Friday, January 18, 2013

Invid's Guide to the Star Wars Universe: Alien Species (#76)

751. Nautolans, or Nautiloids (Wikipedia link for the sake of informing you of what that's referring to). Nautolans are amphibious, oddly humanlike beings (Nautolan women are really obviously women, if you get me) who have a huge mass of tentacles on their heads. The super-cheerful Jedi who appeared in the prequels and various EU material, Kit Fisto, is a Nautolan.

Some long time ago, I mentioned that the Nautolans share a homeworld with the Anselmi. The Anselmi have poor relations with the Nautolans and are vastly outnumbered by them because their mutual homeworld is also a decidedly watery world and the Anselmi aren't amphibious.

The Nautolans have a native language and social cues that are largely useless out of water, and thus adopt others for use on dry land, but otherwise aren't significantly affected by dry-land living (though one must presume they're less hardy in deserts). They have multiple hearts with some level of redundancy, as apparently they beat "separately."

This doesn't mean that Kit Fisto lived through being stabbed with a lightsaber, by the way, because he was stabbed through the stomach. Nothing special about Nautolan durability there, apparently.

Rating: 3/5. The Nautolans are reasonably pleasant and have one or two very memorable representatives.

752. Nazren. Apparently enslaved at some point, they were later freed by anti-Imperial efforts.

Despite the sparseness of that, I like them because they look neat. (Although I find myself wondering if the illustration is of an individual with missing fingers or if the artist simply wasn't paying attention.)

Rating: 3/5. It reminds me pleasantly of a rancor, though only generically.

753. Nazzar. These horse-esque aliens are described as contemplative, philosophical, noble, spiritual, xenophobic, and judgmental.

I love when multiple descriptions have no apparent awareness of their own irony when combined with each other.

Rating: 3/5. Here's a suggestion for a description: They're just like people.

754. Nduuati. ...They're reptilian. One of them was a bounty hunter and (probably) general lowlife.

Rating: 1/5. Although you can never have too many reptilian aliens.

755. Nebalites. Nebalites are massive cephalopods (i.e. something like a squid or octopus) whose sheer size means that they have their ships built around their bodies, as it would presumably be impractical to purchase a built-to-spec ship that could house them normally. They send droids to meet people face to face, as doing so themselves is a bit impractical. Apparently, one was kidnapped once.

...Really?

Rating: 5/5. Please, please, pretty please, somebody use one of these as a crime boss?

756. Nediji. The Nediji are birdlike guys with azure down (light fluffy feathers) and who apparently are quite insular (they're supposed to be extremely rare off their homeworld). They prey on a humanoid species, which rather suggests that interaction with other species might occasionally be... tricky.

Their entry states that they're excellent at disguise and surgical strikes, but as the primary known individual was a criminal agent, I'm inclined to suspect that those were individual skills.

Rating: 3/5. Interesting possibilities there.

757. Neelabi. Neelabi are water-breathing tiny fish/whale/something bipeds. They are darned adorable. One was a podracer, which seems like a poor choice of profession for a water breather, especially since said individual apparently couldn't have escaped a crash.

Rating: 3/5 on sheer presence of appearance alone.

758. Neimoidians. Neimoidians are the cowardly, child-abusing, greedy offshoots of the Duros.

To explain, the Neimoidians apparently put their children into a situation where they need to fend for themselves and must carefully ration their own food and often steal it from other children in order to survive and prosper. Many of their children die in such conditions, and the rampant emotional neglect means that all of them are greedy, cautious-to-spineless, and totally self-centered. (And also good businesspeople.)

They were the subject of some controversy, because the accent that the Neimoidians had in Episode I was modeled after the accent of Thai actors. Unfortunate.

On the other hand, as far as I can tell nobody complained that Greedo was actually speaking Quechua in Episode IV...

Rating: 3/5. The idea of a subspecies/race turning out differently because they adopted a different method of raising children is interesting.

759. Nejma. The Nejma are probably the most hilarious-looking members of the Iskalonian school. They're known as the "Honored Ones" and renowned for their coral sculptures, though this art also is known for attracting thieves.

Rating: 3/5. Have I mentioned I quite like the Iskalonian school concept? Because it's pretty great.

760. Nekghouls. The Nekghouls are a subspecies/subgroup/something that's decidely related to Rakghouls, which are basically zombies (the modern plague kind, though their heads are monster alien heads regardless of starting species). The thing that distinguishes them is that they're Force-using zombies, and it's suspected that they were Jedi or Sith before being converted.

Rating: 1/5. It's not that I have anything against zombies as such, even if they are rather played out lately, it's just that... How is this a species?

-Signing off.

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