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Title: The Essential Guide to Vehicles and Vessels (Star Wars) by Bill Smith, Doug Chiang, Troy Vigil ISBN: 0-345-39299-X Publisher: Del Rey Pub. Date: 19 March, 1996 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $18.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.76 (55 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: An essential purchase for any Star Wars reader
Comment: The Essential Guide to Vehicles and Vessels is a key reference book for the casual Star Wars fan or avid reader keen to know what their galaxy is flying and driving. Combining fun and informative knowledge makes this a great treat, and with the newer edition now out, there's no better time to acquire this when the price is low and many entries don't appear in the second guide.
Each ship or vehicle is rendered with an outline schematic and pencilled illustration. Though colourless, depth and detail are more than sufficient to give you an exact idea what they are. Key systems and functions are labelled, telling you the placement of guns and other technical stuff, which is useful, though some tags are no more than just telling you this a support struts, that an engine nacelle.
Pictures are brought to life by description, and the description for entries varied considerably. It's certainly informative for a casual reader, but many fans will find it light in detail too many places, specifics too vague at times. These guides should provide the basic specs of a ship: like manufacturer, length, number and types of guns, fighter complement, speed, and perhaps cargo capacity. While the Imperial Star Destroyer had extensive stats, the Ubrikkian space cruiser didn't even have a length, while the sandcrawler's height is only given, not its length. Both guides say only the Super Star Destroyer has "over a thousand weapons", but don't provide an extra sentence or two to say its composition.
A considerable percentage of entries came from the Dark Empire comics, whose ships and vehicles have rarely been used outside those three comics. While the World Devastator and various starfighters within are of interest, who would care for the Amphibion water tank, TIE crawler tank or Hutt Caravel, that weren't even important in their respective comics?
The EGVV features many stuff from quaint and obscure sources, like gargantuan insectile Ithullian ore haulers, Star Home, Shieldships, Coral Vanda and private vehicles to name a few. The manufacturer section in the beginning is useful in identifying who makes what.
The errors and consistencies will appear only to the fan well conversant in SW lore. The TIE Defender made no mention of its tractor beam (neither did the NEGVV), the Sun Crusher looks different from its Dark Apprentice book's cover art, Star Home was undergunned from what its book said, are just some of the many but minor tidbits you'll discover.
But it was the excessive redundancy that was the primary failing of this guide. Many important ships were omitted like the Strike Cruiser, Corellian Gunship, Assault Frigate, Floating Fortress and Golan battle stations, all in frequent and popular usage when this was done. Alas, the NEGVV omitted them as well. Yet there are THREE landspeeder entries, THREE Death Stars, TWO swoops and TWO B-wings.
Overall, the EGVV is a great reference guide for those wondering what their SW ships and vehicles look and are, and with most of its contents unseen in the second guide, still have value as a current purchase.
Rating: 3
Summary: Factual and intresting....and flawed
Comment: Like the other Star Wars: Essential Guide books this book allows you to see what ships that featured in the many books looked like. A lot of the familier ships are here TIEs, X-Wings, Mon Cal Cruisers and Star Destroyers along with many unfamilier vessels Dreadnoughts, Victory Star Destroyers and Cloakshape fighters including several vessels from the books that covered the period some 10,000 or so years before the films. Giving manufacturer names, specifacations and some facts about each craft this book is useful if you ever wanted to know a little more about the Star Wars ships and vehicles.
However this book does have some flaws. It gives the size of the Executor SSD at 8,000 meters, it has since been agreed that the Executor is closer to 18.5 KMs in length LARGER that the Eclipse by a full kilometer Lucas himself has apparently confirmed this. Also the Victory and Imperial Star Destroyers have the pictures mixed up.
Apart from these flaws it is an interesting book.
Rating: 4
Summary: An excellent book for any Star Wars fan
Comment: When it comes to science fiction, the Star Wars saga is the best. However, the films themselves give very little information regarding the vehicles used by characters in them. This is a shame, because the technology of everyone's favorite galaxy far far away is nothing short of fascinating. Finally, a book entitled Star Wars - The Essential Guide To Vehicles And Vessels was released! Now, fans would be able to learn about the ever-so awesome vehicles characters in the films used! Read on for my review of this book.
PROS:
-If you're a fan of the Star Wars films, and you're interested in reading about the technical aspects of craft like the X-Wing fighter and the Imperial-Class Star Destroyer, this book will have more than enough information to make you happy.
-The book covers the expanded universe! This means the vehicles from Shadows Of The Empire appear here, as do vehicles that show up in later novels, comic books, video games, etc. Even if you're just a fan of the films, the information on the expanded universe will fascinate you.
-This book is readily available in most major bookstores (B. Dalton, Barnes And Noble, Borders, etc.) You shouldn't have any trouble finding it.
-The price for this book is very good, considering all the information it has to offer. This is a worthwhile purchase if you're a Star Wars fan.
CONS:
-The major problem with this book is that it was released circa 1997. This means it came out before 1999, and accordingly the vehicles exclusive to the prequel films, Episode I and Episode II, don't appear in here.
-The only pictures in the book are black-and-white sketches. I would have liked to see some more detailed pictures, preferably in color.
OVERALL:
If you're a Star Wars fan, I guarantee this book will fascinate you. If you're not a fan of the Star Wars series but know somebody who is, this makes a great gift. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
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Title: The Essential Guide to Weapons and Technology (Star Wars) by Bill Smith, David Nakabayashi, Troy Vigil ISBN: 0345414136 Publisher: Del Rey Pub. Date: 04 November, 1997 List Price(USD): $18.95 |
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Title: Incredible Cross-Sections (Star Wars, Episode II: Attack of the Clones) by Curtis J. Saxton, Hans Jenssen, Richard Chasemore ISBN: 0789485745 Publisher: DK Publishing Pub. Date: 23 April, 2002 List Price(USD): $19.99 |
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Title: The Essential Guide to Droids (Star Wars) by Daniel Wallace, Bill Hughes, Troy Vigil ISBN: 0345420675 Publisher: Del Rey Pub. Date: 16 February, 1999 List Price(USD): $18.95 |
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Title: The Essential Guide to Planets and Moons (Star Wars) by Daniel Wallace, Brandon McKinney, Scott Kolins ISBN: 0345420683 Publisher: Del Rey Pub. Date: 21 July, 1998 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: The New Essential Guide to Vehicles and Vessels (Star Wars) by W. HADEN BLACKMAN ISBN: 0345449029 Publisher: Del Rey Pub. Date: 30 September, 2003 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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