Friday, July 29, 2011

Comic Roundup: July 27, 2011

  • Although a couple of these books are from last week, I actually picked up quite a few new issues this week. Although I went to pick up Criminal, I was surprised to find the new League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. And while I was there, I might as well pick up one or two other books, right? Time to get reading.

  • Rocketeer Adventures issue 3 - It's hard to write about an anthology series month after month. Especially when everything included is good stuff. I should say that the stories this issue were the strongest yet, each a great addition to the Rocketeer universe. The pinups may not have been as strong, but two okay pages do not drag down the issue.

    As an aside, Dave Stevens: Complete Sketches & Studies was available and it took everything in my power not to slap $50 down right then and there. I almost hope someone else buys the one copy they had so that I don't have to face it down again next week. I'm not that strong.

  • Warlord of Mars issue 8 - John Carter carries on his mission to rescue his beloved Dejah Thoris. Since she is now betrothed to another, Carter must find a way to free her from captivity without transgressing Mars customs that might prevent the two of them from ever being together. The action is still strong and I love how Burroughs' crazy imagination shines through. I'm still enjoying this series a lot more than I thought that I might.

  • Warlord of Mars: Fall of Barsoom issue 1 - Fall of Barsoom is to Warlord of Mars as The Old Republic is to Star Wars. This is a good thing. The story takes place 100,000 years before the main book and explains how Mars fell into its current predicament, with its failed oceans and atmosphere, and with racial tensions between the various peoples on the rise. I liked the writing and enjoyed the Jim-Lee-esque art. It could have been bad, but the book seems like a worthy addition to history of Barsoom.

  • Kirby: Genesis issue 2 - Jiminy Christmas, this book is packed full of crazy. All kinds of crazy. I've never actually read a Jack Kirby book, but this seems like the kind of crazy that everyone wants me to think Jack Kirby books were like. Still reading, still curious about the crazy. At least it looks pretty.

  • Glamourpuss issue 20 - In this issue, we get a rummination on the love triangle between Nelson Algren, Simone de Beauvoir, and Jean-Paul Sartre, the continued examination of Alex Raymond's final day, and more fashion model art. In other words, just another issue of Glamourpuss.

    That's a good thing if you like Dave Sim and enjoy following whatever lacunae he wants to investigate. It's not your average comic book. And thank goodness for that.

  • Criminal: The Last of the Innocent issue 2 - After all of the breathless reviews ruined my enjoyment of the first issue, The Last of the Innocent comes back much stronger in the second. Brubaker, Phillips, and Staples continue to kill it with each issue. I'm not going to get me to spoil anything, but I will say that all of the action promised in the first issue finally comes to fruition this issue. Don't miss it.

  • The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Century: 1969 - You know, this is a long book and I'm tired. Maybe I'll come back to it later.



© 2011 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.

Thursday, July 28, 2011

Random Shots: EA Marketing Does An Bombastically Predicatable Thing

  • Nothing that the marketing department at EA does shocks me anymore. Starting with Dragon Age: Origins and Dante's Inferno, they have consistently shown that they have no respect for the actually audience for their games. Instead they try to fool the Madden and Call of Duty crowds into playing something that is outside of their comfort zone. When EA does something stupid, it should come as no surprise.

  • So here is another stupid thing they did. Surprise.

  • For those you afflicted with the inability to click on links (good luck finding your way off my blog if that's the case), EA decided to respond to the many and various calls to include a female Shepard in the marketing material for Mass Effect 3. The statistics indicate at 80% of players use the male Shepard, but those of us who play females are dedicated. In order to recognize those players, Bioware has agreed. And in order to pick the iconic female Shepard, they put it up to a vote on Facebook. Instead of, you know, using the perfectly awesome default Shepard that is already available in the game.

  • The results are predictable.

  • /sigh

  • At a loss for words here.

  • The title is a tip of the hat to Idle Thumbs and Jake's description of the marketing for Dante's Inferno. And for more on the topic, check out Shamus Young's Twenty Sided.

News Filter: 3DS Price Drop Announced One Month After I Finally Buy One

  • Not that I'm bitter.

  • The news coming from Patrick Klepek over at Giant Bomb is that Nintendo will reduce the price of the 3DS to $169.99 beginning August 12. I, of course, used my stack of birthday gift cards to buy one for $250 in June.

  • Again, not that I'm bitter.

  • The 3DS has not hit the stratosphere like its predecessor did. And with the Playstation Vita on the way, Nintendo had to do something to better differentiate themselves from Sony's offering.

  • Not all is doom and gloom, though. Those of us who purchased the handheld at the higher price will receive ten NES and ten GBA games through the Virtual Console free of charge. They revealed five games of each so far. The NES are Super Mario Bros., Donkey Kong Jr., Balloon Fight, Ice Climber and The Legend of Zelda and the GBA games are Yoshi’s Island: Super Mario Advance 3, Mario Kart: Super Circuit, Metroid Fusion, WarioWare, Inc.: Mega Microgame$ and Mario vs. Donkey Kong. Not a shabby lineup if you intend to use the system for a retro gaming, something that I am likely to do. I'm not sure that it makes up for the price differential, but it's not awful.

  • Really, I'm not bitter. I'm hoping that if I say it enough, I'll start to believe it.


© 2011 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.

Wednesday, July 27, 2011

News Filter: THQ Takes A Sledgehammer To Red Faction

  • Giant Bomb is reporting that THQ is putting the Red Faction series out of its misery, citing poor sales for the franchise. Considering how poorly Red Faction: Armageddon performed, both as a game and on the sales chart, this comes as no surprise. What should be surprising is that this is the same franchise that spawned Red Faction: Guerrila.
    CLICHÉ ALERT: THQ is tossing out the bathwater and the baby is going right along with it.

  • As you watch me shake my head, don't mistake this as some disapproval toward THQ. They had their reasons and they are definitely the right ones. No, the head shaking you see is an echo of the one started way back when Armageddon first came out and it was nothing like Guerrila.

  • I suspect that Volition, the developers of the Red Faction series, decided after Guerrila that they needed to return to their roots and design a game that was closer to the first two. But for the life of me, I can't figure out why. Guerrila was a fascinating game. It even inspired a brilliant song. Whatever their reason, it did not work. Oh well.


© 2011 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.

Watched Lately: HGTV

  • I have have to turn in my Geek Card (yes, I have a Geek Card), but I can't keep this to myself anymore: I'm hooked on HGTV.

  • It happened a few weeks ago after my entire family caught the same cold. My wife, my baby, and I were all sick and grumpy. Not feeling well enough to do anything but care for our miserable child, my wife turned on the TV and flipped channels until an episode of House Hunters came on. I was hooked.

  • Now most nights, and most weekends, I do nothing but watch people shop for houses or apartments, prepare their homes for sale, or landscape and decorate their homes. As I mentioned to MMO Gamer Chick via Twitter, watching these people work and shop is so comforting.

  • It's dangerous too, because I often find myself thinking "We should do something like that here." I'm draw primarily to the landscaping and decorating shows, like Curb Appeal: The Block and Candice Tells All, because I love all of the ideas they throw around. Not that I would ever go to such extremes, but I do want to steal some of those ideas to spruce up our home.

  • I'm so hooked on the network that my DVR is set up to record HGTV Design Star. I need help. Actually, I need a lot of help if we're going to get this backyard project started. Are you coming?

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Played Lately: Bastion

  • As soon as it became available, I bought a copy of Bastion. Nothing was going to stop me. Nor should it have because the reviews have been amazing so far. Not that I've been able to play it as much as I want to. Because what I really want to do is skip work every day until I finish it. I did stay up too late a couple nights rebuilding the Bastion and tackling various Proving Grounds. I may even have pouted when I reminded myself that I had to go to bed.

  • Here are a few disconnected thoughts about Bastion:

  • "He gets up." - I know that it's just a stupid little thing, but I love, I adore the fact that The Kid starts almost every level by landing flat on his face. He just lays there until you push the stick and make him get up. Hilarious!

  • The Narrator - Oh my goodness that guy is cool. It is not some astonishing dynamic system, but it doesn't need to be. The part is sharply written and superbly acted. And everything about it oozes cool. Sadly, I can't help but wonder how many crappy narrations we'll have to sit through because of copycats.

  • Old school action RPG combat - As much as I love Torchlight, the combat is pretty straight forward. Bastion feels a lot more tactical, a lot more demanding. It feels good to have so much control of your attacks. It's rewarding to defend and evade effectively. Because it is more demanding, the fights are more difficult. Even for a perpetual newb like me, I want to overcome the challenges instead of a throw my controller.

  • I want to steal this setting - The world building in this game is spare, but highly effective. The efficiency with which Caelondia, its inhabitants, and environs is breathtaking. I'm sure it took a lot of work to pare the descriptions that finely, but you learn so much seemingly very little effort.

    And the names! How could you not want to visit a place called the Rippling Walls? Or explore the Wild Unknown? Or join up with the Slingers or the Breakers?

    If my Unexplored Worlds posts start looking vaguely Bastion like, please forgive me.

  • A word of warning: when you start a new game to show your wife the cool narration, it tells you that you about to overwrite your save game. It's not kidding. I did it anyway because it was too cool not to share. And, to be perfectly honest, I wanted to see it all again. See you in the Bastion!



© 2011 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.

Monday, July 25, 2011

Random Shots: Old Genres Made New Again

  • Every time I read something new about Xcom, it makes me want to smash my head into a wall. Way back when it was announced in April 2010, I said my peace and let the subject lie. But then this interview with Christoph Hartmann from 2K Games comes out and drives me up the nearest vertical surface.
    He explains: "The '90s generation of gamers all love Xcom and we own the IP, so we thought OK, what do we do with it? ... But the problem was that turn-based strategy games were no longer the hottest thing on planet Earth. But this is not just a commercial thing – strategy games are just not contemporary.["]

  • I don't really know how to react to that. Is Hartmann, and by extension 2K Games, willfully ignorant or is he just spinning his PR plates as fast as he can? Not that the answer really matters because it's just as stupid either way.

  • All one has to do is look at some of the biggest games coming out recently to see that old game genres are still viable:

    • One of my favorite games of the last two years is Torchlight. There hasn't been a decent action RPG for years, but then Runic gave us a game that calls back to the original Diablo in feel, but updated for the modern era. How good is it? Well, Runic recently announced that they sold one million copies. And I cannot stop playing it.

    • Starcraft II. Blizzard released a game that plays just like a game that came out in 1998, dismissing all of the innovations in the RTS genre from the intervening twelve years. Business suicide? Of course not. It sold 4.5 million copies.

    • One can discuss the merits of the game from here until the end of time, but Duke Nukem Forever sold a crazy number of copies. According to NPD figures, it sold 376,300 units in its first month. While some (many?) of those sales are from people wanting to see the train wreck firsthand, I believe that there are also many who yearn for a style of shooter that has disappeared in the Call of Duty era.

    • And although it's a brand new game, Panzer Corps follows in the footsteps of SSI's classic Panzer General. I'm glad that the developer, Lordz Game Studios, reminded us that even hardcore strategy games can be made for a mass audience.

  • I might not have bothered to write this post if it were not for this article from Ars Technica. I've been hearing a lot of grumbling lately that people miss space simulations like Wing Commander and TIE Figher. Evidently someone at Seamless Entertainment was listening because they are developing SOL: Exodus. If there some way to preorder, I would have done so already.

  • These examples are not unique. Game genres don't go bad, they just fall out of fashion. It takes work, dedication, and some small amount of love, but there is no reason that any genre of game cannot be resurrected.

  • If 2K Games can't figure out how to make Xcom into a true successor to the original game, while modernizing the design, I call that a failure of imagination. Maybe, just maybe, they should be ashamed of themselves.

  • For more discussion of the issue, check out the most recent episode of Flash of Steel.



© 2011 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.

Thursday, July 21, 2011

Random Shots: CEs The Way God Intended Them

  • Oh look! An honest-to-goodness controversy in the MMO community. Thank goodness to Bioware because this place has been getting awfully stale. For those of you who don't know.... Excuse me for a second.

  • HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA. Heh Heh. Oh boy.

  • Sorry about that, we all know what we're talking about here. Is $150.00 too much? Is it, dare I ask, too little? Let's look at what the community has to say:

    • MMO Gamer Chick decided to listen to her wallet when it came to preordering, even though she is one of the game's biggest proponents (at least from my point of view). And although I want to, I'm not giving away the addendum to her post.

    • The Ancient Gaming Noob, also going CE-less, discussed the included authenticator. He's right about its necessity. If SWTOR is going to be the next big thing, it is going to be a huge target for all kinds of nefarious activity. Hopefully EA/Bioware gets out front with security (as opposed to Trion who had to play a very fast catch up) or they will face all kinds of problems.

    • Syp from Bio Break ordered his as soon as humanly possible. And then to rub all of our noses in it, he made a list of all of the goodies he'll be playing with any day now.

    • And as crazy as it seems, Syncaine of Hardcore Casual is a lot closer to my point of view than I'm really comfortable with. Let me quote:
      My plan for SW:sRPG is to pick it up for $5 on a Steam sale a few months after release. At that point I’m sure most will have moved on and I can enjoy the game in peace, without the hassle of others to ruin my immersion*.

    • Kill Ten Rats has been silent on the issue. What is going on over there?

      EDIT: Well, look here. Someone just remembered that they own a blog. (Hi Ethic!)

  • Although I said I agree with Syncaine, I'm actually a little more torn than that. I love the idea of preordering and collector's editions. I'm just not sure I love SWTOR. I want to be caught up in the hype like everyone else, but will I really miss anything if I wait a couple months for the mania to fade? Probably not.

  • That said, the collector's edition does sound amazing. And considering the audience, I think Bioware would sell out at $200. You folks may actually be getting a deal.



© 2011 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.

Random Shots: Damages, A Steam Sale Story

  • The Steam Summer Sale came and went with barely a notice by most. I suspect that so many people engorged themselves at prior sales to such a degree that this year's sale had little to offer most people. The same could be said of me, but I did find a few deals that I could not pass up. First, the games I've actually played.

    • Frozen Synapse - Holy crud, this game is an interesting as it is frustrating. I have resigned myself to not being good at it, but it's kind of fun to order dudes around in five second increments and watching them blast the hell out of one another.

      EDIT: I bought the version with the soundtrack because, Damn, it is really good. Really good.

    • Super Meat Boy - Although I have only played a little bit, I already understand why everyone likes this game so much. It is demanding, but the levels always seem fair. And I love the graphic style of both the cutscenes to the game itself. SMB is a testament to the ability of a small team (two people!) to make a great game. I need to find more time to play.

    • Monday Night Combat - I tried the demo before and enjoyed it. Just not enough to buy it. When it went on a crazy discount, I did not have any more excuses.

  • As for games I haven't tried yet, each with a tip of the hat to who convinced me to buy them:

    • Trine - Trine became on of several memes running through the Idle Thumbs podcast. I didn't try it back when it was hot, but I'm curious to see if it lives up to the hype.

    • Mount & Blade: Warband - I have to blame Syncaine for this. I thought M&B was okay, but I didn't get deep into it. Syncaine's stories have made me very curious about both the game and the available mods.

    • AI War: Fleet Command - I'm pretty sure (Sort of sure? Have a hunch?) that I hear about AI War on the Gamers With Jobs Conference Call. Not that is matters where, a game of galactic conquest against an AI that ramps up in difficulty the more successful you are sounds really interesting. There seems to be a needle you have to thread where you conquer just enough to drive your war effort, but not so much that you wake the dragon and get overwhelmed.

  • The only thing I didn't get from the sale is more time to play everything. Maybe they'll put that up for the Christmas sale. Please?


© 2011 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Comic Roundup: July 13, 2011

  • Every so often, I check out a new comic book on a whim. Out of everything I've bought for the last couple weeks, only one was a premeditated purchase. Everything else was me taking a flyer and hoping for the best. Lucky for me, most of these turned out pretty good.

  • Robert E. Howard's Savage Sword issues 1 & 2 - I'm usually not a big fan of anthology books. I usually don't want to pay a higher price for all the dross just for the few good bits. In the first two issues of Savage Sword it is all good bits. Each issue bundles stories of different Howard creations, several that I wasn't aware of. And each issue has included a recolored old Marvel comic. This may be the one instance where the anthology format is actually worth the price.

  • Danger Girl and the Army of Darkness issue 2 - The one series (if you can call it that) that I picked up today. Ash finally makes an appearance and Danger Girl does their best to track them down. The plot is pretty silly, what that what I want from a Danger Girl book. And the art continues to be the best the series has see since J. Scott Campbell's initial run. For DG fans only, but thankfully that includes me.

  • Kirby: Genesis issue 1 - So although this came out a couple weeks ago, I picked this up off the large pile of left over issues. The story follows a college student named Kirby who, along with the girl he has a life-long crush on, witness the emergence of super powers into their ordinary world. The art is very nice and the story is very reminiscent of Kurt Busiek's Marvels. Like that series, this book is dense with characters. But since they are all new, there is no context that helps keep them straight. So it feels like the creators tried to jam as much into the pages for fear of being cancelled before the second issue. Hard to decide if I'll come back, but it was pretty for me to consider.

  • The Red Wing issue 1 - After hearing Jonathan Hickman on the Word Balloons podcast, I decided to keep my eyes open for his new book. The Red Wing is not an easy comic to read. It made me feel extremely uncomfortable in the way that good science fiction does best. The premise of the story, about a war that takes place between two time travelling factions, was so unsettling to me that I had to put the book down and return to it the next day. I'm glad that I overcame the mental dissonance because there is an interesting story in here. And the art evokes a European/Heavy Metal look that does not appear in American comics often. I'm not sure what direction the story is going in, either deeply philosophical, really dumb, or pretty dang cool. But I'm an interested enough to find out.

  • Captain America issue 1 - When you are reading a series in trades, it is almost never a good idea to just into the singles unless there is a seamless transition. So when I picked up Captain America #1, I discovered that Steve Rogers is Cap again, SHIELD has been dissolved, and Bucky Barnes is nowhere to be seen. Huh. In this issue, a former WWII ally of Cap returns in the present to menace our hero with the aid of a major villain. The plot will be very familiar to fans of Ed Brubaker's run on the series: that's how the Winter Solder and the Red Skull several years ago. It's not a bad start, but it was not very special either. That's what I get for skipping ahead.

  • Loose Ends issue 1 - Whenever a comic comes along that seems even vaguely crime related, I like to give it a shot. The oversized cover of Loose Ends immediately grabbed my eye. The first issue revolves around the various people in a bar in the American South. The series is labeled as "A 4 Issue Souther Crime Romance", and story is driven by the interactions of the customers and waitresses. The issue ends violently (as you might hope) and left me wondering what would happen next.

  • Terry Moore's How To Draw Women - Okay, I haven't read this yet. But how could you not buy this book?


© 2011 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Unexplored Worlds: The Holy Order of Nama Wiggert, The Assassin

  • In AE 134, an argument over religious doctrine caused a schism in the Cathbrechtian Church. The argument related to the gender of the church's patron, Terry Cathbrecht. The Orthodox Cathbrechtians maintained that their deity was male, as per tradition. The Wiggertian faction, named for their leader, Nama Wiggert, insisted that the church had suppressed the fact that Cathbrecht was in fact a woman who disguised herself as a man to avoid gender discrimination that ran rampant in her time. The church's eighty-seven members quickly divided between the two factions, with the women largely supporting Nama Wiggert and the men supporting the Cathbrechtian Lector.

  • The two factions operated as separate churches for some time until Terry Cathbrecht, angered over the divide among the faithful, appeared before both congregations to reveal that he was a man. Although Cathbrecht intended for this to end the schism, it instead drove the Wiggertians further into denial. Nama Wiggert accused the Orthodox Cathbrechtians of treachery and assassinated the Lector, a pair of priests, the lector's valet, a groundskeeper, the groundskeeper's horse, and a three legged dog.

  • As is the norm in the Land Of The Ten Thousand, Nama Wiggert ascended to immortality and the Wiggertians began worshiping their former leader instead. The Holy Order of St. Wiggert became the de facto Assassin's Guild in the Land Of The Ten Thousand as murder is one of their sacraments. Over the years, the church has grown to include congregations in each major city-state in the region.

  • According to the sacraments, a perspective employer is required to make a substatial donation to the order to hire a Wiggertian assassin and must do so in person at one of the church houses. However the restriction has been eased as the order has grown so that a representative can make payments in the employer's stead and negotiate the price for frequent patrons. Assassinations are frequently bloody and entail several bystanders, much like Wiggert's original killings. However, some individual Wiggertians can be convinced (monetarily) to perform their sacraments in a much lower profile.

  • The hierarchy of the Holy Order is dominated by older women, but the congregation is open to all ages and genders. Although tradition holds that Nama Wiggert was a woman, some men within the order have come to believe that Nama was an ancient title, not a name, that Wiggert was instead a charismatic male with uncommonly long hair and fine features. Although the belief is spreading, it has not yet grown to such an extent to cause a schism of its own.

  • Unexplored Worlds is my attempt to design an RPG campaign in the open. Since I have not rolled a d20 in anger in many years, this is my way to keep playing without actually playing. All posts are written to be system-agnostic, so please use whatever keeps your interest in your own games. Just let me know how it goes!


© 2011 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.

Monday, July 11, 2011

Played Lately: World of Warcraft

  • After my recent forey into Star Trek Online foundered, I turned back to my MMO security blanket, World of Warcraft. With Patch 4.2 on the horizon, I wanted to get back to the game and see what I had missed. What I missed, it turns out, was a lot. I'm going to take advantage of all these bullet points and make a list:

    • Pretty much the entire Cataclysm expansion. No lie.

    • My mage was level 80 with Argent Tourney dailies in her quest log.

    • No Goblins, no Worgen.

    • Never made it to level 60 in the revamped old world.

    • Never got my Archeology above 150.

  • When I quit WoW the last time (and I have quit several times), I had burned out after running my human paladin through Mount Hyjal and falling into static leveling group. WoW is, and always has been, a single player game to me. In those instances where I've obligated myself to even one other person, I burn out faster than a kobold candle in the Firelands.

  • I am losing it. I just made a WoW joke.

  • When I logged in, I went back to my beloved blood elf mage, the one I've been neglecting ever since leaving the game the prior time. Since I never even started her into Cataclysm, I ran off to buy my upgraded trade skills, purchased Archeology, and started off for Vashj'ir.

  • I wasn't sure exactly what to expect. Listening to The Instance, I was expecting to be exceptionally frustrated with the underwater fighting. But Blizzard really did figure out how to lay out the zone properly. The quests took a long while (according to the achievements, it is the longest zone in the expansion), but it had some great moments and an interesting ending. It wasn't a real ending since the story continues into an instance that I've very unlikely to see. Nonetheless, I had a good time.

  • Since then I cleared Mount Hyjal and Deepholm and, with patch 4.2 out, started on the Molten Front dailies. I've also been returning to Orgrimmar every day to do the fishing and cooking dailies, as well as pick up any new crafting recipes that I've earned. I wasn't too far into Deepholm before I hit level 85, so quests are free gold from here on out.

  • I still have two full zones to complete and I still haven't seen Tol Barad. As well, I would like to go back to my blood elf paladin and explore Outland more fully again. And I really do want to see the Worgen and Goblin starting zones. There is quite a lot to do. So for the time being, I'm glad to pull my comfort MMO around me like a warm blanket and settle in for a good time.


© 2011 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.

Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Played Lately: Star Trek Online

  • Back when Steam put Star Trek Online on sale for a vanishingly small amount (less than cup of Starbucks coffee, at least), I thought to myself, "Anjin, I don't think you gave STO the effort it deserves. There are plenty of people who have a great time. How about I try it again the right way?" So I bought the cheapest MMO ever (price-wise, that's not a comment about quality) and gave it another go.

  • My trial character was still there, pacing around the character select screen. She was deleted real quick. I can't go back to an old character unless I've spent a long time with them. Considering the fact that she had only just escaped the tutorial, I wasn't losing anything by starting over. I rolled up a new character (almost identical to the last) and began the tutorial.

  • Once again, like in my last play through, it took me two play sessions to get out of the tutorial. I don't know why this bothers me when I'm just fine with long tutorials in other games (like Rift and Cryptic's own Champions Online.) And when I got out, I headed to spacedock, tried a mission, quit, and never restarted it again. That, it turns out, was the exact same place I quit during the trial.

  • I could see where the game had been improved, but none of that made it fun to me. And once again, it feels more like the problem is with me, not STO. Since I'm not a big fan of the franchise, its Star-Trekiness is not enough to keep my attention. So all I'm left with are game systems and design choices that leave me baffled. It seems silly to me in some ways that I'm sure fans could overlook.

  • My subscription ran out Friday and there is little chance that I will renew it. But at least I gave it the old Star Fleet try one more time.


© 2011 Marty Runyon. All rights reserved.