'Wing Commander' creator takes the director's chair

'Wing Commander' creator takes the director's chair: By Howard Wen. Chris Roberts talks about his passage from the little screen to the big screen.

By Howard Wen

Mar 12, 1999 | Chris Roberts is the first computer-game developer to direct a Hollywood studio movie based on his own game. The 30-year-old Roberts is the maestro behind the Wing Commander games, which from their 1990 debut featured "cut scenes" played between the action to narrate their saga -- a futuristic space opera in which the player pilots a starcraft to battle brutal, feline-ish aliens called the Kilrathi. To date, Wing Commander, its sequels and various spinoffs have generated more than $110 million for their publisher, Origin Systems.

The first two Wing Commander games used simple cartoon animation for the "cut scenes." But starting with the second sequel, Roberts directed real actors like Mark Hamill and Malcolm McDowell. It seems appropriate, therefore, that Wing Commander -- the computer game best known for its movielike quality -- is now coming to a movie theater near you. Shot for $27 million (a modest budget for a science-fiction feature), the "Wing Commander" movie, which opens this weekend, stars Freddie Prinze Jr. ("I Know What You Did Last Summer") and Matthew Lillard ("Scream").

Born in Northern California, Roberts made a name for himself as a game designer in England (where he was raised in Manchester) before returning to the United States in 1988 to work for Origin in Austin, Texas. In 1996, Roberts started his own game development company and special effects house, Digital Anvil, in Austin, where he still works today.

As he and Wing Commander fans await the premiere of his first movie, Roberts recently spoke with Salon about his take on the two entertainment businesses his work straddles.

Why have most movies based on video games sucked?

I think the ones up until now have tended to be from games that don't really have a story or characters. Mortal Kombat is pretty much about guys kicking each other in the head. When you're adapting something to film, as long as the source material has a strong story or strong characters, then I think you've got a pretty good shot. Wing Commander happens to be a game where the whole basis is story and character.

Lots of people paid admission just to watch the first trailer to the "Star Wars" prequel when it premiered in November -- then walked right out of the theater before the feature presentation. Since the second trailer will probably premiere before "Wing Commander" (both films are to be distributed by 20th Century Fox), I imagine you're excited about this but a little anxious, too?

No, my dream would be to get the "Star Wars" trailer in front of "Wing Commander." It would obviously help the box office. We're opening, by the way -- they put the [first] trailer on films that were already opened. So I don't think a lot of people will walk out. It may not be "Star Wars," but it's going to be science fiction. I think that's actually good for the film, because it may widen our audience.

Science fiction in movies and television is in transition now, somewhere between waning interest in the "Star Trek" franchise and high anticipation for the "Star Wars" prequels. Where do you see the "Wing Commander" movie fitting in all this?

People like science fiction, and there really aren't a lot of science-fiction [movies for those] who love them. Take a look at something like "Men in Black." I don't call that science fiction -- I just call that movie "effects-driven." For me, "science fiction" is spaceships flying around, ` la "Star Wars" and "Star Trek." And there's an appetite for that. Even when a not-very-good science-fiction film comes out, people go see it.

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