How will players deal with Yuuzhan Vong if the make an appearance??

[fallen[fk]]

Originally posted by Kurgan

Yes, when I first heard about the Vong, I immediately thought "Species 8472 from Star Trek!" ; p

 

In regard to the Force use against them, I guess with regards to certain powers... Grip: if grip won't choke them, just crush their collar around their throat for the same result. And we have seen Jedi push large boulders to kill enemies in JA videos (muahahha).

 

I still think that being immune to the force is nonesense. The Force isn't dependent on the entity being biological (which is why they can toss big hunks of metal around with the Force). If anything, the Jedi can focus on their armor or their clothes or something. If the BS explanation is that the Force "energy field" doesn't "exist" in THEIR galaxy, it still won't matter, because once they enter the SW galaxy, they become surrounded by the Force, and thus able to be affected by it (just like the other inanimate objects in the SW galaxy). Ysalamari at least make more sense (use the force to block the Force).

 

Actually there's something even older then Species blah blah from Star Trek.

 

Any of you ever watch GI Joe as a kid? The Cobra-La were all genetically manufactured weapons and craft long before either Star Trek or Star Wars franchises used that idea.

 

Oh, and FYI, the Vong ARE NOT in Jedi Academy. Reliable source.

[Darth Vicious]

Because I like attention, I reposted.

 

You will inevitably have some dumbheads running around saying, "the yuuzhan vong are immune to The Force! They don't exist in it! They don't belong in star wars!" etc etc, but as the books have shown us, that's patently not true... Of course, if you didn't read the books, you'd never have known, but that makes you look all the sillier for mouthing off on stuff you don't understand, nor care to.

 

The Yuuzhan Vong exist on a different spectrum of the Force that is outside of the range of current Jedi senses. Outside of the range, but not beyond. You can bring yourself to sense them as a part of the Force, though you don't need to do that to affect them.

 

Example; The human eye does not 'see' electromagnetic energy outside the band of frequencies referred to as 'visible light.' But even though you can't see them, those other frequencies exist.

 

Such is the case with the Force and the Yuuzhan Vong.

 

 

Anyway, as to facing the Yuuzhan Vong... not gonna happen in this game. Maybe in Jedi Knight III... As what we know of Kyle Katarn after the events of JKII-- (this from the new essential guide of characters.)

 

He became a teacher in the Jedi Academy (this we know) and continued up until the war with the Yuuzhan Vong broke out... After losing a great many of his Jedi students to the war against the Yuuzhan Vong, Kyle is starting to despair of the Jedi ever winning the war. Sounds like a possible setup for Jedi Knight III... Most folks seem to be getting sick of "Joe Dark Jedi" villains anyway.

 

 

To be fair, A game centering around the YV, but properly done to illustrate the bizarrely realistic turn Star Wars has taken... would probably sell very well. Why? All Star Wars games do. People who knew absolutely nothing about the timeline bought Knights of the Old Republic. Such would be the case of any NJO game.

 

People would read the back, see the cryptic words that Lucasarts puts down,

 

(25 Years after The destruction of the Final Death Star, War has begun. From beyond the outer rim, a race of terrible foes have come, wielding weapons from which the likes have never been seen, burning worlds without reason, killing innocents without cause. They are the Yuuzhan Vong, and the galaxy trembles before their onslaught.

 

In Jedi Knight: Whatever, Join Luke's New Jedi Order as they attempt to come to grips with these new foes, to protect the Republic that has stood for thousands of years, and to face a race of enemies in mortal combat, an enemy that the Force cannot touch...

 

It was once said that the Jedi were meant to be keepers of the peace, not soldiers. But now the peace is shattered, and the Jedi are faced with a war that offers only Victory, or Death...

 

 

Put something like THAT on the back of the box, and people who don't know much about Star Wars' jaws will drop, and they'll buy the game right then and there. People WOULD buy it. Don't even TRY to explain to the contrary.

 

But as for fighting hypothetical Yuuzhan Vong in Jedi Academy... You don't need no steenken force powers. Go get a lightsaber and carve those aliens a new one.

[txa1265]

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

You will inevitably have some dumbheads running around saying, "the yuuzhan vong are immune to The Force! They don't exist in it! They don't belong in star wars!" etc etc, but as the books have shown us, that's patently not true... Of course, if you didn't read the books, you'd never have known, but that makes you look all the sillier for mouthing off on stuff you don't understand, nor care to.

 

Put something like THAT on the back of the box, and people who don't know much about Star Wars' jaws will drop, and they'll buy the game right then and there. People WOULD buy it. Don't even TRY to explain to the contrary.

 

You are at the other end of the spectrum from those who abhor the NJO - you are directly insulting anyone who doesn't agree with you and accept your postulates as fact, and berating those who challenge your game marketing before they would dare attempt to challenge you.

 

The thing is, for many of us, Star Wars is largely the movies, and a few games, possibly a few books, and not much else. I for one, have a simple test - How does it relate to Yoda and ObiWan? The whole KOTOR thing flows well because it fits well into that paradigm, as does much of the JK series (except dark jedi running around everywhere, but it is a game), and some of the books around the New Jedi Academy. Based on that, I don't buy things about the cloned emperor, vader's hand, or pretty much the entirety of the NJO - and I have read several books until I just couldn't stomach it anymore - reading a book with clenched teeth thinking 'this is b***s***' is not much fun.

 

Would the game sell? Probably - but remember that most JKII reviews highlighted a few things - Saber, Force Powers and Saber battles. Elite Force II had something that reminded me very much of the Amphistaff, and it fit very well there ... I was thinking about this as I played that.

 

This last post makes me think it is time for a new thread ...

 

Mike

[Darth Vicious]

You are at the other end of the spectrum from those who abhor the NJO - you are directly insulting anyone who doesn't agree with you and accept your postulates as fact, and berating those who challenge your game marketing before they would dare attempt to challenge you.

 

I apologize for my use of 'dumbheads.' I meant it lightheartedly... As for the rest... WOW! I'm downright proud I could put together such a hostile post! Dare you challenge me?

 

 

Well, to get the rest out of the way, The EU is just that. EU. It's not Lucas' vision. As we both know, Lucas' Vision begins and ends with the movies. There is no possible way to square any of the post-Endor EU with the stuff we learned in the movie. Anakin being the chosen one and all.

 

There is no way to square the whole prophecy with post-Endor EU. Lucas himself likes some of the post-Endor EU and has said so explicitly. He likes it as a fan, but it's not his story and should not be confused with his story. It's somebody else's Star Wars story, a great big "What If?" which by definition diverges

from Lucas's Star Wars story.

 

 

And despite my fanboi-ism, I do see where the Star Trek thoughts start to come in when faced with the NJO. Why? Star Wars is fantasy. Not Science Fiction... and the Yuuzhan Vong, quite simply, are a creation of sci-fi. If you dig deeper, doubtless you can find some originality in them, but they are definetely beasts of science fiction... And I suppose you could say that was the turn that the story took with the NJO... Hell, with all the post-Endor EU, really.

 

 

So I think i can see from the other side of the fence... Though, before I digress furthur, I have a suspicion that NJO games will be in our Star Wars gaming futures. We shall see.

[toms]

Originally posted by txa1265

Star Wars doesn't have the literary depth of LOTR, but it is a decent story arc ... and the prequel trilogy is also pretty good, in some ways having more depth than the OT - it is just not so much fun to tell the story of the decline and fall of a rotting establishment from the good guys' perspective ...

 

yeah! i wish they would hurry up and get to Vader turning bad, and make the whole thing a lot more interesting... EP2 should have been Ep1, and he should have turned bad 1/2 way through Ep2. As it was they pretty much wasted Ep1 (not much of consequence really happened, when you look back on it). They have a hell of a lot of stuff to fit in Ep3.

 

And despite my fanboi-ism, I do see where the Star Trek thoughts start to come in when faced with the NJO. Why? Star Wars is fantasy. Not Science Fiction... and the Yuuzhan Vong, quite simply, are a creation of sci-fi. If you dig deeper, doubtless you can find some originality in them, but they are definetely beasts of science fiction... And I suppose you could say that was the turn that the story took with the NJO... Hell, with all the post-Endor EU, really.

 

I actually agree with this.

 

Although I also think that a lot of the appeal for the original trilogy to me was the "low tech" look. Weapons were based on real weapons, insides of ships had wires and cables. Unlike most sci-fi which is all smooth, shiny surfaces.

This, combined with the fact it was all very "human" (racism, profiteering, mixed up political structure) rather than the ususal "humans are good guys, some other race are bad guys sci-fi storyline. In SW the humans and aliens all sat down and had beer together, or were evil together, but it wasn't based on race or anything, just on personal motivations.

 

The prequels have lost this a little bit, but the EU seems to have lost it totally... turning in plots right out of ST.

[Darth Vicious]

The Yuuzhan Vong are hardly a concept to have roots in Star Trek of all things... But that's a whole 'nother can of worms.

 

 

For now, to address the point of this topic, I will say that if the Yuuzhan Vong make an appearance, they would be fairly easy to dispatch. So what if you can't use the Force against them? They can't use it against you either. Feed them blaster bolts until they keel over and expire. That's the ticket.

[Prime]

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

To be fair, A game centering around the YV, but properly done to illustrate the bizarrely realistic turn Star Wars has taken...

Bazarrely realistic? How are the Vong realistic?

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

would probably sell very well. Why? All Star Wars games do. People who knew absolutely nothing about the timeline bought Knights of the Old Republic. Such would be the case of any NJO game.

I'm not convinced that it would sell as well as a "regular" Star Wars game. First, you have the problem that a many people know nothing about the NJO, and so may be uncertain or unhappy about a game that has aliens from another galaxy. Then you have a rather large population that loathe the NJO and want nothing to do with it. Then you have a population that likes the NJO and would play such a game. I think you'll agree that the number Star Wars fans that want to play Star Wars games > the number of NJO fans + casual SW fans that want to play an NJO game. Why would Lucasarts limit their audience?

 

The reason that KOTOR is different is because everything is recognizable as being apart of the Star Wars universe, from a movie perspective. Starships, lightsabers, the Force, Sith Lords, Dark jedi, familiar aliens, bounty hunters, and so on are familiar to all those with even a passing interest in Star wars.

 

NJO has (forgive a few mistakes, as I have avoided the NJO) bioengineered aliens, living starships, living armour, amphistaffs, force resistent (or whatever) aliens, and so on. This is a far bigger deviation from the standard SW lore, again from a movie perspective.

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

People would read the back, see the cryptic words that Lucasarts puts down,

 

(25 Years after The destruction of the Final Death Star, War has begun. From beyond the outer rim, a race of terrible foes have come, wielding weapons from which the likes have never been seen, burning worlds without reason, killing innocents without cause. They are the Yuuzhan Vong, and the galaxy trembles before their onslaught.

 

In Jedi Knight: Whatever, Join Luke's New Jedi Order as they attempt to come to grips with these new foes, to protect the Republic that has stood for thousands of years, and to face a race of enemies in mortal combat, an enemy that the Force cannot touch...

 

It was once said that the Jedi were meant to be keepers of the peace, not soldiers. But now the peace is shattered, and the Jedi are faced with a war that offers only Victory, or Death...

 

 

Put something like THAT on the back of the box, and people who don't know much about Star Wars' jaws will drop, and they'll buy the game right then and there. People WOULD buy it. Don't even TRY to explain to the contrary.

I will try. People may buy it if it sounds interesting, but once they find that they can't do the things they see in the movies, and that the Vong are nothing like the what they know, they may become turned off. Hell, look at all the moaning on these boards about how the JK series lets Jedi use guns, and that this deviates from what we see Jedi doing in the movies. That is nothing compared to how the Vong deviate from Star Wars canon and feeling.

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

For now, to address the point of this topic, I will say that if the Yuuzhan Vong make an appearance, they would be fairly easy to dispatch. So what if you can't use the Force against them? They can't use it against you either. Feed them blaster bolts until they keel over and expire. That's the ticket.

This is precisely why I think a game like that would be less successful than the non-NJO games we are seeing now. The Jedi are cool because of their ability to use the Force. People like playing games about Jedi because they get to use the Force like they see Jedi doing in the movies and books. Give them a game where those abilities effectiveness is at worst removed all together or at best stripped down, and people will be screaming bloody murder.

 

It seems to me that it would be viewed like a Superman game where you couldn't fly, a Transformers game where you couldn't transform, or a Spiderman game where you couldn't shoot a web. Sure, you could come up with a story that makes these scenarios sound plausible, but would they be any fun? Of course not.

 

As for resorting to a blaster, what fun would that be in a game about Jedi? Those sorts of weapons certainly have their place (especially in the JK series), but if you limit the lightsaber and Force powers, what difference is there between that game and any other FPS?

[txa1265]

Originally posted by Prime

Hell, look at all the moaning on these boards about how the JK series lets Jedi use guns, and that this deviates from what we see Jedi doing in the movies. That is nothing compared to how the Vong deviate from Star Wars canon and feeling..

Prime ... how could you possible imply that the people here would moan about anything? Surely you know that everyone here is honorable and open-minded

 

Your basic math works:

# gamers > # FPS gamers > # Star Wars FPS game fans > # SW FPS game fans who like NJO

 

... and they want to move to the LEFT, not the RIGHT of the equation. KOTOR was a perfect example - read the previews, they wanted things to be familiar, to bring things we knew from the prequels and original trilogy into the long-ago era Yoda and ObiWan spoke of ... they have succeeded, and in so are pushing people to buy consoles who wouldn't have otherwise, and people to buy a RPG who would otherwise have no intention of getting one (like ME!)

 

When I show people Jedi Outcast - or even Jedi Knight - they want to see me with a lightsaber, slicing stormtroopers, using force powers, and hear John Williams music ... to most gamers, the Vong as as 'out there' as bringing your lightsaber into MoHAA on the raid on Omaha beach (although that would have made that level much easier )

 

It seems to me that it would be viewed like a Superman game where you couldn't fly, a Transformers game where you couldn't transform, or a Spiderman game where you couldn't shoot a web. Sure, you could come up with a story that makes these scenarios sound plausible, but would they be any fun? Of course not.

 

Or a Superman game where you couldn't fly, but it wasn't because of Kryptonite ... the intrinsic light & dark struggle is so central to the whole Star Wars legacy ... I can't imagine anything not having it being much fun to play (not as a Jedi, anyway).

 

Mike

[Darth Vicious]

Bazarrely realistic? How are the Vong realistic?

 

You misunderstand. I meant the realistic turn that they took for the characters; Heroes die. Good guys lose. Just because it's Star Wars doesn't mean your favorite characters last forever.

 

Maybe I'll address your other paragraphs later, but it seems you have quite already made up your mind that the NJO sucks, and thus there's really no point at all to argue... Because, and no offense to you, but it would be like arguing with a mountain to move out of my way. It won't.

[Prime]

Originally posted by txa1265

Prime ... how could you possible imply that the people here would moan about anything? Surely you know that everyone here is honorable and open-minded

Is that Jedi honour?

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

You misunderstand. I meant the realistic turn that they took for the characters; Heroes die. Good guys lose. Just because it's Star Wars doesn't mean your favorite characters last forever.

Thanks for the clarification I realize that that seems to be the popular trend these days, but growing up I always liked that in Star Wars the good guys win, the bad guys lose, and there are very few "shades of gray". Just my preference.

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

Maybe I'll address your other paragraphs later, but it seems you have quite already made up your mind that the NJO sucks, and thus there's really no point at all to argue... Because, and no offense to you, but it would be like arguing with a mountain to move out of my way. It won't.

I don't believe at any point I said that the NJO sucks. I haven't read any of the novels, so I don't know if they are poorly written (I've heard that they are both good and bad, so who knows?). But having read the synopsis it just doesn't appeal to me as a Star Wars series. It may be a good series in and of itself, but to me it doesn't fit my idea of what Star Wars is about.

 

What I was really commenting on was the fact that I don't feel that an NJO game is as viable from a marketing/sales perspective as a "regular" Star Wars game.

 

But in any event, feel free to argue with me I don't take these things personally, and I do try to listen to others opinions, even if they differ from my own. And who knows, I have been convinced of things before

[Darth Vicious]

What I was really commenting on was the fact that I don't feel that an NJO game is as viable from a marketing/sales perspective as a "regular" Star Wars game.

 

Well, I'm not arguing that fact. Why? Because there are Star Wars fans out there who will never, can never, or won't ever give the NJO a chance... There seems to be a lot of them over on these boards... while the official Star Wars boards are rife with NJO fans that are a million times worse than me. THEY berate ME on my lack of NJO knowledge, for chrissakes. As to the NJO having some good parts and bad parts...

 

I think only 2 books in the series really struck me as "bad." but then, the two prequel StarWars movies strike me as "bad," and considering the amount of folks who don't particularly care for the prequels, but love the originals, why let a couple bad apples ruin the whole barrel for you? I can guarantee you that just because I don't like the first two Star Wars movies doesn't change the fact that i LOVE the originals. (if you want reasons, poor execution, poor storyline, terrible unfunny dialogue, the most lukewarm romance i have ever seen. Han and Leia were incredibly uber super dee doo be comparison.)

 

 

As for viability as a game, I'd say it's definetely there. KOTOR sold well because it was Star Wars. Not only that, but because it was a very, very, good game. There is nothing stopping an NJO game from being the same calibre.

 

There is nothing stopping an NJO game from having familiar faces, people, whatnot. There is nothing stopping an NJO game from keeping with the same good/evil struggle that we've come to know as a part of Star Wars.

 

Just because it doesn't have Yoda isn't going to affect sales, for crying out loud. or I mean, it's not as if the advent of the Yuuzhan Vong suddenly prohibits players from being able to choose darkside or lightside, does it? Hell, I'd think that it would become a bigger part of said hypothetical game if that was the case... War makes for a lot of darksiders.

 

And if you really don't like blasters, throw those stupid guns like the flachette launcher or rocket launcher out of the game and force players to go toe-to-toe against the YV with lightsabers... More or less how it was meant to be.

 

I digress. To return to the point, there is absolutely nothing stopping an NJO game from having plenty of familiar aspects that people have come to know and love in Star Wars. Just because you've got a new, different enemy injected into the sea of Stormtroopers, Dark Jedi, Sith Lords, and Rodians already there, doesn't suddenly alter the game to an unrecognizable extent. Bioware got to create their own alien race, and I never really thought twice about it... Never mind that KOTOR held a mention of the Yuuzhan Vong. (not by name but it was fairly obvious by the description of one of their ships.) I doubt Bioware would have put it in on their own... Must have been Lucasarts.

 

Really.

[Gabrobot]

Hmmm...I remember this one time when I had checked out a NJO book, and I was going to actual try reading it and actually give it a chance...until I read on the description of the book about things like Chewie being dead. Of course, this was just after I had read HDM, and I didn't feel like giving any book much of a chance, but still...

[Solo4114]

After hearing about the Vong here and doing some research on Starwars.com, I came to the same conclusion as Prime. They just don't fit my idea of what Star Wars is. You can slap the trademark on the cover, but that doesn't mean it's true to the original. Say what you will about the prequels, but at least they stick with the general MECHANICS of the universe. The Vong just break all that.

 

Now, I DO like the idea that main characters die, but if I was going to do that, I'd start a new series and kill off people besides the heroes of the Galactic Civil War. As for books that got the "feel" of the films right, Timothy Zahn's original series is by far the best of ANY of the Star Wars books I've read, and I've read a LOT of them.

 

My other problem with the concept of the Vong is that it's contrived. "Hmmm....this whole Empire popping up every 5 years or so or a new wannabe dictator is getting kind of tiresome...and the random dark jedi phenomenon is also getting boring...we need something new....I know! How about evil badass aliens from another galaxy!!! They could come from the Delta Quadrant! Oh, wait...that's already been done. Erm...well, they're from another galaxy anyway." And, on top of that, the way that the badasses were implemented was fairly unimaginative and a deviation from the mechanics of the universe.

 

You want a good example of how to revitalize a flagging story by bringing in the evil force from beyond? Look at the Battletech books. Originally it was a feudal universe where great noble houses battled each other for supremacy within the Inner Sphere. Their petty squabbling and bickering, the incessant brushfire wars were all put to a VERY quick end when a new and deadly force came from the outer regions of known space in the form of the Clans. The thing is, the Clans were still VERY similar to the Inner Sphere world. They used suped-up mechs, had genetically enhanced super soldiers, and a very different social structure, but they were still of the same universe in a sense.

 

The Vong essentially sidesteps all technology, the force, and pretty much most canonical notions which would, of course, make them badasses, but at least to me, not very interesting badasses. They're a marauding plot device and a fairly transparent one at that. Hell, I've even started working on a story that, if my legal career fails, I may submit to the powers that be which would neatly sidestep the whole Vong storyline, while still allowing it to be part of the story (but also basically undoing the damage of what had occurred throughout the books). Unfortunately, in order to do that, even my sidestepping measure would be contrived, but it's better to me than an entire contrived series of books.

 

There are PLENTY of other ways that they could've revitalized the series. Have another civil war break out. Have political strife show up. Have an anti-Republic coup pop up made up of old generals looking to set up a military junta. Or, have the Republic become embroiled in a new war between two species outside of the republic, one or both of whom, the republic is trying to recruit to join. There are tons of things that could've been done, but instead, the basic plot device that was used is STRONGLY reminiscent of the Borg. Which, of course, leaves me with a feeling of "Seen it done and done better. Next??"

[Prime]

Some good points

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

I think only 2 books in the series really struck me as "bad." but then, the two prequel StarWars movies strike me as "bad," and considering the amount of folks who don't particularly care for the prequels, but love the originals, why let a couple bad apples ruin the whole barrel for you? I can guarantee you that just because I don't like the first two Star Wars movies doesn't change the fact that i LOVE the originals. (if you want reasons, poor execution, poor storyline, terrible unfunny dialogue, the most lukewarm romance i have ever seen. Han and Leia were incredibly uber super dee doo be comparison.)

Fair enough. I like the Prequels more than you, it seems, but I certainly agree with you on most of the points you stated. But again, I don't think that whether the NJO is of quality or not is the issue when it comes to the viability of a game based on it.

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

As for viability as a game, I'd say it's definetely there. KOTOR sold well because it was Star Wars. Not only that, but because it was a very, very, good game. There is nothing stopping an NJO game from being the same calibre.

Certainly there is nothing from stopping an NJO game from being good, and that helps things of course. But the fact remains that a significant percentage of the SW fan population downright loathes the NJO, and another large (largest?) part who know nothing about it may find that the NJO is different enough from what they know and love about SW to either pass on it or be disappointed by it. Lucasarts would be foolish to go down this road, since there is no point limiting the potential sales. They are in this to make money, after all.

 

I've already stated why I think KOTOR differs from an NJO game, so I won't repost that here

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

There is nothing stopping an NJO game from having familiar faces, people, whatnot. There is nothing stopping an NJO game from keeping with the same good/evil struggle that we've come to know as a part of Star Wars.

True.

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

Just because it doesn't have Yoda isn't going to affect sales, for crying out loud. or I mean, it's not as if the advent of the Yuuzhan Vong suddenly prohibits players from being able to choose darkside or lightside, does it? Hell, I'd think that it would become a bigger part of said hypothetical game if that was the case... War makes for a lot of darksiders.

To my knowledge, and correct me if I am wrong, doesn't the NJO alter some of the canon concepts like the light and dark side of the Force (i.e. there is no light side and dark side)? If so, this again will confuse the casual fan and piss off the more hardcore fans because it deviates considerably from what they see in the movies. I guess in the end it won't matter game wise anyway, because the usefullness of the Force will be limited. And this limitation would be because of the Vong.

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

And if you really don't like blasters, throw those stupid guns like the flachette launcher or rocket launcher out of the game and force players to go toe-to-toe against the YV with lightsabers... More or less how it was meant to be.

I have no problem with guns (I love guns, especailly the sniper rifle). The point is that since it is a game about Jedi, the lightsaber and Force powers are defining elements of that. If a game about the NJO makes guns the most effective weapon and the Force ineffective, then the game basically degenerates into just another FPS (i.e. all you use is guns). I suspect that this would be unappealing to the majority of SW fans who want to play a game about Jedi.

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

I digress. To return to the point, there is absolutely nothing stopping an NJO game from having plenty of familiar aspects that people have come to know and love in Star Wars. Just because you've got a new, different enemy injected into the sea of Stormtroopers, Dark Jedi, Sith Lords, and Rodians already there, doesn't suddenly alter the game to an unrecognizable extent. Bioware got to create their own alien race, and I never really thought twice about it...

The difference with KOTOR is that things were added that followed the Star Wars mythos. New alien races were just from another part of the galaxy like everything else. The vilians, although not Vader, are dark Jedi and Sith lords.

 

With an NJO game, there are no longer stormtroopers or something similar, dark Jedi, Sith Lords, and so on. All these enemies have been replaced entirely by grotesque aliens from another galaxy. Their ships are not just different looking craft, but living things. And again, the Force is not as effective against them. The Vong do not "follow the rules" of established movie concepts, but alter them. This may be great for reading, but for a game who's main audience is movie fans, it isn't a smart business move. Sure, some will like it, but many will be upset and/or confused.

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

Never mind that KOTOR held a mention of the Yuuzhan Vong. (not by name but it was fairly obvious by the description of one of their ships.) I doubt Bioware would have put it in on their own... Must have been Lucasarts.

I've read about this in an interview with one of the developers (sorry, don't have a link ). It was deliberately left as ambiguous so that NJO fans would say "cool!" and non-fans would assume it was something else. They did this because they know how much of a controversial issue the NJO is. They didin't want to get blasted for blatantly having the Vong in KOTOR.

 

Originally posted by Solo4114

My other problem with the concept of the Vong is that it's contrived. "Hmmm....this whole Empire popping up every 5 years or so or a new wannabe dictator is getting kind of tiresome...and the random dark jedi phenomenon is also getting boring...we need something new....I know! How about evil badass aliens from another galaxy!!! They could come from the Delta Quadrant! Oh, wait...that's already been done. Erm...well, they're from another galaxy anyway." And, on top of that, the way that the badasses were implemented was fairly unimaginative and a deviation from the mechanics of the universe.

This is how I see it as well. Now, the view that having various Imperial dictators and dark Jedi becomes old is certainly valid. But in my view the next step shouldn't have been bio-engineered aliens from another galaxy who fly around in living ships. The galaxy is a big place, and there are many interesting possibilites for stories that do not involve some galaxy threatening issue. Tales about various bounty hunters or Jedi dealing with problems on certain planets can still have all the elements that make SW cool. To me small scale does not mean the story is uninteresting, and a galaxy at relative peace does not mean it is boring. I guess my biggest beef with the NJO and the Vong is that it is unnecessary for a good story.

[Darth Vicious]

To my knowledge, and correct me if I am wrong, doesn't the NJO alter some of the canon concepts like the light and dark side of the Force (i.e. there is no light side and dark side)?

 

The NJO at some point tells the audience, "There are no straight answers." But, of course, unless they make an NJO RPG, then there is really no point to include this as well, (which we only find out at a late stage in the series anyway.) Why? Because as you said, unless it was an RPG that could provide more information along the way, it would be pointless and confuse the audience for no purpose at all.

 

 

In any case, I suppose the Vong were probably brought in to give a plot device that could do things people couldn't argue about. After all, nobody would ever believe it if the Imperial Remnant got together and destroyed Coruscant, would they? Nobody'd believe it if the Chiss suddenly decided that they hated Jedi and wanted to kill them all, would they? I sincerely doubt it.

 

 

As contrived as the Vong may seem, They DO have some interesting quirks to them; Their hatred of machines comes from the fact that they worship life above all else, and to them, Machines, droids, and stuff are a kind of half-life that is just an imitation. They figure that if droids were meant to exist, then their gods would have given them the capability to build them. Well, I digress.

 

It was deliberately left as ambiguous so that NJO fans would say "cool!" and non-fans would assume it was something else.

 

No offense, but it still strikes me as odd that the developers would put such a thing in of their own volition, and it is well within Lucasarts' right to force Bioware to put in whatever they please.

 

 

And now I took a trip to my brother's house and my train of thought was disrupted. Damn.

[Artemius]

Hi

 

First time poster, I tried to register a while ago (like 1 year ago)but wouldnt let me for some reason, returned today agian and it seems they fixed the problem finally

 

Anyway about the Vong and the NJO in general (what foolows here contains spoilers to the NJO series, read at your own risk )

 

I've read the majority of the NJO books, till the Force heretic series, so I think I have some perspective on this

 

I'll be the first to admit that the NJO has a serious problem, it just doesnt seem to have connected as well with the fans as the first series of books. You can attribute it to the Vong being too "alien" (which btw doesnt seem right to me, i mean the SW galaxy is full of aliens that act in strange ways the yevetha for example, I dont think much would have changed if they had made the Vong come from the Unknown regions, thus not being "alien" to the galaxy) or a myriad of other things. But in my personal opinion, there's only one thing that doomed the NJO series

 

The simple fact that the first half of NJO books were crap

 

When you start a series like this, that is so radically different from what your fanbase is used to, it'd stand to reason that they'd put their best efforts first. Well, here they did exactly the opposite

 

Salvatore's Vector Prime was bearable, but nowhere near the BANG you'd need to kick off a series. Vong were very flat characters here, reinforcing the linkings some would draw with the Borg. Killing off chewie = HUGE mistake, this disconnected a good part of the fanbase right off the bat, and his death wasnt handled very well either.

 

Next off we have Stackpole's Onslaught and Ruin. Now, I've always liked the X wing series, but I think Stackpole floundered a bit here. Both books had their moments, and gave a little more backgound on the Vong (not nearly enough to shake the Borgness yet though), but there was just something about the pacing that bothered me

 

Then we have the Agent of Chaos series. Utter, utter tripe. I dont know where they found these guys and how they convinced Lucasfilm to let them write NJO books. Having that Riima (sp?) dude trying to cover Chewie's post was pathetic. The whole plotline could have been easily bypassed by the next books. han was a very very bland character, just not believable by me

 

And then we get to Balance point by Kathy tyers. I came sorta prepared because her original series books were nowhere near what I would consider good, but I was ready to give it another chance. To put it in short, it's the first SW book I couldnt finish, it was that bad. Jacen Solo was horrible, Solo still bland, Skywalker as well. More nonsense about Riima's pals getting lost. Another Yuhzan Vong attack that the New Republic is utterly incapable of blocking even when they've already given ground to the Core regions

 

Ok, all this sounded pretty negative, and most people probably quit caring about NJO even if they went over Vector Prime without incinirating the book . But, the thing is, the series rebounded in a HUGE way after Balance Point

 

Greg Keyes's Edge of Victory series gave MUCH needed color to the Vong, showing off the different castes and Domains and how they interact, what their thought processes are, etc. It also gave the first major victory for the New Republic, showing they werent invincible. Corran Horn was handled very well, even better than Stackpole

 

Troy Denning's Star by Star, gave good character development setting up for the next couple of books in the series, as well as pretty good space battle descriptions (although this book has some weak points)

 

Aaron Allston's "Rebel" series was as good as his Old series books, lots of humor as the Wraiths make a comeback, and all around good storyline and char development

 

Matthew Stover's "Traitor" is undoubtly the crown jewel of the series. AWESOME story (althougbh it might strike some as not starwarsish), lots of questions related to the Vong are answered and their "Force blindness" explained. Epic struggle of Jacen solo between the light and dark side. Probably has THE best ending of all SW books, even better than Tim Zahn's endings

 

Destiny's way continued with good storytelling and the Vong finally being driven back a bit, also, their "Borgness" is largely diminished here. They are most definetly a nique creation

 

 

 

Phew, that was long. In closing I'd say that all you who liked the old series but not NJO, things are definetly looking up. At the least, I'd leaf through Allston's series in the bookstore, they require very little background to pick up, and as I said above are very enjoyable. Traitor may take a bit more background and getting used to, but in my opinion is the best of the series

 

In short, give NJO another try after balance point, you might be surprised

 

 

Now, in keeping this a bit on topic, Vong scouts were sent ahead of the mina pck a long time ago before the invasion began, long enough for at least one of them to buy the farm of old age, so timeline issues with them appearing in JA can be largely ignored as long as they dont appear in groups. Since they're scouts and spies, I'd think that the best way to handle them in the game would be to branch off a secret area in one of the levels, that would have a Vong at the end. Since you cant affect them with the force, and their prefered method of combat is amphistaff combat (amphistaffs = more or less their version of lightsabers), you end up with a sort of duel with no force powers, which is my fav form of fuel in JO. So I'd very much like to have the Vong make a secret appearance in JA

[Darth Vicious]

Want to read a good Star Wars book, but not NJO? Pick up Shatterpoint. It's a Clone Wars novel by Matt Stover... and very, very, good. Mace Windu is the ultimate badass.

 

I can see shatterpoints.

 

"The sense is not sight, but 'see' is the closest word Basic has for it: it is a perception, a feel of how what I look upon fits into the Force, and how the Force binds it to itself and to everything else. The Force shows me strengths and weaknesses, hidden flaws and unexpected uses. It shows me vectors of stress that squeeze or stretch, torque or shear; it shows me how patterns of these vectors intersect to form the matrix of reality.

 

"Put simply: when I look at you through the Force, I can see where you break."

[Anakin1607]

"To my knowledge, and correct me if I am wrong, doesn't the NJO alter some of the canon concepts like the light and dark side of the Force (i.e. there is no light side and dark side)?"

 

Uh, WRONG. See, this is the problem, you guys are judging something on second hand knowledge of people who DIDN'T like the books. So don't you think that might be a little bit inaccurate?

 

There's ONE character in the NJO that believes this, and she's killed a book after she brings up her theory, and it never resurfaces. One other Jedi believes her, but most people consider him to be a total deuschbag anyway.

 

And please, if you think the designers of KOTOR left the Vong reference "ambigous" because they "feared" a reprisal from fans I think you need a reality check. It was a cool reference put in by Star Wars fans, cripes you all sound like hardcore purists.

[HertogJan]

Hey guys, I have a kind of offtopic question.... But not totally...

 

What would be THE best SW book to start with? I've never read ANY SW book and well.. I decided I want to give 'em a try... No NJO please (not yet ), but a book with recognizable characters etc...

 

So... Which one?

[Prime]

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

As contrived as the Vong may seem, They DO have some interesting quirks to them; Their hatred of machines comes from the fact that they worship life above all else, and to them, Machines, droids, and stuff are a kind of half-life that is just an imitation. They figure that if droids were meant to exist, then their gods would have given them the capability to build them. Well, I digress.

Again, I am not saying that the Vong are uninteresting or not a good plat device. I seems to many (me included), that as a plot device for Star Wars it doesn't fit. That's all

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

No offense, but it still strikes me as odd that the developers would put such a thing in of their own volition, and it is well within Lucasarts' right to force Bioware to put in whatever they please.

Again, I wish I could find the link. You can choose to ignore it if you want IIRC the idea was the some of the developers were fans and asked if they could do something along those lines. Lucasarts gave approval for a limited reference (just because it the VONG aren't to obvious in that era). Most of the developers knew about the controversial views of the NJO, and not so much for "fear of reprisal", but more just to take these different views into account, they made it more or less ambiguous. It was more to not alienate anyone, but still have a neat reference for those who like that sort of thing. Again, I am paraphrasing.

 

Originally posted by Artemius

In short, give NJO another try after balance point, you might be surprised

It is not that I think they are poorly written (I have no idea), they just don't interest me as a Star Wars story. That's all.

 

Originally posted by Darth Vicious

Want to read a good Star Wars book, but not NJO? Pick up Shatterpoint. It's a Clone Wars novel by Matt Stover... and very, very, good. Mace Windu is the ultimate badass.

I heard it was good. I'm definitely going to pick it up...

 

Originally posted by Anakin1607

"To my knowledge, and correct me if I am wrong, doesn't the NJO alter some of the canon concepts like the light and dark side of the Force (i.e. there is no light side and dark side)?"

 

Uh, WRONG. See, this is the problem, you guys are judging something on second hand knowledge of people who DIDN'T like the books. So don't you think that might be a little bit inaccurate?

uh, AS YOU CAN SEE, I said I wasn't sure. I was basing this on several reviews I have read along with some of the discussions over at theforce.net. And no, the discussions weren't from people who don't like the NJO, so chill. Why are you all defensive?

 

Originally posted by Anakin1607

There's ONE character in the NJO that believes this, and she's killed a book after she brings up her theory, and it never resurfaces. One other Jedi believes her, but most people consider him to be a total deuschbag anyway.

Who is most people? Readers or characters?

 

Originally posted by Anakin1607

And please, if you think the designers of KOTOR left the Vong reference "ambigous" because they "feared" a reprisal from fans I think you need a reality check. It was a cool reference put in by Star Wars fans...

Again, just what I read, and you can choose to not believe me if you wish. It makes no difference.

 

You mean that if they came out and said it was the Vong that every Star Wars fan who played KOTOR would say "awesome! I love that the Vong are in here!"?

 

Now, certainly some of the developers are fans of the NJO, but they also know that some players would not like that reference at all. They just accomidated both groups. What is the problem?

 

Originally posted by Anakin1607

cripes you all sound like hardcore purists

I sound hardcore? You sound like a hardcore fanboy. Why are you all upset? Did I say something about your mother? Did I say that the NJO is a horrible piece of trash that should never have been written? No. I just said that I don't think that it fits my view of Star Wars, and so have avoided it. We know that there are lots of people out there with a similar view, and so (to get back on topic) that is why I don't think an NJO JK game is as viable as a normal SW game.

[Solo4114]

Well, I consider myself a "hardcore purist" for Star Wars, I guess because I just prefer things to either have the tone of the films, the prequels, or the sequel books that Zahn wrote. I still think you can work with those concepts in future books and can write compelling stories. I even like the idea of exploring the "shades of gray" approach to the force, although there could and should still be a dark and light side. But some seemingly darkside methods might be useful in a light side application (IE: using force to protect others, but at what point do you cross over?).

 

I suspect that the Vong storylines are interesting, that the characters may be cool, and that the general concept of the Vong is kind of cool, but as Prime has said, to me, it just isn't Star Wars. The Vong bring things too far out of the realm of space fantasy and too far into the realm of science fiction, and YES there is a difference. Star Wars is space fantasy fundamentally. Star Trek is science fiction. Does that mean one is superior to the other? Nope. They're both very different. But, just like you shouldn't mix your paint colors in the jar (leave that to the pallette), you shouldn't mix your sci fi and your space fantasy. From the sounds of it, the NJO books do just that, and I don't like the idea of it. I gather I'm not alone either.

 

It's for this reason, the fact that I'm not alone, that making a game about the Vong and calling it Star Wars just wouldn't really work for the masses. Prime's right. The NJO fans just aren't a big enough market in terms of the Star Wars audience to warrant making a game about 'em. It'd be tough for people to relate to the Vong because, as has been said, they break all the 'rules' that we've come to accept about the SW universe. It's an interesting idea to go about playing with established conventions, but from the sound of it, the Vong go too far.

 

I mean, think about it this way, from a PURELY marketing standpoint. Look at the kind of criticism that the Vong books have received. Now figure that most Star Wars fans do NOT read the books. They like the movies, and if you give 'em a video game based on the universe, what they'll be expecting is something akin to the movies. Setting KOTOR 4000 years in the past works because it lets you play with some conventions, most noteably the nature of the Sith and the stylistic representations of the universe, but the underlying mythos is still there, entirely unchanged. So, even people who've never heard of Dark Horse comics can appreciate a game in that setting, as long as it sticks with the mythos.

 

The Vong, however, really break from that established mythos. Think about what Obi-Wan says in ANH. The force is an energy field that surrounds EVERY LIVING THING. It penetrates us, and binds the galaxy together. So, why are the Vong outside the force? Because they're from another galaxy? Because they're from planet XPQ-988? Because they're from Alabama? Who knows. It doesn't really matter. The simple fact is that if some of my "generalist" Star Wars fans were given a Star Wars product, featuring Jedi Knights, blasters, and the force, but you then told them, "Oh, by the way...the force doesn't work at all on these guys. They just exist apart from it. Sorry." Most of my friends would react with something akin to "WTF are you talking about? This is a Star Wars game, right? How come I can't use the force on these guys?" The game would get crappy reviews, there would be a big backlash, and whatever company made the game would likely receive nasty mail from over-the-top fanboys.

 

It's just not a good idea. Frankly, I don't think the Vong storyline was EVER a good idea, given the divisiveness it caused in the Star Wars fan community. Stick with what you know. If you want to play with established conventions, ok, but don't play with 'em THAT much. If it ain't broke... And you know what? So what if ol' GL approved it. He's not going to be making any further movies after the prequels are done, so what the hell does he care? He's got plenty of merchandising opportunities for his Clone Wars and probably forthcoming Fall of the Jedi series of books (just guessing, but I'm betting we won't actually see all the Jedi getting killed. But hey! Buy all the books about it, kids!), so if folks want to screw with what happens after his movies and the other established books, that's ok as long as they don't totally deviate from his characters. The man understands money, and he understands that this is just another way to make money. And you know what? He could still decide to sidestep the entire storyline at some point in order to make MORE money. He could ditch the NJO line through some other plot device, and say, "Just kidding. It didn't really happen. Now read these books to find out what DID happen." And you know what? Plenty of people would buy 'em. Hell, a lot of the jilted anti-NJO fans would buy them just because they sidestepped the NJO books, whether they were good or not!

 

As for games, though, better to play it safe if I'm the distributor. I'd rather go for mass appeal than niche audiences.

[Darth Vicious]

The force is an energy field that surrounds EVERY LIVING THING. It penetrates us, and binds the galaxy together. So, why are the Vong outside the force?

 

*sigh*, They are a part of the Force just like everything else. After all, the Force is everything. The Yuuzhan Vong do not sidestep that Star Wars rule. They participate in a range of the Force that is beyond what Jedi can normally sense... and only for the real purpose to demonstrate that the Force is grander than what Jedi see it as. That it's far above a "tool" that even Light-sided Jedi referred to it as. The YV don't break nearly as many rules as you suggest. They're different than what we've normally seen, but that's all.

 

And the force does affect them. You've heard it before but since you keep repeating, "The force does not affect them" or things to that extent, I feel the need to repeat it myself.

 

That said, You see the Yuuzhan Vong as something that doesn't belong in the Universe. That's fair enough. It's really a matter of opinion, anyway... But still, unless you've read the books, it would probably be really hard to imagine the many ways that such a game could easily be sold to casual Star Wars fans.