Teradyn_pff

I think that the thing that upsets me about this is how NOT AOE it feels. Had the same problem with Lords of the Realm III too. Warcraft III seemed to loose the same touch... odd... seeing a pattern here. Maybe third time is not the charm with computer games. Does anyone remember a III being a step up from 2 in a computer game series?

Move the seat of the Empire to another planet and destroy Coruscant with the Death Star! The Jedi are sure to go deaf from that outcry.

@ Darkmark. That was funny. But getting back on topic here... Kashyyk(sp?) was described as too dangerous on the forest floor even for the wookies to live. And I dont see AT-AT walking across wooden bridges, ya know? So will it be a heavily infested ground battle with more casualties due to wildlife than enemy action for both sides? Or will it be a bare map with a few trees here and there? I am thinking that I am going to make sure I am dissapointed with something with this game if I expect everything to look right... I hope they prove me wrong!

I concur with Little.B, the graphics and gameplay seem sticky. Dunno how else to discribe it. Too granular as well in my opinion 1024X768 32bit.

Heh, given the two choices, I would have to claim myself to be Republican in that case. Sorry, can't associate myself with Ewoks.

I am not picking on you Naja, honestly. You did spark a question though. What indication have we had that the imperial and rebel fighters/bombers are anything but special attack units like the US Carrier launched F18s in Generals? The speeders of course are, but what imperial units have we seen that perform that same role? In any even, they seem like support units to the big ground combatants anyway, not direct "battle deciding" decision makers.

Um sorry Vader, didn't mean to do that to you. I was commenting on my fears of what Starcraft 2 would be like IF Blizzard decides to make it.

IMO, Warcraft III could have been done with less graphics. The thing they dissapointed me with was that there was a whole new look, 3d-ish look, new races, etc but a pop cap of 90??? The maps were small considering unit size to map size. Starcraft had the same sprite approach that Warcraft II did and look how well it did. I think Blizzard must have slipped on the precarious edge that so many companies fall from: The flashy graphics over gameplay edge. They managed to come away with a fairly good game, but nowhere near the epic step up we were hoping for that the line Warcraft-->WarcraftII-->Starcraft would have lead us to believe was possible. It became kindof Warcraft < Warcraft II < STARCRAFT ~> warcraftIII. I personally am a little afraid of what Starcraft 2 will be like. Anyone notice that Starcraft Ghost MP does not have any units available (at this time) other than Human? Seem kind of lame to you? It does me. I would think that Blizzard of all companies could have pulled off something better than that.

Ewwwww, ouch. Don't do that. It burnsess the eyesss!

Heh, you people need to be careful. I graduated high scool in 94 and college in 2004... if that gives you any indication. Have a BS in Computer Science and in Mathematics but still shouldn't have taken that long. My only advice is to stay away from the evil side of the gene pool if you get my drift. They are a time and money sink and no good comes of it.

Well, hold on there. You can not say that a country has freedom of self-determination with strings. If a country is operating in a very inhumanistic manner but not outside of its borders then its freedom of self-determination is still intact. The minute someone steps in and says "You can't do that" because it goes against some other country's beliefs, that freedom is taken away. So now we get into a situation where an outside body is stepping in saying you can't do that in your own backyard. This is the point I was trying to make earlier. No country has the right to step in and tell another country what to do. What the US is doing in Iraq for example can be seen as a good thing by some because we are supposedly helping their human rights issues, installing a Democratic government, etc. Truth is, we are doing the same thing that the British did with the African areas but on a more sneaky level. A Democratic society in a very Oil rich country who owes its existence to the US is a powerful resource, right? What I was saying was that I can not stand the Hypocracy. If they are doing the job so poorly in their own country to the point where we need to get involved, we should make them a state in our country and they would be governed, share the same benefits and rights, and share the same obligations etc that any other state in the US does. Otherwise leave them the heck alone. The truth is that if the US went over to Iraq and conquered it and annexed it, the rest of the world would see the shift in Power in terms of Oil (not anything to do with another country taking over another one) and object strongly. Maybe even decide to take up arms to prevent this. Then you get world war III. So what do we do? We work in a sneaky way around to get what we want anyway and proclaim it as an act of mercy, saving these people from themselves and installing a system of government designed to "help them" (read: hook us up with a nice oil source). I strongly object to this as it is dishonorable, sneaky, low, dishonest, etc. Our society as a world is deteriorating rapidly because what is a society where there are no boundaries, no values, no honor?

I am not sure if this was meant as part of the original question but I am wondering how hyperspace is handled once you are in a space battle. In the Star Wars universe, there is no restriction on a single ship going into hyperspace and leaving the fleet, but if anyone remembers Rebellion, you could not do that, the whole fleet had to go at once. I for one hope that a single ship can execute the jump to hyperspace singly as that would present extremely valuable hit-and-run tactics for the Rebels, and the Empire to for that matter. Imagine this scenario: the Rebels build up a large group of ground combatant but dont have too much of a fleet due to a recent engagement with the Empire. They hyperspace in with what they have only to discover that the Empire has a small fleet protecting a repairing Star Destroyer. If you have to move your fleet at once, the Rebels will have to leave right then because they can't adequately protect their troop transports. However, if you can, they could have their transports jump out immediately and launch an attack against the Imperial SD and score a major blow at a relatively low cost fleet-wise. Any thoughts?

If an AT-AT was supposed to contain 3 speeder bikes, their relative sizes in the game would lead me to believe that that particular feature will not be modelled.

Heh, good question. I wondered this myself. My guess would be that cloud city (or that type) will be a battlefield. How? I have no idea because the size of the city would not be condusive to AT-ATs, rebel tanks and especially bombing. Realistically an enemy fleet would be able to wipe out the entire floating city with bombardment easily. Is there a surface under all that gas? It appeared that the upper atmosphere of Bespin was breathable, maybe the lower atmosphere is full of dense gases but still has a solid surface?

I think these changes are a big improvement on isolating the information we are looking for in the questions.

I think that on an average, you will find that the older people will have less and less nice things to say about the prequels. The younger generation tends to buy into the whole hollywood movie mold more than they might realize and this is why Lucas did what he did. He has fallen to the dark side more heavily than even the Emperor. I voted for number 2. The TV series I believe will be Star Wars' downfall. Think about how TV series work. Not fitting for Star Wars. That is the only thing that has kept it so strong in my opinion, is the fact that there were no TV series (not counting animated, haven't seen but they were not as mainstream as thse will be).

Now hold on there Naja. Lets not talk about the parties here because if we go that direction, we get into the fact that the Democratic party has done more to attempt to dissarm the US than anyone. I don't agree with our foreign policy as a whole, especially when it comes to these "peace keeping" missions as they are called. In my opinion, if we have an issue that is going to affect our economy (as the Iraq situation was listed as), we should either leave it alone or make our outright demands for whatever concessions we want and if they are not met, declare outright war on said country and invade, and take over. Harsh? Yes, but that is the honest and most forward thing to do. People may not see the direction our world society is going but it is going down hill. This go out and help everybody attitude is false on the part of our politicians (Rep and Dem alike), and blatently stupid on the part of the populace that believes in it. A country should only police their own territories. If we want to police some other country.. we need to make it our own territory. Plain and simple. What is being attempted now is to step in (in the name of fostering freedom) and change the regime to something that is more likely to trade freely with us. It is money and power, nothing else. All of the freedom and democracy stuff is political crap that is played up to make the whole thing seem like we are doing a good thing. As for the original post, I fully support the use of the 2 bombs. Many points about the lives on both sides have been made well and the 2 bombs did not kill anywhere as many civilians as our conventional raids did. But they make good political targets because of their total effectiveness. The American lives those bombs saved are all that matter. We were at War with Japan and anyone that thinks that means only military casualties are fools. Most of the uniformed military of Japan were not even considering military duty when WWII started. They were civilians pressed into service, like so many of our military. Remember that the Japanese pilots who killed so many Americans in the Pearl Harbor sneak attack were just kids during the first world war. Keep that in mind when decrying civilian casualties. The men who fought and died in the Pacific on those islands were just as deserving of life as the civilians who were working to support the armies that were killing them. Think on this, look at a cute little baby boy and see how innocent and sweet he is. Stalin, Hitler, Hussein were all cute little baby boys at one time. War is death and destruction, it is the last mediator when all others fail. Tell a family member that their son, brother, father, etc who died was a military casualty, but that the civilians supporting the ones who killed him are more tragic. See what they think about that

Ugg, I think I have seen that image somewhere too. An AT-AT mounting another one that had fallen over in the classic tripped pose. Someone needs to have their fingers removed and their copy of photoshop erased.

They both on the same side, right? So what the < or > comparisons for? The question is is Boba Fet > Dash or not? I know he is < Kyle because Kyle wooped him in combat. JA ref.

Well, if you want to get technical about it.. what does the opening text to all of the trilogies say? So we are already past that point in history. Who knows.. maybe we are the decendants of a group of crashed explorers... maybe Atlantis wasn't a city but the crashed space ship... could go on and on with this.

That does make sense. No use wasting the hype when they can use it to get peoples attention during the Christmas media blitz. I kind of think that they should have waited on the Death Star until then but due to the timeline that would have been a given.

I am Jeff from Tyler, TX USA. Just turned 29 and am a Programming Data Specialist for a large media corporation. I have two cats, a brother and sister who are named Boots and Mittens respectively. I enjoyed the original trilogy but am not to thrilled with the direction that the prequels went (don't feel that Lucas has the same vision he did when he created episodes IV - VI). I also am not to crazy with the different directions some of the EU stories went as well. Too many authors for one story if you get my meaning. As a result my EU experience is pretty limited to what is exposed in the PC games like Dark Forces and the like. I played Rebellion more hours than I would like to admit and thoroughly enjoyed it for the most part. The parts that were kind of off for me are exactly what EAW is going to fix apparently and I can't wait. I honestly wish I hadn't found out about it until later.

If you get a chance, grab a copy of Rebellion (e-bay, bargain bin, etc). This will give you the best look, IMO, of the galactic map, missions and space combat next to playing EAW. Ground combat is non-existant as it is kind of dice rolled in a way, but nowhere else are you going to get the Galactic + Space Combat combo that is going to be a critical precursor to any ground combat you are prepairing for in EAW. I do agree with Homeworld 1 or 2 as a good idea of how the space combat will feel, but still there is not really a good substitute for the galactic portion of EAW other than Rebellion.

Does anyone know how rebel attacks on the Death Star will be conducted? Will it be a direct attack like against an ISD's ion cannons, or will it be a special attack ala Rebellion that can be performed when the rebels have X number of fighters more than the imperials? This makes a huuuuuge difference on any tactic that will be employed against this superweapon. If it is like rebellion, the imperial player can have all of his fighters running around in circles leading the rebel fighters on a wild goose chase around the imperial capital ships getting them picked off one by one. Although I will probably be playing the Empire mostly, this is an extremely gamey tactic and one that should not be necessary. Who knows, maybe that is the only way to do it if the Death Star is a distant item not really part of the space battle. We do know however, that we really can't know until we get a few very specific questions answered. 1. Can the Death Star fire on rebel capital ships with the Superlaser?(Either to begin with, or as an upgrade signifying the Death Star II) 2. How does a rebel commander initiate an attack on the Death Star with fighters to destroy the core and how does an imperial player try to protect against this? 3. Is the Death Star an entity in the space battle or an actual modelled station that can be attacked conventionally by capital ships, turbolaser to turbolaser? 4. Can single ships be sent away into hyperspace or does the entire fleet need to go at the same time? 5. Can the Death Star bombard the planet with turbolaser fire not just destroying it with the superlaser? Feel free to add any questions you can think of that would impact the rebel and imperial players' strategem with regard to the Death Star.

My guess would be that the Death Star in the game would be based on the first one. If it is fully modeled, it might have a few upgrades available to bring it around to the second design, but even the first model would be extremely overkill in a nose to nose battle with rebel capital ships. On first consideration it would seem extremely unbalanced to model the Death Star in the game with all of it's surface weapons, fighters, launchable craft, etc. But the issue of it being able to be destroyed with one of the cheapest units on the rebel side makes up for that I think. Not only would the surface weapons be formidable, but I think that the stormtrooper, fighter, and other craft should be there in any event. This thing is extremely costly to produce and extremely risky to deploy due to the achilles heel it has, so in my opinion the full modelling of the Death Star should be done. Unfortunately, the size difference, complexity of dealing with the 2.5d space and planetary gravity constraints will probably have the developement team relegating it to a 3d model that is outside of the regular playing field. Rebel fighter missions against it will be like in Rebellion where they can perform the attack when they have x number of fighters compaired to the Empire. I may be wrong about this but then again, I never imagined a game like EAW being made the way it is anyway. I think that the Death Star's actual capabilities vs what is depicted in the game will make a difference when talking about orbital bombardment, troop and fighter reinforcements, etc. I am excited to learn what Petroglyph has in store for us in this respect because it will drastically change what tactics are employed in this war.