Star Wars, Geek Culture, and Power Converters
I’ve spent a lot of time dealing with what Luke and company have been doing so far in this book but there’s a whole other half to this. Leia and Han, and the story seems to be largely from the perspective of Leia, are off trying to find where the titular young’uns were, and maybe still are.
More after the jump. Continue reading
Yesterday, Jason Fry posted a series of end notes from EG to Warfare. Today he drops more!
Blasters: The mechanics of blasters have been explained rather differently in a couple of Star Wars sources, and Paul Urquhart did a lot of heavy lifting helping me sort through the differences. My question about how a stun setting would work led to some breathtakingly geeky emails between myself, Leland Chee, Pablo Hidalgo, Dave Filoni, Tony Rowe and Robert Clarke. Yes, my job kicks ass.
For even more bits of awesomeness, check out the rest of the notes he’s posted on his Tumblr.
Back in the ’90s, Lucasarts was one of the kings of the video game playground. Among their best titles were their adventure games: Tales of Monkey Island, Full Throttle, Sam and Max Hit the Road, The Dig, Loom. Nearly twenty years after they were published, these games are still regarded as masterpieces. What they all had in common was the engine powering them, Lucasarts’ SCUMM.
Fast forward to 2012. The SCUMM engine is now in the hands of fans who can create homages to the great games of the past. One such in-progress fan creation? The Han Solo Adventures.
I certainly hope Stacy Davidson can finish this game. Just watching that video brings me back to some of the first games I played growing up. For now, I’ll have to go dust off my old copy of Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis.
Don’t forget, at 3PM EDT/12PM PST, author Star Wars Books will be holding a Facebook chat with Jason Fry to talk about the Essential Guide to Warfare. Want to know what went into the various character profiles and warship writeups? You can ask him yourself.
Just remember, this isn’t the chat to ask what’s coming after Fate of the Jedi or when Karen Traviss will come back to the Expanded Universe (she won’t). Your EG to Warfare questions are fair game, though!
You see these kinds of things crop up every now and again, but generally you already know a lot of these little factoids that they present. For instance, most of the time you see something like ‘Warwick Davis was a last minute casting change for Wicket the Ewok.’ This list actually does have some things I didn’t know, some I did, some of which are my favorite SW facts.
Image and more after the break
I need to go put the sharp pointy thing in the thing with the sharp pointy fangs now.
Introducing Trope Tuesday!
What’s Trope Tuesday? It’s a weekly sojourn into the land of fiction and literature to learn more about the devices and themes that resonates with its audience.*
*It’s a thinly veiled excuse for me to destroy your productivity by linking you to that great time-sink in the cloud: TV Tropes.
Every Tuesday we’ll feature one new trope. This week we’re highlighting one of my favorites: Buffy Speak
Buffy Speak is that thing where they say that a guy is saying things too fast, or can’t figure out what the thing they want to say is, or doesn’t have enough learning and stuff to say what the thing they mean is.
A thing you see a lot with this is when they don’t know the right words and stuff, so sometimes you see noun and verb things combined like in “shooty-gun thing”, and stuff that goes in a cycle thing in frustration: “That idea went over like… like… like a thing that doesn’t go over very well.” That thing where you go on and on and forget the stuff you were trying to say comes up a lot. Sometimes it uses that verb-noun-ing dealie thing, and sometimes that name thing where it’s like, descriptive, but not really their name, because you don’t really know their name? Or are trying to make a point? I dunno, just click on the link.
The Trope Namer is, obviously, Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
Ever find yourself doing this when trying to explain Star Wars to someone who hasn’t seen it? “No, no. You see Hyperspace is this wibbly-wobbly … thing … that lets other things go from one place to another place all quick like. You know. Like a thing that goes really fast.”
If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to get back to surfing … that thing. With all the links. And pictures of cats.
Yesterday, the official Del Rey Star Wars Twitter account dropped this tease:
Reviewing outline for 3rd Guide Characters. Tough part is thinking ahead – what #SWEU is upcoming that needs to be included. @Darth_Duff
— StarWarsBooks (@DelReyStarWars) April 9, 2012
I know I’d love to see a number of post-Return of the Jedi Expanded Universe characters included. A longshot, sure, but any chance I could see something about the Antilles sisters?
Who would you like to see in the third EG to Characters? Drop a comment in this post to tell us!
Over on his blog, Jason Fry posted a set of endnotes from his latest Expanded Universe release, the Essential Guide to Warfare.
The book originally began with a transcript of a briefing featuring Admiral Motti, Bevel Lemelisk, a general from the Department of Military Research and Dr. Insmot Bowen, a pre-Republic specialist from the Obroan Institute. Dr. Bowen explained that some of the odd characteristics of the galaxy — including that barrier west of the Core — were the remnants of Celestial technology, and told the panel of an ancient war between the Celestials and the Rakata. (Motti, as you might imagine, wasn’t believing it.)
The section was fun, but my editor at Del Rey, Erich Schoeneweiss, felt it wasn’t the best beginning for the book. He felt we needed something that put the reader in a dynamic scene rather than a briefing room, and that had some actual warfare in it, instead of a discussion of it. I fumed about that for a bit, then fumed a lot more because I realized Erich was right.
I have to say, I’m glad Schoeneweiss suggested a different opening. The prologue was one of my favorite parts of the book and really helped set the stage for perhaps the best Essential Guide I’ve gotten my hands on.
For more interesting notes and tidbits from Jason Fry, head on over to his blog.
With Apocalypse hitting bookshelves last month, the three-year Fate of the Jedi series came to a conclusion. Not only did it mark the end of the nine book series, but the end of the megaseries concept Del Rey has been known for since New Jedi Order kicked off in 1999. FotJ marks the end of an era in more ways than one, but how effective was it?
Part I of the Fate of the Jedi retrospective below the cut.
Author, humorist, and Ewok enthusiast Aaron Allston has updated his appearance schedule for the remainder of the year:
If you ever get the chance to see Allston on a panel at a convention, drop whatever it is you’re doing and grab a seat. He’s one of the funniest men alive and puts on an incredibly entertaining show. This year promises to be especially fun as his first X-Wing novel in thirteen years is due out in August.
via Roqoo Depot