Book(s) Review: Swords & Fire Trilogy and Rooks & Ruin Trilogy by Melissa Caruso

 

Last year I read the Swords and Fire trilogy written by Melissa Caruso and this year I just finished the Rooks and Ruin trilogy last week. Both are set in the same fantasy universe with the former being about a generation or two before the latter, so similar setting but different characters.

The Swords and Fire trilogy focuses on two young women who become bound to each other through kismet, one a member of nobility and the other a poor wretch with uncontrollable magical power. The books follow these characters and a host of supporting cast through adventures and challenges. I really enjoyed the series and found both the setting and the characters engaging and would highly reccomend them to anyone looking for a lighter fantatsy fare.

The second trilogy has a single main character who is a warden of a castle with dark secrets, and also has uncontrollable magical power, who meets a group dedicated to solving magical problems. The dark mystery of the castle causes issues and she works with this group to prevent catastrophe. I enjoyed this second outing less than the first but still found it engaging with a solid satisfying finish.

There are a lot of parrellels between the two trilogies but also enough differences to make it feel like I was reading a new story in the same world and not just a rehash of the same story with different characters. 

If you are looking for light fantasy fare in a unique world with a clear voice and writing style, I can reccomend  these series.

Review: Broken Earth Trilogy

 The Broken Earth Trilogy by N.K. Jemisim is a series that starts slow and a little confusing (you must read the glossary before starting the first book) but after that initial stumble picks up into a solid pace and engrossing story. I quickly found myself enjoying the diverse characters with realistic motivations in a world setting that felt rich and natural in the enviornment protrayed.

The writing and narrative storytelling is clear and engaging, and the descriptions adequate without being too in depth. As the story accelerated into the last book I was devouring the pages and was satisfied with how the it ended overall.

I give the trilogy as a whole an 8 out of 10 and highly reccomend it as something very different from usual sci/fi or fantasy fare.

Board Game Review: Tapestry

From the website, Tapestry is described as "a 2-hour civilization game for 1-5 players". Which is a lie; its not a civilization game, its a victory point generating mechanics game with a fake veneer of a civ game. Don't get me wrong though, you could change all the civ game trappings to gibberish and you would still have a great fun game.

At its heart it is a game where you compete to put together the best engine at generating victory points based on the civilization you start with. There are four different engines and you can invest in any of them but its usually best to invest heavily in one to get the most benefits.

The first time you play it is overwhelming. The sheer number of symbols, options, mechanics, it is truely gobsmacking how much there is going on. Even though the game starts slow and simple, the actions and choices build up until you either find your engine humming along or stalling in the starting blocks. There is some element of luck too, based on the civilization you start with and the tapestry cards you draw that give different bonuses throughout the game as you go through the rounds.

There is some player versus player interaction. On the map itself you can do a little "fighting" over tiles and controlling tiles is one of the engines you can operate for victory points. And on each of the four tracks there are three landmarks you can earn to place in your capital city for more points or resources that you can spend, but only the first player to get to that landmark's spot on the track gets that landmark. This is the biggest source of competition as those landmark buildings are invaluable to building up your city and not only gives you more resources, but is another one of the four victory point engines.

Besides conquering tiles and building up your capital city, the other two engines are developing technologies and exploring tiles. Each of the engines is closely tied to one of the four tracks and often a player will pick one track to invest heavily on and a supporting track to supplement growth and development as it gets more and more expensive to climb a track as you proceed.

This game is available on Tabletopia and Tabletop Simulator as well as a physical board game. My friends and I have been playing it recently on a weekly basis on the latter and it is a big hit with my group. I have definitely added a physical copy to my wish list for Chirstmas.

Rating: 4.5 stars out of 5

Crying Suns Review

Do you remember this little indie game that came out back in 2012 called FTL? Its a fun game even still (booted it up last fall) and one of the all time greats. So when I saw Crying Suns advertised on Imgur I checked it out and was intrigued by what I saw as it reminded me of the former game.

Its described as thus:

Crying Suns is a tactical rogue-lite that puts you in the role of a space fleet commander as you explore a mysteriously fallen empire. In this story rich experience inspired by Dune and Foundation, each successful run will uncover the truth about the Empire... and yourself as well.

I was trying to find one image to capture the game but it was difficult.

Basically you are an Admiral revived from stasis to find the empire you were once part of fallen apart and in chaos. Your goal is to travel from the outer rim to the empire's former center to find out what happened and what you can do to fix it.

The game play is broken into two parts: the first is travelling from solar system to solar system and planet to planet having encounters n which, if successful, you can glean more resources for your ship such as upgrades, repairs, officers, equipment, scrap (used as currency in the fallen empire), or information about what happened and/or what's going on. The second part is ship to ship combat with weapons and squadrons.

I'm about half way through. The game has 6 chapters and each chapter has 3 sectors of planets to run through with a boss at the end. I'm in Chapter 3, sector 3, about to fight the chapter boss. (And I'm playing on Easy, so sue me.)

The variety of encounters is impressive. The game claims 300 unique encounters and I believe them. And some encounters can have different outcomes based on what officers you've recruited along the way. The sectors you travel though have real decision points, as in do I go this route and visit a station that sells and repairs my squadrons, or this route with more opportunities for encounters to build up my resources?

And the space combat... it took me a few tries to figure it out but once I got the hang of it I really enjoy it. Its not simple but its not twitch based or super complicated. There is a lot of variety of ship weapons and squadrons and upgrades so it takes the right amount of thought to win a fight without being frustrating.

Overall I'm really enjoying this game and its totally worth the $28 dollars I spent on it.

4.5 / 5 Stars

Review: Star Wars Rise of Skywalker

*** NO SPOILERS ***

OK, I've had a week to digest Rise of Skywalker and to give it a grade both as a movie and as the end of the Sequel Trilogy and end of the saga.

First off, as a movie: its Star Wars; even when its bad its good. This movie leaned into the bread and butter of the franchise which is space fighting, blaster fighting, and light saber duels. Like all the new movies it leans into spectacle far more than slow story and character building. This is a trend we see starting even in Empire Strikes Back (giant space asteroid worm? Why?) and Return of the Jedi, and since today's modern big name action directors have so much more ability to make what they envision in their heads appear on the screen due to CGI effects and knowing that these Star Wars movies are remembered for the big scenes, the trend towards spectacle over story is almost inevitable.

That being said, the lack of space to breath is really noticeable in this movie. It really goes from scene to scene to scene at a frenetic pace, trying to put a big explosive covered bow to wrap up its own trilogy and the 9 movie saga as a whole. It tries hard, very hard, to raise the stakes to a 9 movie conclusion and really, I feel like it failed in that regard.

Overall, at first I thought I liked it more than The Last Jedi but I feel now that maybe that's not true, but keep in mind I'm a big fan of TLJ so this is not a big hit on RoS. If I were to give TLJ a 7.5/10 score, I'd give RoS 7/10.

Now, taking a look at it as the end of the trilogy and saga, I think it scores better because it hits all the notes you want a big saga end to have: biggest of the bad guys, biggest of the stakes, duels, crisis, combat... you kind of want the frenetic spectacle at the end of the saga, just like Return of the Jedi and Revenge of the Sith both did. On that note, I'd give it a passing grade.

Was fun, would watch again.

UPDATE:

OK, I want to take a minute and talk about The Last Jedi again.

Yes, there were problems. Poe Dameron should have been summarily executed by firing squad for his disobeying orders, going rogue, and full blown mutiny, not gushed over by Leia and Holdo. Arcing turbo lasers without a gravity well. Taking a handful of skimmers out against an army of walkers.

But outside of those issues this movie tells a story, has meaningful character arcs for multiple characters (Rey, Finn, Poe, and even Luke!), and looks and sounds gorgeous! I love re-watching this movie with my sons, it just hits the right notes in so many ways.

And I found Old Man Luke believable and relatable, his story and arc satisfying. His confrontation with Kylo was compelling and more than just a light saber duel.

The issue with the resistance bombers dropping bombs? Capital ships generate gravity fields, it makes sense to utilize it with smaller easier to make bombs you drop into its gravity field than make more expensive torpedoes, especially for a cash strapped resistance.

Canto Bight scenes? I don't see any problem with it, it was a nice fresh look into a galaxy unconcerned with the dark/light war and profiting from it.

Anyone who wanted the Luke / Rey arc to go differently, or hated what the writers and director did with Luke as a character, I sympathize but just because its not what you expected does not mean it was not good.

The movie told a new Star Wars story and told it well.

Eve Industrial Tool

I received an email asking for me to take a new mobile tool for a spin called EVE Online Industrial Tool:

Hi,
I'm one of your fan (blog, podcast, Eon articles, ...), your podcast is really cool :D Never stop it :)
I'm the developer of Eve online industrial tool (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=fr.eoit).
As I know you are a good industrialist and you're playing Eve for long time, I want to know if you could give me some feedback on my app. I know you don't have lot's of time, your family, your job, (btw: same problem for me ;)) but every suggestions are good to know.
And if you want to publish an artical on your blog, that would be really cool :D
Thank you very much for your time.
Fly safe.

Flattery will get you everywhere around here!

I asked him for a list of functions and he sent this:

So a list of the basic functionality by screen : - Item list (shows your favorite items)
- Item info
-> Item prices (based on eve central) and calculated price
->Blueprint/reaction information
-> Material list (with wasted materials in red; based on your skills)
- Blueprint info
-> Details on blueprint
-> Invention screen (for tech2 items) displays the blueprint cost to invent and the profit done with the produced blueprint copy
- Manufacture
-> displays the manufacturing plan for the given item (shopping list, every step to produce the final item)
-> the price distribution (shows you the materials that cost you the most)
- Location prices
-> shows the prices of a given item in your favorite stations
- Assets
-> list the item present in your production station (used in production plan calculation process)
- Mining session
-> manage your mining session and let you know at all time the cost of your refined ore that you have in your cargo
- Parameters
-> change settings
-> set your api credential, Character
-> set production/trade station and favorite stations

I put it on my phone (Samsung Galaxy Note... love the huge screen, never go back to small) and can confirm that it is free and runs really nice. I don't do a lot of industrial stuff besides Planetary Interaction these days but can see the value in investigating blueprints on the fly and I love, just LOVE, being able to compare item prices in two hubs for things I care about at a glance.

Overall I'm impressed and would recommend you give the free app a try on your Android device.

Review: Templar One Eve Novel

When I finished the Empyrean Age novel at the beginning of the month, I immediately picked up the sequel EVE: Templar One, also by Tony Gonzales, and started to read it. Short review: started slow but ended strong and I felt it was worth my time and money. Longer review to follow.


WARNING: SPOILERS BELOW

The Good

I felt that overall the character interactions were stronger in this book than they were in the previous novel. The Gable-Mack-Jonas relationship and arc as they struggled to find Vince and get him off the planet of Pike's Landing was very well written and deserved to be the central story of the novel. I liked the side-story about how CONCORD officials were taking steps to get better intelligence and would have loved to know more about the THANTOS operative and operations. I also found the interaction of dead-Jovian AI drone and the doomed Amarrian scientist great and full of backstory about Sleepers and Jove.

But the best part of the novel, and where it surpasses Empyrean Age by far, was the combat on the ground and in space. There was more of it and far more detailed and engaging.

The Bad

One thing is for sure, Templar One starts slow and disjointed. It jumps around a lot and each section felt like it either assumed the reader knew what was going on and it was playing hide-and-seek with the info to tantalize the reader but left me feeling cold on the subject. I didn't stop feeling frustrated by the jumping around until about the two-thirds or halfway points. Its also worth noting that the book is very slow until that point too.

While I like the continuity of having many characters from the first novel present in the second novel, I really think the author could have saved a lot of ink by just leaving Korvin Lears out of it and had his roles dropped or done by some nameless character. My impression was that the author really liked this Gallente pod pilot and wanted him involved, even if tangentially. I would have preferred more time spent on other characters/storylines instead.

I did not like the character of Mordu himself. While I understand there are eccentric leaders in real life and it should not be any different in New Eden, I really felt that Mordu was over the top in terms of eccentric to the point of parody. 

One last thing; it felt like the author was far more restricted in what he could do in terms of plot events in order to write this book compared to Empyrean Age. Whether its because he had less resources available to him for world shaping (e.g. setting up Caldari State titan in orbit of a planet in Gallente space) or the outcome was more restrictive (i.e. instead of "everyone at war", it was a specific technology has to be shared amoungst the four empires equally), the end result is that the plot felt a bit more constrained and directed, especially in the early going of the novel. The end battles more than made up for that though.

Summary

This is a good book, either as a sequel of Empryean Age or stand alone novel. I would recommend it to any Eve player, but I would have a hard time suggesting it to a non-Eve player unless they read and enjoyed Empyrean Age.

Review: Empyrean Age Eve Novel

When the novel Empyrean Age was released I was skeptical of it being a good read because I rarely have seen a game-based novel or comic seem like anything except a blatant marketing/money grab. A few of the reviews I heard for the novel went along with that bias and I ended up not reading it then.

When Burning Life came out, I decided to try that one instead and was not super impressed. In contrast, over time the reviews and memories of people who read the Empyrean Age novel have been generally positive and a lot of people were excited for Templar One, written by the same author as Empyrean Age. So I decided to read the first book and give it a try.

 

WARNING: SPOILERS BELOW

The Good

I was impressed with the writing style. It was easy to read, the imagery was decent without being overwhelming. The characters were believable for the most part, with realistic motivations and personalities. There were four story arcs, one focusing on people from each of the major empires, and I found myself wishing that the novel had been two or four novels so that each story could have been given more room to cover more of the events and characters. That is always a good sign.

Even though the book felt like a marketing tool (as in, "here is EVE and this is what the major factions are about") I liked the fact that the book moved the plot of the major empires forward. For example, Jamyl Sarum was empress by the end, the Minmatar retrieved some of the Starkmanir tribe from slavery, the Caldari had a revolution for all intents and purposes, and the Gallente had been invaded and Caldari Prime occupied by the Caldari. Of course, the book was only able to move the plat forward because the expansion of the same name moved the game storyline forward, but its appreciated nonetheless.

The ground combat scenes, both in one on one violence and in military clashes, was excellent. I really wanted more of the Minmatar/Amarr and Gallente/Caldari ground battles. This alone makes me look forward to Templar One.


The Bad

For a book about a game about spaceships, there was not a large amount of space combat and what's there is not stellar. That left me a little disappointed but on the other hand, I know how hard it is to write good space combat.

Some character actions and reactions are unbelievable. For example, President Fourtain allowing the Caldari to blackmail him into letting them occupy Caldari Prime and hold millions of Gallenteans hostage, while the Caldari fleet goes back to Caldari space? Yeah, I don't buy that at all. There is a reason governments don't negotiate with terrorists; its because if it works once they will keep using it to get more.

On the unbelievable track, the character called The Broker seemed like one big Deus ex machina in order to force the story of the Caldari and Gallente into the direction the writer wanted. It seemed like he had no limitations but yet was killed off at the end by an incurable disease. How convenient!

Speaking of the Caldari, I don't care what universe you live in, no human society is going to take their entire military force for an invasion of an enemy with superior military might, and in the process leave their home systems with all their civilians completely unprotected. That is beyond the pale.

A lesser transgression of credulity was the Amarr / Minmatar conflict. I find it hard to believe that the massive Amarr empire was under anything more than annoyance level threat from the secretly built Elder led invasion. "Three Titan-led battlegroups" seems insignificant in our view as capsuleers facing entire fleets of nothing but Titans, but I was willing to let that pass as the difference between game realities and canon realities. But the thought that the Amarr could not match and surpass that force with ease and required Jamyl's super-weapon equipped battleship to save the day at Sarum Prime strained my credulity as well. I'm willing to let it pass because it set up some good storytelling and I can paper it over with thoughts that perhaps the Imperial Navy was corrupt or too slow to respond fast enough in high enough numbers.

Summary

Overall I enjoyed it and I'm starting Templar One. I don't think its a book I'll read again but it definitely ranks higher than Burning Life in my eyes and its one I don't mind recommending to people looking for a decent little sci-fi novel or introduction to Eve Online.

I Am A Cylon: Battlestar Galactica Revisted

Long time readers might remember me last year gushing about how much I liked the Battlestar Galactica board game. Well, the annual Bachelor Party came around again and this game was once more front and centre.

TL;DR - Still an awesome game, looking at getting one of the two expansions for it.

We played two games, this time there was 6 of us as Andrew's brother Pete joined the same five we had last year.


Game #1 - Lessons in Treachery 

Players:
Andrew - Helo
Pete - Chief
Metin - Starbuck
Bill - Zarek - President
Dave - Adama - Admiral
Brian - "Boomer" Sharon

The game started slowly for the attacking Cylons but unbeknownst to the human players both sleeper cylons were active, me and Metin. We didn't know each other was out there, but the failed skillchecks started mounting up fast.

Starting Positions.

Early in the game I was president and Dave took it from me in a crisis. I was not pleased as I wanted to try being political leader (and I was a cylon and wanted to negate the president's power) so I made an immediate power play to get it back, arguing that the Admiral and President being the same person was a recipe for disaster. The others didn't buy it  and blocked my bid, putting me on the high probability list for being a cylon.

The humans made good distance early and after a second jump of distance 3 they were still above half for all resources. This was actually a bonus for the cylons as it meant that the cylon sympathizer who appears in the mid point cylon phase is on the cylon side (as opposed to being on the human side if any resource is below half). Pete got the sympathizer card and was sent to the cylon ressurection ship where he started actively trying to thwart the humans.

The suspicions on me got me sent to the brig and soon a skill check came around that removed all doubt. Myself, Metin and Andrew contributed to the check but all the cards except the ones Andrew put in were negative making myself and Metin look like Cylons. I figured the gig was up and my next turn I revealed myself and went to the Cylon locations, while Metin hung around to continue to actively work against them on the Battlestar Galactica.

Up to this point, we were getting a lot of water shortage crises so Brian decided to solve that but accidentally spilling a full glass of water on the game board. While it dried in the sun, we had lunch.

After lunch, with the cylon and human sides out in the open, we worked tirelessly to destroy them. I played a super crisis card and caused the Colonial One to explode. They were getting hounded and damaged by cylon fleets so they forced a jump and lost some population. But finally morale was getting low and Metin finally revealed himself (while still free from the brig) and his reveal cost them their last morale point.

Game, set, match.

Victory as Metin takes the last of the morale away with his reveal!

Game #2 - Death To Smoochy

Bill - Apollo
Dave - Helo
Brian - Baltar
Andrew - Col Tigh - Admiral
Pete - Starbuck
Metin - Roslin - President

Once again I was given a cylon card to start. Damn, I was really hoping to be human this time. Unbeknownst to me, no one else is a cylon at the start.

It did not start well for the humans.

 The game started rough with multiple cylon fleets showing up and a lot (I mean a lot!) of raiders and heavy raiders on the attack. The cost in vipers was high as we worked to the jump but we prevented serious damage and after the jump we worked to repair them as quickly as possible.

Survived the assault, but heavy cost.

 However, another fleet moved in and once more we were on the defensive. The numerous assaults keeps everyone busy and not many skillchecks are obviously failing from sabotage so suspicions are low at the moment. Honestly, with uber-parnoid humans having lost last game and thus using Investigative Committee cards to keep the skillchecks non-secret, plus with no other cylon helping me, I've been unable to do much in the way of real damage.

Here we go again! Scrabble vipers!

 At the halfway distance point morale was just below half so when Brian is revealed as cylon sympathizer he is thrown in the brig but remains human. Pete is the other cylon and reveals himself to throw Andrew in the brig which makes Dave the admiral. Dave is inordinately happy to get the nuke tokens again so suspicions fall on him as the second cylon.

Morale below half already, part of the human plan to avoid the cylon sympathizer.

Yet another cylon fleet!

 As the latest cylon fleet moves in there is a crisis which if failed causes the humans to lose two food. The skillcheck is made public again (stupid Investigative committees!) and I am forced to a decision: publicly cost the fleet two food resources and reveal myself as a cylon, or let the chance go by and hope for another one?

I decided to go for it and hope that the supercrisis I get will help finish the humans off as their resources are running low. I throw negative cards on the check, the food is lost, and I am quickly dispatched to the brig.

Resources running low all over, me and Pete trying to finish them off.

The fleet makes eight distance and needs only one more jump to safety. At this point it has become apparent that two colonial ships on the board are enough if either are lost to doom the humans, so we cylons look for ways to kill them as the humans conspire to keep them alive while navigating other crises.

Either one of those two colonial ship markers are enough to finish the humans if lost.

My supercrisis, a massive cylon fleet activation, is surprisingly passed by the humans so the activation is not as big and this allows them the breathing room to force the jump a turn early with no threat of losing all population (which was down to 2).

Humans win.

Analysis 

This is still an awesome game. The paranoia, the backstabbing, the panic and the relief, it combines to be a rollercoaster ride of emotions and suspense. My only regret is that I didn't get to be a human in one of the games.

You could tell by the second game (our fourth overall) that the humans were starting the get the hang of how to best thwart the cylons: executive orders to make best use of abilities more often, investigative committees for important skill checks to force the cylons out into the open, try and get the sympathizer to be on the human side by letting one resource dip below half early on, etc. Yet despite all that effort they were still one bad roll or skill check from dying.

In hindsight, I wish I had waited to reveal myself a bit longer in the second game, and let Dave dig himself deeper into the suspicion hole he had started to dig for himself. Oh well, next time.

Battlestar Galactica: Great Game or Best Game?

On Saturday I got together with old friends for Andrew's 3rd Annual Bachelor Party in which we eat a decadent breakfast and then spend the rest of the day playing board games, drinking caffeine, and eating unhealthy snacks.

The board game we chose this year was Battlestar Galactica from Fantasy Flight Games. Its not the typical game we would pick as we tend to go for games with empires and army build up with massive clashes and invasions of conquest. With Battlestar Galactica (aka BSG) there is no long term build up and conquest strategy; instead it is a constant immediate decision tactical game as players work cooperatively to stay alive (i.e. not run out of the four resources) long enough to reach the destination.

Well, mostly cooperative. You see, the game includes a traitor mechanic in which a number of players can switch from helping the group of humans to survive to secretly attempting to sabotage them and make the humans lose. These are the Cylons and these are what turns a pretty standard coop game into a literal mind-f*ck and one of my favourite games ever.

There was five of us playing which meant although we picked characters and set up as humans, before the first turn secret loyalty cards are dealt out which has a possibility of turning two players into hidden Cylons. Halfway through the game the rest of the loyalty cards are dealt so you are guaranteed of having one Cylon but most likely two at that point. As a human you spend a lot of effort trying to suss out who the Cylons are by their actions because unrevealed Cylons are dangerous to the fleet and can cause skill checks to go badly throughout the game. If you think you know who a Cylon is you can send them to the brig where their impact is lessened a lot. However, you guess wrong and put a human player in the brig they can't help out anywhere near as much and trying to convince people you are not a Cylon is surprisingly hard.

We played the game twice. In the first game the population resource was hit hard by a massive attack so the fleet was reeling even though there was no Cylons out initially (not that we knew though). At the mid point Brian and I became Cylons but Brian overplayed his hand in a skillcheck he decided to sabotage and got thrown in the brig early. Realizing he was cornered he revealed himself and got sent to the Cylon areas where he could do more than in the brig. Unrevealed Cylons are by far the more powerful.

I played my status very carefully, helping out on skill checks and strategy most of the time and sabotaging skill checks that were the most crucial. (Skill checks are done by a hidden card mechanic with a random element thrown in to give Cylons some cover for subtle sabotage.) At one point I thought us Cylons had won the game through a failed skill check but Dave came through with a special card and removed all doubt he was one of the remaining Cylons.

Finally I felt I was in a position to weaken the humans by revealing myself after throwing Dave in the brig so I did that and we went in the final turns where Galactica ran out of fuel and thus lost the game for the humans. Go Cylons!

 * * * * *

In the second game, we were much more focused and ready for the mechanics but that made the mind games all the more intense as we watched every player's move with scrutiny reserved for bank dealings. This time unbeknown-st to everyone both Cylons were active from the start of the game and were Dave and Metin. That left Andrew, Brian, and I struggling to keep the fleet alive.

During an early crisis I opted to throw myself in the brig instead of making myself look guilty by throwing someone else in the brig like I did the former game. However this act made me look suspicious (combined with the unrevealed Cylons throwing wood on the fire) and they would not let me out, actively working against the skill check to do so. No matter the protesting I did I was accused and under suspicion and that was that.

I spent most of the game in the brig (at one point telling everyone I hoped the Cylons killed them all) and finally Dave was revealed (he has a terrible poker face) and Metin's actions finally convinced everyone else that he was not kosher. Still, it was several turns before I could be freed as Metin was able to block the efforts with his character's special ability.

The game ended in a flurry of attacks as the Cylons went full out to bring us down but the three human players were able to hold it together and escape to Kobol. Go humans!

* * * * *

This game is highly recommended for groups of 5 or 6 (four might work well). The paranoia is intense and definitely one of the most enthralling gaming experiences I have had the pleasure of participating in. The action is constant and I was never bored or idle.

I'll link to Andrew's review once he posts it.

EDIT: Here is Andrew's report.

Eve: The Burning Life Novel Review

It took a while but I finally finished The Burning Life novel last night. Full disclaimer: I did not read Empyrean Age novel.

Overall I thought the book was OK. Good enough to want to keep reading to see what was going to happen and made me care about the main characters, but having certain respects belie credulity to the extreme that almost ruined the book for me.

I thought the writing was very good, i.e. characters acted believably with only a few stereotypes and caricatures, and the dialog was done well. Scene setups and descriptions were solid but not spectacular.

The only thing that I found hard to accept was the basic plot points which seemed hamfistedly put in like the writer was forced to follow a set of plot points on a bullet point list. And then the sudden rise of the protagonist to god-like reputation in the cluster totally goes against the feel of the Eve universe where bigger than life celebrities are very very rare.

I also wanted more explanation as to why Agents are held in such high regard and esteem in the cluster. Its a major plot point, but why? I never felt we went there adequately.

All in all, a decent read with some great insight into various faction but not a novel I would go back to again.

Nintendo DS Game Review: Panzer Tactics

As a huge fan of Panzer General and Panzer General II on the PC, I was very intrigued by the thought of trying out Panzer General Tactics which is based on mostly the same mechanics but for the Nintendo DS. So when Andrew purchased it for me as a Christmas present, I was stoked.

I've been playing the German campaign in my free time and just finished this morning. At first I thought it was a cakewalk game with easy missions and no thought required. And then I hit Suez canal and everything changed. The next three missions or so were bloody and hard and I lost a lot of good virtual men of the Wehrmacht. I successfully took Stalingrad this morning after one abortive attempt and several counterattacks by the Soviets that I managed to push aside.

Now I start the harder (!) Soviet campaign before getting into the American/British campaign at the hardest setting.

Good: easy interface, interesting mission objectives, nice combat system, lots of unit types.

Bad: Not much variance within the unit types (i.e. each type had an early, middle, and late game version with the late game version being easily better), aircraft are still annoyingly fragile, and Russian tanks are still a bitch to kill. Small screen is frustrating at times in large spread out missions.

Overall I give it 3.5 out of 5 stars, a solid rating.