Drinking With Jedi, Talking About Combat Styles

After watching the combat video last week it got me thinking about sword fighting styles ingame. I was lucky enough to get to spend some time with the real Jedi from Episodes 2 and 3.

Left to right Adam Gill (friend), Kyle Rowling (Joclad Danva, General Grievous Actor not Voice and Count Dooku body and stunt double ), the sexy Sandi Finlay (Sly Moore), Matt Sloan (PLO KOON), Michael Byrne (Darth Sidious stunt double) and me John Gatt ( Jedi Wannabe).

Will we get a full set of styles to chose from like one hand and two hand dual sabers and duel blades? Will our specials reflect our weapon of choice?

Over a lot of beers Kyle made me appreciate the importance of stage fighting. The techniques are not just about blocking and swinging. You need fineness in the moves and I was reminded of it as I watched Episode 3 last week.

Kyle helped choreograph the final fight between Ben and Anakin and helped to come up with an amazing ending to the fight, but George wanted to keep the final blow simple. In one way, when I see that final blow where Anakin loses an arm and 2 legs I'm like WTF? Show me how he did that, and in another way I appreciative that it's quick and doesn't take away from the drama of Anakin's defection.

In all my gaming years I have seen a lot of sweet moves in games and some of the Jedi styles in SWG were some of the best (pre NGE as for some crazy reason a lot got removed). What I've seen so far from SWTOR is looking good and I hope BioWare have put as much time into special moves as they have in to things like voices.

An interview with Kyle here and an interview with Matt here.