Year: 2018

Something short today. I think bugs have decided this weekend is going to be a bugs weekend.

Today was a good day though. Lots of loot and excellent company this afternoon to raid the Xmas market with.

Click for bigger. There’s a lot in there (plus some obscured that I didn’t mean to obscure !)

On the left we see a new pooch, a lovely little metal thingy from the market.

Big Lego BB-8 is at the back, keeping his beady eye on 4D. He remembers what happened the last time these two shared screen time and doesn’t want to be eaten again.

We have a trio of micro BB-8s dotting around the scene, including super stunts BB-8 from last year’s advent buzzing around the place on his snowboard.

The advent thingy for today is a blaster rack, with Rose keeping a sharp eye on it. I think she’s checking out the stun setting so she can use it on cowardly stormtroopers attempting to run away.

Nano BB-8 is taking up station over there on the right, in front of a new book : Attack of the Flickering Skeletons (and more Terrible Old Games You’ve Probably Never Heard Of) by Stuart Ashen. I’ll look forward to diving through that soon. (Currently lost in Persepolis Rising in the Expanse series).

Popz BB-8 is a new one. SHINY. And then there’s a new key ring BB-8 lurking beside him.

(I had trouble getting key ring BB-8 to cooperate. Think that one’s been on the funny oil or too close to the Helium stores).

But who is that on the right ?

We have found something to scare the 4D. He was ok with one BB-8. 2 BB-8s. Even 3. But an army of 7 ? He’s off at a dead run, exit stage right.

See you tomorrow !

Oops. I took the picture at lunchtime and I’ve completely forgotten what the new thing was !

Let’s have a reminder.

There we go. I tried out something new today, a delayed timer shot from the phone. First time I’ve done that and it was so I could press the button and then quickly grab 4D so he could take his place in the shot.

Today I think it was either one of the train cars from Solo or an Imperial transport from Rebels. The train sequence was one of the inspired bits of Solo and when I watch that movie again, I’ll look forward to that bit of the movie.

Today ? Game books again. Games don’t give you what they used to pack in ! Long gone are the days of a big box and things inside that truly rattled. Mind you, they used to squeeze enough into some of the dvd style boxes that the box would bulge open and refuse to close up again without spilling its contents all over the place.

You don’t get nearly as much now. Barely anything in fact and rarely anything that is in physical form. I was very impressed with the art book that came with Battletech but that did cost me extra.

So – what are the games today ?

In the middle is the Falcon 4 manual. This is over half an inch thick ! Plus you got a quick reference guide, a key map and a reasonably details map of the Korean subcontinent, the region you fought over in the game.

It’s actually fitting for the complexity of the game and this was an incredibly complex game. It’s still going actually, 20 years after its original release in 1998. It was a buggy mess when it came out but still pretty darn good. I can remember flying missions on it and flying towards a glow on the horizon that would gradually resolve into missiles and shells whizzing back and forth as you got closer.

This was an incredible game for its time and this would still look quite decent today. Flight sims can cheat, as the detail is all very far away instead of you standing right next to the wall with the dodgy texture as you would in a first person game.

Next up is the Settlers. In the days where Digital Rights Management hadn’t found its way into the sneaky ways and always online of today, they had to do it via other means. Still in the software this time but for this game, it would ask you to turn to a certain page and pop in the runes on that page.

Settlers is a colony management wargame. It’s a pretty complicated one, with basic resources combining together to make things like swords for soldiers, bread for food and gold for improvements.

It was one of the ground breaking games of its time, although deathly dreary to play a game all the way through. The strategic aspect was bolted around warrior huts … and these caused an effect like attritional trench warfare.

It took a long time to make a dent in the other players’ territory and that made games drag on a long time. But it is a game I enjoyed in its time, as I highly enjoyed losing evenings to Settlers IV.

Next one is a game called Titan Quest, which included a printed out ability tree for its widespread character class system.

Bit of a shame this one, as the game had massive potential but I never actually played much into it. One reason for that was because it coincided with a previous Windows XP install going very strange and the campfires would be so bright, they would white-out the screen. It was a very broken WinXP install.

Last one is not something I got with a game, I acquired the StarFleet Command III strategy guide later.

This was from a time before broadband (I think). A time before google searches became the thing you would do if you got stuck. Wowhead hadn’t been invented back then. (The game was published in 2002).

It’s a nice strategy guide too. It gives you a description of all of the missions, plus a description of the ships and the various ways they could be customised. A super manual if you like.

I was super addicted to the Starfleet Command games in their day. The nearest modern equivalent is Battlefleet Gothic, set in the Warhammer 40k world but very definitely a rip off of the Starfleet Battles rules that SFC was based on. Battlefleet Gothic 2 looks impressive though, I’ll enjoy watching Enter Elysium play through that when it’s released but I won’t buy it.

That’s it for today !

Day 12 ! Halfway through the boxes. What do we have today ?

A Jedi starfighter today from the prequel movies. A small, functional, pretty little fighter.

And books of movies / movies of books today. By the way there is no 4D cameo today. He took one glance at one of the books there and stomped off on disgust.

One of those books is older than I am ! I wonder if it was before decimalisation. Perhaps not.

On the right we have The Guns of Navarone by Alistair MacLean. This one led to an all time classic World War 2 movie where the Germans had a stronghold in the Mediterranean Sea. Embedded in the mountain side, dominating the area, they had massive gun emplacements that meant the area was a no go zone for all Allied shipping. The stronghold was impregnable by land, unassailable by air and any ships that attempted to get near would be blown to bits by the gun emplacements.

Cue our heroes being sent in to infiltrate the island, penetrate the stronghold and blow up the guns. In the middle, we have intrigue amongst a varied cast of characters.

This is one of the all time classic war movies and I’d heartily recommend it.

One thing about the book and film though, I haven’t read the book for a while but I remember it diverging from the movie in significant ways. And then the book that follows, Force 10 From Navarone, follows the story of the movie instead of the book.

Oh – I left the price on the book …. I acquired this one as a second hand book for 50p. That was actually more than the cost on the back ! Of all the items that have massively inflated in price, books are among the most significant. This book has a tag of 40p on the back. It was printed in April 1974 (written in something like 1957). I can’t believe that it costs that much more to print a book now. Yet this book would cost £8 now. (Or £4 on Kindle). That’s a 20x increase !

Crikey.

Next up, we see Firefox by Craig Thomas.

The movie was a Clint Eastwood star vehicle and the start of the book sums up the plot pretty well. It unfolds as a series of intelligence memos reporting that Russia have developed a new fighter of unprecedented speed and deadly weaponry. But what really sets it apart is that it is invisible to radar.

The book and the movie follow each other quite well here and they remind you of what things were like in Eastern Europe near the end of the 20th century before the walls came down.

I’d heartily recommend this book as well. And I’d point you to its successor as well. This one was followed by Firefox Down which I enjoyed as well. But I’m not going to say anything about that because …. spoilers.

That brings me to … Star Trek Nemesis.

This film killed Star Trek. Or at least it did until the reboot movies started up. Star Trek Enterprise was still going … but didn’t last long after Nemesis despite improving considerably in its final season.

This is a Star Trek movie with very few redeeming features. It’s very grim, dark, non Star Trek. It was very brave of them to go in this direction, perhaps beyond brave and into foolish.

The book is better than the film, it explains what’s going on better and there is a minimum of humour included.

But it’s a disastrous story from start to finish.

It’s like – with most franchises, especially Star Trek, I’d recommend you watch all of it, even if just to experience it. But not Nemesis. Avoid this one like the plague.

(PS All that said, this book was another present from a friend which I enjoyed and definitely appreciated it when it was received …. and then the movie happened)

More tomorrow !