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[G-Flex]

Did someone actually describe Star Wars as "steampunk"? My head is spinning, and now it's falling off. That is the most absurd thing one could possibly say about the series.

[Starver]

What shall I add to this rather loosely themed thread?

How about "The worst thing that happened to Star Wars was George Lucas"?  As in his meddling with the original conceit.  The revamping of the concepts of the original (median) trilogy in both presentation (the "Digital Remastering" and editing) and in the prequel trilogy.  Midichlorians?  Of all common internet acronyms, I don't use "WTF!?!?!" often, barely even as much as LOL, but it would accurately represent my opinion.  And there's a new edit been out recently, hasn't there, to universal 'Meh' by fans world-wide, from what I hear...  But what else do you expect from someone who publicly called Endor "Planet Of The Wookies"?

The Star Wars universe as I knew it in the '80s is just about right, IMHO.  I remember playing the Star Wars RPG, way back then.  (Didn't know it was WOTC, the source material involved was a GMing friend's.)  And anyone else familiar with the character sheets watched the "Luke vs Vader in the Emperor's Deathstar throneroom scene" and counted up how many Dark Side Points were earned by Luke?  No wonder that in the Extended Universe/final trilogy...  ooh, that'd be a spoiler, wouldn't it....


So, I know there are opinions that we really need someone who is Not George Lucas[1] to get Episodes 7-9 filmed.  Anyone want to argue against that?  Whatever, we need to (re-)retcon some of the more recent material/changes.  (Not sure if the Clone Wars stuff is supposed to be Extended Universe/Fan-Accepted canon.)  Hey, maybe get the Darths And Droids team in on the project.


(And Steampunk indeed?  To know what Steampunk is, you need the Space:1889 RPG.  (Or just go for the Gibson material, "The Difference Engine" by him and Bruce Sterling, IIRC, in particular.)   Anyway, had nice times playing 1889, as well...  Same RPing group as with Star Wars, with whom we did various other SF-ish things, Babylon 5, etc)

[palsch]

Bah, that's nowhere near controversial enough.

[Starver]

Bah, that's nowhere near controversial enough.

I'd add to the comments on the end of that article, but I fear I'd be doing little more than an AOL/"Me too!" to (most of!) the rest of the comments.  Inclusive of the BBtS comparison.

The common theory among me and my '80s-living compatriots was that Ep5 was the epitome of The Way It Should Be because because A New Hope might (or might not) have had the planned sequels[1], this as yet unproven piece of fiction had to have a "Hooray, Happy Ending!" conclusion, as of course did Ep6.  But Ep5 could afford to leave it dark, because it was essentially Part One of a two part sequel to Ep4.

How this theory still stands in light of Eps1-3 (all of these known to be leading onwards, and with the inevitable arc of Anni's life leading to you-know-what-situation, in particular, although I think to concentrate on him alone is also a distraction) is hard to say.  You still get the HHE in Ep1...  Memory fails me about Eps2/3, but (Gungun Marching Band especially), Ep1 is very much like a localised version of the "joyous bells ring out across the galaxy" ending of the 'improved and extended' Ep6 ending of the first-revamp version.


But I think a comparison with the opinions of someone who has never seen anything other than the adulterated version is necessary, to be honest.  A bit like getting a resolving a Studio Cut/Director's Cut difference of preference for Blade Runner.  (Yes, I'm putting it on the same footing.  And in this case I've only ever seen the DC version, plus a strange intermediate version that the person I was with when it came on TV (who had seen both of the other 'original' types) swears is neither...)


[1] And prequels.  Even at that time it was obvious there were supposed to be some, although prior to the turn of the millennium/whenever Ep1 came out, we had still assumed they'd be relegated to the Extended Universe books.

[Telgin]

Anyone play the Star wars RPG?

I have some. Seemed okay. Maybe not super balanced. But I had fun.

Expect where my party blasted off a planet and left me in the middle of a war. 

With Jar-jar. 

I have played it, but I don't like the modern version all that much (the one based on D20).  I played the original D6 version too, and loved it 10x as much.  It didn't have silliness like armor making you harder to hit and HP that go up with levels.

What I find hilarious is that they actually fixed some of that nonsense in an earlier version of the D20 Star Wars and then went back on the decision to make it regular old D20 again.

Meh, maybe I'm just bitter.  I like GURPS more than either system, but there will never be a source book for Star Wars for GURPS due to licensing, and I'm too lazy to convert everything over to it.

[ChairmanPoo]

Some decent sci-fi to cure yourselves from Jarjarithis.

http://doctord.dyndns.org:8000/stories/nightfall.htm

[Aqizzar]

I had the old Star Wars RPG (the one made by West End Games).

I never owned nor played the West End Games (who made it before Wizards bought it) Star Wars RPG, but I did have... The West End Games Star Wars Tabletop Wargame.  Based on the same system as their RPG, which meant every model and squad had a full stat sheet, ludicrously complicated terrain rules, no rules whatsoever on how to compose a force, and a one-page Vehicles section that said "We'll publish rules for vehicles later."  It specifically said you should probably have a third person to act as Game Master because there's so many holes in the system.

The cover claimed it was voted "Best New Wargame of 1994" by some magazine.  I'll say.  And no, I never played it.

[Dsarker]

But what else do you expect from someone who publicly called Endor "Planet Of The Wookies"?

I'd like to point out that this was the original intent, according to Lucas. He was a big fan of the wookies.

[RedKing]

Did someone actually describe Star Wars as "steampunk"? My head is spinning, and now it's falling off. That is the most absurd thing one could possibly say about the series.

 

Spoiler: O RLY? (click to show/hide)

[Telgin]

I never owned nor played the West End Games (who made it before Wizards bought it) Star Wars RPG, but I did have... The West End Games Star Wars Tabletop Wargame.  Based on the same system as their RPG, which meant every model and squad had a full stat sheet, ludicrously complicated terrain rules, no rules whatsoever on how to compose a force, and a one-page Vehicles section that said "We'll publish rules for vehicles later."  It specifically said you should probably have a third person to act as Game Master because there's so many holes in the system.

The cover claimed it was voted "Best New Wargame of 1994" by some magazine.  I'll say.  And no, I never played it.

That doesn't surprise me really.  The RPG was more complicated in some ways than D20, but I felt the flexibility of a level free and open character development system was worth it.

The RPG had some holes in its rules too, to be sure.  There were also a number of balance issues (Wookies could become immune to most blasters if players maxed their strength, even without armor.  They could even be tougher than a speeder).  Jedi were monstrously powerful as their character point totals grew.  Some of the other aliens kind of sucked too, and humans were overall better than most aliens.

But it was definitely playable and the issues weren't hard to live with or work around.

My biggest gripe is basically what you pointed out above: "We'll publish rules for X later."  The system was nicely detailed and they had a lot of content, but a lot more was promised that never came out because the company went bankrupt.

[Aqizzar]

Bah, that's nowhere near controversial enough.

Since I just got to reading this, I can say it's a little pretentious but the guy's points do stand.  More importantly, that was the biggest collection of high-brow masturbation allusions I've ever read in one blogpost.

[Sordid]

Oh I think it's more than a little pretentious to think you can see into somebody's head and know their motivations.

They are the selfish, ungenerous, onanistic output of a man who has no desire to include others in the internal grammar of his fictional world. They are the ultimate in auteur theory, but this creator has contempt for the people who view his work — or if not contempt, at the very least a near-austistic lack of concern as to whether anyone else “gets” his vision. The word “entertainer” has as an assumption that the creator/actor is reaching out to his or audience to engage them. George Lucas doesn’t bother with this.

He makes it sound like Lucas knew what he was doing. I think there's a much simpler explanation for the quality of the prequel trilogy: Lucas sucks as a director and writer.

[Starver]

I had the old Star Wars RPG (the one made by West End Games).

Ah, that explains why I never knew about the WotC connection.

In fact, given the 1990 foundation date of WotC (quickly looking that up), it was before they even existed when I first played the Star Wars RPG, and I don't know when the last time I was involved[1], but it was still the same source stuff.

(Never knowingly used WotC products.  I remember the hype over their Magic: the Gathering stuff, in their early days, but I classed it as little different from Pokemon.  Or vice-versa, as I'm pretty sure Pokemon was later[2], but it's a handy reference.)


[1] Except that I know I was participating also in a campaign based in the Babylon 5 universe, which puts a certain knowable limit on that era, even without taking into account the lag between B5's inception and their RPG stuff coming out.

[2] In my old age[3], though, I'm not entirely sure about that, but can't be arsed to check.

[3] "Who's the Prime Minister, dear?  The Prime Minister!  Put your hearing aid in, dear!!"