You Won't Believe How Much Sir Alec Guiness Made From Star Wars as Obi Wan Kenobi

                          Art By Ryan Valle: https://rvalleart.myportfolio.com/

One of the most lucrative Hollywood deals ever made by an actor was the one Sir Alec Guiness penned on a contract with his agent Dennis Van Thal which stated that in waving a fee for the role as the wise old Jedi Knight Obi Wan Kenobi he would take a 2% cut of the gross royalties. These royalties would also be in place on the sequels, The Empire Strikes Back, released in 1980, and Return of the Jedi, in 1983 as well as royalties from video sales.

However, Sir Alec could have earned himself even more money had George Lucas kept the verbal agreement he had mentioned to the late actor in a phone call the night before Star Wars was released back in 1977, so confident was Lucas that the film would be a success due to the positive test audience screenings, and so appreciative as Lucas was from the script changes and suggestions from a seasoned actor like Guiness that Lucas called the actor to offer him a raise which would  mean his royalty rate would instead be %2.5. But as everyone knows, unless you have it in writing a deal isn’t a deal until it’s in black and white, unfortunately that extra percentage never materialized.

Star Wars of course went on to be a monster hit at the box office globally and by 2009, nine years after the actors passing it was reported that the films had earned Sir Alec in the region of £56million, with royalty cheques continuing to roll in.

When the Star Wars movies were re-released in 1997 the late actor said “I still have a contract which says that I earn a percentage cut from the film and, of course, I’m very pleased about it.”

It’s no secret that George Lucas was on a small budget when he made Star Wars but was equally looking for actors who could carry scenes and add gravitas to their given roles, Peter Cushing was an experienced actor of stage and screen and commanded a daily fee of £2,000, which at the time was more than Mark Hamills daily fee of £1,000 and Harrison Ford who was earning around £750 per day. James Earl Jones who voiced Darth Vader had been advised by his agent at the time that Star Wars probably wouldn’t amount to much and to “just take the money and run”. It’s also been hinted that technicians who worked on the film turned down opportunities for gross royalties too.

The royalties for just the original Star Wars movies will have made Sir Alec Guiness more than his combined earnings from 40 other film roles over a career of sixty years. This included The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), for which he won an Oscar, not to mention other notable films such as David leans Lawrence of Arabia as well as A Passage to India, The Man in The White Suit and Oliver Twist. 
Eighteen years on and his presence in the original trilogy is as as strong now as it ever was.

Coffe Table Reads For Mancaves - The Art of Battlefield 1

The Art of Battlefield 1

With the forthcoming reveal of Battlefield V from EA and the most recent 'Apocalypse' DLC released for Battlefield 1 keeping current players occupied I thought it was long overdue I took purchase of another book on video game art I'd had my eyes on for some considerable time.The Art of Battlefield 1 from Dark Horse is an absolute treasure trove for the eyes in terms of illustrative and design work for Battlefield 1 which launched on PC and PS4, Xbox One back in late 2016.
At 184 pages its a stunning coffee table addition to any man-cave or study looking to add some laid back reading, especially which puts more focus on the art than the word if you're a lazy reader like me. Descriptions and design notes support a lot of the imagery giving a keen insight into the processes of bringing one of the most popular FPS games of recent years to life. Forr the most part, the book is a beautiful 'behind the scenes look at illustrative design and the historical factors that came into focus when creating a WW1 FPS game.

The book explores character design, showing the various design exploration of soldiers uniforms and in latter stages of the book, the ethos behind keeping the brand imagery in sync with other Battlefield games,but what really stands out is the way in which combat and map design create scenarios when combined with land, air and ground warfare. Pages are full of some truly eye popping digital renders and visualizations of how the game should look from air to air combat, tank warfare and the detail that goes into bringing the horrors of the World War 1 battlefield to life.

The book is a nice size and measures in at 23.6 X 2 X 31.2 cm, hardback with a matte finish to the cover, compared to Titan Book's  The Art of Battlefield 4 which featured a lot more architecture and locations The Art of Battlefield 1 feels like it presents and explores far more of the scenarios from the campaign and multiplayer that players will come face to face with in the game. 

If you can snap up a copy for under £30.00 / $40.00 then you've got a bargain because the book is difficult to put down, in fact these books are perfect for browsing in an evening or lazy afternoon.

Amazon have both kindle and hardback editions available and the price has been reduced from its original RRP: http://amzn.to/2px6V6B

Want to see more art from the DICE team?, check out Senior Concept Artist Robert Sammelin's portfolio here: https://robertsammelin.myportfolio.com/projects

BATTLEFIELD V Heads to WW2

Battlefield 1 has kept me hooked nightly since it launched back in 2016, yes nightly and I'm proud say I'm one of the 25 million users that has joined its ranks since I cannot abide Call of Duty or where it ended up with drones and sci-fi walking mechs and day-glow weapons. Modern Warfare was the last great outing, possibly Black Ops II which also played pretty decent. Visually the latest WW2 Call of Duty looked absolutely stunning but the TTK was crazy and I suffered a really bad case of motion sickness trying to play deathmatch games, something  I never get from Battlefield games. 

 Above: Call of Duty revisited the WW2 era for its 2017 release.

The World War 1 setting was a huge gamble for EA and DICE but they absolutely nailed what is quite possible the quintessential representation of warfare in the modern age where the advent of armored warfare may have been in its infancy but the industrial age paved the way for scary ways in which to wage war on fellow man.

There's been quite a bit of rumor floating around where Battlefield heads next, first up was the rumor that a Bad Company sequel / prequel would appear but money seems to be a safe bet on a WW2 setting with Battlefield V. 
Reveal wise this could happen at GDC in San Francisco in late March or anytime in the next few weeks.

Battlefield 1 has a glorious mix of air land and sea combat, sea combat only really came to the fruition properly with the inclusion of warships late in the games release with the awesome map Heligoland Bight as part of the turning tides DLC in December 2017, it is perhaps the most chaotic fight you'll experience in BF1.
Air combat in Battlefield 1 balances out between bombers and nimble fighters with differing payloads and paint jobs which creates a great way for players to mix up the fight. Battlefield V will most certainly contain air combat and it would be great to see the same format of a mix of fighters and  bomber here with planes not explored that much in videogame FPS titles such as the Ju87 or Focke Wulf 190D.

In terms of ground combat I'd love to see other theaters explored, such as Crete which could have German paratroopers facing off against British and Australian, New Zealand troops which could bring in a very nice mix of combat similar to Helogoland Bight.
Much like Amiens is the definitive street combat map the same could be said for a map set within Caen during the invasion of Normandy.

Uniform wise it appears that customization will be key to Battlefield V, would love to see some options here of swapping helmets out for berets in specific units such as paratroopers as well as being able to reverse the smocks for German troops who wore the Tan and Water parkas made famous in films such as Where Eagles Dare.

Weapon choice would be vastly improved for a WW2 setting, there were some pretty unique weapons in Battlefield 1, some of which carried over to WW2 such as the Lewis Gun which was eventually replaced by the more widely adopted Bren but aside for the 1911's and Lugers which will no doubt make another appearance it would be great to see weapons like the MP44, American M3A1 Grease gun and M1 Thompson get the battlefield treatment. other more unique weapons would be the FG42, the Panzerfaust, De Lisle carbine, Lee Enfield No.5 and Lahti L39 20mm anti tank gun.

 Above: The 1911 Colt 45 "The Care Package" skin -  Legendary

It'll be interesting to see how broad the scope is for either the campaign or multiplayer in Battlefield V, the campaign mix split between tanks, planes and ground combat in the campaign worked extremely well and tied in some key elements to the historic warfare not just on the Western front but in the Middle East as well. With the Eastern Front, the Pacific and Middle East theaters all providing some exciting options for dice it provides a huge diverse choice to pick from.

Above ; T.E Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) Will historic characters also appear in Battlefield V?

The Ultimate WW2 Strategy Game for 2018

Armchair Generals of the world rejoice, there's a new WW2 hex based strategy game on the horizon which is looking to take the Panzer General crown, Klotzen! Panzer Battles was recently announced as a new addition to the popular hex based strategy gaming genre for PC and arrives during the summer of 2018.

Klotzen! Panzer Battles will offer a challenging turn based combat experience with a built in adaptive AI system that will look to capitalize on ways to attack the player when they least expect it. The game looks to provide a wide variety of historic engagements from WW2, all of which are based on historic engagements. Impressively Klotzen! Panzer Battles aims to provide players over 550+ unit types in the game  which are divided into 22 unit classes including infantry, Battleships, armored tanks, bombers, submarines, and fighter planes. Klotzens other unique approach to strategic combat will allow players to re-write military history by conducting historic military campaigns to play out a range of entirely new and unique outcomes such as the invasion of Normandy a whole year earlier in 1943 instead of in June 1944 or successfully invading England to take London or on the Eastern front to successfully steamroll the Russians in order to take Moscow.

Combat in the game takes into consideration things like supply lines which are crucial to moving units as well as being able to recycle knocked out units. Add to this the ability to coordinate multi task force initiatives with attacks from the air and sea by utilizing naval power parked off the coast. Attacking towns and supply lines from the air provide a tactical edge not seen before in other hex based games. The various Campaigns offered in the game can be fought over a variety of terrain options such as the brutal harsh realities of Winter combat on the snow covered Eastern front and at the other end of the scale, the unforgiving cooking pot of North Africa.

Map sizes in Klotzen! Panzer Battles look pretty substantial and vary from 200km to over 1000km in scale, (each hex represents 10km).

By far one of the biggest draws of the game is the way that developer Maxim Games has managed to visualize the game, typically most of the WW2 hex based games on the market cater for a 2D perspective, to do this Maxim Games have pre-renderded 60 images of each unit, by comparison Panzer Corps managed only 2, right side, left side. The 3D effect adds a nice bit of finesse to the game looking to make its mark in today's crowded strategy market.

Another nice aspect of Klotzen Panzer Battles is the fact that the outcomes of campaigns is different each time, there are two or three different outcomes to each map which increases the replayability aspect of the game. The role of Generals and Commanders all with various traits also shakes up the outcomes and ongoing tactical operations of the game which I think offers a nice spin.

From the looks of it Klotzen Panzer Battles has looked closely at what both Panzer General and Panzer Corps have already offered up to WW2 strategy gamers and decided to bring the WW2 hex based genre up to date with a really thought out strategy offering of its own. For any game looking to introduce something fresh into a heavily populated genre developers need to look at areas where rival games have made their mark and then improve upon that offering with their own unique ideas. The use of aircraft as an attacking asset on supply and towns is an interesting one, the visuals are fresh and really nicely detailed and the sheer number of units and proposed scenarios (60 scenarios at launch) make this a title to keep a close eye on for sure.

Panzer General has ruled the roost for many years and Panzer Corps DLC offerings have kept the lights on for a good while but this looks like it could really shake up the genre nicely.

Be sure to check out the Steam page for Klotzen Panzer Battles here