Tom : I am glad you mention Starship Troopers
Actually, you''ll notice that one of the marketing points of the movie was the excellent effects, and the use of non-humanoid aliens, which was extremely costly. I don''t remember a lot of movies doing that before (Alien maybe...)

but the interesting thing about Starship Troopers, as you said, isn''t the plot. Rather it''s the message, if you think about it five seconds.
A race of evil bugs from the other side of the galaxy, that would have send an asteroid on our planet ??? How convenient.
The point of the movie was to make you think about how cool fachism can look (IMHO). And the use of non-humanoids as the enemy is just a clever trick to make it more obvious. They are different, they are bugs, let''s wipe them out...
If they had been more like us, we probably would have been thinking a little bit more, wouldn''t we ?
So you see, how our preconceived ideas can be used to manipulate us. The big asteroid being just an excuse to launch a massive attack against a race we would have otherwise ignored (maybe), or treated differently (more probably).
The appearance of the aliens you design is a narrative tool (mm, not sure of the expression, but you get the point?) and should be used just like that : a tool. Unless you are a scientific trying to study alternative life forms (then, refer to the Tierra project, amongst others).

youpla :-P

Tom - I think you should look around to find the HP Lovecraft Omnibus set... that''s where I read his stories the first time. These are truly classics of the weird, and they are an excellent source of information about the horror/suspense genre.


People might not remember what you said, or what you did, but they will always remember how you made them feel.
~ (V)^|) |<é!t|-| ~

You know what''s funny? For all the times I''ve watched Starship Troopers, I never made that connection before. Perhaps it''s because I''m beyond the need to destroy creatures weaker than I am. I don''t kill insects like most people do. In fact, it sickens me to see other people do it.

In this sense, I might not be a very good candidate for making a viscious alien species, which could actually be a good thing. How many alien species do you think would really be bent on wiping out mankind, particularly when they''re across the frigging galaxy?

But I''m thinking in human terms again. A truly-alien alien might not intend to kill. In fact, it might not have any concept of killing. For anyone in this conversation that hasn''t read "Sphere" by Michael Crichton, I strongly recommend doing so. (The book is far superior to the movie, as always.)

As for another really great non-human alien, check out "Deep Rising" (1998). The monster wasn''t really an alien per se, but it had all the qualities that make a great alien menace.

I''ll try to bring my aiens to bear on the plot, so they have a greater purpose other than to mystify. There are several species in my world I can use to do this. Thanks for the tips.

Well, as a matter of fact, Starship troopers is originally a book written by Robert Heinlein. And don''t believe it''s a crap plot just because the movie can''t go deep under the surface. It''s your brain''s job to do that, after all
Even in the movie, you should be at least a bit confused by the underlying fachism of this society, where you can''t become a citizen if you haven''t served ... it''s much more political that the movie make it look like. The reason I talk about it even though I haven''t read it, is because I saw this interview with Heinlein, after the movie was out, where he explain himself what he tried to show in the movie. Seem like a lot of people in the States missed the point ...

kseh : mmmh, I *never* remember the guy who wrote the pyramid of needs... but basically, we humans do survive, grow and reproduce, it''s just that for most of us western societies, we already have got that, and we care about other things a bit "higher-level", which, as you say, make us forget that we do that to. I guess I am just saying I agree with you

ahw ell

Which brings to mind an interesting point. What if an alien species were so superior to ourselves that they mastered survival and reproduction, and perhaps even satisfaction? Eudaimonia, anyone?

Just a thought. What would that species be like? What goals could they have if they no longer yearned for enjoyment? My guess is, you''d have an Alpha Centauri plot where all members of the species are striving for transcendence to another state of being. An interesting idea, I think.

Actually, this is interesting to me, because this is where psionics originated in my future human society. People had grown so used to automation and eudaimonia that they began looking into hidden aspects of the human psyche. It''s not your run-of-the-mill plot where people just kind of inadvertantly stumbled onto psionics. No, my humans worked for it.

Okay, that''s it for my rant tonight.

cf the Vorlon in Babylon 5, the Thirdspace thingies (I particularly love the question of G''Kar of tha Narn "could it be that we are mere ants on the fingers of giants ?")
cf the Asgard in Stargate SG1 (not sure of the spelling, the little greys, basically).

Your point is nice, what is the goal of a species. And what do you do once you have mastered the basics... I guess it''s a nice definition of what a species does. Fight for survival, look for food, build shelter, create social life, look for self improvement, etc. It applies to quite a bunch of animals, I guess if we expand that, we can create interesting alien cultures.

youpla :-P

I wonder how the player (which is probably human ) can interact with species wich are truely different, because then communication would probably be a problem. Are there some things which are common to all sapient species ? How can we define a frame of reference common to both species ?
This is one of the main reasons why there are so much antropomorphic species, if they don''t share some common traits with us the only possibilities are to avoid them (not very interesting unless the scenario is very well constructed) or to fight them (far too overdone).

Some references :
Orson Scott Card : "The Ender strategy"
David Brin : "Uplift war"

Well, on the contrary, I think it could make a whole game to try and understand other species. Or at least make first contact.
Star Trek has it easy, meeting humanoids races. But the few ones that are not, usually end up doing the best episodes I have seen (anything with the Borg, the species 237 or something, that species that was a descendant from Earth dinosaurs and were invastigating the spaceship crew ...)
The special episode Thirdspace (in Babylon 5) gives you one of those encounters you''d rather avoid.
But I think this could make the whole interest in a game.
Rather than having a "you discovered the Zorgluvian. They are friendly" message on your log, you could make a whole portion of the game around discovering a few, well designed species.
Imagine playing the commander of the ship that makes first contact with a spaceship. And imagine you f*ck it up like the guy did in Babylon 5 with the Minbari, provoking a war, and the quasi-extinction of the Solar system ...

Now that would be a nice game !

(since you refer to O.S. Card, try his "Return to Harmony" series, the last book has an interesting form of this kind of encounters)