Friday Update Triple Threat – Fan Friday, Studio Insider & Fan Site Summit

Yes, we’re late with this week’s update! Turns out I can’t do _everything_ from the iPhone :)  Anyway, hopefully better late then never, right?

Today’s Friday Update is a three-parter: First up is a Fan Friday.

As with every Fan Friday, this one is stcked full with lots of goodies for the TOR faithful:

The Fan Site Spotlight features the excellent SWTOR Life, and if you’re not visitng that site regularly, you need to put it in your rotation. They have the most awesome interactive Dev Tracker search, not to mention other great features! I got to meet Serge and Derek at the Fan Site Summit, and there really couldn’t be two nicer guys! Bookmark ’em!

This Fan Friday also includes the mother lode of events at which you can catch Star Wars: The Old Republic this year:

• E3
• San Diego Comic-Con
• gamescom
• Penny Arcade Expo
• EuroGamer Expo
• New York Comic-Con
• Paris Games Week
• Dreamhack

We’re also treated to a new piece of concept art of Hutta:

A Bounty Hunter stalks his prey in the muddy marshlands of Hutta.

Also, as usual, there is some great fan artwork to check out, a new smattering of forum avatars and smilies are available, and last but not least two new polls.

Next up, we have a brand new edition of Studio Insider where Audio Designer Scott Morton talks about creating the mix of music and sound effects that help make the combat sequences in The Old Republic so engaging:

One of the first things we do when beginning audio production on combat abilities is to give each class a distinctive aural character. We’ve discovered that a great way to establish a sonic palette for each class is to come up with one or two descriptive terms that capture the essence of what we’re trying to convey, and attempt to tune every sound to those terms.

Scott includes some awesome “before and after” video/audio examples, so you really owe it to yourself to go check out the entire blog!

Also part of the Studio Insider is the Community Q&A. This month’s topic is about art, and is handled by Senior Concept Artist Clint Young (Editor’s Note: You can catch our interview with Clint from Star Wars Celebration V right here!) Here’s a small sample from the Community Q&A:

Q: Are there weather condition changes on planets? – Fyror

A: Each planet has localized weather conditions. Depending on the world the weather you will encounter will include rain, snow, sandstorms and many other unfavorable conditions; it just happens to be a constant for those worlds. For example, if you’re on Hoth you can expect moderate to heavy snowfall with the occasional blizzard.

Next month’s Community Q&A is all about sound and music… so go post your question now!

Finally, today’s update gives everyone a look back at the Fan Site Summit! BioWare put together a great video that summarizes the entire weekend (minus late-night podcasting and too much food.) You can see most of your favorite fan sites in action here, so go check out the video!