Cornwell's tale of the Agincourt campaign follows the career of a longbowman who gets made ventenar (sergeant in command of twenty archers) during those events. As fans of Cornwell may expect, he has a some diabolical enemies - some English, some French - who he crosses paths with on and off during the course of the novel. The times are brutal, and so is the story, especially his many little revisionist takes on the romanticized version of the story (e.g. Shakespeare's).
Most importantly, contains all the adventure and historical detail that you would expect. Great stuff.
29 December 2008
26 December 2008
Music that I got in the primary gifting period.
I'm not going to say much about these, just list them. They are good! Look for them on youtube or something! Also, Graham Reid's elsewhere has lots of good reviews of most of them and usually a song you can listen to (I found out about many of them from his mailing list/RSS feed originally, and recommend both). Also, strictly speaking some of these were actually gifted to Make Tea Not War but I'm sure she won't mind sharing. Ordered by the order of the pile of CDs:
- Frightened Rabbit: Midnight Organ Fight
- Calexico: Carried To Dust
- Samuel F Scott & the Bunnies on Ponies: Straight Answer Machine
- David Byrne & Brian Eno: Everything That Happens Will Happen Today
- Luke Buda: Vesuvius
- Flogging Molly: Swagger, Drunken Lullabies
The Star Fraction by Ken MacLeod
I re-read this on a whim, seeing it on the library shelf, and was not disappointed. I think this may be his best novel - it's certainly so densely packed with ideas it seems liable to implode at any point. Fantastic. Should be on any serious science fiction fan's must-read list. Probably the must-own list, really.
For those who are late to the party, it follows a few characters, but centrally Moh Kohn, a mecenary with a hacked together gun/AI who discovers as part of a routine 'protect university science department from anti-technology terrorists' job that he seems to be a key part of some kind of backup plan to save British (or possibly global) socialism that was put together by his father (a genius computer programmer, and author of the OS/internet substrate of the computers used in the time of the novel) and seems to have suddenly activated itself. A combination of interesting and plausible politics and technologies make this work much better than many similar attempts. Also, there's a really good sprinkling of stuff that is just damn cool (the way that Gibson can also do so very well).
For those who are late to the party, it follows a few characters, but centrally Moh Kohn, a mecenary with a hacked together gun/AI who discovers as part of a routine 'protect university science department from anti-technology terrorists' job that he seems to be a key part of some kind of backup plan to save British (or possibly global) socialism that was put together by his father (a genius computer programmer, and author of the OS/internet substrate of the computers used in the time of the novel) and seems to have suddenly activated itself. A combination of interesting and plausible politics and technologies make this work much better than many similar attempts. Also, there's a really good sprinkling of stuff that is just damn cool (the way that Gibson can also do so very well).
Rollback by Robert J Sawyer
An interesting, bittersweet novel about early life extension technologies. The main plot centres on a married couple. She was the person who deciphered the first message received from extraterrestrials, but is now 87. A response is received and she is offered a new (and phenomenally expensive) rejuvenation treatment to aid her efforts to decipher the alien's second message. She accepts, but only on the condition that her husband also gets the treatment. Unfortunately, it only works on him. The novel is from his point of view and explores the various effects that this has.
Good.
Good.
13 December 2008
Spindrift by Allen Steele
Reliably good hard sf space opera from Steele. This is in the Coyote universe but only loosely related to the Coyote stories, which I had been finding a little bogged down in their own history and characters recently, so this was somewhat refreshing. It's a first contact story, and a fun enough representative of the type.
The characters are fairly one-dimensional, and the bad guys in particular seem motivated by little else beyond the needs of the story to have some villains. On the other hand, the exploration and hazards of space sections more than make up for those shortcomings.
The characters are fairly one-dimensional, and the bad guys in particular seem motivated by little else beyond the needs of the story to have some villains. On the other hand, the exploration and hazards of space sections more than make up for those shortcomings.
The Last Green Tree by Jim Grimsley
A strange kind of blend of science fiction and fantasy novel, dealing with magic that is allegedly some kind of sufficiently advanced technology (although it is hard to see how it is). In any case, the characters are strongly drawn and interesting, and their attempts to deal with the clash of magicians which incidentally wipes out most of a world.
It's sort of a follow on from The Ordinary, in that it is set in the same world and answers certain questions raised in that novel, but the connections are largely incidental.
It's sort of a follow on from The Ordinary, in that it is set in the same world and answers certain questions raised in that novel, but the connections are largely incidental.
04 December 2008
Hot Topic by Gareth Renowden
A nice general introduction to climate science, what is happening to the world, and what specifically is going to happen to New Zealand. The major topics of the IPCC reports are covered here, with a bit of expansion on areas of interest to New Zealand laypeople (or at least that is how it comes across - I must admit to only having read the summary versions of some of the IPCC reports myself).
03 December 2008
Mouse Guard RPG: Read-through Review
The pre-order for this includes a downloadable pdf, so I spent yesterday evening reading the whole thing. It captures the feel of the comic very well - there is an emphasis on teamwork, on being small creatures in a big dangerous world, and on making hard choices about what you beleive in.
Oh yeah... quick aside for those not familiar with the comics... mice are like people, they have a little medieval society and talk and stuff. All the other animals are basically just animals but as mice are tiny they are effectively monsters. The mouse guard are the mice who protect all the other mice from these dangers.
I'm not familiar with any of the other Burning Wheel games, so I can't give any comparison to those, but it's certainly a lovely system. The basic way you make tests is simple (roll a pool of six sided dice, 4-6 are successes, you need X successes where X is picked by very following instructions in the skill description). The more elaborate kinds of tests and things you can do with them (teamwork, use of weapons and tools, etc) build on this base in straightforward ways.
There's also a real focus on getting into play fast - there are premade characters and missions in the book to start you off, and every kind of animal you might meet is statted out (even a bear, although I hope never to see a mouse patrol facing one). Every session each player gives their mouse a goal to try and acheive by the end, as well as the mission you have as a team. The GM sets out to put some obstacles in the way of the mission and goals. Things get interesting due to the failure mechanic. When a player fails a test, it isn't just 'do you succeed or fail'. Instead, the GM decides whether your mouse succeeds, but takes a condition (like now it's Tired, or Injured, etc) or fails, but there is a Twist in the story.
Adding a twist to the story allows the GM to bring in entirely new obstacles or sub-plots, and seems like it will make running a session go pretty smoothly while maintaining a sense of unpredictability and excitement.
The other neat thing is that after the mission is done, the players get a formal turn. This is basically the guards' down time, where the players get to finish up their goals, recover from the mission, and stuff like that. There's some limitations on how much you can do and you still have to make tests to get things done. Having this be directed by the players is a cool idea. I like it.
There's some overarching shape to the stories too - the seasons have a very pronounced impact on the day to day lives of the mice and the missions that the guard will need to do. There are a few ways suggested to use these changes to structure your games. All of them look pretty good (e.g. X sessions per season, X weather changes per season, etc). Over this there's an even bigger structure where the life of your patrol will probably come to a close as the characters retire or die.
Getting back to the point about running the game, it seems like it will fit into my preferred mode of 'think up a basic idea about what will happen in five minutes before the session and then run with it'. The characters have a whole lot of flags written in to the character sheet as well - friends, enemies, things they beleive in, things to roleplay each session, things they are good at, personal quirks, etc. These all have mechanical reasons to be incorporated into play, as well, so they'll be sure to be used.
There's plenty more in the rules, but I think it's premature to say more before play. At this stage, it all looks like it will be great.
Lastly, it looks absolutely fantastic. It is filled with David Petersen's art - some from the comics, some new (all stunning) - and printed in full colour. It's been printed through Petersen's publisher, so I expect it will come out the same quality as the comic collection, i.e. significantly more fantastic than a pdf read on a laptop screen.
Oh yeah... quick aside for those not familiar with the comics... mice are like people, they have a little medieval society and talk and stuff. All the other animals are basically just animals but as mice are tiny they are effectively monsters. The mouse guard are the mice who protect all the other mice from these dangers.
I'm not familiar with any of the other Burning Wheel games, so I can't give any comparison to those, but it's certainly a lovely system. The basic way you make tests is simple (roll a pool of six sided dice, 4-6 are successes, you need X successes where X is picked by very following instructions in the skill description). The more elaborate kinds of tests and things you can do with them (teamwork, use of weapons and tools, etc) build on this base in straightforward ways.
There's also a real focus on getting into play fast - there are premade characters and missions in the book to start you off, and every kind of animal you might meet is statted out (even a bear, although I hope never to see a mouse patrol facing one). Every session each player gives their mouse a goal to try and acheive by the end, as well as the mission you have as a team. The GM sets out to put some obstacles in the way of the mission and goals. Things get interesting due to the failure mechanic. When a player fails a test, it isn't just 'do you succeed or fail'. Instead, the GM decides whether your mouse succeeds, but takes a condition (like now it's Tired, or Injured, etc) or fails, but there is a Twist in the story.
Adding a twist to the story allows the GM to bring in entirely new obstacles or sub-plots, and seems like it will make running a session go pretty smoothly while maintaining a sense of unpredictability and excitement.
The other neat thing is that after the mission is done, the players get a formal turn. This is basically the guards' down time, where the players get to finish up their goals, recover from the mission, and stuff like that. There's some limitations on how much you can do and you still have to make tests to get things done. Having this be directed by the players is a cool idea. I like it.
There's some overarching shape to the stories too - the seasons have a very pronounced impact on the day to day lives of the mice and the missions that the guard will need to do. There are a few ways suggested to use these changes to structure your games. All of them look pretty good (e.g. X sessions per season, X weather changes per season, etc). Over this there's an even bigger structure where the life of your patrol will probably come to a close as the characters retire or die.
Getting back to the point about running the game, it seems like it will fit into my preferred mode of 'think up a basic idea about what will happen in five minutes before the session and then run with it'. The characters have a whole lot of flags written in to the character sheet as well - friends, enemies, things they beleive in, things to roleplay each session, things they are good at, personal quirks, etc. These all have mechanical reasons to be incorporated into play, as well, so they'll be sure to be used.
There's plenty more in the rules, but I think it's premature to say more before play. At this stage, it all looks like it will be great.
Lastly, it looks absolutely fantastic. It is filled with David Petersen's art - some from the comics, some new (all stunning) - and printed in full colour. It's been printed through Petersen's publisher, so I expect it will come out the same quality as the comic collection, i.e. significantly more fantastic than a pdf read on a laptop screen.
The Stuff of Thought by Steven Pinker
This book is about the language of thought - how the mind frames concepts about the world internally. Pinker uses both psychology (mainly evolutionary) and linguistics to pick apart what the language of thought is comprised of. This approach is plausible, to the extent it works, but limited given our current state of knowledge. Still, there's plenty of Pinker's usual interesting psychological facts in here.
I found the first part of the book pretty hard going. It's fairly dense and dry, and the bulk of his thesis gets set out here. The second part is lighter, and significantly more readable, and has him applying the thesis to particular things - metaphor, swearing and the use of implication in speech.
Overall, a good read.
I found the first part of the book pretty hard going. It's fairly dense and dry, and the bulk of his thesis gets set out here. The second part is lighter, and significantly more readable, and has him applying the thesis to particular things - metaphor, swearing and the use of implication in speech.
Overall, a good read.
26 November 2008
Peter Wicked by Broos Campbell
The third Matty Graves novel. Campbell seems to have really hit his stride with the series - this one was the most enjoyable yet. Graves is a refreshingly down to earth character, quite a contrast to the more usual naval hero who is honourable to a fault. The picture drawn of the United States Navy's early days and the ad hoc foreign policies of colonies in the Carribbean are fascinating too.
19 November 2008
The Wolf Sea by Robert Low
I was very impressed with Low's first novel, The Whale Road, and this second one carries on in the same vein. It's rough and brutal, with a human side from our narrator's point of view. This story begins in Constantinople, with Orm losing the sword he got at the end of the first novel. The rest of the story involves his attempts to track it (and his old enemy Starkad) across the western Mediterranean, and trying to keep his Oathsworn alive and be a good jarl.
Overall, it's a fantastic adventure, and I'm left unhappy that I have to wait at least six months for the third novel.
Overall, it's a fantastic adventure, and I'm left unhappy that I have to wait at least six months for the third novel.
13 November 2008
An Evil Guest by Gene Wolfe
In this novel, Wolfe gives us his take on Lovecraft. It's set in the future, and centers on an actress who gets involved in some strange goings on. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
There's a lot of fun to be had in working out what he is referring to obliquely (or not so obliquely, as with 'that darn squid god').
There's a lot of fun to be had in working out what he is referring to obliquely (or not so obliquely, as with 'that darn squid god').
11 November 2008
Trail of Cthulhu: Additional
Session two of this went very well. This was more action than investigation oriented, with our brave academics confronting several deep ones behind the murders.
This gave us plenty of opportunity to test the combat and fleeing rules. These flow pretty well, and both have a good sense of the back and forward of scuffles and chases. Although coming very close to it, none of the investigators were killed (although one was seriously wounded). On the other hand, they didn't actually kill any monsters either.
After getting out of the ritual chamber (which the creatures did not seem keen to leave), they decided to dynamite the place closed and return to Arkham and ponder the discovery that something called a Cthulhu will wake when the stars are right, and that this is in about six months.
I got to have a lot of fun with the one character who has 'in the blood' as their drive, too. Good times.
This gave us plenty of opportunity to test the combat and fleeing rules. These flow pretty well, and both have a good sense of the back and forward of scuffles and chases. Although coming very close to it, none of the investigators were killed (although one was seriously wounded). On the other hand, they didn't actually kill any monsters either.
After getting out of the ritual chamber (which the creatures did not seem keen to leave), they decided to dynamite the place closed and return to Arkham and ponder the discovery that something called a Cthulhu will wake when the stars are right, and that this is in about six months.
I got to have a lot of fun with the one character who has 'in the blood' as their drive, too. Good times.
02 November 2008
Flint & Silver by John Drake
I wasn't especially optimistic about the idea of a prequel to Treasure Island, but it is quite enjoyable. In his afterword, Drake says that he wanted to write the story so that he knew their history. He also has written the book for adults rather than teenagers. It's been many years since I read Treasure Island, so I'm sure I missed a bunch of stuff, but it was still a good adventure story. Long John Silver is the hero, and Drake paints an almost believable portrait of a honourable man who becomes a pirate, and how he leads a crew to be less brutal than they might otherwise. He also has to deal with Flint, a treacherous psychopath who is probably just as unrealistic a pirate in the other direction.
A good read. There is to be a second volume, as well, but I think I might re-read the inspiring work again next.
A good read. There is to be a second volume, as well, but I think I might re-read the inspiring work again next.
29 October 2008
De Blob
This is one of the most fun games I've played on the Wii. It has style, wit and gleeful anarchy in play (and even more so in the story that frames it).
So. Play. You are a round blob with a funny expression, and you can soak up paint and then paint things by bouncing against them. The controls are fairly simple - nunchuk stick to guide you, flick the remote to jump, Z to target things (paintbots, bad guys, buttons, etc) to jump on them. It's basically a platform game, with the added bonus of letting you splatter paint over a blank city however you like. Each level is huge (taking an hour or so to complete) and there are a bunch of challenges - little timed tasks - that give you extra points. Some of these also stop bad guys spawning, or get rid of dangerous black ink. All good, with the exception of jumping from building to building, which is supposed to be useful and give you bonus points, except instead it is utterly random where you end up.
This is all wrapped in a glorious piece of utterly mad story. The facistic inkies have taken over the city, removing all the colour via paintbot and trapped all the inhabitants in gray suits. You are a jungle dwelling blob, recruited by the colour resistance (a few other blobby characters) to strike back. The cutscenes that start each level, and some of the story-related tasks in game, are hilarious. Best quote: "They have forced all the musicians to become accountants!" The craziness is included everywhere - the way that major buildings get redesigned when you take them back, the patterns that you can pick up to make your painting more varied, the musical stings that play when you paint something, and so on.
The multiplayer modes seem quite fun too, although so far I have only played them with my daughter, so I'm not sure how they will work when ruthless competition is active. There's no reason they wouldn't be - the competitive painting one at least was pretty neat. Also, on the topic of kid-friendliness, once you have completed a level, it can be opened in 'free paint' mode, lacking all enemies and objectives. This is a bit hit with her.
So. Play. You are a round blob with a funny expression, and you can soak up paint and then paint things by bouncing against them. The controls are fairly simple - nunchuk stick to guide you, flick the remote to jump, Z to target things (paintbots, bad guys, buttons, etc) to jump on them. It's basically a platform game, with the added bonus of letting you splatter paint over a blank city however you like. Each level is huge (taking an hour or so to complete) and there are a bunch of challenges - little timed tasks - that give you extra points. Some of these also stop bad guys spawning, or get rid of dangerous black ink. All good, with the exception of jumping from building to building, which is supposed to be useful and give you bonus points, except instead it is utterly random where you end up.
This is all wrapped in a glorious piece of utterly mad story. The facistic inkies have taken over the city, removing all the colour via paintbot and trapped all the inhabitants in gray suits. You are a jungle dwelling blob, recruited by the colour resistance (a few other blobby characters) to strike back. The cutscenes that start each level, and some of the story-related tasks in game, are hilarious. Best quote: "They have forced all the musicians to become accountants!" The craziness is included everywhere - the way that major buildings get redesigned when you take them back, the patterns that you can pick up to make your painting more varied, the musical stings that play when you paint something, and so on.
The multiplayer modes seem quite fun too, although so far I have only played them with my daughter, so I'm not sure how they will work when ruthless competition is active. There's no reason they wouldn't be - the competitive painting one at least was pretty neat. Also, on the topic of kid-friendliness, once you have completed a level, it can be opened in 'free paint' mode, lacking all enemies and objectives. This is a bit hit with her.
Battle Fleet by Paul Dowsell
Starts kind of weak, but once it gets going this is a great adventure story. A lot of thinking about life and death. This is number three in the series, I think I'll need to look up the earlier ones too (although from mention in this one of plot happenings, I'm not sure whether they will be consistently as good as this one).
26 October 2008
Geiger Counter: Total Eclipse
This game ran at the Fright Night 2 convention, 25 October 2008.
There were seven total in the group, some with almost no experience playing games with this much shared narration, and one person who hadbeen considering running it himself. As we got into brainstorming the film, things went smoothly right from the beginning. I had prepared some basic ideas - basically enough to guide where it went, or act as a fallback if people were short on ideas. This was plenty, especially as the game had been sold as an Aliens-inspired survival horror, which had everyone thinking in that mode to start with.
As we began to define the menace (a nano-machine based, infectious meme-complex) and setting (an asteroid mining facility with a population of about 13000), things really took off. The characters were a great selection of people from all over the facility, plus a couple of outsiders (a mining barge pilot and a military auditor). Inside we had a black market fixer, a prostitute, a soldier and an engineer. Relationships between all these characters quickly complicated things in a very satisfying manner.
Putting together the trailer was like a light version of the scene framing that comes up later, and I felt that it really helped get people into the right space this game. Also, I think we got almost everything from the trailer into the film - maybe we cut some of the exact quotes from the Colonel, but the spirit of the thing was there.
Once the film itself began, things just rocked along. The pacing seemed to work naturally, with everyone in pretty much the same space about how much horror to show in their scenes, and making an effort to include characters that hadn't had a scene, or waiting before returning to characters in trouble. I'd put together a soundtrack with a mishmash of spooky film scores and a few Darkest of the Hillside Thickets songs, and this managed to give us some appropriate music several times, and (even better) a few interesting contrasts... one was a kind of jazzy, romantic theme that came up just as things were beginning to fall apart.
We began losing characters as the menace got to eight dice (the first when it reached 7 or 8). Things began getting very tense as the nano-memes began infecting the whole complex. As their stories began to play out, we had some great subplots. The soldier shot the Colonel, and made a run for it, trying to rescue both his girlfriend and the working girl without them finding out about each other. By coincidence, those two were working together to escape to the very end. There were a few other subplots going on too, and they all got resolved satisfactorily (in a horror movie sense - the two-timer got his in the hangar bay as one of the women escaped in a rescue ship, for example). The barge pilot, was the other survivor, taking the ship out while getting her revenge on the (now meme-infected) Colonel who had wrecked her navy career, as they blew up the mining colony on the way out.
There were loads of great cinematic moments, too. Two characters who we thought we dead returned for some extra scenes, spaceships crashing, pursuit through tunnels and across the surface of an asteroid, the giant machinery that was crushing and cutting minerals out, and so on.
Overall, a fantastic game, and very smooth to run. This beta is noticeably more straightforward than the previous draft, used for my test run a few months back.
There were seven total in the group, some with almost no experience playing games with this much shared narration, and one person who hadbeen considering running it himself. As we got into brainstorming the film, things went smoothly right from the beginning. I had prepared some basic ideas - basically enough to guide where it went, or act as a fallback if people were short on ideas. This was plenty, especially as the game had been sold as an Aliens-inspired survival horror, which had everyone thinking in that mode to start with.
As we began to define the menace (a nano-machine based, infectious meme-complex) and setting (an asteroid mining facility with a population of about 13000), things really took off. The characters were a great selection of people from all over the facility, plus a couple of outsiders (a mining barge pilot and a military auditor). Inside we had a black market fixer, a prostitute, a soldier and an engineer. Relationships between all these characters quickly complicated things in a very satisfying manner.
Putting together the trailer was like a light version of the scene framing that comes up later, and I felt that it really helped get people into the right space this game. Also, I think we got almost everything from the trailer into the film - maybe we cut some of the exact quotes from the Colonel, but the spirit of the thing was there.
Once the film itself began, things just rocked along. The pacing seemed to work naturally, with everyone in pretty much the same space about how much horror to show in their scenes, and making an effort to include characters that hadn't had a scene, or waiting before returning to characters in trouble. I'd put together a soundtrack with a mishmash of spooky film scores and a few Darkest of the Hillside Thickets songs, and this managed to give us some appropriate music several times, and (even better) a few interesting contrasts... one was a kind of jazzy, romantic theme that came up just as things were beginning to fall apart.
We began losing characters as the menace got to eight dice (the first when it reached 7 or 8). Things began getting very tense as the nano-memes began infecting the whole complex. As their stories began to play out, we had some great subplots. The soldier shot the Colonel, and made a run for it, trying to rescue both his girlfriend and the working girl without them finding out about each other. By coincidence, those two were working together to escape to the very end. There were a few other subplots going on too, and they all got resolved satisfactorily (in a horror movie sense - the two-timer got his in the hangar bay as one of the women escaped in a rescue ship, for example). The barge pilot, was the other survivor, taking the ship out while getting her revenge on the (now meme-infected) Colonel who had wrecked her navy career, as they blew up the mining colony on the way out.
There were loads of great cinematic moments, too. Two characters who we thought we dead returned for some extra scenes, spaceships crashing, pursuit through tunnels and across the surface of an asteroid, the giant machinery that was crushing and cutting minerals out, and so on.
Overall, a fantastic game, and very smooth to run. This beta is noticeably more straightforward than the previous draft, used for my test run a few months back.
The Accidental Time Machine by Joe Haldeman
A good, kind of relaxed, kind of a modern take on H G Wells' Time Machine. I don't want to say much about the story, as discovering it as you go is part of the enjoyment. Just read it.
24 October 2008
Nation by Terry Pratchett
A bit of a change of pace, but very good. This book isn't set on the Discworld, and it's generally more serious than those books. However, the general message of practicality in difficult situations and the efficacy of science over supersitition is about as good as the message in any young adult novel.
23 October 2008
Cowboy Angels by Paul McAuley
A fantastic read. Much more techno-thriller than science fiction, although the science fiction is fairly critical to the plot ('cowboy angels' are black ops agents trained to infiltrate alternate worlds). The story ends up being very human - the hero is a retired agent, reactivated to try and bring an old friend back in. The one thing that seemed to run through it was his determination to do the right thing - not just his duty, but the right thing for the people around him too.
The friend has been murdering alternate copies of the same woman in different worlds. As we get further and further into the plots and counterplots, things stay exciting. That keeps up all the way to the last paragraph.
The way that the alternate worlds fit together, and how the one that invented the technology to travel to others deals with it is fascinating too. The technology was invented in the USA and they used it to help out alternate, and less fortunate, Americas. A lot of that help is trade, of course, so they enriched themselves too. He shows several different facets of these interactions (including with our own world, in which they are acting covertly).
The friend has been murdering alternate copies of the same woman in different worlds. As we get further and further into the plots and counterplots, things stay exciting. That keeps up all the way to the last paragraph.
The way that the alternate worlds fit together, and how the one that invented the technology to travel to others deals with it is fascinating too. The technology was invented in the USA and they used it to help out alternate, and less fortunate, Americas. A lot of that help is trade, of course, so they enriched themselves too. He shows several different facets of these interactions (including with our own world, in which they are acting covertly).
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