The 1991 sequel to the promising Wing Commander takes the space opera theme even further, with more cockpit-based space combat, dramatic cut scenes, and glorious 320×200 VGA graphics.

Wing Commander II: Vengeance of the Kilrathi, as the title hints, is the “Empire Strikes Back” of the Wing Commander series. The second game in the series had to be much better than the first to keep it going. And it was much better, although the mission structures are more linear in this sequel.

Like before, you can name your character whatever you like (from Wing Commander III onward the lead character was called Christopher “Maverick” Blair) and you go out on an adventure in a war between humans and the alien Kilrathi. Wing Commander II was one of the first games to use a full voice cast to record the dialogue so that it could be digitised and used in sync with the game.

Wing Commander always reminded me more of Battlestar Galactica than Star Wars, but the similarities between Wing Commander and both are fused into its DNA. Vengeance of the Kilrathi is a good sequel; a good level of progress for the series, and a good nostalgic game to play if you like dogfighting in spaceships. And it’s easy to buy online legally and play now.

More: Wing Commander II on Wikipedia
GOG: Wing Commander 1 & 2 on GOG.com