The Vulpine Theocratic Hegemony

I’ve been playing a fair bit of Stellaris lately, and between each game, I find myself tinkering with my empire a bit to fit my preferences.  But, at present, I only have one empire that has made it reasonably far – The Vulpine Theocratic Hegemony, my race of spiritualist foxes.

What follows is a description of these people and how they fulfill their quest for the stars. Continue reading The Vulpine Theocratic Hegemony

Why I Buy Low Budget Sci-Fi

I have a habit of looking over the cheap movie shelf at my local Wal-Mart, just to see if there are any movies that might be interesting.  Almost inevitably, low-budget science fiction movies that haven’t even made their way to IMDB catch my eye, and yet these are the ones that are most likely to make it into my cart.  I realized at some point, that this was something of an odd habit – why would I go out of my way to pick up what is surely going to be a B movie, when there is a perfectly good movie right next to it at the same price?

After thinking about it, I’ve had a general dissatisfaction with mainstream Hollywood science-fiction for a few years, that has prompted me toward riskier movie buying choices. Continue reading Why I Buy Low Budget Sci-Fi

Sacrificing an Eye for Wisdom

After my post on dragons, I ended up talking with one of my awesome coworkers about Odin.  The thing I like the most about the Odin myth is that he gave up an eye for wisdom.  For reasons that I never fully understood, this always resonated with me and I’ve thought about it often.

As I went down that path, I was reminded of one of my favorite poems (In the Darkest of All Forests), in one of my favorite books (Armorica), from my favorite trilogy (Riverrun) by my favorite author: S. P. Somtow.  I’m not going to analyze this a lot, except to say that poem doesn’t stand alone – it sits within a context (the series of poems, Tales of the Wandering Hero; the story, Armorica; the trilogy, Riverrun; and my life at each juncture I’ve read it) and acts as an anchor to that context for me.  It is bookmarked so that I can unfold that context in a few short verses and remember my own personal search for wisdom. Continue reading Sacrificing an Eye for Wisdom

The Cloverfield Trilogy – Part 1

A while back, I started hearing things about a new Cloverfield movie on Netflix – The Cloverfield Paradox.  When I heard that it was pretty bad, I immediately figured I should make the time to watch it for a good laugh.  It had been a long time since I had seen the original Cloverfield, and I was aware of 10 Cloverfield Lane (but hadn’t seen it), so I decided a trilogy viewing was in order, and promptly made plans for a Saturday with nothing else going on.

What follows is my thoughts on each movie, and how they work as a whole.  There are definitely spoilers, but each movie segment is short, so it may not be too bad. Continue reading The Cloverfield Trilogy – Part 1

The Notebook

At the end of my Moulin Rouge! review, I said that I likely would have enjoyed The Notebook more than Moulin Rouge!.  To test out this theory, I borrowed The Notebook, and made the time to watch it.  Romance for its own sake is not really my genre (as I’m more used to love stories being embedded in some other genre), but it seemed worth a shot to see if I was movie savvy enough to enjoy such a movie if it was well executed.

To that point, it fell somewhat short of enjoyable, but kept itself above the threshold of painful.  For more, you’ll have to see my full review after the jump. Continue reading The Notebook

Ibb and Obb

I recently finished Ibb and Obb with my friend John as part of our regular Saturday morning gaming.  This one kind of came out of nowhere for me, as it’s hard to decode anything about the name.  It really delivers on the 2D puzzle-platforming genre though, and the two player cooperative element is really well polished.

A bit more about the good and bad of this one after the jump. Continue reading Ibb and Obb

Thoughts are stripped of their texture to form words that they might be colored by the mind of another.