Subscribe
Social
/dev/random (Tumblr)
@LukeMaciak (Twitter)
+Luke Maciak (Google+)
Category Archives: entertainment
Iron Man 3
Iron Man 3 is the first of the post-Avenger era Marvel movie. Joss Whedon’s epic super hero romp is a tough act to follow, both in terms of quality and box office success (which are not the same thing mind … Continue reading
Lord of Light by Roger Zelazny
When I reviewed Illium and Olympos by Dan Simmons I was quite impressed by how he managed to seamlessly blend the legendary ancient epic with post-singularity science fiction while staying true to both. I gave Simmons a lot of credit … Continue reading
Bioshock Infinite: Part 2 – Elizabeth
Spoiler Warning! This post contains spoilers for Bioshock Infinite, including mid and late game details. It does not discuss the main plot or the end twist but it does spoil at least one major important game event which is pivotal … Continue reading
Bioshock Infinite: Part 1 – Art Direction and Visual Storytelling
Bioshock Infinite is a great game. You may remember that I had mostly positive things to say about the original Bioshock game. I have never played the sequel, because to be honest, it seemed like an incredibly stupid idea at … Continue reading
Diaspora by Greg Egan
I believe I have found a new favorite writer. His name is Greg Egan and he writes science fiction so hard you can’t consume it in hasty bites least you want to break your mind’s teeth on it. You have … Continue reading
Looper
The trailers for Looper looked quite amazing but unfortunately I missed it when it was in theaters. I was pretty excited to finally see it, though the lack of Looper themed memes on the internet concerned me a bit. You … Continue reading
My Wizards are Different
In the previous installments of this series I tackled all kinds of fantasy tropes – now it is time to re-invent magic users. I want to come up with a slightly different, off-beat magic interpretation tying it to my old … Continue reading
The Postmortal by Drew Magary
If you know me, you probably realize I’m a firm believer in the fact that aging is a disease that can, and should be cured. Our short lifespans and high reproductive rates have been instrumental in getting us where we … Continue reading
My Dwarfs are Different
In most fantasy settings Dwarfs are brave trustworthy and honorable but a wee bit greedy and selfish. They are known for never breaking their oaths, and always making good on their promises and also for holding life-long grudges against those … Continue reading
Safety not Guaranteed
A small town newspaper publishes a strange add in it’s classifieds section. It is one of those odd-ball ads that usually end up on reddit where they are proved to be internet jokes, or just silly pranks made by the … Continue reading
Capacity by Tony Ballantyne
Here is a very poignant question: what happens when you digitize a human mind and then bootstrap it and run it as a self aware software entity? How that virtual person relate to the original physical person from which it … Continue reading
The King of Pain (Król Bólu) by Jacek Dukaj [part 3]
Welcome to the third and final installment of the exhaustive review of this remarkable (and remarkably long) book. The Social Tragedy of Post-Scarcity Imagine a world in which nano-assembly has been perfected and made super cheep. Imagine a nation in … Continue reading
My Zombies Are Different
Zombies are not strictly a fantasy concept. In fact, they tend to be heavily under-utilized in that setting, perhaps for a good reason. In modern day or futuristic settings when the living dead show up, you can pretty much guarantee … Continue reading
The King of Pain (Król Bólu) by Jacek Dukaj [part 2]
I’m usually not a huge fan of anthologies. Not that there is anything inherently wrong with collections of short stories – it’s just that when I buy a book, I prefer the more substantial experience of a novel, rather than … Continue reading
Dishonored
Back when I was still actively playing World of Warcrap, one of the games’ many inside jokes were the pandas. According to the lore, somewhere in Azeroth there existed a race of pseudo-Chinese panda bears that were mostly known for … Continue reading
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
So, how did you guys like The Hobbit? I found it a little bit underwhelming. Then again, I’m not sure what could have been done differently to improve it… This story and this movie… They are what they are, and … Continue reading
Like Lizard on Ice: Dexter Retrospective
Last weekend the penultimate season of Dexter wrapped up with an explosive cliffhanger finale. I discovered the show back in 2008 when I watched Season 1 and Season 2 in their entirety in about a week of time. I have … Continue reading
Posted in tv
7 Comments
Dark Knight Rises
I didn’t see Dark Knight Rises in the theater when it first came out. The timing wasn’t right and the logistics just weren’t right. Now I’m actually kinda glad, because the whole thing was rather disappointing. And I’m saying this … Continue reading
DOTA 2
Lately I have been entertaining myself playing DOTA2. I got a beta invite from one of the readers here (thank you sir!) and found it quite addictive. The game is currently F2P but in a closed beta so you need … Continue reading
Posted in video games
3 Comments
Progress in Fantasy Settings
Here is an idea worth pondering: what happens to fantasy setting when the technological progress kicks in? The obvious answer is nothing. Nothing can happen, because once a universe leaves the medieval like “sweet spot” it ceases to be fantasy … Continue reading
Posted in rpg and tabletop
12 Comments
X-COM: Enemy Unknown
X-COM is not a video game – it is digital crack cocaine. It will suck you in. It will keep you up until 4am on a weekday. It will make you mutter “just one more turn, just one more spin … Continue reading
Fantasy Setting: Tales of Those Who Left
So here is a new thing that I’m doing. I’ve been writing a lot of articles about reinventing standard fantasy tropes. This is a really fun thing to do, but it is sort of repetitive. Does all fantasy must involve … Continue reading
Posted in rpg and tabletop
2 Comments
FTL
FTL is a new indie game that explores a novel concept: how do you fuck up an idea that simply cannot fail. It is one of the first games that was crowd-funded from the ground up via Kickstarter. The development … Continue reading
My Trolls Are Different
I’m having a lot of fun doing this whole reinventing fantasy races thing lately so I decided to do Trolls this time. What do we know about these creatures? Well, in most settings Trolls are big, dumb and extremely dangerous. … Continue reading
Line of Resistance (Linia Oporu) by Jacek Dukaj
If you asked me who were the most interesting SF writers of the last decade or two, I would without give you five names: Vernor Vinge, Charles Stross, Cory Doctorow, Neal Stephenson and Jacek Dukaj. Not necessarily in that order. … Continue reading
RSS Feed