I sprained my ankle today

Joy.

While I was caring for the guinea pigs, I dropped a bale of hay down the stairs into the basement and broke the bottom step. While stepping down there, I ended up hearing a huge cracking noise and the rest of my evening was spent in abject agony.

Worse, one of our guinea pigs died the night before.

Poor Autumn.

This is going to make cleaning out their cages slightly difficult today.

Sexism and Gender Politics in Arkham City

I can't see why ANYONE would think this was sexist.

Note: This blog entry contains major spoilers for the game and you should proceed at your own risk if you haven't played Arkham City.

    Film Crit Hulk wrote a couple of interesting articles on the sexism in Batman: Arkham City. I actually think people should check them out.

Article 1#
Article 2#

    I disagree with some of his conclusions but I think it's an important thing to address the objections he and others have raised.

    Likewise, the Game Overthinker has his own podcast on the subject.

Podcast

    I think it's fascinating to address the changing role of women in both comics and video games. The fact we're talking about it as opposed to accepting it at face value makes me think definite progress is being made.

    Others might disagree but since it's my blog, I'll just say they're wrong.

    Let's face it, comic books and video games have never been the most progressive mediums when it comes to women. For the longest time, both have been defined as "boys' entertainment" and it definitely shows in their depiction of women.

    Gail Simone created the "Women in Refrigerators" webpage to talk about how female characters in comics were considered disposal compared to their male colleagues. For example: Barbara Gordon a.k.a Batgirl was shot and crippled by the Joker while Batman had his back broken by Bane. Batman was up and running again by the end of Knightfall but it took Barbara over a decade to start walking again.

    Video games started with Mario and Link saving the Princess. Samus Aran and Lara Croft are the two grand dames of video game heroines but both are sexualized beyond measure. Just look up Samus Aran's Zero Suit. I mean, seriously, would video game developers put Boba Fett in that outfit?

    It's no coincidence that the Final Fantasy games were hugely popular with women because of their comparatively tame sexualization (barring FFX-2) and strong roles for female characters. Lara Croft has recently being rebooted in hopes of re-imagining her as a strong female character instead of a joke. It might be a case of "too little, too late" given her name has become synonymous with fanservice but I wish them luck.

    Now, where what's the deal with sexism in Arkham City? Well, let's start with the female characters.

    Catwoman is actually one of the more interesting characters in the game. She's overtly sexualized but the game points out it's all an act. Catwoman has long been a character who uses her "feminine wiles" to manipulate men, though this has been called sexist in the past well before AA. Wasn't it Alicia Silverstone's Batgirl (ow, I hate remembering that movie) who pointed out that sort of passive-aggressive resistance went out a long time ago?

    However, the game does a nice job in establishing Catwoman is rather ambivalent about sex. She's obviously making use of her "distracting sexiness" to throw off her enemies. Hell, Catwoman steals kisses from enemies during takedowns. It adds an interesting layer to her relationship with Batman. Since before Julie Newmar, Batman has had a flirtatious relationship with Catwoman.

    Batman has never been particularly harsh to her and has even trusted his secret identity to her on occasion. In Earth-2's continuity, Bruce Wayne and Selena Kyle actually married and had a child together. Arkham City is the first game where it's implied Batman may simply be the victim of Selena Kyle screwing with his head. After all, in this game we find out that Selena Kyle flirts with everyone and it's always insincere.

    Yes, she cares for Batman and has moral choices to make regarding helping him but it's obvious she's not desperately in love with Bruce. Selena Kyle is a woman fully in control of her sexuality, even as it's something she uses as a weapon.

    Catwoman also gets to kick ass during the game, occupying a "Lightning Bruiser" role. She can't take quite as much punishment as Batman but her ability to deal with huge numbers of thugs, especially when fully upgraded, is notable.

    The camera does ogle her a bit too much for my taste and Batman rescuing her from Two Face is something I think the game could have done without. However, Catwoman does get the opportunity to return the favor later in the game. That makes up for it, mostly.

    Next up is the behavior of the generic mooks in Batman: Arkham City. Seriously, the male characters in the game are surprisingly foul-mouthed when it comes to women. The word b*** is used to a ridiculous level, usually referring to Catwoman or Harley Quinn.

    The amount of sexist commentary from the thugs also goes into some uncomfortable areas. Specifically, some thugs speculate on Catwoman being bisexual and Harley Quinn being transgendered for their own lewd fantasies and/or because they can't imagine taking orders from a woman born female.

    Here, detractors have a valid point.

    Now, I'm aware that hardened cons are not the most politically correct people on the planet. In real life, sexual violence is going to happen in environments as rife with power/dominance issues as prisons. I don't have any objections to the fact that the thugs are people the game wants us to hate. When a female nurse is rescued in Wonder City, the implications of the thugs' intent is clear and there's an argument that it's no different from rescuing any of the political prisoners being threatened throughout Arkham City.

    Except, it is.

    The first issue is that I don't object to the use of harsh language by thugs, it's just that it's remarkably focused on the women of the game. Yes, thugs would call Catwoman a "b***" and probably would use a lot more harsh language. It's just they never call Batman a "b******" or an "a******" or use any other similarly harsh words towards male characters. We don't see any of the male thugs threatening male characters with rape either, because that's not as socially acceptable to depict in our society.

    Bluntly, it's permissible in a Teen game for Batman to swoop in and rescue a female character from the threat of imminent rape but not the same for him to do so with a male character.

    Here, I think the developers really dropped the ball. They were trying to push the envelope with Batman's edginess but I think they did it in a half-hearted way. The thugs are capable of threatening women with sexual violence and being sexist but they aren't able to do the same towards men. It's because of this I think the game could have definitely dialed it back a notch without sacrificing storytelling integrity.

    Which brings me to Talia.

    I think Batman: Arkham City did a reasonable job in depicting both Talia and the League of Shadows. You know, aside from giving the daughter of the Demon's Head an outfit showing her midriff.

Because I think the world's most dangerous terrorist needs to show her belly button.

    I'm sorry, that just seems rather out of place. Are we really to the point where we need Talia al Ghul of people to show more skin to be sexy? A girl who basically thrives on being sexy due to how dangerous she is?

    Well, with that out of the way I'd like to say that the game mostly gets it right with Talia and her bodyguards. When we first meet one of the League of Shadow ninjas, she's seemingly dead and stuffed in one of the Penguin's display cases. However, it was after she'd killed eight of the Penguin's goons. Honestly, I thought that was probably underselling what one of the League could do but it's still pretty damn impressive.

    Later, we discover she actually faked her death and had entered into a trance of some kind which allowed her to survive a gunshot wound. While she's seemingly dead in her display case, she hears Batman's plans to go after the Demon's Head and breaks free. She then leads Batman on a rooftop to rooftop chase where only exceptional cunning lets Batman track her down.

    Badass.

    Ironically, the way Batman deals with the League's ninjas is less sexist than you'd think. Specifically, Batman fights them the same way he would any other thug just without the bone-snapping maneuvers. Normally, violence against women is a bad thing to depict in games but here Batman is obviously going to die if he doesn't fight back and it's a contest of near-equals.

    You could even argue the reason Batman doesn't break any of his opponent's bones is less because he's worried about hurting women than he doesn't want to unnecessarily **** off the League of Shadows when he's coming to them for a favor.

    There's also a hilarious subversion when Talia is being threatened by the Joker. For the entire time, we're meant to assume Talia is going to die unless we rescue her. Then, when Bruce Wayne is in a spot, Talia just causally spins around and seemingly kills the Joker. The entire time, Talia was playing possum and just testing Bruce to see how far he'd go for her. Had the game ended with her leaving Batman to face the Joker alone, annoyed he wouldn't kill him for her, I would have been pleased.

    Unfortunately, it ends with Talia being killed by the Joker from behind.

    This, honestly, just p***** me off. Talia is one of my favorite characters and I support Batman with her above all other options. The fact that the ending of the game then goes on to mourn the Joker of all people bothers me to no end.

    Yeah, I get it's Mark Hamill's last performance as the Clown Prince of Crime but Talia is lying dead just a few feet away. Don't you think Bruce Wayne would be carrying her body out? Don't give that he can just take her to a Lazarus Pit either. They mentioned that option for Ra's al Ghul but they didn't do that for Talia.

    So definite mixed marks for Talia and the League's depiction.

    Finally, Harley Quinn.

    Harley Quinn is always a difficult character to write in relation to the Joker. If you treat her situation seriously, she's an abused spouse with elements of Patty Hearst crossed one of Charles Manson's female followers.

    I.e. there's nothing particularly funny about it.

    If you treat it for laughs, you run the risk of laughing at some uncomfortable subtext. I love the DC comics stories about when Harley is away from the Joker and becoming her own woman. Words cannot express how p***** off I was by the ending of Gotham City Sirens, which undid all of her positive characterization.

    Really, I like the Harley Quinn in the Arkham Asylum video games because they nicely sidestep the issue. Here, Harley is just a bad person. No, seriously, it removes a lot of the sexism  to treat her as the Joker's number 1# henchwoman and nothing else. She's not remotely sympathetic and is a dangerous psychopath. It makes her villain instead of victim.

    Indeed, in the Joker's dying state, Harley plays the role of a major villainess. She kills people left and right and sends a Doctor to die horribly at the hands of her male followers. Some of them are plotting against her, thinking she'll be easy pickings when the Joker is dead but at least some of the criminals are rightfully afraid of her.

    Then we find out she's pregnant with the Joker's baby.

    Honestly, I'm not sure what to make of that. I can't say it's necessarily sexist or not, given pregnancy is part of the human experience. I think we'll have to wait until Arkham Asylum 3 to find out how that changes things. I actually like Harley's depiction in the AA games. She's tough, dangerous, and as mad as the Joker.

    I think Arkham City isn't nearly the sexist work that people give it credit for. It has a number of strong female characters who are more than just women for Batman to rescue or romantic interests. It even passes the Bechdel Test due to Catwoman and Ivy talking about plants and loot. I would have appreciated a chance for Catwoman and Harley to talk, let alone Catwoman and Talia. Still, I think the game had a surprisingly good grasp of some its female characters.

    Unfortunately, this just makes the areas it does slip up on all the more troublesome. The game just needed a little tweaking to be less troublesome in its gender politics.

    That's my .02 and you're welcome to disagree.

The Social Satire of Batman: Arkham City

    One of the hardest things to write is satire. One could say that all media is informed by the social injustices of the world but I think that's a bit pretentious. Really, it's damn hard to do a piece on the current problems of the world without coming off as preachy.

    Even attempts to slip a message under the radar are rarely successful because people usually sense when they're being talked down to. One of the worst serials of Doctor Who was The Two Doctors, which was a lengthy track against eating meat. It's no surprise we later see the Doctor eating steak, people reacted that badly to it.

    I think part of the problem is that it's impossible to exaggerate a problem to suitably heroic levels without somewhat warping the message. The X-men are effective metaphors against intolerance because they're a mixed group of ethnicity and genders working together for a common goal. The best lesson against prejudice isn't that Sentinels are hunting mutants for having superhuman powers but that Storm is black, Kitty is Jewish and both of them are way cool people.

    At least that's my opinion.

    It's why I think that Batman: Arkham City is a surprisingly good piece of social satire. People tend to forget that Escape from New York was satirical, designed at highlighting the increasing crime in urban areas and the seeming disconnect from the central government.

    Brazil is a tremendously funny comedy which only makes sense if you appreciate what it has to say about British society (and society in general). The satire is interwoven with the storytelling and the two do not function without each other.

    Batman: Arkham City is effectively a diatribe about dehumanization and giving up the rights of individuals. It's easy to say it's a satire of the War on Terror. The in-universe Arkham City can be taken as an analogue for Guantanamo Bay and the use of Tyger soldiers as a reference to Blackwater in Iraq. That's actually demeaning Arkham City. It has a much larger applicability to a variety of situations and places. Throughout history, governments have routinely gone through periods of oppression and militarization when its citizens have feel threatened. They often crack down on undesirables and the "other" in hopes of appearing strong.

    One of the least controversial groups to crack down upon is criminals. For obvious reasons, criminals have less rights in society than regular people. Television and movies indoctrinate us with criminals as stock villains worthy of death.

    Batman is one of the few characters in cinema who attempts to arrest his villains and even then, they usually die in his movies. Heck, in Tim Burton's Batman, the Cape Crusader kills probably a hundred or more of the Joker's henchmen before the later is finally dealt with.

    Batman: Arkham City is a wonderful satire of that attitude, using a backdrop of Gotham City to ask what necessary measures should be taken to deal with criminals. I think just about everyone even passingly familiar with Batman, which is probably half of the people on Earth, have a vision of Gotham City as a crime-ridden hellhole. So, if someone were to suggest that Gotham City should take extraordinary measures to deal with its criminals, most people would just nod their head.

    There's already a staggering number of people who ask, "why doesn't Batman just kill the Joker?" After all, no prison can seemingly hold him and he kills more people every time he breaks out. This ignores that, theoretically, the state could execute the Joker or build a prison where he can't escape. We just assume Batman should do it because he's the hero. Indeed, the only reason the Joker hasn't been executed or killed in action is the cyclical narrative of comics.

    In the backstory of Batman: Arkham City, the decision is made to put all of Gotham City's criminals in a gigantic penal colony surrounded by a sixty-foot concrete wall. The implication, supported within the game itself, is that the criminals will have no one to victimize but each other. Presumably, they will eventually kill each other off in a battle royale for supremacy. In a very real way, Gotham City has chosen to summarily execute its surplus criminal population in a way that leaves their hands bloodless.

    In real life, the death penalty is a highly controversial subject. In most of the Western World, it's soundly condemned with the United States being the odd man out. Even if you agree with it in certain cases, it's a messy affair that rarely leaves anyone satisfied. Proponents of the death penalty dislike the endless series of appeals which denies families closure and frequently re-opens wounds that are best left healed over. Opponents of the death penalty, in addition to human rights issues, often cite that you rarely know 100% for certain if an executed party is guilty or not.

    Wartime removes much of this uncertainty. You can have individuals assassinated and/or killed during a bomb drop. The use of Tyger mercenaries in Arkham City takes the police out of the equation. It's obvious that the soldiers have orders to kill anybody who attempts to escape from Arkham City.

    Likewise, martial law has long been a codeword for a situation which cannot be handled by normal civilian authorities. It's a common belief those who willing to fight for their country are more trustworthy with power than those who aren't (a fact talked about by Robert Heinlein in Starship Troopers).

    Arkham City is a place criminals can be disposed of in a way without Gotham City adopting the trappings of a fascist state. Arkham City, behind its large concrete wall, is a place where criminals are "out of sight and out of mind." In the city proper, life goes on as usual. Only behind the walls of the Arkham City does law and authority cease to exist yet is simultaneously omnipresent.

    One of the things I liked about the V for Vendetta movie adaptation was the fact that, minus minorities and curfews, life seemed to go on as normal in Norsefire Britain. The banal reassuring normality of the setting helped highlight the terrible nature of what was going on under the citizenry's nose. If Arkham City were to sink beneath the waves, which it literally is if the in-game flooding is any indication, no one would notice.

    The thing about imprisoning criminals and stripping them of all rights is there's always someone willing to exploit their newly reduced status. Doctor Hugo Strange and Mayor Quincy Sharp are the guiding forces behind Arkham City and neither of them are adverse to slapping the label of criminal on anyone who disagrees with them. The video game opens with Bruce Wayne, not Batman, being arrested for seemingly the crime of disagreeing with Arkham City. Likewise, Jack Ryder (the Creeper in DC comics) is arrested for apparently doing a journalistic piece on Arkham City.

    The abduction of Bruce Wayne, of course, starts the downfall of Arkham City. People start asking questions when a billionaire celebrity disappears they didn't ask when the dozens, if not hundreds, of innocent regular citizens inside Arkham City did. There's a reason that people usually quietly disappeared in totalitarian states.

    It's better to make it a private affair that causes an uncertainty more than a confirmation the government has taken your loved ones away. That willful ignorance is on display throughout the game with most Gothamites having no idea what goes on inside their newly constructed prison.

    Both Mayor Sharp and Doctor Hugo Strange believe their methods are necessary for protecting Gotham - which makes their actions all the more reprehensible. They are committed to their course of action, believing all of it is righteous and just.

    We don't need an explanation for why the Tyger soldiers obey their orders, either. They're mercenaries. Their job is to collect their paycheck, not serve any ideology. Besides, society has sanctioned their activities - causing the average Gothamite to be as responsible for any atrocities as Mayor Sharp and Warden Strange.

    On the ground, we also get to see the abuse the criminals endure at the hands of a prison system that hates them. They're denied food, warm clothing during winter, and are left to their own devices. Like in real-life America's prison system, gangs absorb all of the criminals who want to survive. These criminals are made worse by the environment they are surrounded with.

    After all, Hugo Strange is uninterested in rehabilitation, the entire prison is a giant death trap. So why not let the criminals tear each other apart? Replace the Penguin and Two-Face's gangs with the Bloods or Aryan Nation and the situation described in Arkham City isn't too dissimilar from many real-life prisons.

    In the role of Batman, we get a nice bat's eye view of the horrible conditions within Arkham City. I appreciate the game for giving us a surprisingly nuanced and sympathetic portrayal to not only the political prisoners but the criminals as a whole. Yes, some are scum talking about what they want to do to Harley Quinn or Catwoman but others are simply cold and hungry.

    It's one thing for Batman to go after the criminals trying to kill him but it's another to descend down to beat up one just trying to get warm near a burning steel drum. Batman: Arkham City does this without sacrificing story or game content.

Arkham City review (Spoiler)

    Okay, I wrote a Non-Spoiler review of Batman: Arkham City and posted it right before this one. If you're not interested in having plot-points and character decisions spoiled for you, I suggest you go read it (here).

    If you've finished the game, here's a review which will talk about all of the various developments in the video-game mythos. Given that a lot of Batman: Arkham City's plot depends on surprise, I highly recommend that you do NOT read this review if you haven't completed the game.

    Okay, glad that warning is out of the way.

    *ahem*

    HEAVY spoilers to follow.

    I loved the plot.

    The idea of the Joker being  poisoned by the Titan formula he ingested to beat Batman in Batman: Arkham Asylum is poetic justice at its finest. The fact they have the audacity to actually kill the Joker is something I hope they won't reverse for the next game. Well, actually, that's a lie. I hope they bring back Mark Hamill as the Joker because he's entertaining as hell.

    I know there's a big controversy over whether or not Mark Hamill will ever return as the Joker. Honestly, that's his choice. If he wants to, I'd certainly welcome it. If not, I think the Joker should be retired from this particular mythos.

    There's plenty of other villains to use from Prometheus to Bane. Well, not Bane. The Bane in this version is a character who lives and dies on his drug addiction. He also got defeated easily by Batman in this one. Frankly, I do think the game went a little overboard in its killing. Killing the Joker at the climax of the game is one thing. Killing Ra's al Ghul, Talia al Ghul, and Hugo Strange in addition to the Joker is crazy.

    Ra's al Ghul and Talia al Ghul are unlikely to remain dead anyway but the game makes a big deal about Talia's death. Frankly, I hope she comes back next game as I was intrigued by Batman and Talia's relationship. I especially liked that Barbara Gordon a.k.a Oracle was clearly jealous of her.

    The use of Ra's al Ghul as the mastermind behind the plot is something I have mixed feelings on. I absolutely loved Ra's al Ghul's Wonder City and the "Tests of the Demon" (though I felt a hang-glider test to determine Batman's fitness and the "giant Ra's" fight were a bit silly) but I didn't think it made sense for Ra's to be behind Hugo Strange. Ra's al Ghul is about world domination and purifying the planet.

    Yes, I could see Ra's al Ghul wanting to kill a bunch of criminals but I really think this should have been restricted to a side-quest. Frankly, the fact Ra's al Ghul dies within minutes of the revelation that he's behind Arkham City makes the whole thing silly. Why not Ra's al Ghul the final boss if this is his brainchild? I like Clayface just fine but it really should have been one final battle against the Joker or the Demon's Head.

    Speaking of which, I did like the Hugo Strange "tower climb" and I thought he was effective as the warden of Arkham City. One thing I might have changed would be inserting the helicopters dropping Tyger troopers throughout the game to attack Batman. It would have made the dangers of Hugo Strange and the Tyger organization all the more pressing.

    Likewise, I would have kept Quincy Sharp as Hugo Strange's willing collaborator or made Sharp the ultimate mastermind of Arkham City. He was set up as a major bad guy in Arkham Asylum with his plans to create the city located in a secret room behind his office. There was no reason to reduce him to a one-note pawn in this game.

    Another thing I appreciated was the use of continuity in this game. Batman: Arkham Asylum felt like a six issue mini-series. Batman: Arkham City feels like an on-going comic book. You get to investigate Bane, Deadshot, and Hush as part of your efforts to clean up Arkham City and none of these characters relate back to the main plot. I really enjoyed the investigations and hope we continue the side-quests in the next game.

    BTW, there was NO reason to cop-out on a Bane vs. Batman fight in this game. BAD developers! People who have finished the game and go back to the Joker's hideout will probably want me to comment on the fact that Harley Quinn is pregnant with the Joker's child. I'm not really sure what people expect to come from this and I'm kind of 'meh' about the whole thing.

    We're a little past the Victorian idea of the "demon seed" and the worst thing that could happen is that the kid becomes a Batman Beyond villain. Amusingly, I'd like to think that Harley names her "Duela" and has Harvey sign off as her godfather.

    You'd have to be a hardcore DC fan to get that joke.

    I think the character to benefit most from Arkham City, however, is the Riddler. I admit to being a huge fan of the Riddler. I think a lot of comic book writers struggle with the Riddler because he's not as psychotic as other members of the Rogues Gallery his theme is similar to the Joker's. Also, of course, the riddles can't be things that the audience gets if they're too hard for the police. A video game, by contrast, is the perfect medium for the Riddler as it gives audience participation.

    The Riddler is great in this game, basically existing as the secret ruler of Arkham City. He's infiltrated all of the gangs in the city, has set up elaborate traps for his hostages, and has huge projection screens he uses to taunt Batman.

    Literally, the entire city is covered in Riddler gizmos and devices. I would have preferred more hostages to rescue, perhaps a dozen instead of four so it didn't require QUITE so many Riddler trophies between rescues. Still, the Riddler was awesome and I loved the Mad Headdrome-esque effect he possessed during his taunts.

    What do I want from Arkham Asylum 3? I think, honestly, I'd like to actually explore Gotham City as opposed to just a portion of it that's been walled off. You could move around the city in the Bat Mobile after the Black Glove Society or whoever takes a building over. Each individual section of the city is a different "stage" per se. That way, you wouldn't have to do the entirety of the city like in Arkham City.

    On the other hand, some may actually find that inferior to Arkham City so to each their own.

    Great game, though. Well done.

10'/10

Buy at Amazon.com

Arkham City review (Non-Spoiler)

    I love me some Batman.

    So much that I'm going to do my review of Arkham City in three parts. The first part, this review, is going to review the Arkham City game from a non-spoiler perspective. The next will be a spoiler review that covers all of its plot elements in detail. The third will be a discussion of Arkham City's social commentary. Yeah, you heard that right. I'm going to devote an essay to discussing the social satire of a Batman tie-in video game.

    Yes, I am completely insane. Thank you for asking.

    A little background before we get into this. I LOVE Batman. I grew up with Batman: The Animated Series. I was one of those kids who watched the original Michael Keaton Batman in theaters with awe. I know who Azrael, Cassandra Cain, Spoiler, and Hush are. Hell, I actually proposed to my wife during a impromptu Batman movie marathon. That last bit, I point out, is kind of coincidental but it cements Batman's importance in my life.

    So yeah, this game is made for Batmaniacs like myself.

    So what's the final verdict? I love the game, I give it a ten out of ten, and yet I can't say it's quite as perfect as the original. Oddly, I'll still probably play Batman: Arkham City a lot more than I played Batman: Arkham Asylum. Maybe it's nostalgia at work here but Arkham Asylum is just a note perfect video game to me.

    I may do a retrospective review of it someday, I love it so much. It felt like a six-issue Batman miniseries and I see no reason why it couldn't have been in-continuity. Of course, given DCU regularly savages its own continuity, maybe it's for the best.

    I liken Arkham Asylum to a perfect meal of steak, garlic mashed potatoes, bread sticks, and tea. It's delicious and after you're done with it, you're left wanting more. There is no more, however. Arkham City is more like Chinese food. You can scarf it down and afterward, there's enough to go back and get a second helping. Still, there were things I would have done differently.

    The premise is simple enough. Blackgate Prison and Arkham Asylum were destroyed due to the events of Batman: Arkham Asylum. As a result, there are thousands of hardened lifers and homicidal lunatics now impossible to incarcerate. Rather than in real-life where these guys would be transferred to other institutions, Gotham City takes care of the problem in a unique fashion. They wall off the slums of Gotham City and dump their criminal population inside. There is no order inside and the criminals are left to their own devices.

    You'd think I'd find this premise ridiculous but it's actually really intriguing. I think it's because I approach it from the perspective of a comic book. In this universe, the Joker has undoubtedly escaped dozens of times already and murdered hundreds of people. He's not alone either, making Gotham City something of a festering black hole in terms of crime. If the Gotham City Earthquake happened in this continuity it's also possible this is a disaster zone. One where it's cheaper to use it as a makeshift prison than try to repair everything.

    Whatever the case, it's Escape from New York-esque premise is one I'm willing to believe. Comic books are filled with a lack of government supervision or the government being evil. In the X-men comics, there's countless secret societies in the government devoted to kidnapping or killing mutants.

    Hell, one of Marvel's major missteps was actually going out and having a death camp made for them by Weapon X. That's another issue, however. Whatever the case, it's easy for me to believe the Gothamites hope Arkham City will solve their crime problem. By solve, I mean, believe the citizens the criminals will kill each other off. The game is filled with causal evidence the authorities are habitually abusing, starving, and arming the prisoners well before the explosive climax.

    Batman's role in the game is to head into Arkham City and pretty much do what he does best, punching bad guys and saving innocents. After all, not all prisoners in a penitentiary are going to be as psychotically evil as say, Two Face. It doesn't help that the prison is being supervised by long-time Batman villain Hugo Strange (apparently making his first appearance in this continuity) and fascist dictator wannabe Quincy Sharp (now Mayor of Gotham City). You just know that something terrible is going to happen with that premise.

    The game controls are much faster and more intuitive than Batman: Arkham Asylum. Batman is able to handle larger crowds of thugs much better than in the first game, which is almost a shame. The first game did an excellent job of establishing Batman was a human being rather than a superhuman like Superman.

    It's possible for Batman to fight off six guys at once in the first game, but it's a tremendous strain on him and you mostly have to rely on stealth to survive. In Arkham City, I had no difficulty fighting off seemingly dozens of mooks as if they made of paper. It's not until later in the game that the thugs gain any weapons more dangerous than a baseball bat or pipe and, even then, they're pretty easy.

    Swinging across Arkham City is a bit like running rooftops like in Assassin's Creed 2, though you have the advantage of Batman's grappling hook. Honestly, I felt it was a mistake not giving Batman the option to physically jump from rooftop to rooftop like Ezio. The grappling hook is fun and all but there's something classic about Batman leaping across the rooftops.

    The pandering to those who have a working knowledge of the Batman mythos is tremendous with literally hundreds of references spread throughout the game. The references are much easier than the ones in Arkham Asylum and thus, you can use them to solve the Riddler's challenges much faster. Still, I would have appreciated a list of the actual Riddles because it would have made my enjoyment all the greater. Instead, I just saw a reference to the Falcone Crime family and took a picture with the Bat-Camera.

    Riddle Solved.

    One change I didn't like was the removal of Oracle from the game for the substitution of Alfred. I understand that Barbara Gordon is no longer going to be Oracle in the rebooted DCU. Hell, I have a copy of the new Batgirl 1# and it's obvious she's not nor likely ever has been. Still, I really liked the relationship between Batman and Oracle and wanted to see more of it. Alfred's banter with Bruce is entertaining, though.

    What I really approve of is the addition of side-quests to the main story. Arkham Asylum was highly tight in its storytelling. However, once you were done with the game, there wasn't much left to do other than solve the Riddler's various challenges. After Arkham City, there's plenty of re-spawning thugs and stories to continue pursuing.

    Some of them were very good, some of them were frustratingly hard, and at least one I found impossible to complete even with the internet. I'm very happy with the developers for making the game this way and I give them two thumbs up for it.

    Overall, I give this game a ten out of ten and highly recommend everyone with even a passing appreciation of Batman to pick it up. I suspect a lot of the references will go over the heads of most people, but it's all explained in the video game to the point I don't think anyone's enjoyment will be affected.

10/10

Buy at Amazon.com

Vampire Apocalypse: Fallout review

     Vampire Apocalypse: Fallout is the third but hopefully not final Vampire Apocalypse novel. It is also the darkest in the series so far, ending not in a heroic triumph but in what I can say many readers will interpret as a downer ending.

     The name of the novel is also distinctly appropriate, reflecting not only radioactivity but also the aftermath of freedom fighter leader John Harris' activities. A major theme of the book is the repercussions from actions taken with the best of intentions.

    In a way, Fallout is the most political of the Vampire Apocalypse series so far (at least in my opinion). It is here that Harris gets to reflect on the breaking down of infrastructure and the dangers thereof. As bad as it is under the vampires, they kept people fed (even if mankind lived in filthy feeding camps).

     The book takes an interesting stand on nuclear power as well, not so much condemning it as condemning the older plants which haven't been updated. Finally, Fallout shows the effects fear-mongering, demonstrating the results of individuals seeking someone to blame during a time of crisis.

    What I really enjoyed is the war against the vampires being portrayed realistically (for whatever value of such may be when involving vampires). No matter how many battles Harris' group may win or how much sabotage they do--their enemies are simply numerous and well-supplied for his group to defeat alone.

     Harris' angst over this forms the bulk of the book's narrative. Harris continues to fight, even when denied by his fellow humans, but a major theme of the book seems to be personal heroism isn't enough. You need the support of your fellow human beings, people who are willing to stand with you to save the world.

    Derek Gunn has done an excellent job of also portraying the enemy side of war and its increasingly factious nature. My favorite of the factions (in a "love to hate them" sort of way) is the Thralls. William Carter, the Thrall leader, has used the chaos generated by Harris' group to increase his own position, much like many high ranking officials throughout history.

     Derek Gunn has really made something special in this villain, a man I believe to be the most loathsome character in his entire series. Whereas the vampires are expected to be baby-eating monsters, William Carter is effectively a human being who has adopted racist attitudes against his fellow humans. He's a rapist, mass murderer, and psychopath who I can't wait to see get his.

    I enjoy all of the new characters created in the series and appreciate the expanding cast of the Vampire Apocalyse series. World building is always a chore for an author but the varying perspectives of existing characters give an increasingly holistic view of just exactly how bad the situation has gotten in the world.

     While it's bad enough that we hear about children used as food sources and women as forced breeding, seeing the perspective of an actual victim is another matter entirely. I thank Derek, as a reader, for being willing to get that dark without being gratuitous.

    Fallout isn't my favorite of the Vampire Apocalypse series, being a dark set up for future novels down the line, but it's definitely a worthy entry in the series.

8/10

Vampire Apocalypse: Descent into Chaos review

    Vampire Apocalypse: Descent into Chaos continues the adventures of the resistance group headed by "I have no idea what I'm doing" Peter Harris and his rag-tag bunch of human survivors. It's been a short time the events of the first novel, A World Torn Asunder, and the first pocket of free-humanity has been established. Of course, this is when everything goes from bad to worse.

    Is Vampire Apocalypse: Descent into Chaos good? Yes, it continues the trend established in the first book. The good-guy characters are sympathetic and likable. The bad-guy vampires and their thralls are hateable but interesting to read about. This is a novel where you want the heroes to win and the bad guys to fail. It's a quick read with a lot of fun, pulse-pounding action. You won't regret buying it.

    On the human side of things, I continued to enjoy the depiction of the resistance. Derek Gunn has a way in describing characters that makes them come off as authentic and real. Yeah, a number of these guys will die but not all of them and you really want to see them survive. Instead of a John Conner-esque messianic archetype, John Harris is obviously just making **** up as he goes along and hoping he doesn't get the last of free humanity killed along the way.

    One thing I enjoyed was the author didn't just blow past the important role of support personnel in wars. Yeah, the guy who is actually holding the gun is important. Equally important, if not more so, is the guy who is making the gun and the bullets. Then there's the guy who patches the wounds of the guy holding the gun. Even the guy who cooks the other guys' meals. Non-combat personnel are vital to any military and it's nice to see them play a role in this novel.

    If there's one character that's a serious misstep in the human side of things, its Regan. Yes, he's apparently named after the President. That's a bit like V for Vendetta naming Adam Susan, "Mister Thatcher." Basically, Regan is the slimy politician and obstructive bureaucrat we've seen since time memorial (I especially liked Walter Peck in Ghostbusters). In this case, Regan more or less exists to get the humans to try and entrench themselves so they can survive.

    This isn't unreasonable on the surface, if not for the fact that its condemning the rest of humanity to a slow and painful death at the hands of the vampires.  Really, the guy is monstrously callous and even in terms of pure-survival strategy, his ideas are stupid. In their current state, Free Humanity could be wiped out by a stiff breeze. Continuing the war against the vampires is the only way they can strengthen their numbers to have an actual chance of surviving.

    God, yeah, I really hated that guy. Not in he "love to hate it" way, either.

    Thankfully, the vampires and the Thralls more than make up for this. Derek Gunn has a nice way of creating purely evil antagonists that, nevertheless, are enjoyable to read about. The vampires may all violent psychopaths but they're damned entertaining. I'm a believer there's a difference between pure evil and "two-dimensional." Daleks are pure evil and they remain the most consistently entertaining villains on Doctor Who.

    Really, the biggest villains in the book are turning out to be the Thralls. Essentially human but for the fact they have three times the strength of a normal person of their build, Thralls have no excuse for the horrible things they do. The vampires are alien and human but the Thralls come off as a combination of frat boys and Nazis. I actually look forward to our heroes killing more Thralls than I do the vampires themselves. Derek Gunn does a fun job of starting to establish the seeds of a Thrall rebellion while maintaining the fact they're every bit as evil as the vampires.

    Overall, Vampire Apocalypse: Descent into Chaos is a nicely moody book that creates an atmosphere of heroic resistance in a relentlessly bleak world. It's a bit like I imagined Skynet's world to look like, except humans are in blood-pens as opposed to labor camps. The action is good, the characterization is consistent, and the storyline entertaining. I hope to continue to read the series as new volumes come out and wish Derek Gunn much success in the fiction market.

9/10

Wing Commander 3: Heart of the Tiger review

    Well, I've finally played one of the Wing Commander games. I pretty much plowed through this game after downloading it and I've got to say that it stood up surprisingly well. Some games, I guess, never get old.

    The plot line is pretty basic: Colonel Christopher Blair (Mark Hamill) has been reassigned to the T.C.S Victory by Admiral Tolwyn (Malcolm McDowell).  His girlfriend and/or wife Jeannette Devereaux a.k.a Angel has been, unknown to Blair, captured by the Kilrathi and is presumed dead.  This has him seriously bummed. However, his best friend Hobbes is on board the T.C.S Victory and there's plenty of Kilrathi to chew through.

    The setting is surprisingly well realized. Through a nice use of "show, don't tell" we get a sense that the Terran Confederation is on its last legs. The war has literally been going on for generations and just about everyone is shell-shocked to one degree or another. There's a looming sense of doom and gloom that clings to all of the characters, though some squad members are more upbeat than others.

    Mark Hamill does an excellent job playing Colonel Blair, portraying a very different character from Luke Skywalker despite both of them being hotshot pilots. I really wish we'd gotten a Wing Commander movie series starring him because it would have been nice to see him in the Sheridan/Sinclair role of being an experienced leader. I especially liked Mark Hamill's not-so-subtle handling of Blair's frustrations. You really get the sense this guy hates the kind of garbage he's put through on a regular basis.

    I actually was very pleased with the way that war, as a whole, was portrayed within Wing Commander 3. The missions are all fun and entertaining but they're mostly designed small-scale strikes against the Kilrathi that don't give you a sense the Terran Confederation is making any real progress against them. Colonel Blair might pull off a hundred miracles a year blowing up carriers all by himself but there's millions more where that came from. Humanity's circumstances feel desperate for the majority of the game, illustrating that the Kilrathi aren't necessarily better at war than humanity but they're possessed of a stronger will. They're continuing to fight despite their mammoth losses because their leaders simply don't care.

    While the game is a starfighter simulation, I actually enjoyed interacting with the game's characters much more. Colonel Blair doesn't have quite the same level of choice that Commander Shepard possesses in Mass Effect but he's not far off. Hobbes is always entertaining, being a character I absolutely loved right up until the end. Flint is also fun, even if she came off a bit too posh for a seasoned fighter jock. Rachel was my favorite character of the game and no jokes about her actress' other film credentials (go ahead and look it up - I'm not telling).

    Each of the characters is carrying his or her set of baggage through the setting and only rarely does any of it feel ludicrous. Snake comes across a little ridiculous with her constantly sharpening a knife but real life is filled with soldiers who managed to survive on hatred for the enemy well after they'd lost any real sense of humanity. Likewise, I felt Captain Eisen (Jason Bernard)'s "old soldier" routine was quite engaging.

    I do have some objections to the game and they're the kinds of things that can't really be discussed in a review without spoiling the plot. Suffice to say, veterans of the game will know that I had some objections to the major plot twist and also the way the game ended. I also felt the Kilrathi were treated a little too much as a one-dimensional race of evil conquerors. Ironically, the situation that humanity is forced into makes the final chapter of the game an interesting moral dilemma and I'm glad that the game offers no easy solutions for the war.

    Overall, I really enjoyed Wing Commander 3: Heart of the Tiger and recommend it despite its age. Despite having some disagreements with the storytelling, I actually think that it made me more emotionally invested overall. As a result, I can't in good conscience take away points for them.

10/10

A love letter to Admiral T'nae

    Oh Admiral T'nae, you lovable psycho you.

    Star Trek Online has something of a problem with creating memorable NPCs. I hate to draw the inevitable comparison but World of Warcraft is positively dripping with them. If you don't like Thrall and Jaina Proudmoore, you have people like Whitemane and Garrosh Hellscream.

    Part of the problem is the source material. Star Trek Online takes place a long time after the Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, and Voyager era. So long that most of the characters from that time period are dead. There's also the fact that the developers would have to pay likeness costs and I doubt they're willing to do that. As a result, there's only a limited game space to develop NPCs and it shows.

    There's exceptions to this: Ambassador B'vat is a wonderfully engaging Klingon villain, Franklin Drake makes you want to punch him in the face every time you meet him, Obisek is George Washington meets Obi-Wan Kenobi, and Haakev is an obnoxious twit with delusions of grandeur. Heck, all of your bridge officers are perky and fun. I do have one favorite NPC, though, one who stands above all the rest.

    Admiral T'nae a.k.a Admiral Ripper.

    No, seriously, this woman is the most violent and insane person ever to wear a Starfleet uniform (including Kathryn Janeway)! The fact she's a Vulcan, blandly pleasant, and stately only makes her raging psychopathia all the more intriguing to watch unfold. Thanks to her, by the end of the Romulan front, your character has probably done more covert operations than the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare protagonists. I feel for the Romulans, really, because I can't imagine them recovering for at least a generation after the iron fist of Admiral Ripper comes down on them.

    Think I'm exaggerating? Let's take the mission Preemptive Strike where Admiral T'nae says the Romulans are developing Thalaron weapons (basically the Trekverse equivalent of nukes). What does Admiral T'nae do? Attempt to negotiate with the Romulan government? Quietly send in deniable assets? No, she sends you to blow up the Romulan fleet in orbit then detonate the Thalaron weapons on the ground before Starfleet wipes out any Romulan reinforcements. Great Surak, Lady, remind me never to get on your bad side. Even better, at the end of the mission, she says we may have headed off a war. In what universe does what you just did not qualify as an act of war?

    It doesn't stop there because Admiral T'nae has no intention of letting the Romulans have any advantage over the Federation. Admiral T'nae sends you to blow up any research into Borg technology the Romulans may be doing, twice. Hell, she even works with Section 31 to feed the Romulans disinformation. That's like the President working with crazy militiamen to subvert the government of Syria. In, Taris, she has you violate an apparent treaty with the Romulans to go investigate the Iconian home world. Hell, all of the missions she gives you seem built around ignoring Romulan sovereignty to make sure they can't possibly threaten the Federation. It's all the more hypocritical because she says Starfleet can't help Obisek's rebellion because it's an internal matter.

    Does blowing up the Romulan home fleet not qualify as interfering? I mean, seriously. I'd love to see the Federation embassy on Rator III's itinerary. It probably looks like this:

    7:00: Breakfast
    8:00: Trade Negotiations.
    9:00: Explain why we assisted a planet in gaining its independence by blowing the hell out of the Romulans sent to take it back.
    10:00: Tea-Time.

    Ironically, I don't consider any of this bad characterization. It might be intentional or it might be a happy coincidence but I have no difficulty believing that Admiral T'nae is the kind of officer the 2409 Starfleet would put in charge of the Romulan Front. According to the timeline, Nero attempted to wipe out Vulcan in this reality and was only stopped by the intervention of Worf. Given the attempted genocide of her home planet and how badly Starfleet has been kicked around in the Star Trek Online universe, it's easy to see that they put someone who was more interested in results than Federation policy.

    Much like Admiral Cartwright from Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country, Admiral T'nae is a person who wants to see a hostile enemy race brought to its knees rather than made peace with. The fact she's a Vulcan only makes it more understandable. They're the people with the biggest ax to grind with the Romulans. Given that the Romulans are controlled by Empress Sela as opposed to the saintly Chancellor Gorkon, T'nae's methods might actually be right.

    I salute you, Admiral T'nae, you're maybe not the hero we want but maybe you're the hero we need.

Vampire Apocalypse: A World Torn Asunder review

    I just finished Vampire Apocalypse series by Derek Gunn. I loved it. I'm looking forward to reading the next books in the series and definitely recommend them. The first book, A World Torn Asunder, isn't high art but it's a nice post-apocalypse setting and a decent vampire story. Heck, it's also a good piece of military fiction. That's the short version and all you really need to know about it. Everything else is just icing on the case. Still, if you want to know specifics, keep on reading.

    A World Torn Asunder is a nice introduction to the Post-Apocalyptic world of Vampire Apocalypse. It avoids a lot of the pitfalls I've always had with zombie apocalypses. Specifically, 'how can people be so stupid to lose the entire planet to these guys?' George Romero has slow moving cannibal creatures destroy the world's population, despite the fact the military should be able to wipe them up very quickly.  Yeah, I know it's social satire but that doesn't excuse some basic issues of storytelling. Was the military was on coffee break that week? Soldiers strike? Throw me a bone here.

    While vampires taking over the planet is not quite as difficult to believe as zombies, there's still the question of 'how exactly do these people take over?' Derek Gunn's vampires can't exist in the daytime and die if you set them on fire. That's a pretty big pair of weaknesses. It's not like White Wolf's World of Darkness where the Antediluvians can just kill a million people by thinking hard and are immune to everything up to and including nuclear weapons.

    Thankfully, the author handles the issue by having the world decaying before the vampires seize power. It reminds me a great deal of the Road Warrior's description of how humanity fell to chaos. What was the narrator's description?

    Oh yes.

    To understand who he was, you have to go back to another time. When the world was powered by the black fuel. And the desert sprouted great cities of pipe and steel. Gone now, swept away. For reasons long forgotten, two mighty warrior tribes went to war and touched off a blaze which engulfed them all. Without fuel, they were nothing. They built a house of straw. The thundering machines sputtered and stopped. Their leaders talked and talked and talked. But nothing could stem the avalanche. Their world crumbled. The cities exploded. A whirlwind of looting, a firestorm of fear. Men began to feed on men.

    The short version, described in the prologue, is that humanity has been cut off from the Middle East's oil supply by instabilities in the region. As a result, the rest of the world has fallen into economic chaos. The United States has split into fifty separate countries and everywhere else is equally ****ed. It's not entirely believable but it's enough to satisfy my suspension of disbelief. Really, without oil to power society, the world is going to collapse. Alternative energy be damned.

    The depiction of small town life in the opening chapters really appealed to me. I grew up in a small town and believe me, if you want to take over the world you should start in Ashland, Ky. Russians could invade and it would be a month before the state government noticed. Plus, I'll be honest, I'm pretty sure my neighbors would sell my family out to the vampires for an extra foot of yard space.

    So, obviously, I'll sell them out first when the vampire revolution comes.

    *ahem*

    I won't post any spoilers but the shocking swerve at the end of the vampire "takeover" process left me feeling a little sick. It was a nice way to introduce our villains and show us just how dangerous they are. The fact that they take over through raw strength and no tricks is also a nice change. Too often, authors try and depict vampires as a race of Emperor Palpatines. While his manipulations were about the only thing good in the Star Wars prequels, I think there's something to be said for brute force. When forced between dying and their children dying or serving as a slave, most people will choose to be a slave.

    That's just my experience. *shifts his eyes* By the way, all those worlds I've enslaved had it coming.

    I won't bother describing the post-vampire takeover world other than to say it's nicely imagined as Hell on Earth. Humans live in camps as literal fodder for the vampires and they are guarded by traitors to the human race, people rewarded with slaves picked from the most attractive prisoners. Derek Gunn doesn't go into detail about that particular aspect, but it nicely reflects the world is a horrible place to live and there's nothing remotely sympathetic about its vampire rulers. No sparkly vampire romanticism here (not that there's anything wrong with that - I quickly tell my wife).

    The majority of the book's later half is about a squadron of survivors who are doing their best to survive despite the slow decimation of their ranks. The majority of humanity is kept drugged out of their minds so there's not much in the way of a resistance as our story begins but our heroes are trying to change that. Despite that, their heroism never comes off as unbelievable and it neatly avoids the "one great man" theory of human leadership. There's a lot of people who serve in the Human Resistance and all of their contributions count. I love Terminator but it seems a bit of a cop-out to say that if not for John Conner, the entirety of humanity would roll over and die.

    Overall, I really enjoyed the treatment of vampires. Are they 'Always Chaotic Evil' psychopaths who are irredeemably evil from their transformation? Yes. After so many years of poor misunderstood vampires, I'm more than happy to just watch them revert to their soulless evil bloodsucker roots. The main vampire, Nero, is a monstrous scumbag with no redeeming qualities and there's nothing wrong with that. It makes the situation for the humans all the more desperate.

    I'm not the kind of guy who gushes over books but I I really enjoyed this one. It was a nice remedy to an overworked schedule and all manner of depressing things going on with my life. Sometimes, you just want to read about a squadron of desperate resistance fighters blowing the hell out of the undead.

    Vampire Apocalypse: A World Torn Asunder is a book about fighting vampires, survival, and inspiring but believable protagonists. As fiction goes, you could do a lot worse. You know, if you like post-apocalyptic fiction about vampires running feeding pens straight out of your worst nightmares.

    Maybe it's an acquired taste.

9/10

Heir to the Empire review

    Ah, Star Wars: Heir to the Empire.

    Let us journey back to an ancient time known as 1992 where I was a boy aged twelve and the book, Dark Force Rising was available in a book rack at a hotel gift shop. I, like many young boys, lived and breathed Star Wars. I didn't know this was the sequel to Heir to the Empire but I can remember my first thoughts seeing it. "It's so large! Like the books my dad reads! It looks so adult and serious!"

    My favorite character was Luke Skywalker instead of Han Solo, I never saw the original trilogy in theaters but I'd seen it repeatedly on television to the point I'd already memorized the words. I made my own lightsaber out of a wooden pole because the plastic ones sucked (IMHO). My first Star Wars toy was Jabba the Hutt because all of the other ones were sold out at KB Toys.

    I devoured Dark Force Rising and thought it was the best thing since sliced bread despite not having any idea who half the characters were. Being the industrious lad I was, I immediately sought out the original book and purchased it at Waldenbooks. You know, that place which existed before Borders but like it has since faded into the mists of time. At least around Ashland, Ky.

    Having re-read Heir to the Empire as an adult, it's not a particularly deep or serious science fiction book like I remember it being. However, as an eleven year old, it was far more mature than the original trilogy (not hard I know).

    I'm sure I'm not alone in this regard because this book more or less set off the Star Wars Expanded Universe as we know it. Sure, there had been previous Star Wars novels but not nothing quite as successful as this.

    Literally hundreds of books owe their existence to the explosive success of Heir to the Empire and its sequels. Now, it's probably as much due to the ridiculous popularity of Star Wars that this book was a runaway hit but Timothy Zahn's writing also deserves a lot of credit.At heart, it does what every Star Wars fan secretly longed for a writer to do: take the saga seriously.

    Now, much to my joy and regret, I've read probably every Star Wars book written up until Deathtroopers (that's when I realized I no longer cared 'quite' as much about Star Wars as I used to-I only have Luke Skywalker looking down at me with a green lightsaber from my desk right now).

    Having read, again, literally hundreds of Star Wars novels I still put Heir to the Empire in the number one spot. It stands the test of time and remains one of the few Star Wars novels I consider just plain good fiction. Why? It's not the plot. I'll be honest, it's not terribly original. Instead, it's three things: characters, mood, and pacing.

    The characters are who every Star Wars Expanded Universe fan remembers. Well, at least they remember Mara Jade and Grand Admiral Thrawn. Captain Pellaeon, Talon Karrde, and Joruus C'Baoth are usually remembered fondly but rarely given quite the same level of attention as the previous two. I'd spoil for new readers of the Expanded Universe what ultimately happens to a few of the characters but some of their fates actually lead me to abandon the EU save as the occasional picky browser.

    Grand Admiral Thrawn is pretty much a character tailor-made to be loved by fan boys. Sort of like how young male Trekkies love Klingons, Star Wars fan boys who don't love the Rebels inevitably love the Empire and Mandalorians. This existed even during the original trilogy where there are people, to this day, who will insist their favorite original trilogy characters were Admiral Piett and General Veers. Why? Well, the Empire has the coolest stuff and better uniforms. Sure, they're Space Nazis but they're not ACTUALLY Nazis so it's okay to like them. I'm deeply ashamed of them and can't believe they exist *hides his copy of the video game TIE Fighter and his Stormtrooper helmet*.

    Seriously, Grand Admiral Thrawn is basically designed to be loved by those who occasionally like to root for the villains. He's a cultured genius with charisma to burn and you can easily see why people would want to follow him. Inspired by such diverse personages as Sherlock Holmes, Sun-Tzu, Caesar, Erwin Rommel, and Karl Donitz; Grand Admiral Thrawn is a tremendously fun character. A lot of fans have complained about his "special ability" which is the power to predict the actions of foes in battle by studying their species' art and what art they personally collect.

    To which, I say, Luke Skywalker can levitate things with his mind. Suspend your disbelief, people.

    Mara Jade is also another character of runaway explosive popularity. Frankly, I wish she'd been slightly more popular for a number of reasons. It's frankly easy to understand why Mara Jade was so popular, she's the fourth girl in Star Wars prior to Amidala. There's Leia, Mon Mothma, and Ion Cannon Girl. Adding a snarky kickass female to balance out the gender ratio a bit certainly couldn't hurt Star Wars' popularity towards the feminine gender. Plus, as the vast amount of fan art goes, it didn't hurt her popularity with guys either.

    Honestly, Mara Jade is a bit of a stereotypical character. She's an Imperial Princess, for all intents and purposes, raised by the Emperor to kill our hero and who ends up falling in love with him. This is a trope as old as Greek myths and certainly was a well-trodden trope by the era of Ming the Merciless. Hell, TV tropes.com even has a name for it in the "Mad Scientist's Beautiful Daughter." What's actually amazing is that Timothy Zahn didn't have a romance with them blossom despite everyone expecting it. Frankly, for the longest time it seemed like she was more likely to hook up with Kyle Katarn in the Dark Forces games.

    Shut up, my fanfics are canon! George Lucas just doesn't know it!

    *Ahem*

    Still, Mara Jade transcends the trope a bit by combining Marvel's Black Widow with a gender-flipped Han Solo. I'm not quite sure  what that says about Luke but fans were clamoring for them to get together for literally a decade after this book was written. Here, she's mostly obsessed with killing Luke for slaying the Emperor, but it's easy to see she has doubts from the very beginning.

    After all, it's been five years and even the most hardened fanatic is going to have qualms about slaying someone when it will destroy your present life. Oh and you were raised to believe in Space Hitler only for the rest of the galaxy to painfully disabuse you of the notion he was actually this warm and cuddly guy. I actually liked the Coruscant scene from the special edition where they were pulling down Palpatine's statue. The Emperor has had twenty years to quietly butcher and punish those people who elected him. I think that's enough time for even the people of Space New York/Washington D.C. to get the message.

    The other characters are still very interesting. Captain Pellaeon is basically Thrawn's Watson. He serves as the audience POV into Thrawn's world while simultaneously being a respectable naval officer in his own right. It's easy to believe that he's completely unaware how insane it is to continue fighting years after the galactic capital has fallen to the Rebellion and the rest of the galaxy is rejoicing at his government's disillusion.

    In a way, he's a nice critique of totalitarian governments because Pellaeon exists in his own little world. The opinion of the common man in the galaxy is utterly irrelevant to Pellaeon's view of the world.

    Talon Karrde is sort of a less enjoyable figure, being the sort of idealized "Gangster Next Door" who fiction keeps insisting exist but actually don't. In real life, Jabba the Hutt is probably more likely to exist than a genuinely noble crime-lord who somehow controls half of the galaxy's underworld. Unfortunately, he's obviously a favorite of Timothy Zahn and plays the role of putting the galaxy's criminals squarely on the side of the New Republic.

    Joruus C'Baoth.... is a crazy Sith Lord. Except, this was before the word "Sith" had appeared on screen so he was just a "Dark Jedi Master." Lucas' real problem with storytelling began with Return of the Jedi because, for the life of me, it took decades for us to find out who the hell the Emperor was and why he had the same powers as Yoda. Even now, it's not exactly clear (at least to film-goers) where the Sith come from other than they're an old secret society that wants revenge on the Jedi for some reason.

    In any case, Joruus C'baoth sort of represents the Dark Side as viewed by Timothy Zahn. It's crazy, self-destructive, and powerful. I feel kind of bad for Darth Vader and the Emperor because both get lumped in with incompetent comic book villains like Cobra Commander and Serpentor when both were actually quite intelligent in the films. Joruus C'Baoth just exists to give us an unambiguously evil nutter for the audience to hate.

    The mood of the novel is quite effective, basically grounding us in the Star Wars universe in a way that few others have tried to do. Everything seems to be "normal" for the galaxy. There's no crazy weirdos with super-powers running around (except Luke). There's no comic book supervillains building armies of robots to conquer the galaxy. The biggest problem facing the New Republic is getting the economy running again.
   
    It makes Thrawn all the more ominous before the Expanded Universe filled in the timeline gaps to make it a never-ending series of warlords up until this book. Timothy Zahn treats it like the Emperor died and the Senate reformed the next day, inviting the Rebellion to take over. In a way, I almost prefer it because it would make a lot more sense for a large number of Imperials to defect and serve the new regime than treat it like the Rebellion had to fight every step of the way to the capital.

    Finally, the novel is extremely well-paced. The book starts very slowly with Thrawn's introduction and him smashing a bunch of faceless New Republic mooks. It then builds up, our villains slowly assembling their arsenal for their big strike. The end is pure Star Wars, consisting of a ridiculous daring plan meant to decapitate the antagonists in one blow. The only difference is that it's Thrawn attempting it as opposed to the heroes. I love this book, always have and always will.

10/10

Sword of Damocles (Star Trek: Titan Book 3) review

    Short version: Sword of Damocles is about religion.

    Slightly longer version: Sword of Damocles is about good faith, bad faith, lack of faith, and the how they interact.

    Star Trek has a very oddball relationship with religion. Part of this being due to Gene Roddenberry's belief that the universe would be a better place if everyone was irreligious. Obviously, this didn't really go over too well with all of the cast and writers. William Shatner, for example, wanted Captain Kirk to fight the Devil in Star Trek: The Final Frontier. Honestly, it couldn't have made that movie worse.

    Ooo, burn! Yeah, folks, I'll be here all night. Actually, I'm probably the only guy who really LIKED that movie but that's beside the point.

    There are other examples too of Star Trek being pro-religion: "Bread and Circuses" is a love letter to Christianity and Deep Space Nine is more or less about God. Amusingly, Babylon Five which had four seasons devoted to analogues for angels and demons, was more agnostic than Deep Space Nine.

    Still, the trouble with religion is always there. Worse, it leads to some pretty hackneyed plots. Robert Beltrane' s Chakotay was supposedly the first openly religious Star Trek character from an Earth religion. Yet, I say if you can't tell me Chakotay's tribe and what his specific religious beliefs are, he's no more actually Earth religious than Kira Nerys.

    There's also been some dumb attempts to reconcile the more religious elements with Gene Roddenberry's vision. For example, trying  to have Kira believe in a secular version of the Prophets when Sisko is fighting demons in the Fire Caves before ascending to become Space Jesus.

    My own religious beliefs are an irreverent form of Christianity. How irreverent? I like to think Captain Kirk actually killed God in Star Trek: The Final Frontier. Which is ridiculous, I know. What does God need with a spaceship?

    Anyway, my real-life faith isn't really relevant save for the fact that I have no trouble dissecting the occasionally strange nature of religion even while believing in God. Religion can lead people to do some positively dumb **** and I have no problem pointing that out. Still, science fiction talks about religion can often end up being heavy handed and problematic. Really, it's the fundamental nature of religion that causes the problem. Either you believe that religion has a place in the lives of human beings or you think it's nonsense.

    It's the rare person who believes both and even then, he's not likely to win favor with those who take their belief (or lack there of) in God deadly serious. I think the only book about the nature of faith and its importance I actually enjoyed was Hogfather and that was written by an atheist.

    Kudos to Mister Pratchett. You will be missed.

    Sword of Damocles, despite not being up with Mister Pratchett's work, handles the issue surprisingly well. I believe this is due to the fact that the authors don't forget to tell a story in the midst of all the parable. On one hand you have the deranged religious fanatics of the week and on the other you have the religious members of the Titan crew. Contrasting this are the secular members of the Titan crew who find both of their views peculiar but respect their right to have them.

    The plot suffers from a small aspect, however, which is the fact that it tries to be weird and deep. Honestly, I think it's better to stick with comprehensible and deep or weird and sanity-blasting. The book involves time travel, oddball spatial physics, and plenty of stuff which just complicates the issue of faith versus reason. There's also an obvious "twist" regarding the fate of the U.S.S Titan which is just telegraphed from the very beginning and so easy to figure out you feel sorry for the cast.

    The book also ends a relationship I was actually looking forward to reading more about. I won't spoil it but it was something that left me feeling cold as opposed to moved. Call me crazy but I would have appreciated if they'd managed to keep the relationship going through the books indefinitely.

    Overall, I very much enjoyed the book but felt the technobabble and oddity of the "final problem" undercut the book's message about religion. Likewise, I missed the interaction between Troi and Riker when they were split up for almost half the book. The book tackled a big science-fiction/real world issue and I applaud that but it was a harder read than I would have liked.

8/10

Ex-Patriots (Ex-Heroes book 2) review

    Despite my desire to get this in audio-book, I got caught up in so much that I had to wait until I could get it in Kindle form. I only finished it about a half-hour ago and I am now ready to give my thoughts on the work. I'll try and avoid spoiling anything more than you would normally get from the back cover and instead talk about what I enjoyed and felt could be improved.

    For those who like their reviews short and sweet, here's the short version: Ex-Patriots is a worthy sequel to Ex-Heroes and continues the story in an enjoyable fashion that not only progresses the story but also has some nice social satire that works surprisingly well.

    To get the obvious comparison out of the way before the book begins, Ex-Patriots seems inspired (at least partially) by George Romero's third zombie film Day of the Dead. Peter Clines is well aware of this and nicely acknowledges his inspiration in the text. At the risk of using an overblown comparison, he does Day of the Dead right.

    As most fans of the Romero Zombie films know, DOTD didn't turn out the way George Romero wanted. Having envisioned a story about how the government and military would deal with the problems of zombies, budgetary issues transformed it into a story about eight guys dealing with the zombie apocalypse. Some of which, whom, were soldiers.

    It's a testament to George Romero's skill as a filmmaker some interesting points about the military, isolation, and society were still made despite general agreement it's the weakest of the initial four movies. Peter Clines, unrestricted by Hollywood budget, gets to expand the response for how the military deals with the situation.

    Likewise, as he's stated in numerous interviews and the book's afterword, he's not interested in vilifying the military either. Instead, he strikes a careful balance between treating the military as mostly fundamentally decent people and the fact that their training and rules are ill-suited to the Post-Apocalyptic world of Ex-Heroes.

    Ironically, I think Peter Clines gives some nastier and more cutting satire of the military than he might have had he treated them as the "EVUL military" zombie movies usually do. The army's "Stop Loss" program and internment being justified under real life present-day laws works as a much more powerful indictment of current abuses of power than any amount of DOTD "evil soldiers" could. This is not Independence Day jingoism, also referenced in the book, and we see that the military is able to mount an effective offense against the zombies but is not able to win.

    It's a nice medium between the usual, "the military would utterly crush a zombie apocalypse" and "the military is too stupid to beat the zombies" which seems to be the usual two extremes faced in zombie fiction. World War Z, for example, has plenty of detractors for its depiction of the US military's handling of the situation. Honestly, I think plenty of people will disagree with Peter Cline's depiction of the US armed forces but they are at least allowed to keep their dignity. This, despite their semi-antagonistic role.

    Ultimately, though, the book is about the superheroes of Ex-Heroes as opposed to the personnel of the military base they find within the book. Zzap, Stealth, Saint George, Cerberus, and the new character of the Driver are all given ample screen time. Amusingly, I like to think of this book as the third and fourth trade paperback of the series as much as I do it as a novel.

    The book feels even more comic book-y than its predecessor and that's not an indictment. With the zombie apocalypse out of the way, we can focus more on superheroes kicking butt and taking names. If there's one complaint I have, it's the fact that it's a little TOO much like a comic book in terms of character development.

    Despite being almost a year after the events of Ex-Heroes, the characters are pretty much where we left them. Saint George is still pining hopelessly for Stealth, Stealth is slightly less frosty but still keeping everyone at arm's length, Queen Bee is still offering herself to Saint George for guilt-free sex, etc. I wouldn't mind if Peter Clines did a little more character development in terms of everyone's relationships and where exactly they're going.

    The new character of Captain Freedom is a bit over-the-top for the more grounded characters of Ex-Heroes but is a worthy addition to the ranks. I'm less sold on the Driver but still liked him despite having less background on him than others. Frankly, the oddest thing I have to say in this review is I'm pleased that Peter Clines included an ethnic minority as a major character. Not enough books remember to do that.

    I really enjoyed Ex-Patriots and if this was a comic book then I would buy every issue. I am officially on board with the series and will state that I am sure this book is about equal with the original. Even if I don't like some of the elements, these complaints are very mild. The book is a fun mixture of action, heroism, social satire, and comic book references that make it delightfully fun even when the situation is grim and horrible.

10/10

My predictions for Star Trek Online Free to Play (F2P)

    It's a reasonably known fact that Star Trek Online is going to be going Free-to-Play (also known as F2P) sometime in 2011. Since it's the middle of October, that means it's probably going to happen soon. Obviously, I can't review what hasn't been released yet but the developers over at the website have been kind enough to share their development process in regular journals. There's also a lot of play-testing going on I am not a part of.

    So, this is actually a review of the semi-educated gamer who is just going to give his thoughts on what he THINKS he's going to get.

    Take it with a grain of salt.

    1:] More of the Same: I have heard some pretty wacky theories about what Star Trek Online was going to be re-released as. My favorite was the idea that the developers were dumping the entirety of the current MMO and rebooting it like Star Wars: Galaxies was cashiered in for Star Wars: The Old Republic (to simplify what happened there).

    I think this was always the wishful thinking of those who hated the game and wanted something vastly different from the get go.

    At heart, everything I've read so far indicates that Star Trek Online is basically going to remain... Star Trek Online. It'll have the same graphics, game-play, starships, and missions as before. There's just going to be the obvious change you're not going to have to pay for it anymore.

    Since the very beginning, a lot of games have been begging for a transformation of Star Trek Online from a starship-based game to a character-based game where you and your friends could all work on the same starship. Suggestions have ranged from having NPC captains to each campaign taking place in a different sector with travel done off-camera.

    Yeah, I don't think that's going to happen.

    Star Trek Online is going to remain a game where you're the captain of your own starship and you fly around the universe blowing **** up.

    For better or worse.

    2:] A Trail of Gold Coins Leading to the C-Store: My father is a lifelong businessman from the time when it was actually possible to earn a decent living in America doing hard work (novel concept, I know).

    One thing he instilled into me from day one was the fact that "you get what you pay for." In the case of Star Trek Online Free to Play I'm sure we're going to find a staggering amount of gamers frustrated by the fact there's going to be better stuff available to people willing to buy it in the C-Store.

    For those unaware of what a C-Store is, I ask why you're reading an article on Star Trek Online, but the short version is it's a store for in-game content like new shirts for your crew or in-game loot of one type or another.

    Likewise, I'm sure that there's going to be missions and content not available for the F2P crowd which will be available for cash subscribers.

    For example, I'll be entirely unsurprised if there's a "Terran Empire" campaign where you and your buddies can hop over to the Mirror Universe to fight the EVIL Terrans with the climax being facing down an evil version of your own ship captained by an evil version of you.I'd also be totally unsurprised if this content was only available for people with a paid-for "Gold" subscription.

    That's just business.

    3:] The Bonuses from the C-Store will remain largely meaningless: This is an odd little factoid that I'm sure many fans will disagree with but I don't think the post F2P "C-Store only" equipment will be particularly good. Sadly, for $200 bucks real-cash you won't be able to purchase your own V'Ger with planet-destroying superweapon at Lieutenant level.

    (Awesome as that would be).

    My reasoning for this is because F2P is basically an extended demo. They want people to become intrigued enough by Star Trek Online  to become invested in the property. People live, breathe, and die Warcraft and STO will never have that. However, they can have people who will make this a regular part of their day if they don't have to worry about paying every month. You don't want to scare those very same customers off by making it impossible for them to be competitive.

    In the end, they're just going to be tiny things that will make it easier for you in-game like an extra 5.5% shield regeneration bonus or extra 10 points to your phasers.

    4:] The Developers are going to artificially lengthen game-play: One thing that has been especially controversial is the introduction of the Dilithium System.

    You won't be able to get a new ship, the object of every Star Trek Online gamers' fantasies, until you have refined a certain mount of dilithium. Say 200,000 dilithium crystals or whatever to get the Sovereign-class ship when you're flying around in a Galaxy-class ship. Furthermore, there will be a maximum amount of dilthium you can refine each day.

    This, of course, is a marked change from the previous system where you receive a new ship every time you go up in rank. I can understand what the developers were thinking with this. This is meant to draw out game-play so you can stay at a certain power level a lot longer than you might normally.

    Overall, I think this is going to be a mistake and will bite them in the butt. Ships are things players love and if they introduced a hundred more ships into the game that everyone could get by going through a ridiculous quest line, there would be people lining up in droves to collect them. I, myself, wish I'd been able to keep my Klingon starship from the Doomsday Machine adventure. I can just see my heroic Federation PCs piloting around a Romulan warbird or Borg Sphere.

    Okay, maybe that would be silly but I expect this to be amended. They'll introduce repeatable quests to farm refined dilithium and we'll probably get the equivalent of Chinese Gold Farmers offering to trade refined dilithium for cash. Hell, they say they're not going to sell refined diltihium in the C-Store but you know people will demand it who just want their Sovereign-class ship.

    I expect there will be a greater emphasis on crafting and other time-consuming activities in game so that gamers can be expected to pour more of their time into Star Trek Online.

    5:] Player vs. Player will continue to get the shaft: I have a confession to make, I don't play Player vs. Player (or PVP).  I don't really have an interest in measuring my skills against those who equally enjoy my hobby.

    I think part of the reason is because I suck.  It doesn't matter what game, I always turn it down to "Easy" and leave it there. Yet, a lot of games thrive on matching their players' skills against one another. Halo wouldn't be Halo if not for teams of red and blue shooting the hell out of one another.

    Unfortunately for PvP enthusiasts, I'm not getting the impression that this is an area that the developers are particularly concerned with. I'm fairly certain Player vs. Enemy (or PVE) is the market that they're trying to court. I.e. Solo Gamers.

    I'm sure that a few bones will be thrown their way but I don't think that they'll be receiving nearly the same attention as other groups.

    Sorry, guys.

    6:] The content will continue to remain largely Federation-based: One thing that has always bugged a lot of Star Trek Online fans is that the Klingons get screwed in terms of content. They get only a fraction of the adventures that Federation players get and the majority of the game-board, so to speak, is Federation. Plenty of their adventures are adapted from Federation content and seem to be in a haphazard manner from the complaints I've heard.

    (Is it true that some Klingon missions actually end with "Hail Starfleet"?)

    Sadly, the statements about the Klingon Faction lead me to believe they'll actually be moved to becoming a "sideshow" as opposed to something you're expected to believe is a reasonable alternative to the Federation. I expect the eventual Romulan Faction will be treated much the same way and any Cardassian Factions that are created.

    Sorry guys.

    7:] New adventures will continue to come in a trickle rather than a wave: The thing I want most out of Star Trek Online is more content. I've still got a couple of campaigns left in the Undine, Devidians, and Borg but I'm eventually going to run out of adventures to do.

    Personally, I hope the developers at STO will continue to release a steady stream of new campaigns to keep me interested. I don't take much to be satisfied but this is what I'm really hoping for most. More content and less bland "Go into System X and shoot down 6 squadrons of Y type of starship" missions.

    8:] Shooter mode won't blow anyone away: I love Halo, Mass Effect 2, and Killzone. However, they're  designed around the idea of your character lugging around machine guns and plugging away at enemies until they go down. Phasers are inherently less violent, even with addition of miniguns to them. Likewise, I suspect they're just adapting existing adventures as opposed to creating content specifically around shooter-mode's perspective.

    Call me crazy, but I think it's unlikely the new "shooter" mode is going to revolutionize Star Trek Online's game play. I do hope, however, it leads to more ground-based missions.

    9. Starship Interiors are going to remain generic: One of the biggest complaints about Star Trek Online's starships is the fact that they're not really "yours" the way the Enterprise was Kirk's. For the longest time, they didn't even actually possess interiors other than the bridge. There's nothing to do in the Engine Room or Crew Quarters but at least they're there. I appreciate that change, because it gives me an added sense that I "own" my starship.

    Sadly, ship customization doesn't appear to be high on the list of the developer's goals. I would totally decorate the **** out of starship with large-scale interior customization options. I'd make Ten Forward have a Ferengi bartender, give it a Hawaiian feel, and the Captain's quarters would have a holographic fish-tank with a shark in it. Oh and while we're at it, I'd like an armory where I can store trophies from all my various missions plus those weapons I want to keep but don't have any more use for.

    Plus, I want a space unicorn.

    Anyway, I don't mind too much that I'm going to be Captain of a vessel I can't customize to a ridiculous level but it would have been nice.

    10. The Flag Officer ranks are going to be expanded: The problem with tying rank to level means that eventually you're going to run out of ranks to promote your character to. I think players are going to get more than a little suspicious when the developers introduce "Grand Admiral Five Stars" to the game. Personally, my suggestion is that the Flag Officer ranks should be expanded to 20 levels each. I don't think this is going to happen but I wouldn't be surprised if they're expanded to level levels each like the other ranks. This is a good thing in my opinion.

    Basically, Flag Officer should be when your character is free to go exploring whatever the hell he wants to do in the Star Trek Universe. There should be less pressure to try and move your way up through the ranks. Honestly, I wish that was the case with the Captain rank because I'd love to see player characters have the option of simply refusing to become a Flag Officer and continuing indefinitely as a Captain.

    That just seems more of a Star Trek thing to do.

    Overall, I'm not sure how accurate my predictions will be but I'm still pretty excited for F2P. I enjoy Star Trek Online and hope to continue playing it for months in the future. Still, that will require more than just bells and whistles to keep me interested. I'm going to need something substantive to chew on for anything more than the most causal gaming experience.