Andy's Blog

So, Mass Effect, then. Mass Effect is a multimedia property centring around a series of three video games released between 2007 and 2012. I have recently been playing through the series for the first time, and - Wait, let me first talk a little about Star Trek: Resurgence. Star Trek: Resurgence is a video game and, mostly, visual novel based around the multimedia property Star Trek, released in 2024, which - Wait, let me first talk a little about interactive novels. Back in the late 20th Century, there was a series of books (and many imitators) called "Choose Your Own Adventure". Upon reaching the end of each numbered passage, the reader would be given a choice, a branching path in the narrative, with each choice prompting a continuation elsewhere in the book. A recent article by Atlas Obscura showcased some diagrams illustrating the structure of these narratives; in many cases each choice led to an entirely distinct storyline, two or more paths that did not reconnect at all...

So, Sonic Frontiers, then. Yes, against all tradition, I am writing a video game review for a reasonably current release. I have a PS5 and little else on my wish list! So, as a consequence, games that have not yet missed the boat. This is a modern 3D Sonic game and, again against all tradition, it is pretty playable! It borrows conceptually from Sonic Adventure in that there is a "hub world" and smaller linear "levels", but the levels are vastly shorter and there's a lot more to do in the hub world. The "levels" are basically side challenges, kinda-sorta necessary to progress in the main game. Mostly necessary. You'd have a job doing the whole game without doing a single "level" (and, yeah, it's probably necessary to at least do one in the tutorial stage), but honestly it may be possible. See, the level challenges give you "keys" you need to collect to unlock progress, and these same keys sometimes drop randomly from chests ...

 There's a ... Thing, in the comic book industry, occasionally, where they do a SPECIAL EDITION! of a comic book - there's a word they use but I can't remember, like PURE or something - where it's just the linework, no colours. So that you can Truly Appreciate the Craftsmanship of the Artist. I've always been a bit nonplussed by that. I know how hard colouring is, what it adds to the page, the context and texture. Mood, emotion, environment. Take a look at this page, for example. Each row of panels is intentionally similar; the third panel is - not quite identical, there's a tiny amount of different hatching on the door but - basically the same. The inker hasn't blocked out Alfred's face or added shading. The line work is, structurally, the same. But the lighting is different! It's happening at a different time of day, it's dark out, Alfred's lit from inside. Without the colours you wouldn't get that so starkly. (There is some dark sky in...

"Do you ever feel like ... I don't know, like we've got a raw deal?" asked Melanie Labtek. Her legs dangled from the balcony overlooking the hydroponic forest. Below her, the trees stretched off into the distance until they disappeared around the curve of the ship's surface. Above, the stars were visible through the impenetrable plexiglass screen, continuing their imperceptible migration from prow to stern.   "Raw deal like what?" said Angela Cleaning, perched next to her on the balcony.   "Like, I don't know. Trapped on this ship, our whole lives. I mean, we didn't get a choice in it, you know? Neither did our parents and neither will our children."   "We do important work," Angela insisted earnestly.   "Do we? Just running maintenance, keeping things ticking over until we reach Colony One? They reach. Because it won't be us. We'll be long gone. Our descendants get to be conquering heroes, and the people who laun...

 I'm a DC comics fan, and I have no idea what's going on with DC right now. A year or so ago, Scott Snyder was doing his epic Justice League plot - Justice vs Doom - and I was very much enjoying it! This story then left the JL comic to be its own thing, Dark Nights: Death Metal, and I kinda lost interest. Partly because it heavily featured Snyder's clunkily-named favourite character, The Batman Who Laughs, who is kind of What If Batman Was Also The Joker, but also somehow the most powerful force for evil in all the universes. I've been studiously ignoring all of his comics because I find him to be dumb. He wears a slab of metal over his eyes covered with spikes. I have no time for him. I was planning to pick the thing up in a collection, on sale, some time down the line. The Justice League comic went back to telling disconnected, stock JLA stories, and I felt somewhat vindicated in my decision, though also frustrated by not yet knowing *how* this status quo was restored...

We've been rewatching Star Trek: The Next Generation recently, and we've reached The Outcast, an episode which I'm sure has been discussed in more depth by more qualified people than I. Nonetheless, here is my Hot Take. On the face of it, The Outcast is about a member of a gender-neutral alien race who expresses a gender identity, and deals with the consequences - persecution, potential abuse, and a "cure" for their condition. Which is all fine and interesting as far as it goes; it sounds like a startlingly prescient subject for a network show from the early 90s, boldly tackling such topics as gender-neutral pronouns ("it doesn't really translate," they say, and diligently avoid them throughout). Here's the thing though: I'm pretty sure it's not actually about gender. In the context of the period, gender dysphoria was not a thing that was being discussed in any sort of a way. From the language and imagery used, from the "bashing...