Something has become clear in the weeks since the Rogue One release: it provided a major opportunity for a great intersection of new work and old surrounding the classic trilogy (and beyond). It has inspired official, unofficial, and fan material from books to art to games. Not coincidentally, there are obvious and not-so obvious connections to West End Games Star Wars RPG.
Right out of the gate, the Rogue One: The Ultimate Visual Guide (a combination visual dictionary and incredible cross sections book) features old-time WEG inspired material. While there have been occasional references in the new works (Shantipole in Rebels, for instance), this book is loaded with them. This isn't an accident. Author and Star Wars Story Group member Pablo Hidalgo was once a freelance writer and artist for the game. He acknowledged the connection quickly after people started calling out the references on twitter (maybe elsewhere, too).
For me, it was fun to discover the Rebel leadership carried the titles of various Ministers as originally called out in WEG's The Rebel Sourcebook (easily one of my favorites ever). Having updated that Rebellion early history twice in later RPG editions (once in Saga Edition's Rebellion Era Campaign Guide and again in FFG's Age of Rebellion) it was nice to see the basic governing structure carried forward. Bits of that history still seem to be relevant so far.
Artist and avid Star Wars gamer Khairul Hisham started posting several of the connections on twitter. Then he went all out and assembled them into a single blog post complete with photos of the text from the Visual Guide and the corresponding original reference in The Rebel Sourcebook and other WEG products. As he notes, that's probably not all of them.
Beyond the official material, the movie inspired artist Darren M. A. Calvert to create some WEG style black and white character portraits of the Rogue One principal cast. He then asked former Star Wars RPG WEG line editor Eric Trautmann for some d6 stats....which he did, and more. Eric created an unofficial mini WEG-style Galaxy Guide, including the fonts, graphics, and cover.
Fun stuff to be sure.
Now to wrap up:
Fantasy Flight released the long awaited bounty hunter sourcebook, aptly named No Disintegrations. I wasn't on this one, and like everyone else, I'm looking forward to seeing it.
There's a great Star Wars video game Humble Bundle going on. Check it out for deals on some fun old games. It benefits unicef on behalf of Star Wars Force for Change.