About Slogs...

[Xavier]

Tremors, possibly number 2, I'm searching it too

EDIT: here is what was on my mind
http://www.oddworldforums.net/showth...hlight=Tremors

[Bullet Magnet]

Really? That's a body plan I see often in modern fantasy/science fiction. It's clearly based on ratite birds, which is far less obvious in the slog.

[Xavier]

Heh, there is some similarities between this and a Slog:



Except this shrieker has a "tail"
I agree it's a basic body plan, but I really think this is where the Slog's design came from.

[Bullet Magnet]

I notice that the shrieker holds its torso beneath its hips, instead of in front of them like on a slog. The two legs of the shrieker seem analogous to the forelimbs of a quadruped, rather than the hind limbs as in the slog.

[Crashpunk]

OFFTOPIC
do slogs have eyes?

and that fish is sweet!

[Bullet Magnet]

Slogs have no visible eyes, like many Oddworld species (though less and less since Olds left OWI). How they navigate the world remains a mystery.

[Crashpunk]

ah ok

[paramiteabe]

Maybe slogs navigate useing heat sensory organs like Shreakers do. They sense the body heat of something else the rest is well obvieous.

[Zerox]

There's no obvious organ for that. Snakes are the only species I'm aware of that can in reality, and they have noticeable sensory pits. I was under the impression Oddworld's creatures detected/noticed something else (maybe a form of echolocation...? The Scrab's large head would show it in particular is highly sensetive in that sense), considering at least Fleeches we could assume to be cold blooded, thus making them invisible/harder to detect. It could be an entirely new, alien sense to us. Maybe even an air form of electroreception (though whether that could work out of water [in the form we know in sharks] is unbeknownst to me. BM should know though)

The Slog's body is on a permanent downward angle, presumably easing stress on it's legs, it's upper jaw moving instead of the lower. At least, they're like this when sleeping/resting, which it may spend an amount of time doing more than otherwise due to supporting the odd structure. But would the fact it's body weight is forward leaning, thus mean that when it walks or, perhaps more runs, that weight helps give it forward inclined momentum/carry it forward? Since it is always like that, it could get used to what would otherwise make it off balance. That would, with the absence of the tail, at least theoretically increase it's acceleration, if not necessarily the top speed. Less effort might be required for that speed due to gravity, though. Thoughts?
The skull also would seem light, given that the head is a large part of it, and the inside of the mouth is deeply concave, noticeable in the main official art. Their feet also go forward right below the head, have a pretty wide spread (certainly much more than ordinary dog feet) and their legs (thighs mainly) seem more noticeabley muscled, though that may not mean much given muscles are obvious on many other species too.

Why the Slog anyway? I'd have thought Elum moreover had similar problems, magnified by it's size and less compact build. But Elum may help prove my theory of the heavy forward momentum (look at it running...). It also has pretty large feet.

[Wil]

Sligface: how do scrabs and paramites sense their enviroments? they don't seem to have eyes.

Lorne Lanning: They use their brains glands and this gives them vision similar to what dolphins or sharks have. They sense the electro-magnetic fields around the living creatures that they cannot visually see.

[Zerox]

Thanks, Max. Never thought to ask that in Q&A.
Hmm, only sharks can sense electromagnetic fields, dolphins use echolocation. Perhaps these species can also pick up the slight radiation of the electromagnetic field, their own and other creatures, rebounding off of objects so they can sense their environment also...? (since dolphins sense the rebounding sound waves from objects, and Lanning references dolphins also, I suppose).
Either that or the environment gives out a lesser amount of this electroradiation. It's obvious they can sense the walls, floor, and small or thin objects (notably the webs of the Paramites). Perhaps that of the planet, and where it is interrupted in even the tiniest ways.
Lorne's answer suggests that they can sense the entire environment and not just living prey.
Or it could just be more beyond our understanding and more dissimilar from the senses utilised by sharks or dolphins than I realise.

[Wil]

You’re assuming they don’t also use more familiar senses, albeit with potential perceptions that exceed our own. Paramites and Slogs clearly have senses of smell and hearing, and Scrabs have hearing too. One theory I liked back in the day was that Paramites could sense vibrations in the ground and use them to work out a (non-pictorial) picture of their environment.

[Phylum]

or sonar. scrabs have the right beak shape to project a high pitched noise. Slogs whine when blown up, maybe that's misdone sonar resulting in death.

[Zerox]

Or maybe the Slogs whine because they're dying? I think I would. Anything disturbing to them, such as the explosive rings in AO, that make the Slogs whine when passing through them. I don't recall if this occurs anywhere in AE.

You’re assuming they don’t also use more familiar senses, albeit with potential perceptions that exceed our own. Paramites and Slogs clearly have senses of smell and hearing, and Scrabs have hearing too. One theory I liked back in the day was that Paramites could sense vibrations in the ground and use them to work out a (non-pictorial) picture of their environment.

Smell is obvious. Vibrations may, again, need some form of source, unless it's sensitive enough to work an idea from almost nothing. The feet of Scrabs and Paramites could do that, on stone picking it up easily, and soft soil they dig in slightly giving them more reception surface area. But then, Slogs and Meeches don't have similar feet for that, and they otherwise look somewhat unlikely candidates for sensing vibrations. At the very least they have the basic visual sense stated by Lorne, at least hearing and smell will be heightened above that of us. Those just aren't necessarily practical for rapid environment sensing, smell particularly/at least.

[Sanssouci]

I like the idea of them using electroreceptors ala monotremes

[marlz]

I have an interesting question about slogs.

Throughout the course of the Oddworld series, they have constantly appeared as non-possessable enemies. But I managed to possess one in the GBA version of Munch's Oddysee.

My question is this: Can they be possessed in any other games? If so, what is it like to control them and are they actually useful?

[Nate]

They can be possessed in the xBox version of MO. They're not very useful other than to kill other slogs.

[marlz]

OK. Thanks Nate!

Just quickly on the topic of possessing things in MO, I think it's really wierd that if you possess a Paramite, you can kill another Paramite with it. Or is that only in the GBA version?

[Wil]

I don’t remember Paramites in MO GBA. Only Scrabs.

[marlz]

They first appeared in the GBA version in "Level 8 - Journey", the first part of the area called Break Wind Hill (I laugh everytime I hear that).

They also (randomly) appear in the last level, 2nd screen.

[AlexFili]

I'll have to revisit MO sometime and check out all the funky things you can do with possessed animals. Slogs are an enigma. Don't forget, they can cram like 40 into one of those tiny Slog pens!