EU Interview Roundup

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Over at Club Jade, James conducted a video interview with Essential Guide to Warfare author Jason C. Fry.

To celebrate the release of Scourge, Roqoo Depot and EUCantina have interviews with Jeff Grubb. He also made an appearance last week on Star Wars Books’ official Facebook page to answer questions from fans. TFN has a lovely recap here. If the interviews have you curious, you can read a 50-page excerpt from the book over at Suvudu. Scourge hits bookshelves today.

Big Shiny Robot talks to Tom Taylor about his latest project, Boba Fett is Dead.

‘The Old Republic’ May Already Be Losing Subscribers

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The great Word of Warcraft killer? Perhaps not quite reports Ars Technica.

In an investor note released today, Cowen and Company analyst Doug Creutz said he suspects that subscription levels for The Old Republic may already be lower than the 1.7 million EA reported in February. Creutz’s primary piece of evidence for this belief is publicly available server population numbers assembled and reported by TORstatus.net. These figures have shown a roughly 10 percent decline over the last two months. That doesn’t necessarily mean the game has lost 10 percent of its subscribers in that time, of course, but it isn’t really a sign of strong player growth, either.

I’m, unfortunately, one of those subscribers who canceled their TOR subscription. For the first month or so, I was greatly enjoying the game playing through as a smuggler. The first three worlds were a delight but the problem came when I got to the fourth world I visited. It was pretty much a carbon copy of the third. By this point I was growing a little tired of the recycled dialog, battle mechanics, and fetch quests.

The Old Republic might be a neat Star Wars-skinned MMO, but it just can’t escape being a bit too much of a grind for me. Those hoping that Bioware somehow managed to squeeze a Knights of the Old Republic experience into the game didn’t get quite what they were looking for.

Ars Technica via Club Jade

Lazy Sunday Afternoon

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Looking for something to fill your time while there doesn’t seem to be anything to do with SW floating about? Well, how about this? Have you heard about Star Wars Uncut? It’s a project that was started in 2009 as a crowdsourced attempt to recreate the entirety of of SW:ANH as a fanmade piece. Well, a few months back, the project was completed and the ‘Director’s Cut’ was released, containing the handpicked best shots stitched together to recreate the entire film in 15 second clips. The project was actually nominated for an Emmy (Scratch that, the project won a Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Creative Achievement In Interactive Media in 2010). So, follow this link and give it a watch.

Sorry, no embed, the site wasn’t cooperating. Here’s the trailer, though.

Sports and Geek Fandom: The Bizarre Double Standard

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Here at Tosche Station, we mean it when we say we’ll talk about anything and everything that has to do with geek culture.

I’m a sports fan. Gridiron football, soccer, basketball (though we’re not on speaking terms until the Sonics come back to Seattle). My first love, though, was baseball. I grew up watching the Seattle Mariners and listening to Dave Niehaus* weave together a daily narrative of America’s grand pass time. Even as my enjoyment of gridiron and basketball waned and my passion for soccer rose, baseball always stayed at the top of my list. But why? Why a game that’s admittedly slow-paced, is crammed full of breaks in the action, whose popularity always seems to be waning? A simple answer, really. Baseball lends itself beautifully to geek culture.

*And to give this a bit more of a science fiction feel, one of the greatest Niehaus calls ever occurred when outfielder Ichiro Suzuki threw a ball on a line from right field to third to gun down Terrance Long. In his words, “Ichiro threw something out of Star Wars.” 

Continue reading →

Buy a Cool Shirt, Support a Great Cause

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Hey Twitter users and Expanded Universe fans, want to support a good cause and get a stylish new shirt for your wardrobe? EUCantina sultan and our Podfather Austin Blankenship is selling wardrobe with my favorite hashtag, #SWEU. Just the thing to take with you to conventions.

Profits will be donated to Reading is Fundamental, a nonprofit geared towards getting books in the hands of kids. A multitude of styles and colors are available, so head on over to Cafepress to get yours.

Francis Lawrence Offered Director Role for ‘Catching Fire’

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With Gary Ross no longer in the picture for Catching Fire, Lionsgate Studios has offered I Am Legend director Francis Lawrence the gig according to The Hollywood Reporter.

It must be noted that it isn’t guaranteed that Lawrence will direct the sequel to this year’s biggest blockbuster hit. Lawrence has not accepted the offer yet and should he turn it down, Lionsgate will need to ramp up their search again to find a suitable replacement. Given their target of having the film hit theaters in November 2013, the studio will be hoping to have a definitive answer soon.

Other directors that were considered include Tomas Alfredson (Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy), Duncan Jones (Source Code), and Bennett Miller (Moneyball). Lawrence came out on top primarily due to scheduling availability.

If nothing else, hopefully this means less shaky-cam moving forward.

via Club Jade

Slow News Day….?

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In an effort to preserve our readership from Brian’s iTunes list, Shane and I were discussing what we could do to possibly indicate a slow news day.  One of the blogs he reads uses the Slow News Day Gorn–appropriately, since there is nothing slower than the Gorn.

But this being a primarily Star Wars blog, news today has been slower than:

a) Greedo’s gun hand (because Han shot first)
b) Jabba the Hutt
c) Bossk (this was Shane’s favorite)
d) the Sarlacc’s Digestion
e) a season on the moisture farm
f) Brian updating his taste in music

Got a better suggestion?  Let us know in the comments.