They also mention it will include some upgrades to the Essence engine that powers the game, so it should look even better than the original.  Here are some more snippets from the press release.

"Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts is the next chapter in the critically acclaimed Company of Heroes series. Players take command of the German Panzer Elite as they struggle against the might of Operation Market Garden, or lead the British 2nd Army in the vicious battle for Caen, France. The standalone title features two unique armies with full length campaigns, new multiplayer modes, Microsoft DirectX(r) 10 support, mission persistence, improved vehicle and soldier AI, enhanced physics, and a dynamic weather system. Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts is fully compatible with Company of Heroes, allowing players to wage war with four unique armies. Internally developed by Relic Entertainment, Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts is scheduled to ship for Windows PC in Fall 2007."

"In Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts players will experience fast- paced dynamic tactics like never before, in two of the most brutal World War II campaigns ever fought," said Tarrnie Williams, general manager, Relic Entertainment. "With two intensely cinematic campaigns, significant upgrades to the Essence Engine, mission persistence, improved vehicle AI and weather effects that directly impact the battlefield, we're delivering yet again on our commitment to leading the way in strategic gaming with the best, most innovative titles available."

Scanning the 'net yesterday, I was shocked and saddened to see the headline that
director Bob Clark and his son were killed in a car accident early Wednesday
morning. Clark is probably best remembered as the director of the holiday
classic A Christmas Story, and the raunchfest Porky's, but genre fans will also
remember him as the director of several horror classics, including Black
Christmas, which fans are now calling the original slasher film before Halloween,
and the haunting Deathdream (one of the only good movies ever shown on Elvira's
Movie Macabre show in the '80's).

Clark also produced Deranged, a fictionalized account of the life of Ed Gein,
which is predictably pretty gruesome, but also funny in an underhanded way.
Screenwriter / Director Alan Ormsby made the film's narration droll because the
real life story was so sick, without the black comedy it would have been
unwatchable (Deranged may also be the first "mockumentary," a style later
perfected in This is Spinal Tap).

Black Christmas is now a classic of '70's horror, with shots from the killer's
perspective years before Halloween's classic POV of the killer opening, and
chilling phone stalking scenes that clearly inspired When A Stranger Calls.
Deathdream was a frightening retelling of The Monkey's Paw, with a dead soldier
coming home from Vietnam a combination vampire / zombie, feeding on the living.
A rotting ghoul was the film's physical manifestation of the horrors of war, and
where it would take the major studios years to make films about 'Nam, Clark had
the courage to make an anti-war film when many wouldn't.

Clark also gave us Murder By Decree, a terrific Sherlock Holmes mystery with
Christopher Plummer and James Mason, and the aforementioned Christmas Story,
which was not a hit when it was first released but is now among It's a Wonderful
Life for mandatory holiday viewing. And of course, Clark also gave us Porky's,
the outrageous comedy for the post-Animal House generation.

Last night at the L.A. Grindhouse Festival, one of the fest's organizers talked
about Clark before the movie screenings, and was pretty broken up over his death.
They had shown Black Christmas last December, and the theater, which holds 280
capacity, had over 300 people in attendance. Clark was there for a Q&A, and
stayed until every fan who wanted to meet him did, and everyone who wanted an
autograph got one. The fest organizer also told us to make sure and watch a Bob
Clark movie in his memory, and I recommend you do the same.

I made my triumphant return to Uncle Gamer Radio podcast this week to talk about our solar- powered Nintendo mods with our friends Liquilife and Vicious. For those that don't know, the gang here at Tom's Hardware Guide and TwitchGuru built a mobile, solar-powered Wii station and followed that creation up with a DS Lite mod that runs entirely on solar power (which we affectionately call the DS "Light" or Sun of the Solar Wii).

After wowing Uncle Gamer's hosts with our mad mod skills, Liquilife, Vicious and I discussed a number of other subjects, from the worthiness of Xbox 360 Elite (I said I'd buy one); new racing titles on the horizon; the evolution of Sonic the Hedgehog; Microsoft's efforts to win over game developers; and the new Grand Theft Auto 4 trailer.

Speaking of GTA 4, Vicious and Liquilife discusses the GTA series and its clones, such as Scarface, Godfather, Saint's Row and other games. Interestingly enough, Vicious and I agreed about GTA: San Andreas being more offensive than, say, Saint's Row. And with games like Saint's Row stepping up the GTA formula, we wondered what Rockstar can do with GTA 4 to bring something new to the table.

If you haven't checked out Uncle Gamer yet, give them a listen.

We recently received a sweet gaming rig here at Tom's Hardware Guide. Vigor Gaming, based in City of Industry, CA, sent us a brand new model called "The Quadfather." We haven't finishing testing this QuadFX beast yet, but here are some pictures of the system along with a few of the specs.This SLI-enabled rig looks hot and we can't wait to get it going on some Doom 3 and Oblivion tests.

2 AMD Athlon 64 FX-74 3.0 Ghz processors

2 Nvidia GeForce 8800 GTX cards

2 GB of RAM

AsusTek motherboard

A 500 GB Western Digital hard drive

300 GB of RAID

Windows XP

More details coming soon. Stay tuned for some benchmark tests on Tom's Hardware Guide.

Tennessee Titans quarterback Vince Young is in serious trouble. Not only will the second-year NFL star need to avoid the dreaded "sophomore jinx" but he'll also need to hire a protective detail and a witch doctor to shield him from the misfortune known as "The Madden Curse."

I'm sure by now most people know what the Madden Curse is, but for the uninitiated, here it is in a nutshell: ever since the mega-popular EA sports title began putting major NFL stars on the cover of the game box, those particular players have fallen victim to a series of odd misfortunes, from terrible slumps to freak injuries.

In fact, I wrote about the Madden Curse in a column last year in which I described my general contempt for the Madden NFL game franchise, and one of the biggest reasons was the Madden Curse. Here was the evidence I submitted in that column:

• In 1999, EA put Detroit Lion Barry Sanders on the Madden NFL 2000 cover, who was on his way to becoming the greatest running back. He suddenly and inexplicably retired during training camp that summer. Green Bay Packer's running back Dorsey Levens was also featured on another cover of the game. He was cut a year later.

• Tennessee Titans running back Eddie George is on the cover of the 2001 version. That year, George has a key fumble in a playoff game, leading to a Titans loss. George became injury-plagued after that season and was never the same player.

• EA went with a QB for Madden NFL 2002, but Minnesota Viking Dante Culpepper suffered a 4-7 record before having season-ending knee surgery.

• Back to running backs! EA put future Hall of Famer Marshall Faulk on the cover, but the St. Louis Rams RB struggled that season and never again gained 1,000-plus yards.

• Rising star Michael Vick graced the cover for Madden NFL 2004, but the Atlanta Falcons quarterback broke his leg during a meaningless preseason game during the summer and played just five games that season.

• Okay, let's try a defensive player this time! EA picked Ray Lewis of the Baltimore Ravens, who had been one of the most dominant defensive players in the game - until that season, when he put up mediocre stats and the Ravens missed the playoffs.

• And the coup de grace: Philadelphia Eagles QB Donovan McNabb was featured on the cover of Madden NFL 2006, and he soon endured a nightmare season: a feud with receiver Terrell Owens (who was later cast off from the team), a serious injury that led to a sports hernia (ouch!) and missing the playoffs with a terrible season. Perhaps most unbelievably, the president of the Philadelphia NAACP chapter Jerry Mondesire criticized McNabb, who is black, in a newspaper editorial. Seemingly out of nowhere, Mondesire called McNabb a mediocre player and claimed McNabb wasn't playing the quarterback position like a true African American athlete, i.e. not running and scrambling enough.

And the curse continued this year, too. Seattle Seahawks running back Shaun Alexander graced the cover of Madden NFL 2007 this year, just one year removed from his historic MVP season. And what do you think happened? He got injured. Specifically, he missed a huge portion of the season after breaking his foot in the first game of the year. Coincidence? I think not.

The Madden Curse has become such a terrible force that after San Deigo Charger fans began a petition to keep their superstar running back and league MVP Ladanian Tomlinson off the cover of Madden NFL 2008. Now those are smart, dedicated fans. As a New England Patriots fan, I would have done exactly the same thing if Tom Brady was being considered as a cover candidate. Just imagine what would happen if Brady were on the cover: he'd probably suffer a career-ending concussion and go back to dating Tara Reid instead of supermodel Gisele Bundchen.

Moving on. This year's cover boy, Vince Young, had an excellent rookie season as a first-year quarterback. But I just can't shake the feeling that something bad is going to happen to him soon. And for the life of me, I can't understand why the Titans or their fans would allow their young franchise quarterback to be on the cover of Madden NFL 2008. They just don't learn, do they? How much evidence does one need to believe in a curse? I hope it doesn't take 86 years.

After years of Hollywood not taking comic books seriously, superhero films
finally made a big turn around with X-Men in 2000, and Spider-Man in 2001. Their
respective directors, Bryan Singer and Sam Raimi, were inspired choices who
brought a fresh vision and healthy respect to two of the most anticipated comic
adaptations in memory. Yet Spider-Man also had a secret weapon in his corner,
someone who brought empathy and experience to the job. He's not a young kid who
won the screenwriting lottery, but a respected veteran who's been around the
Hollywood block.

Alvin Sargent wasn't the first name you'd think of when it came to superhero
films. Before Spider-Man, he was best known for writing Ordinary People (adapted
from Judith Guest's novel), for which he won an Academy Award. He also wrote
Paper Moon, Straight Time (with Jeffrey Boam, and legend has it an uncredited
Michael Mann), as well as Julia (for which he also won an Academy Award), among
others.

Sargent's forte is emotion and giving characters humanity, which many would have
initially dismissed for a superhero film. But what separates Spider-Man from his
super brethren is he's vulnerable, not invulnerable. As Stan Lee told Creative
Screenwriting Magazine, "He was the first, if not the only superhero who was a
regular guy. He's just a regular teenage kid who happened to accidentally get a
superpower, but it didn't bring him fulfillment and victory in every other area.
He still had money troubles, he still had family problems, he still had problems
with girls, he still had to worry about making a living. So I think he was
perhaps the most realistic of all of the superheroes."

This is also what appealed to Sargent. As he told Newsweek, "I don't write
comic-book stories. But Peter Parker is the guy down the block. He feels guilty
about the death of his uncle. He worries about his aunt May. He lives in a
crappy one-room rental with a bathroom down the hall. He's a lonely boy who
wants nothing more than to be with this girl who loves him. And he can't tell
her. That's a great story. That's mythic."

Being a screenwriter in Hollywood can be awful. If you're on the A-list, you can
make a ton of money, but your vision can be mangled beyond recognition, or never
reach the screen, and since you're getting well paid, you're supposed to shut up
about it. And even the best in the business aren't invulnerable. There was a
time when William Goldman (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Princess
Bride) couldn't get a gig for five years. Joe Eszterhas became the hottest
screenwriter in Hollywood with the success of Basic Instinct. Three years later,
his name became a punch line with the failure of Showgirls. Robert Towne wrote
what many consider to be one of the greatest screenplays ever written, Chinatown,
but also wrote the scripts for Days of Thunder and Mission: Impossible because
he admittedly needed the money.

One Hollywood cliché is certainly true: A career is a marathon, not a sprint.
Having "heat" can burn out quick. More important is having a career. As Sargent
approaches his 80th birthday, with his name on what will certainly be a monster
summer hit, and a track record any screenwriter would be proud of, he's proven
you can have both.

I had the opportunity to play Heavenly Sword back in May of last year, and what I saw then was very impressive.  Admittedly, what I saw was not much more than a small section of a single level for a female God of War clone (complete with the same style for the boss fight) with better physics and environment destruction, but it was still one of the most impressive pieces in the Sony booth at E3 2006.  Cut to April 2007 and we're still waiting for most if not all of the big showcases from Sony's E3 booth to get released on their new console (but we did get Gundam...oh yes...we got Gundam right in our big stupid faces).

Today Sony released some new information about the story of Heavenly Sword as well as ten new screenshots.

"Emotionally charged, stunningly beautiful, and delivering unprecedented dramatic character performance, Heavenly Sword(tm) showcases the power of PLAYSTATION(r)3 (PS3(tm)) computer entertainment system. A dramatic tale of revenge sees Nariko, a fiery red-haired heroine, embark on a quest for vengeance against an invading King and his army. The story builds around the ancient Heavenly Sword, which once belonged to a powerful deity. It can never be wielded by a mortal without it slowly but inevitably draining their life-force."

"When the invading King (played by Andy Serkis) destroys the warrior clan that guards the Heavenly Sword, the clan leader's daughter, Nariko, takes up the sword in a desperate fight for survival. Nariko must now pay the ultimate price as she embarks on one last mission of vengeance against the King and his army before her life is finally and irreparably overtaken by the omnipotent Heavenly Sword..."

"Andy Serkis, the world's leading CG actor, famous for his roles as Gollum in "The Lord of the Rings" and Kong in "King Kong," was heavily involved in the creative process. As well as starring in Heavenly Sword as the villain, King Botan, Andy was a major contributor to the character development, writing, casting, directing and performance capture for the PS3 title."

Heavenly Sword features a deep, diverse combat experience made possible only on PS3.

KEY FEATURES

• The Heavenly Sword - The Heavenly Sword itself can transform into three distinct weapons, each with its own accompanying fighting stance used by Nariko to vary combat styles.

• The Combat Engine - The combat engine can scale up from sophisticated one-on-one encounters to one-on-many, where enemies employ intelligent squad-based dynamics, right up to combat against battalions pushing real-time gameplay and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to unprecedented new levels.

• Physics-Based Combat - The physics-based combat allows players to sweep debris against opponents, kick tables to halt an oncoming surge of fighters, smash the enemy into the scenery, or throw bodies into other enemies using "aftertouch" controls.

• Wide range of Objects & Weaponry - Heavenly Sword provides a wide range of objects & weaponry including rapid fire crossbows and massively damaging bazookas.

• Creative in-game Cinematography - Coupled with real-time story evolvement and amazing set-pieces, Heavenly Sword feels like a blockbuster action movie that takes combat gameplay to new heights.

I track videogame release dates for all the major consoles and the PC.  I used to do it as a budget-minded consumer so I would know what months I needed to start stockpiling the Ramen, but now it's part of my job.  Actually, it used to be part of a different job long ago when I was working at an EB Games, and that's when I first noticed the trend of fake release dates.  You see, in order for retailers to presell games, they have to be able to tell you when they are coming out.  They have to have this nebulous release date to hold out there for you to justify the fact that you are giving them money but getting nothing back (at least for now).  Game distributors like to track presell trends in order to see how much interest there is in a particular title so they give the retailers these dates the facilitate the presell process.  In order to get this date the distributors pressure the developers to either come up with a realistic date or they just demand that the game get released in whatever state it's in on a specified date.  This is how you get games that are released broken, and as downloadable content becomes a bigger part of console games, you can bet that more and more console games will become like PC games.  What I mean by that is that they will be released in a late beta or alpha state and then patched weeks later.  This has been a staple of PC gaming for years, but I welcome all you console gamers to our world.

When I look at the release date calendar, the fake dates start to stand out.  For instance, any release date for "Team Fortress 2" is fake.  I've actually been tracking that release date for almost ten years now.  When I first started tracking it, TF2 was built with the revolutionary "Quake 2" engine.  The same goes for "Duke Nukem Forever".  Any date out there is fake.  Other dates you can usually count on being fake are anything that is the first day of the year, the last day of the year, or the first day of any month.  You can also expect any release date that is more than about three months away to slip.  I see the release dates for "Stranglehold" and "Heavenly Sword" are both August 1st.  10 to 1 you won't see those games on that day.  There's a chance they could make that date, but more than likely, it's just a goal they are trying to hit.  Just keep all this in mind when you're checking those release dates and remember that none of them are set in stone.  Here's a quick list of the games I suspect have fake release dates as of now.

• Metroid Prime 3: Corruption (Wii) - 6-1
• Super Smash Bros: Brawl (Wii) - 6-1
• Stranglehold (PS3, 360, PC) - 8-1
• Heavenly Sword (PS3) - 8-1
• Indiana Jones (PS3, 360) - 9-1
• Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots (PS3) - 9-1
• Army of Two (PS3, 360) - 11-1
• Super Mario Galaxy (Wii) - 11-1
• Halo 3 (360) - 11-1
• Rock Band (PS3, 360) - 11-1
• Final Fantasy XIII (PS3) - 12-1
• Gran Turismo HD (PS3) - 12-1
• Final Fantasy Versus XIII (PS3) - 12-31
• Alan Wake (360, PC) 12-31
• Halo Wars (360) 12-31
• Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (PS3, 360) - 2-1-2008

Currently on sale, the 40th anniversary issue of Rolling Stone, one of the best
issues of this magazine I've gone through in a loooonnnnnngggg time, features
"twenty interviews with the artists and leaders who helped shape our time." Two
directors are interviewed along with Bob Dylan, the two surviving Beatles, and
Mick and Keith, among others: Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg.

Both directors are interviewed by veteran RS film critic Peter Travers, and what
makes Spielberg's interview especially interesting is how he addresses today's
entertainment technology: How it has changed today, and how it will change
tomorrow.

Spielberg told Travers, "Today with television and the Internet, with kids
putting up Web sites that feature all of their pet projects and their pet peeves,
they are really able to broadcast who they are to the world. That's the big
pardigm shift from the 1960s. And kids have so much more to offer. They know
more, they have more information."

How does he feel about movies being downloaded? "It's just made movies
portable," he replied. "I make all of my movies to be seen in a movie theater,
because I believe in the social experience. I believe people have a better time
in the company of strangers."

He added, "We've become a fast food nation, and that includes how we get our
entertainment. Kids are happy to spend four hours blogging and e-mailing each
other...Kids are already telling us what they want. They want variety. They want a
big-screen movie, but they also want YouTube videos downloadable on a hand-held
device." While movie downloading "will certainly do significant damage to the
art form by today's standards," Spielberg still thinks the potential is there to
create a new art form on a much smaller screen.

For the directors of Spielberg's generation, getting your hands on the tools was
one of the biggest hurtles for a young filmmaker. Now that technology and movies
are right at your fingertips, Spielberg is still keeping his eyes open to what
today's generation can come up with. "And if they invent something great, all of
us will follow."

It's been quite a year for gaming blog Kotaku. First, the site got blackballed by Sony after Kotaku adhered to journalistic principles and refused to cave to Sony's threats regarding the publishing of a PlayStation Home rumor that ultimately proved to be true. Now Kotaku has Jack Thompson on its tail. The Florida lawyer and anti-gaming activist has asked the FBI to investigate Kotaku.

Apparently, Thompson believes the gaming blog is "targeting" him and encouraging its readers to make threats on his life. The day of the Virginia Tech shooting, a Kotaku reader posted a comment on the site suggesting that Thompson "be shot for taking the opportunity to leech off a tragedy to push his own agenda." Ironically, Thompson contacted the FBI after he got owned by Kotaku editor Brian Crecente, who wrote a detailed article dissecting Thompson's claims of a connection between the Virginia Tech shootings and violent video games (as of this moment, there is no connection).

And here's the best part: Crecente, a former newspaper reporter who covered crime and police beats in Denver, contacted some folks he knows over at the local FBI office. Apparently, the FBI isn't ready to put Kotaku on its most wanted list; the agency told Crecente it probably won't even look into the situation. Rather than take the opportunity to bash Thompson for making their lives difficult, Kotaku took the high road and issued a note to readers asking them to refrain from making threats again Thompson. "If nothing else, that makes gamers look like a bunch of immature hotheads," Crecente wrote. And that is yet another reason why Kotaku is one of my favorite gaming sites.

In the case of the Sony flap involving the PlayStation Home report, Sony eventually made up with Kotaku (after the blog made the blackballing public and called out Sony). However, I don't advise anyone to hold their breath and wait for Thompson to make nice with Kotaku.   

What happened to space sims?  When I first got into PC gaming (or computers at all for that matter) in the dark days of the early 90s, it was specifically to play X- Wing.  What a perfect idea for a game.  It sounds trite and obvious now, but back then the idea of a flight sim in Star Wars space was extremely exciting.  I learned DOS so I could install and configure X-Wing with a boot disk on my roommate's computer without asking him.  Several of my friends and I split the significant (in college terms) cost of an 8 bit Sound Blaster card so we could play it with sound.  It was glorious.

Other space sims like Wing Commander II were available at the same time, but none could compete with the draw of flying the death star trench on a computer (admittedly, it was a sad affair in X-Wing).  When Wing Commander III: Heart of the Tiger was released in 1994, it had the largest game budget of any game ever made (a paltry $4 million).  The game play was damn good, and it told a sweeping narrative with full-motion video cutscenes starring Mark Hamill, Malcolm McDowell, and porn star Ginger Lynn Allen (in a decidedly "unporn- y" role).  As years went by we saw Wing Commander IV, Wing Commander: Prophecy, Tie Fighter, X-Wing Alliance, FreeSpace, Independence War, Privateer, and on and on and on.  It seemed there was no stopping this genre.

However, something did stop it as time went by.  Sales for Independence War 2 and FreeSpace 2 were not very good, and the companies there were leading the charge in space sim development were either swallowed up by big distributors or went on to develop FPS and RTS titles that were on the rise.  Very few space sims come out anymore, and none in the big franchises that I played back then.

For an article I'm writing, I needed to get a hold of some of these older space sims so I started to look for them in the usual spots online.  I was surprised to see that Amazon is selling a version of FreeSpace 2 for $80 and copies of the Wing Commander games go on ebay for as much as $40 with around 20 bids.  Also, the mod communities are very big for these games, and there is still a lot of fan-driven development going on.  There is obviously still a niche market for these games, and with the whole retro gaming movement going strong, I think a new Wing Commander game (a real-deal space sim, not some rails shooter or arcade console nonsense) would do very well, and so would a new entry into the X-Wing series (as opposed to Rogue Squadron).

Maybe I'm the minority here, but I miss the feeling of flying and fighting in space.