5 replies to this topic

[_Comrade_]

Jordan Weisman describing the concept of battletech

Quote

I'm just a huge history buff,” Weisman said. “I imagined what could be a setting in which humanity did a backward slide, quite considerably, in technology. I wanted it to feel like the fall of Rome, and the slide into the Middle Ages. We lost a huge amount of technology, a huge amount of science, as we slid and as Rome consumed itself. Then the Mongols invaded, and then everything kind of degrades, goes to s--- and becomes the Middle Ages. It’s terrible for a long time. So I thought, ‘Hey! That's fun! And it also gives me a good kind of model for the geopolitical situation.’”

So there you go folks, the clans are the mongols and the rest of us are medieval tribes after the fall of rome

https://www.polygon....n-babcock-bills

Also they almost got sued by George Lucas as well cause Lucas actually trademarked the word "droid"

Quote

Of course, the BattleTech line of tabletop games was originally called by a different name. The first edition was actually published as BattleDroids, and in the early ‘80s that particular turn of phrase caught the eye of one of Hollywood’s biggest names — George Lucas. Some time during that first year of sales, FASA got a letter from the lawyers at LucasFilm.
“They politely said that ‘No, you can't use the word droids in the name,’” Babcock said.
“I politely wrote back,” Weisman said, “to point out that Isaac Asimov had been using the word ‘android’ since something like 1956. ‘I think it's kind of out there already,’ I said. They wrote back to point out that they had a lot more lawyers than we did.”

Edited by _Comrade_, 30 November 2017 - 09:11 AM.

[Koniving]

Always wondered if they based the Clans on Klingons... or if Klingons were eventually modelled after the Clans, because post 90s Klingons are Very, Very similar in numerous core concepts regarding honor, combat, "Rites" and rituals.

[MechaBattler]

_Comrade_, on 30 November 2017 - 09:01 AM, said:

Jordan Weisman describing the concept of battletech



So there you go folks, the clans are the mongols and the rest of us are medieval tribes after the fall of rome

https://www.polygon....n-babcock-bills

Also they almost got sued by George Lucas as well cause Lucas actually trademarked the word "droid"

The fact Lucas or someone within his organization felt they needed to bully a small scifi game is exactly why I hate big franchises.

But I do think Battlemechs sound better than Battledroids. :3

[Johnathan Tanner]

_Comrade_, on 30 November 2017 - 09:01 AM, said:

Also they almost got sued by George Lucas as well cause Lucas actually trademarked the word "droid"

The same guy who sold out to the empire of micky mouse. And now we have bad movies where Han didnt shoot 1st and gets rekt by his emo derp child. GG close george.

[Koniving]

Johnathan Tanner, on 30 November 2017 - 09:54 PM, said:

The same guy who sold out to the empire of micky mouse. And now we have bad movies where Han didnt shoot 1st and gets rekt by his emo derp child. GG close george.

Harrison Ford's conditions for playing Han Solo included 11 million (significantly more than most of the actors combined) and that his character Finally Die. He wouldn't play the part otherwise.

There's an interview about it on youtube. He thinks Han Solo is a flat character with little more than cliches and bad writing, and that Harrison Ford changed several lines just to make the character bearable. For instance when Princess Leia says "I love you", he was supposed to say "I love you too" before being frozen in carbinite. Harrison Ford changed it to "I know" as an attempt to add some sort of depth or interest to the character. The arguments between Leia and Solo were also influenced by Ford to create conflict, as there really wasn't much there since Lucas was more interested in little green muppets and a scary bad guy that had a goofy British voice.




Either way, Harrison Ford doesn't have to play the role or get asked about it again (another condition was to never be propositioned for it again).

Personally I wasn't happy with the prequels Lucas made and I enjoyed Rogue One. Haven't seen the one where Harrison Ford dies yet. I did enjoy Lucas's first trilogy and the remaster of edits and new scenes later on. In fact one of those new scenes quickly became my favorite. But that's a story for another time.

[Koniving]

On a Star Wars related note, started watching the Force Awakens. I get its in the future, but second seat tie fighter didn't make any sense until the rear turret came into play, wonder when X-wings got turrets. "Fin" is told to use the bottom gun, and has the idea of staying low (allowing for strafing runs from the safety of above if these Tie Fighters ever used THEIR turrets but they don't on TOP of the fact that from the bottom turret he has basically no combat vantage to even try to make these hits and I get that one person is a junk rat and the other is just a storm trooper with no airborne combat experience... but the number of tactical snafus so far is just absolutely astounding... So I could understand why Disney's first Star Wars movie was not well received.)

Anyway, back to Battletech.
The Bronze Age Collapse is also a good comparison... as is Firefly + Game of Thrones. (Come to think about it, shortly after watching the Battletech campaign demo, I thought "You know this reminds me of something," and later I see that Harebrained Schemes is going for a Firefly mercenary feeling. The betrayal reminded me of the scene where Malcolm says



Better make sure you get paid, mercenary, or it is going to be a bumpy road for you in the new Battletech game.
MW5: Mercs seems to be going the same route from what I read.

Back to the Bronze Age, we had the pinnacle of civilization at the time before it collapsed. Evidence has been found that we, in fact, had vase-like batteries capable of producing DC power. In other words, some form of limited electricity long, long, LONG before the age of the Roman Empire.

Today, photography film is starting to go the way of the dodo and in 40 years, who is going to still know how to develop film into photographs?

The first "mouse", defined as a computer interface device that moves a cursor on the screen by the manipulation of 2 or more wheels either directly or with a ball, was made in the 1940s by the British as a stationary trackball device. 20 years later, it was invented again, separately, with no relation, as a wooden box with two wheels directly on the table, no ball. Later, in the 70s, redone again with the ball but with four wheels, then again with the original 2 wheels one ball design and three buttons by HP... until Steve Jobs saw this 300 dollar thing and had a life of about 2 or 3 months, thought it was a marvel, and said they had to recreate it in something that was less than 10 dollars and lasted at least a year. And there's the modern mouse. (The name mouse came from the cord which stuck out the back. It was also called a bug but clearly that name didn't stick).

Why was that worth mentioning?
In Battletech, technology for things gets made, lost/forgotten/destroyed, reinvented either entirely separately or through the rediscovery of old stuff... and it just keeps repeating... much like history...and mice.