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i can understand the whole discussion about the Rebellion not having any funding and therefore having to make due with what they have... but since the Empire does have control of most the galaxy.. wouldnt they have a substancial amount of money from their operations... and in that way couldn't they afford more advanced or better looking ships...
I'm not concerned so much with the outward appearance of the ships as I am with their visible interfaces. Clearly the pod racer, the royal cruiser, and the naboo fighters all have much more sophisticated graphical interfaces. The problem with this is that, by comparison, the x-wings and tie fighters, the millenium falcon, and the imperial shuttle of the OT appear to be severely dated. The controls, the displays, all look like much older technology. To be fair, they are much older technology, having been produced in 77-83. However, they could easily have matched that in the PT to make things appear more congruous. As it stands, it's hard to buy the jump from detailed and pretty cg displays in a Naboo fighter to the barely stick figure representations we get in an x-wing, a ship over 30 years newer. Ditto for the tie fighters.
Honestly, I fully expect Lucas to fix those up when he gets to his final editions of the OT, and honestly, those are the kinds of additions that don't bother me in the slightest.