Another Edition of Dungeons and Dragons is in the works
Here is the executive summary. The 4th Edition rules were a bad business decision and resulted in decrease in market share.
This new edition is supposed to be a return to their “roots” in a effort to win back their core fan base.
For more details, try Ace’s take on the Forbes story.
HT to Mr. Reynolds, and oh BTW, there have been several Traveller movies. Namely Serenity and Dark Star.
Marc Miller and Loren Wiseman never made a dime off those however.
Monday Book Pick: Princess Valerie’s War
Princess Valerie’s War: A Space Viking Novel by Terry Mancour
The second in a series that follows on to one of my favorite books, Space Viking.
This is follow up book to Prince of Tanith, which was my pick back on 12/12/11. There is clearly at least one more book after this one.
Monday Book Pick: Prince of Tanith
Prince of Tanith: A Space Viking Novel by Terry Mancour
A well written sequel to one of my favorite books, Space Viking. Like most of H. Beam Piper’s work, Space Viking is in the public domain, so sequels like this are fair game. Luckily this one is well written. It takes place after Lucas Trask marries his new love, Lady Valerie, and picks up the action pretty fast. It has all of your old friends and enemies, plus a few more. Fair warning. It ends in a cliff hanger. More about the ‘third’ book in the Space Viking Series later.
Sunday SciFi: A Middleman/Doctor Who Crossover story
Written by Middleman creator Javier Grillo-Marxuach!
Friday B-Movie Pick: Genesis II
Dipping into the mid-70s well again, we find this 1973 SciFi flick by none other than Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry. Set post-apocalyptic where humankind nuked the crap out of the planet, and people are digging out, rebuilding, and empire building. Mariette Hartley provides some nice eye candy, and ya, Roddenberry gets a bit preachy. No surprise there.
Monday Book Pick: The Dark Design
The Dark Design by Philip Jose Farmer
The third book in his epic Riverworld Series.
Sunday SciFi: UFO
UFO was live action SciFi show from the puppet master himself, Gerry Andersen, that ran for a single season of 23 episodes back in 1970.
Great actors, dark thoughtful scripts that always didn’t have a happy ending, sharp miniature work, and a late 60s sense of style and fashion made this show really stand out. Oh and the purple haired moon chicks in silver miniskirts. The cast included Michael Billington, who, according his wikipedia entry, was screen tested for the role of James Bond more than any other actor.
The show also other cool eye candy, including the gull wing door cars, nuclear submarines with a jet fighter mounted on their bow, space interceptors and S.I.D. (Space Intruder Detector). What really made the show was the dark, thought provoking scripts, complex characters and some fine acting by Billington, Ed Biship and Gabrielle Drake.
There is a UFO movie, based on the series in the works. Currently scheduled for a Summer 2013 release.
New Doctor Who Christmas Special Trailer
Monday Book Pick: Rogue
Filed under: Baen Books, Monday Book Pick, Science Fiction
Rogue by Michael Z. Williamson
Williamson revisits Kenneth Chinran, the “hero” of The Weapon. The war is over, Ken wants nothing to with his his role in the war, just be left alone and raise is daughter. Of course, that isn’t going to happen. One of Chinran’s team members has “gone rogue” and the Government of Freehold wants him taken down. Mainly because they don’t want other governments getting a reminder of just how deadly a trained Freehold Operative is. Chinran, and his lovely young assistant, travel across known space tracking down their prey as he performs assassination after assassination, including Earth, were Chinran is justifably afraid of being torn to small bloody bits by the surviving population.
Friday B-Movie Pick: Paul
This nerd fest of a film is a big sloppy wet kiss, with tounge, to Steven Spielberg. Simon Pegg and Nick Frost wrote the screenplay and star as a pair of British SciFi fans who make the pilgrimage to Comic Con in San Diego. Then they start on a road trip to obsure SciFi and UFO sites, including the spot where the ST:TOS episode Arena was film in order to act out the battle between Kirk and the Gorn. Then they run into the title character, a Gray, who is colored green in the film (“Little Green Men” reference). From there it, the film becomes a drinking game as you spot every single SciFi reference slid into nearly every scene.
Oh ya, of course this film, like every episode of The Middleman, has a Wilhelm Scream.