103 replies to this topic

[Kaleb Graff]

When will these people learn that the best way to make a good-selling Star Wars game is to make an actual Star Wars game, not a generic (insert genre here) with Star Wars units? That Age of Empires ripoff (so bad I can't even remember the name) is a perfect example.

That was Galactic Battlegrounds. They probably won't learn though, so long as people buy them. Maybe we could arrange a boycott.

[Markus]

all the 142 independent worlds......

The other 16 worlds are Empire/Alliance starting worlds.

That's it. I need a new computer...... I can't even get away with playing anything but the 30 something planet map in the current release.......


/cry I need a bigger pocket book....

[SpardaSon21]

When will these people learn that the best way to make a good-selling Star Wars game is to make an actual Star Wars game, not a generic (insert genre here) with Star Wars units? That Age of Empires ripoff (so bad I can't even remember the name) is a perfect example.

That was Galactic Battlegrounds. They probably won't learn though, so long as people buy them. Maybe we could arrange a boycott.

Thanks Kaleb, or not. There was a reason I didn't remember the name. *Shudders in horror at recollections of game.

A boycott? Doubtful. Only hardcore fans visit forums and the various internet stuff, and if we got enough people to arrange a viable boycott we could just pretty much demand whatever features we wanted at that point. Sadly, a lot of people (idiots) love the new direction (obviously since Lucas is rolling in cash from them), so we are stuck with all that garbage (including Jar-Jar) as canon, never mind the fact the stuff there makes any decent fan want to vomit himself to death to purge the filth from his body.

I could handle a lot of the prequel garbage. The fact that the Gungans and Jar-Jar are actual irrefutable Star Wars canon now is simply disgusting though.

[keraunos]

I could handle a lot of the prequel garbage. The fact that the Gungans and Jar-Jar are actual irrefutable Star Wars canon now is simply disgusting though.

That's another thing that is hard not to love PR (mod ) for. Simply put, in canon SW few ideas are exploited forever - look at gungans - Jar Jar even appears in all prequels. Now SW is all about few races (with as many strange characteristics as possible), and few people changing the fate of the galaxy. This "dumbing down" is simply irritiating - we have so many sources to make GFFA truly alive, with plenty diffrent races, many people and ships and few heroes that can influence, not shape galaxy.

Thanks for keeping up not only with SW, but with realism and massive scale, Phoenix

[Phoenix Rising]

Sadly, a lot of people (idiots) love the new direction (obviously since Lucas is rolling in cash from them), so we are stuck with all that garbage (including Jar-Jar) as canon, never mind the fact the stuff there makes any decent fan want to vomit himself to death to purge the filth from his body.

I have an admission: in the nearly 10 years since TPM was released, I've seen it exactly once, at midnight on opening day. By comparison, I've probably seen ANH 100 times. That's either A): really bad because someone in my position should know G-canon material inside and out, or B): speaks volumes about the difference between PR and official games. You decide. However, I'll probably end up getting the prequel trilogy on DVD for reference purposes (obviously the other two aren't as bad).

[feld]

I have an admission: in the nearly 10 years since TPM was released, I've seen it exactly once, at midnight on opening day. By comparison, I've probably seen ANH 100 times. That's either A): really bad because someone in my position should know G-canon material inside and out, or B): speaks volumes about the difference between PR and official games. You decide. However, I'll probably end up getting the prequel trilogy on DVD for reference purposes (obviously the other two aren't as bad).

Confession:
I've been a SW fan since roughly 1980 (If you can count a five year old as a fan). I had the same feeling towards the prequels on first viewing. A recent revisit has left me liking them alot more than when I first saw them. Yes, we can all make our own list of things that we hated. That's not my point: the movies certainly had problems. And no one needs another list of those.

But I'll say this: I have recently reviewed all three prequels and I think that much of my initial dislike was because I had a bunch of expectations in my head and GL didn't give what I expected. How dare he!? <grin> What he did give me actually has some redeeming features on a review. It all clicked (for me at least) when I heard a commentary from Lucas saying (in his head) the movies are all one film and it's called "The Trajedy of Darth Vader". Recommend grabbing those films and watching all six in order with a fresh set of eyes now that the initial disappointment has worn off.
PS - when you re-watch the Battle of Coruscant, watch carefully: I really do believe that they're all on repulsorlift...and that the folks at ILM thought about it when they filmed it...

Edited by feld, 19 December 2008 - 10:24 PM.

[Kitkun]

I never really cared for TPM, even when I saw it on release day. When I was nine. Jar-Jar was overdone.
AotC was alright. I liked how the movie was mostly about them hunting the enemy.
RotS, though, I liked. I loved the much darker tone, and the combat was just great.

Edited by Kitkun, 20 December 2008 - 05:56 AM.

[Casen]

The Phantom Menace was by far the worst Star Wars movie. The ground battle was stupid, the space battle was short and pathetic, and Jar-Jar was a nightmare (but that goes without saying).

The only redeeming factor was the decent lightsaber battle, but then again the lightsaber fights, and the Jedi/Sith in general, have never been my primary interest when it comes to Star Wars. So for me TPM was the worst.

Attack of the Clones was better...though at certain times too much stuff was going on at once.

Revenge of the Sith was good purely for the drama factor.

But still, not to sound cliche`, the classic trilogy beats the prequel trilogy.

[Tropical Bob]

I will say that The Phantom Menace is not among my favorite movies of all time, but I am going to disrupt the flow here. I don't hate it. *GASP*

I like it...Though not necessarily the actors: I'm sure they could've found a better little Ani...What I think is really important about it, and gives it a big reason not to disregard, is that it sets up everything that follows in the whole series.

And I do like how Lucas made it so that the trilogy was basically about Anakin and his spiral into darkness. In fact, from a certain point of view, the entire movie series is about him: from childhood to his death, and his journey into the dark, and back to the light.

[Phoenix Rising]

Jar Jar, Jake Lloyd, and everything else in TPM aside, my main complaint is that it just isn't epic. It's a prologue that didn't ever need to be on screen. As far as I'm concerned, the plot is analogous to UPS invading Saskatchewan. That's not Star Wars. Star Wars is about struggle on a galactic scale. I can name dozens of books that would've made better movies.

[Kitkun]

As far as I'm concerned, the plot is analogous to UPS invading Saskatchewan.

Hmm... what would they use? They've got the trucks and aircraft, but the winter weather'd slow 'em down... and for combat... the fruit and chocolates the company I work at is shipping? The flowers from the last place I worked at?

[keraunos]

I also watched TPM only once - the worst SW movie, without doubts. It doesn't only suffer from poor scripts, badly though (and executed) battles, but also annoying gungans :/ But it had one good side - technology. We've seen plenty of interesting TF stuff - all the way from Lucrehulks and Droid Fighters to B1 Battle Droids (even with annoying sounds, entire idea is really good) and cool Droidekkas And it had Maul - the character that gains a lot in the novelization and, especially, 'prequel' novels and comics.

AotC was a disaster as well, but this one got saved by confederacy plot, and epic battle at the end. I watched it plenty of times. Well, at least last 20 minutes

On the other hand, RotS was IMO second only to ESB. Excellent plot (again, much better in novelization - Anakins actions seem much more probable there - the only downside of the movie), seduction by evil and struggles of characters (think Anakin-ObiWan), epic battles, and Great Change - coming of the empire :] It would be even better without annoying focus on Anakin, but that's simply one of the Lucas ideas. Still, close to perfection (read - ESB )

[Kaleb Graff]

I must admit I really can't join you in your attacks on TPM, as I actually liked it when I first saw it. Then again, I was all of 6, and I didn't become a real Star Wars fan until about 2003. Still, I really haven't seen it since then, and it was kind of silly.

[SpardaSon21]

About the prequels:

The less Jar-Jar/Gungans, the better it is.

TPM: Absolute garbage.

AotC: Better, though not quite to the usual standards of a Star Wars movie. Geonosis really helps to redeem it.

RotS: Pretty damn good. Especially when Obi-Wan is a dick and just leaves Anakin lying there.

[Phoenix Rising]

I must admit I really can't join you in your attacks on TPM, as I actually liked it when I first saw it. Then again, I was all of 6, and I didn't become a real Star Wars fan until about 2003.

Heh, if you were 6, then you don't remember what it was like before the prequels.

[SpardaSon21]

Yeah. It was pretty good. Good movies, and good books, especially the Thrawn trilogy. Thrawn is a lot of people's favorite character, and especially since Outbound Flight was published, one of the few good things to come out of the Old Republic. Then again, it has Thrawn, so it would be hard for it to be a bad book.

Edited by SpardaSon21, 21 December 2008 - 08:15 AM.

[anakinskysolo]

I must admit I really can't join you in your attacks on TPM, as I actually liked it when I first saw it. Then again, I was all of 6, and I didn't become a real Star Wars fan until about 2003.

Heh, if you were 6, then you don't remember what it was like before the prequels.

Do you really think that Star Wars was better before the prequels were released? I think that its true what somebody said before on this topic: That many people were expecting the prequels to be like they thought they would be, and when they saw them and realized that they weren't how they expected, then they didn't like them. Maybe you should see TPM a second time with a more open mind and try to see it for what it is, not for what you expected it to be, even though I agree that it is probably the worst of the six SW movies, I believe its not THAT bad as some people say.

[Kitkun]

Maybe you should see TPM a second time with a more open mind and try to see it for what it is, not for what you expected it to be, even though I agree that it is probably the worst of the six SW movies, I believe its not THAT bad as some people say.

Echoed. I don't hate it, but it is the weakest of the six.

[Ghostrider]

Maybe you should see TPM a second time with a more open mind and try to see it for what it is, not for what you expected it to be, even though I agree that it is probably the worst of the six SW movies, I believe its not THAT bad as some people say.

Echoed. I don't hate it, but it is the weakest of the six.

TPM has some good points. Ian McDirmid is superb - watch the tiny change in facial expressions. I also love the way the plot shows how he plays both ends against the middle like you wouldn't believe.
As far as I am concerned, the entire trilogy would collapse without Ian McDirmid.

Watch it simply for the way he manipulates everyone around him to perfection - predicting everything.
The same goes for the rest of the prequels - watch them simply to see Palpatine at his deadliest - the subtleties are superb.

There is one scene in particular that gets me every time - when Palpatine gets made Chancellor and the camera zooms in to a perfect deadpan face, and you see a millimetre twitch of a smile in the last 2 frames. Just superb acting.

It is also good in that it shows Anakin as a nice kid who got hit by a truck called Palpatine.

The rest is theatrical padding, sure.

Edited by Ghostrider, 22 December 2008 - 08:32 AM.

[SpardaSon21]

Maybe you should see TPM a second time with a more open mind and try to see it for what it is, not for what you expected it to be, even though I agree that it is probably the worst of the six SW movies, I believe its not THAT bad as some people say.

Echoed. I don't hate it, but it is the weakest of the six.

It is also good in that it shows Anakin as a nice kid who got hit by a truck called Palpatine.

Yeah, although the final impact is two movies later in RotS, but that was really just Palpatine backing over him a few times to make sure he was Sith. The first impact happened when his mom got Tusken Raider'd and he went on a crazy un-Jedi killing spree. Also the Clone Wars were hell on Jedi in general, since war and the Jedi Code don't mix. That was a beautiful move by Palpatine right there, especially since a lot of the soldiers were only too happy to start blowing Jedi heads off when Order 66 came.