Monday, April 28, 2014

The Aztecs: Doctor Who meets a lovely lady

After skipping over a number of missing episodes we reach The Aztecs, a serial I actually got recommended to me from a few sources. I can see why. It's pretty good.

After arriving in South America a hundred years before the Spanish turn up, Barbara is mistaken for a reincarnation of one of their Gods, and she sees this opportunity to switch them away sacrificing people since that's why the Spanish wiped them out. Obviously the Doctor's against this, but Barbara's determined, but no matter how much she tries things keep springing back to the way history is remembered. And the Doctor again points out that you can't change history. Not One Line!

Friday, April 25, 2014

FTL: The Next Generation

My thoughts on the FTL: Advanced Edition. Honestly, it's more FTL. If you enjoyed the game but had gotten tired of the same old encounters you're well served as there's plenty to spice things up. Though you're mental for thinking that in the first place.

Everything added is great. It feels like they've filled the game out a little more. Drones no longer feel quite so much like the short cousins to weapons with the massive array of extra stuff they add. The new beacon paths is damn handy, allowing you to plan a lot more. The extra systems that just offer so many more options. It's all little tweaks that improve the game even more. It feels like exactly the same game I dumped over forty hours into, but better. Since it's free, anyone who owns FTL needs little excuse to try it out, if you still haven't, then now you have even more reason, not that you should have needed it. If you still haven't bought FTL yet, this gives you even more reason.

Which pretty much sums it up unless I waste time going into detail at what those changes are. So instead I'm going to do another Captain's log, this time from the new Lanius ship.

Friday, April 18, 2014

Back to the Beginning: The very start of Doctor Who

After my dance around parts of Doctor Who, I decided to go back to the beginning, and have plotted a course through fifty years of TV. The list is an interesting mix of recommendations – either quality or lore based I don't know going in – plus the regenerations and the coming and going of companions. One of my Whovian experts said that last one wasn't needed except for those that fell into the examples of lore based, such as Earthshock, but I figured it'd make for easier viewing seeing how these people come and go from the Doctor's life.

And when I say I'm going back to the beginning, I mean the actual beginning. The very first Hartnell story, An Unearthly Child. And yes, I'm including the 10,000BC episodes as part of that.

Friday, April 11, 2014

Continuum continues

Continuum was one of those programmes I started watching on Sy-Fy because new sci-fi. Also it had a cool time travel concept, and Rachel Nichols. It helped that at the time I didn't have a whole lot to watch. Unfortunately, the first season quickly devolved into a police procedural with some cool future tech, and not much else. But because I tend to quite like police procedurals I stuck around.

Continuum tells the tale of Keira Cameron, a CPS protector – that's future corporate cop in normal language – who gets pulled from 2077 to modern day while trying to stop a bunch of anti-corporate Liber8 terrorists from escaping their execution via time travel. Once here she integrates herself with the Vancouver PD – yes, a show filmed in Vancouver that actually admits it – and does every thing she can to stop Liber8 from altering the future.

Monday, April 07, 2014

FTL: These are the Voyages

As FTL: Advanced Edition came out last week, I present FTL The Captain's Log. It started out as an idea for BeefJack, but we weren't entirely sure how sustainable it was. Plus I was pretty late to the FTL party so it was also no longer that relevant. Enter DLC, and I finally get to release it. This was actually my second playthrough of the original game. I might do another for the Advanced Edition, which I still haven't found time to play. At the very least I'll post up some thoughts in a few days.

Blackbox recording of NCC-7625, The Kestrel-A discovered in Rock controlled sector of space.
Captain's Log Stardate 9130113.15
I have been assigned the important task of carrying plans for the stolen plans for the Rebel's capital ship to what remains of Federation Command. My mission is clear, I have to get this information delivered as quickly as possible.

First jump and already my honour is already is putting me at odds with my duty, but civilians being attacked by an unmanned rebel scout ship wasn't exactly a problem for my crew.

Friday, April 04, 2014

Back to Who: A jaunt through Time and Space

It should come as a surprise to no one who followed this blog in late 2013 that I've dived back into Classic Doctor Who. Not just Enemy of the World I got for Christmas but a whole lot more.

Of course that's where I started. A little bit of time left in 2013 I watched Enemy of the World and got to see Doctor Who does James Bond from a caravan. And honestly, it was kind of brilliant.