Wednesday, June 6, 2012

Invid's Guide to the Star Wars Universe: Alien Species (#45)

441. Hoovers. Hoovers are small beings with elephant-like trunks who are apparently poorly known. One existed in Jabba's palace as the Hutt's "pet," but unbeknownst to most, he was a skilled technician and would suck the blood of the palace's other inhabitants at night.

Holy cheese, how many vampires were in that darned place? (There was an Anzati there too.)

Rating: 4/5. Tiny blood-sucking elephant-faced aliens are hilarious.

442. Horansi. Horansi are sapient big cats. Even though they're apparently bipedal, they still look like "normal" Earth big cats, which is perhaps mildly unrealistic, but a nice touch (although apparently the females still have humanlike bosoms... wha?).

They apparently have a rigidly enforced caste system, and believe that it is all that stands between them and the horrible strife that they suffered in their history.

Rating: 2/5. At first, it sounded good, but some of the strange details take away from them.

443. Horobians. They're from Horob, and were only beginning industrialization around the time period of the original movies.

Y'know, sometime I'd like to see a civilization that industrialized oddly, such as still custom-crafting all their parts even though they've obtained advanced technology or something, limiting their production until they finally meet a group that had invented the assembly line and standardization. How realistic that'd be is a bit questionable, perhaps, but it'd be more interesting than the simplistic "technology level" thing people always do.

Which has nothing to do with these guys, because I've said all I have to say on them.

Rating: 1/5.

444. Hortek. Hortek are moderately telepathic reptilian predators who are described as "humanoid." If you look at the page picture, you'll see one of the many reasons why I hate that term.

But I'm not going to hold it against them, or against Ejagga Pakkpekatt, the awesomely named exemplar of the species, because they're reasonably cool and aren't depicted as evil reptiles.

Rating: 4/5. That is all.

445. Houk. Houk are big, heavy, and strong, moreso than Wookiees in at least some cases, and apparently have a reputation for bad tempers. They have corrupt, untrustworthy governments (just like everybody else in that regard, huh?), a large number of colony worlds (over thirty), and surprisingly are known for being indirect and deceitful in personal confrontations despite their big brutishness, their tempers apparently being less explosive and more pressure boiler (though I admit that's a bit of an inference on my part).

Hey, there's a neat detail.

Rating: 4/5. A better than average big angry brute race. How nice.

446. Howler Tree People. The Howler Tree People apparently communicate in an ultrasonic range and can cause severe headaches in members of other races; their language is also apparently so difficult it generally requires a team of translators to hold a conversation with them.

Rating: 3/5. All things considered, there ought to be more guys who are that hard to communicate with.

447. Hrakians. Hrakians are near-humans from Hraki.

Rating: 1/5. Next.

448. Hrasskis. Apparently, they have large, veiny air sacs on their backs. They also believe in succession by seniority, and that taking one's turn in seniority is the highest of honors.

Is it bad that this description immediately made me think of a terminally ill Hrasskis who bumps off his seniors to get to the top before he dies?

Rating: 3/5. Interesting feature (even if it's only a single minor one) and interesting societal wrinkle.

449. Huloons. The Huloons are one of many groups shafted by the Hutts; their homeworld was turned into a big nature preserve by the Hutts, and the majority of the Huloons were killed to make space for it. Huloon survivors who escaped offworld apparently try to make pilgrimages back to their homeworld, but the Hutts generally catch them and torture them for entertainment purposes.

Gee whiz, nice guys, those Hutts.

Rating: 3/5. I suspect they got some pity points.

450. Humans. Aw, look at that huge article. It figures stinkin' humans would get such a big article, doesn't it?

I'll give 'em this, human females are attractive. That's about the only redeeming feature of the lot of 'em.

Rating: 0/5. ...I kid, I kid. It's just silly to rate us as an alien species, but it had to be done.

-Signing off.

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