Cerez

Soo… you're saying the asexual creatures will talk and flirt with themselves much more often, hence the vocal distinction? I guess that makes sense… in a strange kind of way… ... Kyle: "Hey babe, you look gorgeous. Let's make out." Jan: "What?" o.O Kyle starts hugging himself. Jan: "Ookay…"

So... they sound different because…? I love this find, @. These are those rare personality gems you come across in countless lines of monotone code.

Also, can someone explain to me the difference between "NEUTRAL" and "ASEXUAL" -- because I really can't see how that makes a difference in terms of vocal production…

Okay, now I'm going to do something very unusual, that some of you might find very strange coming from me, but I assure you my intentions are completely sincere. I will also ask any fellow Clone Wars series fans not to intervene, defend, or express their opinions. This is thread is purely for negative criticism about the series. I myself am a big series fan, but I am very much interested in hearing the thoughts of the people who dislike, or even hate, the series and to find out why they feel that way about it. When I say criticism, however, I mean reasonable and informative arguments about people's experiences and thoughts on the series. I don't wish to see any "It sucks" comments without an informative statement as to why it would "suck". Such comments are of no use here, and I will see to it that they are removed by moderators. With all that said, why is it that you personally dislike or hate the series, and what do you dislike/hate so much about it? Speak now, or forever hold your silence.

"SHEMALE"???? o.O

I actually personally consider Lucas a worthwhile and in some ways very accomplished artist who has taken a route rarely visited by other artists that I feel has impacted much of his art in a negative way. I was merely trying to explore what these negative effects meant through a critical discussion, and try to come to a conclusion as to how an artist should view their own work.

Only 40 years, haha (from concept to realisation)! Anyone here still remember the Virtual Boy?

Thanks Eez.

That's the Oculus Rift?! o.O I imagined something… more elegant... It depends on how comfortably it sits on your head. Half a kilo can be a lot if the straps and design of the device are uncomfortable. The bigger problem will be with extended exposure to its screen, I think. It seems to me this is much like enclosing yourself in a little dark box with an OLED screen set right in front of your eyes. Without natural light it won't be healthy for the eyes. Although, I do see how this is sort of a necessity for virtual reality...

It's not about liking or not liking, George Lucas, @@Ping, or labelling him. There are wonderful things Lucas created, and there are not so wonderful things, too. I'm only critically discussing the artist's relationship to his work, and Lucas' recent actions fit the bill in terms of what constitutes, in my honest opinion, as a lack of respect for one's own art, and as such his actions present a good case study. It's just an observation and analysis, not an attack on the individual. Please don't misunderstand my intentions. I'm just as much a fan of Lucas' work as you are, and I do have immense admiration towards his earlier work. Lucas is not the only person/artist who has made such drastic revisions to their work in the world of film. There are others as well, but he's one of the few who has ventured so far with his changes. Critical analysis requires a non-biased standpoint. We need to look at the good as well as the bad, and we can't afford to idolise or protect the subject for sentimental reasons. Otherwise it won't be a critical discussion. This thread seems to have turned with everyone's input from an analysis and discussion of the artwork into a critical discussion about the artist's relationship to his work -- which is the artistic subject of the artwork, so I see no problem in discussing this.

It's great to see that they are trying to create something like this, but two things about this particular experiment: The Good: 1. It looks like they've finally mastered the viewpoint/look-around in virtual reality. 2. Slowing down the real-time action is a nice touch, and helps the player follow what's happening with a good illusion of realism. The Bad: 1. That headset and grip device look like they're right out of the 80s. How much does that thing weigh? I wouldn't want to carry it on my head for more than a minute. 2. The response time on that swing action looks awfully slow to me. It reminds me of the awful level of motion detail in the MotionPlus of the Nintendo Wii. If it's not spot on, it just won't feel natural. The Ugly: 1. I got to see it, and now you have to hear my critical analysis of it… 2. Move along... move along...

Very true, @@redsaurus! A series that most certainly has been all but forgotten. Do you know if Lucas was involved with the production/licensing of that series as well? I presume he was… Wikipedia says that he was even involved with the writing of these series. In that case we have an example of a direct replacement of art content, even to the exact name. Need we say more? That's the same as if Da Vinci had decided to repaint the Mona Lisa five years after its public release and called the new work of art the same name: Mona Lisa. That would have caused an outrage among fans of the original work, and jeopardised his name as a respectful artist -- because of no appreciation and/or confidence shown towards his own art. Would he have had the right to do so? Yes, since he created the original. Would that have been seen a respectful course of action with everyone involved? I highly doubt it. Would that have been true to himself, and considerate/appreciative towards his initial inspiration? Most certainly not. Does the Mona Lisa as an artwork have faults? You bet! That's what makes it so interesting; it has faults and merits alike.

Darn… I'm going to give up on this one, then. If it won't work in base JKA, then I'm not really interested in developing this mod any further. My hope was that there was at least some way to store the player's current model in memory, and recall it when needed, but it seems the only place that can be done in the base game is through an SP Icarus script. The mod itself is a cloaking device, that lets the player cloak their character (make them hard-to-see/near-invisible) at the push of a button, and loads an appropriate stylistic visual representation based on the gender/type of the player's model (human male, human female, alien), then lets them toggle the cloaking device off with the same button, and reverts their model back to the default look. It was intended to add extra functionality and challenge in MP duels. I guess instead of making it a general function mod for all in-game models, I will have to make use of this as an additional skin/option for particular new models, with an additional script included that has this toggle function hard-scripted and bound to a key. Well, if anyone has a model/character who likes to use a special cloaking device to their advantage, and they are interested in incorporating my work in their player model release, let me know. Thanks everyone for your help.

Umm… it was George's imagination that the TCW team built upon, and it was in consultation with him that they created the series. I don't think George is/was unimaginative. I just think that he chose to sacrifice his own art for the sake of immediate popularity. I don't think he put the same heart into the prequels as he did with the original trilogy. But it could be that the original trilogy was created with the active help of a whole lot of other people -- big projects like movies tend to be that way -- and that his involvement and own ideas in the original saga was less than what we perceive. Perhaps he really did intend to create an sci-fi action extravaganza from the beginning, and not the gripping personal and emotional journey of an unlikely group of heroes that the original trilogy came to be. Either way, I wouldn't put George down so. It's not right. The artist should be respected for their imagination and their work, but the artist should respect their muse as well.

That's so true. It made the story a personal journey for all of us, instead of keeping us as spectators like the prequel films did. All the films really did was establish a setting (a world) and present a whole lot of action, but without real emotional involvement. That's where The Clone Wars are so much closer to the original trilogy than the prequels.

I know there was a rumour circulating about that. I know that George played a part in the creation of Ahsoka, and that him and Dave (the director of the series) kept in active touch regarding the development to her character. It's also obvious that there had to be a way to prevent Ahsoka from being able to appear later in the original trilogy films and in Episode 3, but I don't think killing her was actually intentionally discussed as a plan of action at any point.

I thought I'd start this little poll to find out which aspect each of us likes most about Star Wars. What drew us in, and/or what's keeping us around. If there are any options I left out, feel free to let me know in the comments below.

Hmm… It's too early to say yet, but deep down I still feel that the same thing is taking place with the Clone Wars to Rebels transition as with the rest of the Star Wars art so far. But let's move away from the Clone Wars series, and look at the earlier work (like the prequels to original trilogy relation) to analyse the artist to art subject relation and determine the general artistic possibilities with the new sequel, Episode VII, in the series. That may help us to come to some worthwhile conclusions about sequential art and the artist's proper conduct in relation to his/her work.

Thanks for your thoughts, and opinions, @@Ping. The way you've expressed them at first made me jump back in fright a little, but I do see your point about the prequel/sequel problem. I will pose the question, though, is it really necessary for a prequel or sequel to impact the original work, and, furthermore, if Lucas' intention was to expand on or continue the original story, why had he changed the feel and thematic content of the artwork? I don't remember the original trilogy have so many action sequences and so little character development, for example. In serial fiction, the episodes are usually tied in a manner where the overall essence of the series is maintained throughout, even if the individual stories differ. For instance, the Back to the Future series is a good example. The episodes have an entirely different storyline, and each even have a completely different time period and location, and yet they all feel as though they are a part of the same work of art. The original trilogy of Star Wars does the same, as does the original Indiana Jones trilogy. The same thing can't be said about the fourth Indiana Jones film, which, although it attempts to mimic the feel of the original series, fails to capture much of the essence of the original artwork. If an author/artist is going to revisit a work of art they have released 10 years ago, they ought to do it in a manner that preserves the integrity of the original artwork. That's no easy task (largely due to the passage of time), and that's why I think, as a rule of thumb, that, once finished and released, an artwork should not be re-edited or altered in any way by the original artist -- especially if considerable time has passed since its initial release. The on-going problem with the new Star Wars is exactly this: while all the content is intended to fall into the same work of art, they do so in a way where old content is being replaced and "overwritten" by new content, and the older work of art is constantly being affected or compromised by the new. That's what I mean about the Clone Wars series as well. For the sake of argument, let's take the Star Wars: The Clone Wars as an original, independent work of art. If the Clone Wars series was an individual work of art, with its own style, not tied to the grand label of Star Wars, the series and its character would endure and survive the passage of time. But now we have another series that mimics the style of the old one, also labelled as Star Wars, that changes the overall themes and essence of the original artwork, and pushes the original work of art into the background. Therefore no respect is being paid to the old series and its characters. I'm hope what I'm trying to say here makes sense.

That whoever ask that question be executed immediately, unless they are Sith.

What I'm effectively looking for is a way to pipe the results of a VSTR to a CVAR through the console in base JKA. I.e.: set oldModel "placeholder" set thisModel model vstr thisModel --> pipe the result to oldModel EDIT: Even better; directly pipe the result of "vstr model" into a user variable. It's strange that the Quake 3 console should not have a way to pass the value of an returned command into a variable, or some way to directly pass on the value of a variable into another variable… :/

No, no-no; I'm not saying that as an artist I would create work solely for others' enjoyment, @@Circa. Quite the contrary. Art is an expression of the artist, and it needs to stay personal at all times. But once the artwork is considered done for the first time by the artist, and released to the world; from that point there should be no further changes necessary. If the artist seeks to improve his/her own work, they should do so by creating a new artwork, not by mending the already published one. The original artwork should be preserved for what it is, with all its merits and faults. That's what I firmly believe. Because sometimes faults add just as much to the integrity and value of an artwork. And there is the chance factor, the "gift of the muse", the "magical" essence that contributed to its first creation that would be compromised with a second interference by the artist.

I agree with this entirely. But as an artist myself I find that it helps not to touch what has been completed, or what works, exactly for this reason. Out of respect for the creation, and for the audience that appreciates it. That doesn't stop an artist from moving forward. There's a point where every artist needs to let go of their artwork, and release their baby to the world. Beyond that, changing anything is altering the integrity of the artwork, and in my belief showing a form of disrespect towards one's own creation. George Lucas is a good example, as what he did unsuccessfully represents this issue in creative rules/philosophy really well. And while it's true that Lucas didn't create everything on his own, the work was still his property as an author, and he had moral responsibility over it while handing out licenses, permissions, and overviewing new work created for his fictional universe. In fact, he still does to this day, supervising the production of the new trilogy as the original author and advisor.

CrimsonStrife, so you're saying that the voice of the person who appreciates the artwork the artist has created should not be heard? That the fan/reader/viewer's experience should not be respected and taken into consideration? The artist creates, but he/she needs to do so in respect to themselves, to their own work, and the effect their work has on the audience. I believe a good artist will never desecrate their own work. As human beings we are not in full control of all that we create. Other factors come into play. And that's why we have to be careful and respectful towards what we have created. I feel the artwork that I've started this thread with shows exactly this dilemma of the creator: torn between his uncertainty whether to make drastic changes, or whether to preserve the integrity of his original creation. All the while the artwork (the character) stands on the other side, her fate entirely determined at the mercy of the creator, but witnessed by countless people in the audience, whose hearts are affected by the artist's changes. The point of this thread so far has been not to complain, but to discuss the relationship between the artist and his creation, as presented in the artwork I have shared at the start of this post.

Yeah, but what you both seem to keep missing is that in the process of adding in those details and making changes a vital essence of the story was lost. The humanitarian value of the artwork was compromised by the author/owner of the work. Those details did not have to be told. There were other ways the lore could have been expanded that would have preserved the integrity of the original art.