Burdokva

I know it's something supposedly minor but am I the only one who is very disappointed at how bland the new Imperial, ahem, First Order vehicles look like?

The TIE/fo in particular (it's been practically confirmed that's the official name based on the X-Wing board game and Bandai's upcoming scale model), it's just a normal TIE-Fighter with some very minor detail alteration and negative colour scheme! White radiator/solar panels and black hull! ... Meh.

Oh, prequel designs discussion! How I've longed thee! ...

Honestly, the prequels were very hit-and-miss design wise. I loved some things, I hated others. Apparently I'm in the minority for liking The Phantom Menace the most out of the three and I also believe that it had the best designs. Particularly the Naboo fighters. 

Doug Chiang initially designed them with a widened tail boom to accommodate the astromech droid but Lucas revised the design as it wasn't streamlined enough. Here's Doug's original concept:

I am not sure if true but I've also read that the two renditions of the Jedi starfighters underwent a similar treatment so as to be sleeker (and the full scale AOTC prop cheaper), hence why Artoo doesn't fit inside.

I liked the blasters, the Naboo soldier uniforms, most of the Trade Federation vehicles and ships. The battle droids are not a bad design and if they weren't total idiots as characters I'm sure more people would appreciate it.

I also loved the (briefly seen) Separatist capital ships in Revenge of the Sith. I know they're based on unused Rebel cruiser designs for Return of the Jedi, which might explain why I though the fitted great with the OT design aesthetic (minus the bright coloration). Loved the Invisible Hand. Stupid name for a warship but great design. I only wish it was featured more prominently, as well as the other Separatist ships, in ... well, pretty much everything prequel related.

What bothered me was the lack of design cohesion. I didn't mind that TPM looked sleek and polished unlike the rusty OT but I hated how there wasn't an overarching design aesthetic within the prequel trilogy and within the various organizations. I would have preferred for the entire prequel trilogy to be different visually rather than "evolving" toward the OT. Which didn't even work out fine.

Say, the Separatists - why didn't they keep those awesome AAT tanks from the first movie (aside from LFL selling toys)? Instead, we got increasingly boring "tank" droid designs. Many of the existing designs deteriorated by Revenge of the Sith. Droid control ships, which became like donuts not only in shape but in their colored toppings, and the droid starfighters.

What I honestly hated were the Jedi robes. Okay, wasn't Ben Kenobi wearing just some tattered robes suitable for a desert hermit? Like pretty much everyone on Tatooine, aside from the hooded cape?

Nope, they're now the standard Jedi uniform. Which looks silly, pretentious and out of place.  

-Please ignore-

Has Ady stated anywhere what he intends to do about Anakin's age in Ep. I? Will he keep him as a kid and hime a large time jump between Ep. I-II or try to insert Hayden/actor as a young adult and scrap Anakin being 9 years old?

One thing I hope there is more of in PT:R is space! The Prequels severely lacked that feeling of a vast galaxy, space travel and exploration. And I don't mean simply adding more space battles but generally more time spent on starships and in space. Also, having Anakin actually be a great pilot wouldn't hurt.

I'd love to see more Dooku too. Given Christopher Lee's few scenes would it be possible to have Dooku play a larger role? I am thinking something along the lines of Dooku running around on the Separatist flagship and pursued by Obi-Wan/Anakin or the Jedi as a whole, somewhat vaguely resembling the Rebels fleeing the Empire in TESB. More space! :)  

Wow! I'm ming boggled by that screen comparison of Obi Wan on Geonosis. I can't believe how better and more natural it looks with just a color correction!

For the first time.. I'm actually midly optimistic about the PT:Revisited.

Hey Ady, if that doesn't count as spoiler for the edit, could we get some photos of the scale models you've built? As a scale modeler myself (I have two FM 1/72 X-Wings, one that's getting a complete rebuild after I messed it up as a kid, and a brand new one still unopened) I'm very interested to see how they've turned out. Not movie shots, just photos of the models. :)

If you want to keep them a secret, I understand. But I propose you add an Extra clip "Making of - The Models" once ESB:R is out.

Tough luck with filming the Degobah shot! Thumbs up for the re-shoot, keep going man! ESB:R will be great. :)

Something I saw in The Force Awakens threat (so great not having to use "Episode"!) reminded me about a very irritating thing the Prequels.

Ady, whatever your story structure will be, please, please have Padme be either a Queen (an actual royalty) or an elected Senator for her planet. But not an elected Queen with a fixed mandate. Just... please. It's a horrible, terrible idea.

Joke aside, sometimes I dread posting here. I say "can't wait to see TESB:R" and I fear people would pile on top to say I'm being pushy. Call me crazy but... :)

Eh! 

Hey, Ady, could you spoil us with some photos of the X-Wings you made for the shots? As a scale-modeler I'm curious to see what you did with them. 

Can I say that I'm still very excited about TEST:R and can't wai to see it finished? Awesome works and congrats on the job Ady! :)

Also, a dictator isn't an evil space wizard. They should have sensed the Force being strong(ly evil) with him. ;)

I didn't thought much about it from the movie. Some large conlfict decades ago, which involved clones and Obi-Wan being a general in it. Interesting backstory piece, nothing more.

After reading Timothy Zahn's trilogy (which is fantastic and one of the EU pieces I love most dearly) I thought that it was a galaxy-spanning conflict between the Republic's army of regular soldiers led by the Jedi against another army, likely (Separatist) aliens. This also explaining why the Empire was staffed only by humans.

I even though they were two intertwined conflicts, hence the plural "wars". The first, when the Jedi and the Republic defeated the enemy, and then when the semi-crazed Dark Jedi - clones hastily created by the Jedi in desperation due to their dwindling numbers during the war - rebelled, also leading a large host of growth accelerated cloned soldiers. During the second conflict the entire clone army went crazy (to the Dark Side) and aimlessly rampaged accross the Galaxy.

Palpatine used the chaos and usurped power, creating the Empire and smashing the clones/Dark Jedi. Behind the scenes, though, he had been influencing the Dark Jedi or teaching the Force to mentally unstable clones.

Everything in the recent clip has been fantastic. Two minor effects that I miss were the "electrified" TIE during the canyon collision and that at the end the two TIEs stop blasting away at the Falcon (admittedly, this was also missing from the original version).

One thing that in all honesty I do not like though the shaking effect that implies the Star Destroyer collision (if that was the what Ady aimed for).

It makes the Imperials look quite incompetent and somewhat lessens the impact of the danger the Falcon and her crew are in. It's as if the Falcon escapes not only by Han being an incredible pilot but also because the Imperial fleet just can't catch it due to its own incompetence.

As with .Mac. I also assumed that it's a last minute evasive maneuver to escape collision and it shows just how good the Imperial fleet is and how much they're willing to risk. Would it be possible to leave the shaking effect but much more toned down?

I'm not much into movie editing/effects but if possible I think it would be great if there's a slight, smooth but noticeable "sideways" shake to the right side of the screen. It implies that it's the result of kinetic forces not being compensated fully by the artificial gravity on the ships due to the sudden evasive maneuver to the right but not an actual collision.

:)

I know it has become a staple of Star Wars history but I never thought that there were actual "Red" or "Gold" squadrons when I originally watched the movie as a kid. I thought they were simply the squadrons' callsigns. Same with "Home One", which was clearly a callsign. Seriously, who would name a battleship and a fleet flagship at that "Home One"!? At least the X-Wing series tried to fix it and call it Independence but that was later retconned. Meh.

Whatever, my point is why should things be taken so literally? Real pilots in wartime flew a number of planes. Whether their "mount" was lost to ground fire, shot down, mechanical wear or engine/structural failure. Luke's "Red 5" X-Wing was just a random beat down X-Wing* that was likely replaced with other random not so worn X-Wings as the war progressed.

* don't get me started about how stupid the entire X-Wings "are super secret top of the line stolen fighters" thing is. At best they should have been the previous generation (Clone Wars/pre-Civil War years) top of te line fighters, like late 1980s Su-27s or F-15s.

Even the supposedly inferior TIEs are clearly faster in the Death Star trench run and look newer/more modern. ;)

Just to note I prefer the widescreen shots of the Falcon's cockpit. There's something off for me in the cropped shots, so thumbs up for all the hard work, Ady!

I haven't been able to find much info on it in the thread but (besides obviously re-cutting to match the video) what are you aiming for with the audio? Besides being a 5.1 mix, anything specific? Are you re-doing sound effects, etc.?

Sorry, just trying to get some info w/out having to again ask for a release date (soon...)! :)

Eman, fantastic clip! I can't believe how real RotS can actually look.

The project is very interesting and I hope you can spoil us with some more screenshots and/or clips soon. 

Thumbs up, will continue to look how this develops! :)

Easterhay said:

Burdokva said:

The OT was never solely about the redemption of Darth Vader, or even about Luke becoming a hero.

Well, the OT is about Luke becoming a hero. I don't know why you think it isn't.

See, wanting to stop your pregnant wife from dying is pretty emotional, especially when compared to the idea you posit, about wanting a bunch of spaceships, which wouldn't have had any emotional impact at all.

Added bold for clarity. See again the "solely" part (or maybe my English isn't clear enough; "only" then).

Regarding the "emotional impact" of Anakin's fall...

Each to his own. For someone like me who's interested (and studied) history and politics, this was a cringe inducing and ridiculous reason that had no basis in reality. Because we're full of people wanting vast military and political power to save their wives at childbirth, right?  

People who want power lust over it because they want to establish empires, legacies, to rebuild societies and even the world to their own vision; people who are usually idealists (even if their ideas are terribly flawed) and put their ideas before their loved ones. 

People who want to protect their loved ones generally try to put them out of harms way; if anything, they don't go on a quest and attempt to prevent death itself. I really can't establish an emotional connection to a completely delusional character who obsesses over his wife dying at childbirth given their miraculous technology. 

Sorry, but even in a world of  faster-than-light starships and space wizards this sounds implausible, to say the least.

Not to mention it's completely different to the Darth Vader character of the OT.

DuracellEnergizer said:

Prior to the release of the PT, I had come to envision the Mandalorians as this formidable society of relentless warriors who were able to rival the Jedi even though they weren't primarily made up of Force-users. Unfortunately, the PT and the subsequent EU have spoiled that perception.

I had a similar concept of them. Warriors who relentlessly train to hone their skill and use advanced technology to offset the advantage a Force-user may have. That they'd look down on Jedi as archaic and generally see themselves in the vein of "the modern world" vs "tradition and mysticism" in theme, without having some very specific credo or culture.

Or, more plainly said, knight vs wizard.

The OT was never solely about the redemption of Darth Vader, or even about Luke becoming a hero. Watching the OT I was as much involved in the fight of the Rebels against the Empire as that of Luke's personal story. It wasn't just a background for other character events, rather it was a developing story all of its own.

The PT had none of this. Endless, poorly edited "battle scenes" for the characters supposedly doing something in while not on (horribly monotonous) sit and talk scenes. As RLM put it, people in the ST mostly just sit/walk and talk if not involved in bad CGI pew-pew nonsensical battles.

I don't mind seeing Anakin's fall tote Dark Side if it was one part of a larger story about how the Republic fell and the Empire came to be. One that made some sense and had an emotional impact for the viewer, that is.

Also, I seem to be in the small minority on this but seriously, Anakin became "evil" out of love?! That was not only cliché. It didn't make sense. Anakin should have become Darth Vader out of wanting power. Maybe of a misjudged sense that "his" way was better and had to be enforced even through power and terror; because he wanted vast fleets and armies to make the world as his will. Not because his wife was (supposedly) about to die at childbirth... eh...

What I'm most afraid about the Sequels is that they'll pull of the same soap opera routine as the Prequels did. Not a space adventure, not even a war story in space. Just plain afternoon episodic drama with some CGI crammed in.

Musical score added to the podrace from the 'Shadows of the Empire' soundtrack and from 'A New Hope.' Podrace edited to accommodate new music. 

That sounds great! I've always wondered why fan editors don't use the SotE soundtrack. It's very good and, IMHO, better than the scores for AotC and RotS.

Can't wait to see the edit. Seems like a lean and fast version of Ep. I without being a radical change.

I've always thought that the Separatists were too incoherent and "weak" villains. 

How about introducing Dooku early on  as the master of Maul (no "Darth", just Maul). And Dooku's personal flagship, from which he leads the nascent Separatist movement, could be the Invisible Hand.

An idea I had sometime ago was about basing Ep. II around a search for Doou and his flagship. In a sense a reverse situation of TESB, only this time it's the rag-tag Republic strike force trying to hunt down the large enemy ship.

The Clone Wars did something similar in the Malevolence arc.

As for blowing up, I believe a CGI shot with an overlaid explosion wouldn't be that hard.

Personally, I like the donut ship design (a lot, in fact) but it served its purpose in Ep. I. It looks like a floating hangar that dispatches troops or hauls cargo not a fast warship.

The Invisible Hand, on the other hand (sorry), looks like a fast and menacing ship that's made to fight and escape, if needed.

I have been trying to find this one for a while and with help to Galactus (thank you!) I finally got to watch it today. 

I watched only Disk 2 - The Cinematic Cut. My overall impression is very positive!

The DVD itself is done very professional. The menus are great, very responsive (note that I did watch it on my HT PC, as I no longer have a dedicated DVD player), very atmospheric.

The video quality is good, especially during the pre-rendeed cutscenes. In-game sections show the ago of the game but the cutscenes are amazingly good, the motion-capturing in particular.

The audio was solid during the pre-rendered cutscenes and menus, some cracking and wobbliness during captured footage but I think this is normal. I got a 2.0 on my setup but I'm unsure if this was due to codecs or the release itself.

It's obvious a lot of work has gone into the editing. From time to time the "player" shows the entire scene in sweeping 360 degree shots, which is nice. I also really enjoyed the moments when Jango's display appeared, as well as the sniper rifle section.

The "widescreen" treatment was barely noticeable and I didn't feel like parts of the screen were cut. It felt very natural in 16:9!

Admittedly, after the first half hour the firefights can get a bit too much but that is something that's unavoidable, especially in an arcade shooter such as this.

It seemed to me a lot of effort was put to trim them down as much as possible while keeping the flow of the story, which is good. Still, somehow I feel that had this edit used cheats during gameplay it would have been great; seeing Jango cut through lesser thugs even faster.

Something to note, the DVD fast forward/fast backward function is very fast and smooth, which it usually isn't on my rig (and hence why I avoid DVDs). Thumbs up here!

I haven't payed Bounty Hunter (never had a console) and couldn't really experience the story, despite wanting too. And the story is good!

As someone who doesn't have any previous knowledge I had no issue following the plot and enjoy it as a movie. I can fully recommend!

Good job, guys! And thank you!

EDIT: Just found out my dedicated sound card was disabled in BIOS after some hardware changes during Christmas, so this likely explains why I got only 2.0 stereo.... apologies for any misinformation!

Is this still live? Looked very promising, sad to see there have been no updates in a while...

Well, I've always thought that Dooku would work magnificently as a Jedi who believes that the only way to defeat the Sith, who are slowly overtaking the Republic, is to go on an all out war against it and take over.

Tragically misguided, lured into the Dark Side and not entirely a "hero" but rather a ruthless, dedicated leader with good intentions.

And the Separatists (who should have been formed at the beginning of Ep.I) could have been the twisted version of the Rebel Alliance.

Instead of poor but heroic rebels, the Separatists are initially rich and power hungry human and alien star system who eventually are united by the fear of an increasingly brutal Republic, and fighting for independence. Over the course of the movies you get to sympathize more with their cause, however flawed it was at the beggining.

Monroville said:

This may have been dealt with, but will we see any red lasers come out of the side guns on the AT-ATs?  There are times when the side guns move in reaction to the snowspeeders but nothing happens:

 I ave to agree. While I always found the side (anti-aircraft, I guess) guns to be very interesting, they also look wierd in that they do nothing....

What I'm dreading is a "new" villain who is actually a young clone of Palpatine. Worse, he's not even "clone", he is created by Palpatine only through the force (to bridge with Ep. III").

Oh, the horror...

If there's anything I'd like to see from the Prequels, it would be the Separatist capial ships from Ep. III. Fantastic designs which were greatly underused.