Its quite apparent that the developers took a lot of inspiration for the design of the Tempest from the SR-71 Blackbird, the same goes for the old SR 2 Normandy. Its even meant to be a stealth plane like the SR-71 Blackbird. Compare and contrast.
Community AdminIt certainly looks like that's the case. I don't have an eye for aeronautics and real-life ships, but there no doubt were plenty of real-life inspirations.
I couldn't find much talk about the design of the ship, but there is the following: “The whole look I wanted for the Tempest is that extremely cantilevered balance to the ship,” says art director Joel MacMillan. “So you have this very long, thin fuselage, but then the landing gear would be situated at the back. I love the image of that being parked on a cliff face – it’s almost like it’s on a perch, and you see the nose extending off the cliff face.”
Yep, its no surprise that they explain the design of the ship this way, because if its a stealth ship, then every square inch of the ship in and out will be designed with stealth in mind. A very sleek look is one major quality of any stealth aircraft. The very materials with which the ship is built is used for this reason for the sake of avoiding radar detection.
Maybe it's just me but I see more differences than similarities.
Yes they are both capable of atmospheric flight and have wings towards the back but beyond that they look completely different to me.
I'd agree on function if nothing else- the Tempest has no weapons and just intends to be hard to find and harder to hit while running away.
i do have an eye for aircraft & navel vessels, military equipment etc. and i have to agree, i've often looked at the tempest and thought it had design similarities to the blackbird, they even share mission profiles, mainly stealth reconnaissance. and while the normandy shares many points of design functionality with the SR-71 i don't really think they match up visually. though i guess that's a bit more subjective, just like individual taste.
---edit
so on reflection, i still don't see the visual resemblance between the SR-71 and the normandy... however, i do see a lot of similarities between the normandy & tempest, so somewhere i guess the normandy likely shares similarities with the blackbird that i can't see.
