I decided to try the Freelancer demo (Digital Anvil / Microsoft). I wasn’t really impressed. It’s a 2003 game, yes. And although it looks and feels like Elite, Freelancer is not exciting. Rumours has it that the game designer (Chris “Wing Commander” Roberts) was forced out of his Digital Anvil company after Microsoft bought it out.
Which (once again) led to the search for ‘enfant terrible’ Roberts. Apparently he founded PNR (Point Of No Return) Entertainment, which indeed appears to have a website. Naturally, it’s full of Wing Commander references too..