Tyler F.M. Edwards's Blog, page 33

TV Recommendation: Lucifer

Since I already had a Crave TV subscription for Discovery, I decided to peruse their other selections. One show that caught my eye was Lucifer, and while I didn’t know much about it going in, it didn’t take long for it to win me over.

[image error]Loosely based on a comic book of the same name, Lucifer focuses on the titular character, Lucifer Morningstar, also known as Satan, Beelzebub, and so forth. He’s the Devil, in other words. After a few thousand years of running hell, he got bored with the place and moved to Los Angeles, where he operates the nightclub Lux and lives a life of decadence befitting the lord of sin.

Lucifer’s playboy life takes an unexpected turn when one of his human friends is murdered. Lucifer finds himself mixed up with the police investigation into her death and develops a fascination with the detective in charge, a former B-list actress turned straight-laced cop named Chloe Decker. Alone of all humanity, Chloe is somehow immune to Lucifer’s devilish powers, and he wants to know why.

And the series pretty much goes from there. It’s basically yet another cop show with a supernatural twist, a standard police procedural apart from the fact one of the “detectives” is literally the Devil.

It’s a pretty basic show. The ending to each episode’s mystery of the week is usually very easy to see coming, and for the most part it’s just following standard tropes. It’s also no stranger to plot holes and is generally not a show you should think too hard about.

What makes it worth watching, though, is Lucifer himself. The actor who plays him, Tom Ellis, is absolutely brilliant. He’s perfectly charming and impeccably witty, and even at his sleaziest, he’s still irresistibly lovable.

[image error]He’s got range, too. Lucifer is mostly a comedic show, but on occasion it does have some more dramatic moments, and Tom Ellis absolutely nails those, too, injecting an incredible amount of pathos into the role. It’s amazing how sympathetic Lucifer can end up being (sympathy for the Devil, heh).

A core conceit at the heart of Lucifer’s mythology is the principle of history being written by the victors. God won the war in heaven, so we humans have only ever heard his side of the story. Naturally, he paints Lucifer, his rebelling son, as evil. But Lucifer himself tells a different story.

Devout Christians may be bothered by the idea of the Devil being presented as a sympathetic, if clearly flawed, person (and indeed the show has been protested by some activist groups), but I’m about as far from Christian as it’s possible to be in the Western world, so to me it’s an interesting new take on the mythology.

Also, to play Devil’s advocate (pun intended), I have heard it suggested that the message of Lucifer is, in truth, deeply Christian: the idea that no one is beyond redemption, not even the Devil himself.

Lucifer also feels like a refreshingly different character in some of the ways in which he defies the usual cliches of “superhero” type characters. Whereas normally in shows like this the protagonist seeks to conceal their true nature, Lucifer is quite open about it. He’s happy to tell everyone he meets that he’s the lord of hell. It’s just that people usually don’t believe him, viewing it merely as an eccentric affectation.

[image error]The show’s liberal attitude to sexuality can also be refreshing, if at times selective. It seems to me that matters of gender and sexual orientation would matter little to immortal celestial beings, and this is reflected by Lucifer and his demonic lieutenant, Mazikeen, both of whom seduce humans of either gender almost constantly.

We see a lot more of Maze with women than we do of Lucifer with men, so it’s not perfect, but at least the effort was made.

On the downside, Lucifer’s co-star, Chloe (Lauren German), is a lot less compelling. She’s rather wooden and just kind of dull in general. It’s fine when she’s just playing the straight (wo)man to Lucifer’s whacky antics, but in more serious scenes, she flounders.

The rest of the cast is mostly just okay, with no else being as delightful as Lucifer or as dull as Chloe, but I will highlight a couple standouts.

One is Rachael Harris’ “Dr. Linda.” Dr. Linda is Lucifer’s hilariously unethical therapist, and like him, she manages to nail both her comedic and dramatic scenes. She’s a real treat.

The other (and the thing that first drew my attention to Lucifer) is the great Tricia Helfer, who joins the cast in season two to play Lucifer’s mother, the “Supreme Goddess of All Creation.” If Tricia Helfer isn’t enough to convince you to watch a show, what is?

[image error]Overall, Lucifer isn’t the smartest show ever, and I wouldn’t expect it to be more than it is, but it’s fun. The sheer awesomeness of Tom Ellis is enough to compensate for the show’s hiccups. I’d recommend giving it a try.

Filed under: Misc., Reviews Tagged: fantasy, Lucifer, review, TV

Cheating on WoW: Destiny 2, Again

I’ve been curious about the Destiny games for ages, my interest fueled by the general hype around the series, as well as my inability to let go of my love for the Bungie games I grew up with.

[image error]Unfortunately, the open beta for Destiny 2 pretty much told me nothing about the game. So when a proper free trial popped up, I was happy to have another chance to give the game a try.

The good news is this is a far more fleshed out experience than the beta was. The amount of content is significant — several hours’ worth, at least — and all of the basic systems are in place. There’s now a character creator, for instance (though given this is a first person game where everyone wears helmets 95% of the time, I’m not sure there’s much point).

There’s also now a cutscene at the beginning that explains some of the story, so I kind of get what’s going on now. Sort of. I think? Still not really sure what the deal with Darth Zug-Zug is.

This game could really use a codex or something.

The gameplay is… fine, I guess. Not much to complain about, but to be honest I don’t see much to separate Destiny 2 from the other MMO or quasi-MMO shooters I’ve played. What differences I do see are quite subtle.

The gameplay is slightly less mindless than Defiance, but the setting and lore also seem to have had a lot less effort put into them. It doesn’t have The Division’s weird difficulty spikes, but the world is a lot less detailed, and exploration a lot less rewarding. The graphics are a lot better than Defiance’s, but oddly still not as good as The Division’s.

[image error]Heck, I even found a public event where the boss has the exact same mechanics as Dark Matter Monoliths and Remnant Architects. Is it really that hard to come up with different fight mechanics in a shooter? I guess there’s not much to work with, but still.

I did like how pistols seem to be a strong choice in Destiny 2. I like the aesthetics of pistols, but in most shooters they’re relegated to an option of last resort. In Destiny 2, they seem to be pretty good.

Maybe too good. Pretty much every gun in Destiny 2 seems quite overpowered. That might not seem like a problem, but it tends to trivialize weapon choice if none of them have any drawbacks. At first I was lamenting my inability to find a good sniper rifle, but eventually I realized it didn’t matter. Who needs sniper rifles when even a six-shooter can blow someone’s head off from five hundred feet?

I guess if I have one big complaint about Destiny 2, it’s that it’s just too easy. I’m sure there’s tougher content later in the game, but when it comes to leveling and solo content, this is another MMO aimed squarely at the lowest common denominator.

Such complaints aside, this seems a solid game overall. It’s polished. It plays well.

But I don’t feel a strong urge to upgrade to the full version right now, and overall I do feel a bit disappointed. Given the game’s pedigree and all the hype around it, I was expecting something special. Instead I got Defiance with deeper gameplay but a shallower backstory.

[image error]I know it’s unfair to compare Destiny with Myth. It’s been twenty years, after all. But nonetheless I can’t help but think about the enormous gulf in originality between them. Myth was a game so unique that even today there’s nothing like it. Destiny is fine for what it is, but there’s plenty of other games just like it.

There was a spark of true creativity in Bungie games in those days. That’s what I was hoping to see in Destiny 2, and that’s exactly what I failed to find.

Filed under: Games Tagged: Destiny, Destiny 2, sci-fi

Who Carries Star Trek’s Torch?

It seems like the great nerd debate lately is which show is the better successor to Star Trek’s legacy: Discovery or The Orville.

[image error]I have to be honest, mulling over things during the mid-season break, I’ve got to admit that Discovery is losing some of its luster. I watched a random episode of Enterprise a few days ago (“Judgment”), and I couldn’t help comparing it to Discovery. “Judgment” isn’t even one of the better episodes, but even so, I wound up really missing the Star Trek of yesteryear and feeling as though Discovery was missing something.

The thing is, Discovery is trying too hard. It wants to be edgier and more real, and it also wants to have the same morality of old school Trek, and although its had flashes of brilliance, more often than not it doesn’t do a great job of either.

The Klingons have no nuance. They’re just disgusting space goblins with no redeeming qualities whatsoever. However cartoony the Klingons of TNG onward may have been, they were still people, with a balance of noble and negative traits.

The attempts to make the human cast members grittier has also been hit and miss. I was initially happy to hear some harsher swearing on Star Trek, as it added an element of realism for me, but the fact it was just one line in one episode leads me to believe it really was just something thrown in for cheap shock value.

As is much of Discovery, really. It’s a show that’s trying hard to surprise and to shock, and damn the consequences. Who cares if it makes sense, who cares if it has a meaningful purpose in the story, if it gets people talking, that’s all that matters.

[image error]

Song of the Month: Metric, Hustle Rose (Live)

I haven’t been doing this series for that long, but already it feels overdue to post a song by my past, present, and future favourite band: Toronto’s own Metric.

I had a hell of a time trying to decide which song to post. Metric has a pretty broad library, and they’ve changed their sound several times over the years, so it’s pretty much impossible to find a single song to sum them up.

I decided it would be a good idea to post a live performance, because at least then I could showcase the glorious weirdness that is Emily Haines. And if I’m going to post something live, Hustle Rose is the obvious choice.

It’s funny. I never liked the album version of Hustle Rose that much. It’s one of the few Metric songs I can’t muster much enthusiasm for. But the live version? The live version is something special.

The live version and the studio version aren’t even that different, really. There’s just something about the song that needs to be performed live to make it work.

Can’t feel anything; my dreams are so tight. Why wouldn’t I STAND IN LINE TONIGHT?!?

Filed under: Misc. Tagged: music, Song of the Month

WoW: All Good Things…?

For the last several years, the thought of my not playing Warcraft — not simply taking breaks, but permanently leaving the game — had never really occurred to me. The Warcraft universe has been an important part of my life since before I learned to read. The thought of that ever changing was simply absurd.

[image error]But now I’m starting to wonder. Maybe a time might be coming soon where I should move on. I look at the upcoming expansion, and I can’t say I feel the urge to play it. Instead, I’m wondering if it might be better to quit while I’m ahead.

That’s not to say that I’m rage quitting because I hate the direction of Battle for Azeroth. Oh, don’t get me wrong. I do hate the direction of Battle for Azeroth. It’s asinine on every possible level.

But I’ve hated the direction of WoW before. Remember Warlords of Draenor? Yeah. Hating Blizzard’s decisions is old hat to me by now. It’s just part of the experience. If it was simply a matter of hating BfA, there would be no story here.

No, this thought has actually been in my mind since before BfA was announced. Battle for Azeroth has simply accelerated my timetable.

See, I got to thinking — really thinking — about where WoW was going to go in the very long term. As much as it sounds nice in theory to be able to continue enjoying a story you love indefinitely, it doesn’t necessarily work that way. No king rules forever (my son), and no story can maintain quality forever. Eventually, things will get stale.

[image error]So I started wondering if it might not be a good idea to let go of WoW at some future date when the story had reached what I felt to be a satisfying end point.

At the time, I was picturing this as something a few years off. But then came Battle for Azeroth, and if rehashing the faction conflict yet again isn’t a red flag that Blizzard is running out of ideas, I don’t know what is.

Fueling the fire is the fact that I have had a pretty good time with Legion. It’s not perfect, and it’s definitely not everything I ever wanted in an expansion, but taken all in all, it’s been a pretty good ride, and as endings go, you could do far worse. For all the mishandling of their story in recent years, the Burning Legion has always been the ultimate threat at the heart of the Warcraft universe. Their defeat seems like a natural end point.

When I embarked on my mad “Mustering of Azeroth” scheme to play every class story, I never intended it as a farewell tour, but it does work brilliantly as such. By the time I finish, I’ll have played every class, every spec, and most of the races. I’ll have seen just about everything the game has to offer and had a grand time doing it.

And really, there isn’t that much left in the story I care about. Most threads have been resolved. Nearly all the big questions have been answered. I’m pretty satisfied with everything at this point.

[image error]I mean, N’Zoth is still interesting, but it’s not an arc I have a lot of emotional investment in. He’s too much a behind the scenes player. Similarly, I’ve wanted to see Nyalotha for years, but at this point I doubt it could live up to expectations, especially with the standard TSW set for Lovecraftian weirdness. I don’t think WoW even has the technological ability to make Nyalotha as bizarre and frightening as I’m imagining it.

I like the new Void lore, but again, I don’t feel the strong urge to explore it further. Seems like all our big questions have been answered.

Ultimately, it may come down to Azshara. She’s the one unresolved plot thread I’m still heavily invested in. When the idea of leaving WoW behind first occurred to me, my general thought was to wait for an Azshara expansion and then move on once it was done.

But now we know Azshara will be in Battle for Azeroth, and my future as a WoW player may hinge on how she is handled. If it’s true that she’s been relegated to being merely a first tier filler boss, that may just be the final nail in the coffin. If this is some fakeout where Azshara turns out to be the final boss and BfA is an Azshara expansion in disguise, maybe I’ll play it after all, but then it becomes likely I’ll move on after that.

It’s not as if the gameplay is keeping me around. It’s gotten better over the years, but I still find WoW to be at best adequate as a game. Some of the classes are pretty fun, but they’re held back by overly easy enemies and a fundamentally simplistic and restrictive model of combat.

[image error]I am excited by the new allied races, but at the same time, what do I need more alts for? I’ve leveled through the old world so many times, and BfA seems to be returning to an endgame model where alts are largely pointless.

The thing that would most hold me back right now is my attachment to my characters. As I’ve said before, I’ve played my rogue for a really long time now. She’s become a kind of mascot, my go-to online identity. Letting go of her will not be easy.

It’s a shame that WoW is so laser-focused on endgame to the expense of all else. It would be nice if I could just go around repeating stories with my characters indefinitely as I can in TSW, but it just doesn’t work that way. Story quests aren’t repeatable, and I’ll never get groups for endgame dungeons or raids once Legion is done.

If you’ve already done the current content and don’t buy the new expansion, there’s no point to playing at all. At best I could role-play, but that’s never quite been my thing, and I would still have to cope with the new story direction, unless I somehow find a group of RPers who ignore everything after Legion.

The subscription-based business model also contributes to making WoW an all-or-nothing affair. You can just pick it up for half an hour if the mood strikes you. You commit fully, or not at all.

I don’t know what I’m ultimately going to do. I do know myself; I have far too much franchise loyalty for my own good, and Warcraft has always been a part of my life. It’s hard to imagine ever leaving it behind for good.

[image error]But I have to say right now I feel as though I’ve gotten all I want out of WoW. I’m content. I don’t need anymore.

And Blizzard should be far more worried by that than by all my burning hatred towards the decisions of Battle for Azeroth.

Filed under: Games Tagged: fantasy, The Mustering of Azeroth, Warcraft, World of Warcraft

Retro Review: Killjoys, Season Two: Episodes 6-10

Moving on to the second half of Killjoys’ second season. Again, spoilers ahoy.

[image error]“I Love Lucy”:

You know, I’m not really a fan of all the pop culture references in episode titles (or the similarly current soundtrack). It would work for a near future sci-fi set on or near Earth, but Killjoys is so far removed from our society in terms of both time and space it might as well be an alternate reality. It just doesn’t fit.

Anyway.

“I Love Lucy” sees Dutch and the team contact an eccentric collector in the hopes of acquiring more of Khlyen’s green plasma (which sounds like a strain of weed, now that I think about it). Of course, shenanigans ensue.

This is another weirdly mixed episode. The first half is what I remember from season one of Killjoys: a painfully predictable string of cliches I’ve seen countless times before. But it does redeem itself a bit later on. I did enjoy seeing Dutch go full Yalla on the guy — a chilling reminder of the darkness of her past — and the whole twist where maybe he’s not such a bad guy after all was an interesting choice.

Overall rating: 6.9/10

“Heart-Shaped Box”:

[image error]So apparently D’avin’s penis can cure level six conditioning.

Did not see that coming.

Following their night together, Sabine is revealed as a level six, but one who has been stripped of her power and conditioning. This becomes an opportunity to study a live level six, though in practice we mostly learn about their state of mind more than anything practical.

The idea here seems to be to tell a tragic story about how Sabine has regained her humanity, only to have it slip away again. And it kind of works, but not entirely. There’s too many holes and hiccups.

For one thing, we as viewers haven’t really been given enough time to care about Sabine. For another, D’avin was way too okay with letting his girlfriend get tortured in the first part of the episode, which rather kills the romance.

But most importantly they just didn’t do enough to try to keep Sabine cured. Really they didn’t do anything. I cannot believe that this is a phrase I am about to type in all seriousness, but they really should have spent more time investigating the fact that D’avin’s penis seems to cure level sixes, even if temporarily.

[image error]Seriously, that should have been a bigger deal. I mean, I’m not saying he should bone her every time she starts feeling stabby, but clearly there’s something there. Something about the whole exchange of bodily fluids, presumably — it messes with the plasma. Maybe they could have used some of D’avin’s DNA to try to create an anti-six vaccine.

Oh my gods what I am even writing right now.

Also, Dutch assuming the name in the box is the other her is a huuuuge leap. How does she know?

Overall rating: 7/10 What am I doing with my life.

“Full Metal Monk”:

This episode manages to have all kinds of bad stuff happen and escalate events quite a lot while still feeling like a complete and total waste of time. Impressive.

Dutch and D’avin investigate a trail of breadcrumbs left by Khlyen and find a long-abandoned facility on Arkyn, which once again raises more questions than answers.

Meanwhile, Johnny, abandoned by his teammates, seeks the aid of Pawter to discover the purpose of the wall around Old Town. Which they are only partially successful in.

[image error]I’m bothered by how much of a waste of time this episode is — offering so many opportunities for real answers without actually giving any — but I’m even more bothered by Dutch and D’avin’s treatment of Johnny.

They’ve basically abandoned him to his fate for trying to do the right thing. That’s a terrible way to treat your brother/partner, and massively hypocritical when you consider how much time Johnny’s spent bending over backwards to help them with their problems. As established by the last episode, Dutch is half a sociopath at the best of times, but D’avin’s better than that. Or he should be.

Overall rating: 6/10

“Johnny Be Good”:

This season started well, but it’s really losing momentum as it heads toward the end. Sort of the opposite of season one that way.

“Johnny Be Good” starts en media res, as is common these days (maybe too common — I’m getting a bit sick of it), but it reveals an unusual amount, which both spoils a lot of the episode’s tension and makes the whole thing feel very disjointed, especially considering how much is going on.

To make a long story short, the crap hits the fan in Old Town, Dutch and D’avin drop everything to go rogue and defy the company despite berating Johnny for doing the same thing last episode, and we get yet more super vague sinister hints about the level sixes.

[image error]I was enjoying this mystery for quite a while, but now they’re just heaping question after question on without offering any answers. It’s stopped being intriguing; now it’s just confusing. I’m being strung along, and I hate being strung along.

There better be a damn good explanation for all this, and soon.

There’s also the matter of Pawter’s death to consider. I know it was coming because I’d had it spoiled, and even if I hadn’t it was quite glaringly foreshadowed, but I’m still unhappy. Pawter was the show’s best character — likable, complex, and well-acted — and Killjoys doesn’t have enough strong points to be able to burn those it has.

Overall rating: 5/10

“How to Kill Friends and Influence People” (season finale):

Well, I finally got my answers. This episode feels like it’s about half info-dumps. Would have been far better to portion out the reveals over the whole season, but at least they didn’t just keeping piling on more mystery.

The finale of Killjoys’ second season sees Khlyen show up, the Killjoys deciding to immediately trust him despite past history, him doing a whole lot of exposition, and finally him sacrificing himself to save the Quad. It’s rushed, and there are parts of it that don’t make sense, but at this point that’s about what I expect from this show.

[image error]I really don’t buy Dutch being so traumatized by Khlyen’s death. I can see her doing some mourning, because he was essentially her father, however terrible a parent he may have been, but I can’t see her being so distraught at his sacrifice when up until about twenty minutes previously he was what she hated more than anything else in existence.

To be fair, though, “How to Kill Friends and Influence People” does have its moments. It’s got some extravagantly over the top action sequences, even by Killjoys standards, and that’s a lot of fun. The banter that often feels so forced is actually pretty funny here, and I laughed out loud more than once.

Really, though, the saving grace of this episode is Johnny. Every single scene of his is amazing. Some of them are exciting, some are intense, some are funny, and some are heartfelt, but he absolutely nails every single one. If the rest of the episode could have lived up to the standard he set, it would have been amazing.

As it is, it’s just okay.

Overall rating: 7/10 Nearly all of those points are for Johnny.

So I leave Killjoys’ second season the same way I did the first: unsure if I want to bother watching more. It has its moments, and there’s glimmers of potential here, but the writing is consistently sloppy, the acting often mediocre, and the overall quality level is consistent only in its inconsistency.

Killjoys is okay, but that’s all it is, and it’s increasingly clear that’s all it will ever be.

Filed under: Retro Reviews Tagged: Killjoys, review, sci-fi, TV

SWTOR: The Traitor Trickle

Man, what’s going on with SWTOR? They seemed to be on such a roll there with Fallen Empire and Eternal Throne. Two great expansions in rapid succession that seemed highly successful by just about every possible measure. But now I return to the game after nearly a year away, and it seems to be floundering, with barely a trickle of new story added since I left.

[image error]Do note this post will contain spoilers for Knights of the Eternal Throne and the recent patches.

It’s not that I don’t like the new story. It’s imperfect, but it’s got a lot going for it.

I do give Bioware major points to finding a way to bring drama to the story after effectively painting themselves into a corner with the ending to Eternal Throne. At this point, the player is the most powerful person in the galaxy, commanding an army that no force in existence has yet been able to beat.

It’s hard to make a dramatic story in that context. The War for Iokath suffered from this. Why am I wasting time fighting a ground war against the Republic when I can just threaten to wipe Coruscant off the map with the Eternal Fleet?

There’s pretty much only one thing left that can threaten the Eternal Alliance: a betrayal from within its own ranks. And very wisely, that’s exactly what Bioware has thrown at us.

Unfortunately, I had the traitor’s identity spoiled for me, so the reveal didn’t have much drama, but I still think making Theron the traitor is an interesting path to take.

[image error]More than anything else, I admire the sheer gutsiness of it. Theron’s been around for a long time. People have put a lot of effort into grinding influence for him. Many people have even romanced him. I feel really bad for those people — I’d be losing it if Lana had been the traitor — but at the same time I can’t help but admire Bioware for being willing to take such a huge risk. No sacrificing good story for the sake of gameplay here.

It fits well with my own RP, too. As a player, I’ve never had any strong feelings one way or another on Theron, but my agent has always hated him. This is due to a combination of the traumatic experiences she’s had at the hands of other Republic spies and his close relationship with Lana — Cipher Nine is the jealous type.

So having Theron now turn traitor is a great escalation of the tension that’s always existed between them.

Also, speaking of Lana, I was pleasantly surprised by the amount of romance content in recent patches. I mean, it’s not a lot, but it’s more than I expected, and it’s well done. I think I might need to reexamine my views on relationships, because I think Lana’s bloodthirsty tirade about the wrath and ruin she’ll bring down on anyone who hurts me is just about the sweetest thing I’ve ever seen.

It’s an interesting story, but the trouble is there’s just so little of it. Each of the three major content patches since I played last contains roughly an hour of new story. Even TSW, at least prior to the pre-reboot drought, was putting out more content than this.

[image error]It’s not just a lack of bang for my proverbial buck, but the extreme brevity of the story harms its quality, too. I think Theron may have a point, and there’s probably a great conversation to be had around the Eternal Alliance playing Team Zakuul: Galaxy Police, but there’s just no time for any of that, so instead of a gripping ideological split it’s more, “I’m the bad guy now, kthxbai.”

Also, we need to talk about Copero. Man, that was a disappointment. As a Chiss main, I was really looking forward to finally getting to know Cipher Nine’s people. Not being a big Star Wars fan, I know very little about the Chiss, and I’ve always regretted being so ignorant of my own character’s origins.

But the Copero flashpoint and accompanying story tells us pretty much nothing about the Chiss, their history, their culture, or why they’re the only society in history the Sith have chosen as allies. They’re just a different color of trash mob to mow down.

On that note, it also needs to be said Copero is an absolutely miserable experience from a gameplay perspective. Umbara was pretty good, and I thought maybe Bioware was finally figuring out how to do fun dungeons, but Copero is a long, long slog through endless trash mobs and bosses that have about twice as much health as they should. It was painful — actually painful; my fingers were getting sore by the end.

To make matters worse, I had to do it twice. For some reason story mode and solo mode are separate this time, and I made the mistake of doing story mode first, which doesn’t count for the story mission. I therefore had to pick up the actual story mode (which is called solo mode) and do it all over again.

[image error]I feel a bit dumb, but based on general chat, I am far from the only person to make that mistake.

Oh, and there’s no recognition at all that I’m playing a Chiss. Racial content is usually very minimal in SWTOR, so I wasn’t expecting much, but at least a few dialogue tweaks would have been nice. It’s weird having all the Chiss treating my Chiss as an outsider.

At least Raina’s back. She was one the last missing companions I really wanted back — just waiting on Nadia now. Although it was too short as always, I did really enjoy seeing her and Cipher Nine catch up. That was a very real feeling moment. I’ve always liked their relationship.

So it’s not all bad news, but nonetheless, it’s a big letdown after how stellar Eternal Throne was. My hope is that the current lull is due to most of Bioware’s efforts being put toward another big expansion, and I think there’s pretty good odds that is the case, but I don’t like having to take it on faith. It would be nice to hear them confirm, “Yes, we’re working on Knights of Theron’s Douchey New Haircut; just be patient.”

Because at face value, it looks like SWTOR reinvented itself for the better only to squander all its momentum and faceplant once again.

Filed under: Games Tagged: sci-fi, Star Wars, Star Wars: The Old Republic

World Spectrum: One Heart

As I have previously noted, it is my habit to write a story in my father’s honour as a birthday gift, because he is a horribly difficult person to find a gift for.

This year’s story had me writing in the setting of the World Spectrum for the first time in years. It’s just a brief little vignette, but it was interesting to revisit this universe. I had to try to turn back the clock on my writing style to how I wrote then — a fascinating challenge.

Fair warning: This story takes place early in the first book, so if you haven’t read it, it might not make a lot of sense.

—————————–

One Heart

© 2017 by Tyler F.M. Edwards

They were coming for him.

Merrik cowered beneath a half-collapsed roof in what had once been a townhome, hearing the heavy footfalls. He heard a muttered curse in a language he didn’t understand, and it confirmed his worst fears. It was a Tor soldier.

Outside, the city of Heart burned. The footsteps of the great war machines called Automatons rumbled through the air like distant thunder, underscored by the screams of their victims.

Just a few weeks ago, Merrik could never have imagined such a nightmare. He and his thirteen year-old daughter, Nolly, had lived a peaceful life in Heart. Times had been difficult following the loss of Nolly’s mother, but they’d had each other, and they had endured.

Then the Tors had invaded.

Merrik had never given much thought to Eastenhold’s belligerent neighbors in Tor Som; the last hostilities had ended years before, and Heart was far from the contested border. But the Tors had come in overwhelming force, and city after city had fallen to them until even Eastenhold’s capitol had come under siege.

The defense of Heart had gone badly from the outset, but then the true madness had come. The Automatons had gone mad, Tor and Eastenholder machines alike killing everyone and destroying everything in their path.

In the mad flight for safety, Merrik had been separated from Nolly. He could still hear her calling out to him, but the panicked crowds had pushed him farther and farther away, and by the time he had been able to double back, she had been nowhere to be found. He had spent a panicked day and night searching for her through the corpse-strewn streets, but he had found no trace of her.

His mind filled with images of her lying dead in an alley somewhere, her bright brown eyes dull, her round face slack and bloated.

The despair was choking.

Now Merrik cowered in the ruins, his whole body shaking in terror, his lungs aching from the smoke that hung over the whole city.

He could hear the Tor soldier ascending the stairs. Perhaps it would be for the best to die here, Merrik thought. He didn’t want to live without Nolly. He only hoped the Tor would grant him a swift death. He had heard stories…

But a strange thing happened then. He began to feel a tickle at the back of his thoughts. It grew to whispered voices, and then he felt his consciousness expand across the city, connecting to the thoughts and feelings of countless other individuals.

He found himself lost in a sea of minds. A mother hiding her children in a basement.  A blacksmith hefting his hammer, intending to use it against the Automatons. A wounded man, dying in a ditch. A secretary cowering under her desk as Automatons tore the building down around her. All of Heart, united as one.

Then, he felt a note of recognition within the chaos, and he seized on one single mind, the only one that mattered.

Nolly.

Father! she thought.

I’m here, Nolly, he responded.

He wanted to ask her if she was okay, but he found he didn’t need to. He could feel everything she did. She was tired, hungry, and frightened, but otherwise unharmed.

He sagged with relief.

What is this? What is happening? he sent to her.

I don’t know, she thought. But Father, look!

He found himself looking through his daughter’s eyes. She peered through a broken window in what had once been a restaurant. She beheld a host of people, soldier and civilian, Tor and Eastenholder, marching through the broken streets of Heart, growing larger by the moment. They marched toward the Automatons, not away, and they did so unafraid.

At their head stood a small, round-faced woman with brown hair – unmistakably a fellow Eastenholder. She moved with the grace of a predatory cat, and the mere sight of her was reassuring in some indefinable way.

Merrik reached across whatever strange link bound the people of Heart together and touched her mind as well. Her thoughts burned hot as a bonfire, full of passion and bravery, and it made his heart soar.

There was a scraping of wooden beams, and Merrik came back to himself as the rubble concealing him was torn away.

A Tor man stood before him, tall and fair with a hauberk of gleaming mail and a uniform of crimson wool. He raised a bloody short sword for a killing thrust, and Merrik saw his death approach.

Father, no! Nolly screamed into his mind, her heart in her throat.

It’s okay, Nolly, he sent. I love you.

He poured all the warmth of his love into the link, all the light and wondrous potential he saw her in her, all the ways she reminded him of her mother, all the ways she had brought joy to his days over the last thirteen years.

He braced for the blow that would end his life, but at that moment, the link expanded again, and he looked down at himself through the eyes of the Tor soldier.

At first, he felt a searing, caustic hatred toward the Eastenholder parasites. But almost immediately this faded as the Tor man – Yohar – beheld the love that passed between Merrik and his daughter.

Yohar knew such feelings well.

In his mind, Merrik saw a boy – not more than five or six – with golden hair and blue eyes. The same golden hair and blue eyes as Yohar, as his father.

Along with the images came a great warmth of love. The same love Merrik felt for Nolly.

Yohar lowered his sword.

A long moment of silence followed, and then the Tor man sheathed his blade and instead extended his hand, helping Merrik to his feet. Their eyes met, blue to brown, and an understanding passed between them. They were not friends, but no longer could they be enemies.

Merrik’s mind skimmed across the surface of the ocean of thoughts he now found himself in, from Yohar, to the woman who even now led her impromptu army against the rebelling Automatons, to all the other strangers whom he now knew as well as he knew himself.

He let all those things pass over and through him, and he settled his attention again on the one mind that most mattered to him, on his daughter’s.

Stay where you are, Nolly, he thought, smiling for the first time since this nightmare had begun. I’m coming to find you.

He gazed at Yohar, who nodded. And I’ll have help.

Filed under: My writing, World Spectrum Tagged: fantasy, original fiction, sci-fi, steampunk, The World Spectrum, writing

Retro Review: Killjoys, Season Two: Episodes 1-5

Since I had already resubbed to CraveTV for the sake of Discovery, it only made sense to check out what else they had on offer. I soon learned that season two of Killjoys had been added in my absence, and though the thought didn’t fill me with tremendous enthusiasm, it did seem worth another look.

[image error]As usual with my binge watch reviews, there will be spoilers.

“Dutch and the Real Girl”:

If you remember my reviews of season one, you’ll know I’m not the biggest Killjoys fan. It’s generally something I watch for lack of any better options.

That said, this is a pretty promising start to the season. It’s a little rushed, but it doesn’t lack for excitement. Killjoys is always trying so desperately hard to be “cool,” and often it ends up feeling forced and lame, but this episode actually is pretty cool, most of the time. I particularly enjoyed the unveiling of “Alice.”

And the mystery with Khlyen is certainly going interesting places.

The best and worst part of this episode is the character of Clara, played by Defiance alumni Stephanie Leonidas (nice seeing her again). The best because after one episode she’s already my favourite Killjoys character by far. The worst because she didn’t end up becoming a main cast member.

Overall rating: 7.5/10

“Wild, Wild Westerley”:

[image error]With the team reunited, Dutch and her crew return to the desolate ruins of Old Town on a warrant. In practice, this mainly serves to reintroduce the show’s more peripheral characters, like Dr. Pawter.

My main takeaway from “Wild, Wild Westerley” is that Killjoys actually has a lot of great characters; it’s just that none of them are main cast members. Give me a series that’s just Pree, Pawter, Alvis, and Clara. That would be an amazing show.

On that note, Pree used to be a warlord?!? You can’t just mention that and not tell the story, Killjoys!

Also damn this show’s soundtrack gets on my nerves sometimes. I’d forgotten about that.

Overall rating: 7.1/10

“Shaft”:

You know, it may not be amazing, but overall I am enjoying season two of Killjoys more than season one.

In this episode, Dutch and her team learn of a missing team of killjoys that Khlyen apparently tried to cover up. They set out in the hopes of rescuing their comrades and learning more about his plan, only to be drawn into madness and violence in an abandoned mine. Alvis accompanies them, and in the depths he uncovers new evidence that the Scarbacks may have an important role in current events.

[image error]Meanwhile, Pawter continues to be awesome.

The main thing I like about this season so far is that it seems to have a clear sense of direction. There’s a pretty well-defined arc, and they aren’t wasting a lot of time on extraneous matters.

I do hope this starts going somewhere soon, as right now it’s just a whole lot of, “Huh?” But for now the mystery is intriguing. I really have no clue what’s going on with Red 17, Khlyen, and the Scarbacks right now.

Overall rating: 7.5/10

“Schooled”:

Khlyen’s last message before the destruction of Red 17 went to an unlikely place: a school. And this is no ordinary school, but an experimental space station funneling in “gifted” children from Westerley, run by a familiar face from Qresh.

I’m a little lukewarm on this one. In theory it’s still part of the main arc around Khlyen, but we don’t really learn anything, so it ends up feeling like filler even though it isn’t necessarily.

It’s entertaining enough, but this isn’t an episode I’m going to remember much in the long run.

Overall rating: 6.9/10

[image error]“Meet the Parents”:

It’s family time. While Johnny and Pawter sue for support from Pawter’s insufferable Qreshi family, Khlyen hunts down D’avin’s father in the hopes of discovery the source of his immunity to the Red 17 conditioning.

This episode’s a bit of a mixed bag. As much as I like Pawter, the attempts to make me feel sympathy for her awful, decadent family fell entirely flat, and there’s a lot of leaps here that don’t make a lot of sense. How does Pawter go from being exiled to on the Nine’s council just like that? Why was Hank trying to kill everyone again?

On the other hand, Khlyen’s story is a lot better. Still doesn’t do a lot to advance the plot (a little, but not much), but the respective actors for him and D’avin did a great job of playing each other, and it was just a lot of fun. I’ve seen lots of stories like this in sci-fi, but they’re rarely executed so well.

Overall rating: 7.3/10

Filed under: Retro Reviews Tagged: Killjoys, review, sci-fi, TV

TSW: Waiting on a Miracle

Is there a word for something that’s both unexpected and yet totally unsurprising?

[image error]Last month, the Halloween season had me feeling nostalgic for The Secret World. It was the first time in years I didn’t have TSW’s Halloween event to look forward to. Eventually I figured, “To hell with it, it’s not Halloween without TSW.”

So just a few short months after saying goodbye to the game, I was back in the dark days. For what it’s worth, this was still probably the longest I’d gone without playing the game since I started.

For the most part my characters are still retired. The only one I’ve pulled out of mothballs is Kamala, my second of three Dragons. Years after her creation, I finally finished Kingsmouth with her, and as of this writing she’s just started on Blue Mountain.

I’m playing very casually, just poking away at a mission or two here or there, and I’m not sure if this is a long-term return or just a lark. At this point I might as well finish Dawning of an Endless Night, but I’m not thrilled with the idea of slogging through Egypt yet again, so we’ll see.

The irony is not lost on me that I refused to make the jump to Legends because I didn’t want to start over, so my solution was to pretty much start over.

I’m complex.

[image error]I will say there’s a difference between starting over by choice and starting over by necessity. In the immortal words of Frank Costanza, “It’s different psychologically.”

And there’s things Legends can’t offer me. I’m a big fan of Kamala’s appearance, but near as I can tell there’s no way to make a character who looks like her in Legends. That same problem dogs all my characters, really — it would have made such a difference if I could have imported my original character looks into Legends.

Nor can I tinker with builds in Legends to the same extent. That has always been one of the greatest joys of TSW, at least for me. For Kamala, I’ve focused on super-charging her resource generation as much as possible, so she can fire out finishers like a machine gun. As with all fist builds, it does lack AoE damage, but otherwise it’s proving very effective, and it’s damn fun. It’s crazy how fast I can tear through single targets. Being twinked six ways from Sunday doesn’t hurt, I guess.

There’s something oddly surreal about playing this walking corpse of a game. You can almost feel it dying day by day. Almost every week there seems to be some new bug or crash. Most recently the DirectX11 client randomly stopped working for about a week.

In some ways it’s not as dead as you might think, though. Oh, it’s mostly dead, but not entirely dead. There are still people hanging out in Agartha, though much less than there once were, and I’ve even run into a few other lowbies out in the world while leveling.

[image error]I’m also still getting spammed with notifications about Fusang non-stop. Of course maybe it’s just one guy running around solo-capping stuff for kicks. Over my five years in The Secret World, I think I’ve spent maybe an hour in Fusang, and most of that was to fight the lunar golem back when that was a thing.

Still, I won’t pretend this isn’t a game with one foot in the grave, and there is a very lonely feeling to playing it these days. I guess the silver lining is that this is a game that’s meant to feel lonely and unsettling, so in a twisted sort of way having the population crash kind of enhances the experience.

As I’ve said, I’m surprisingly okay with not seeing any more content updates. I’d love more, of course, but mostly I’m just grateful for all the awesome stuff I’ve already gotten to experience.

What does sadden me is the thought that no one new can ever find this game again. It’s a bad habit, but I’ve always had a great desire to share anything that makes me happy with other people, and so I’ve spent years evangelizing this game and trying to get everyone to give it a shot. I miss being able to do that. I don’t like that this is something I’ll never be able to share with anyone else ever again.

And beyond personal concerns, I wish more people had been given the chance to play TSW. It was always very poorly advertised, and a lot of people were scared off by the fact it was an MMO despite the fact you could just as easily play it as a single-player RPG, so there are undoubtedly tonnes of people out there who would have loved this game but never got the chance.

[image error]That’s the real loss here.

Yeah, there’s Legends, but it’s just not the same.

Still, despite it all, I am having fun. Even with the game bleeding out, even with this being my fourth time through, I’m having fun. This is still one of the best games I’ve ever played. Maybe the best.

One thing that I’ve always loved about TSW is that it seems like every time I revisit an old zone or mission, I find something new and interesting that I never noticed before. Amazingly, after all this time, that’s still true.

This time the discovery came while interacting with John Wolf. Now, I’d undoubtedly heard this conversation many times before, but the significance had somehow passed me by.

John talks about a home that he lost. And he gives this home a name: Miracle.

Now, even if you’re a long-time TSW fan, I don’t blame you if you don’t know what Miracle is. But if you do know, it’s a name that’s likely to give you chills.

I’ll explain, and it is very hard to find concrete info on Miracle, so take anything I say with a grain of salt, but this is the story as I understand it.

[image error]Ragnar Tornquist has worked on the setting of The Secret World for a very long time. Almost sounds a bit like me and Soulcleaver. And while The Secret World is the only incarnation of that universe to make it to the public so far, it’s not the only one he has planned. Miracle is another.

We know Miracle is a video game, but beyond that the details are harder to uncover. It seems clear that for a time Miracle and TSW were in fact one and the same, but somewhere along the line he seems to have decided Miracle would be a separate game in the same setting.

Reading between the lines — and again, grain of salt — the impression that I’m left with is that Miracle is the true conclusion to the arc of TSW and its main conflicts. The end of the Fourth Age of Humanity and the dawn of the Fifth, all that. TSW is the set-up. Miracle is the pay-off.

The matter of when or even if Miracle will be made, like so much about the game, is an open question. But at least there doesn’t seem to be any evidence that Ragnar ever gave up on the idea.

And it is therefore to Miracle, not Legends, that I am currently inclined to give my hopes for the future of the franchise.

Until that day comes, I’ll continue to enjoy TSW as I can.

[image error]Be seeing you, sweetlings.

In the half-light.

Filed under: Games Tagged: fantasy, Miracle, The Secret World