Controversial bit first. I like Sword Art Online. Yes, I know it has massive limitations in how it is written and some of the tropes the author uses are not great but on the whole I like the light novels and the anime. Ok, controversy over and I will say from the off that this is not a good game adaptation/tie in.
Gameplay
The game is set in an open world divided into areas with some dungeons added on as you get further through. Played in a third person perspective the design is fine and it runs smoothly save for the ridiculous number of loading screens which take some lime to finish. This maybe due to assets in each zone but it breaks the gameplay up a lot (as does the 2d cutscenes which dominate the early game time). On the whole though things look good. The problems come when you actually start playing the game and progress a bit. Firstly the camera control is awful in that it does not seem to lock onto the enemy you are attacking (and pretty much all you do in the game is attack enemies). As a result aiming your skills is often a case of luck rather than judgment and you can end up launching a ten move combo at thin air. Frustrating.
Secondly is the control mapping itself. I have played this on PC and switch and both have issues. On PC the default bindings are awful and for me rendered the game unplayable (I don’t have time to remap everything). The switch is better but every button does two or three things depending on the combination used and it just feels clunky. Combat lets you use four possible attacks depending on combination but I usually found myself sticking a strong attack on the easiest option and running with it. This game feels like it was designed as a PC MMO and then they decided to port it to console. With better key maps the range of skills would work well on a PC setting with the ability to customise a skill tray. On console though it is just a mess.
Finally is the game premise itself. Basically you can watch the plot cut scenes but you will still end up doing the same thing. Killing monsters. That’s it. The skill tree covers weapons skills only and whilst you can build friendship with other characters this is all driven by the combat engine. This is a waste given that the whole premise of the original SAO was that it was a virtual world and we know that several of the key characters had other skills such as crafting, cooking, beast taming.
Really?
So the gameplay is limited and after a few hours of killing different monsters I decided to explore the friendship system. Oh dear. In combat you can praise your teammates for certain characteristics they demonstrate and build affection with them. Get it high enough and you can then reach the ‘hand holding’ stage and then eventually the ‘princess carry’ stage which triggers a bedroom cutscene. No I am not making this up. You basically get a romance cut scene with characters who are all canonically under eighteen replete with the character you are romancing in nightwear. Nothing too risque in the design but that is beside the point. Ignoring the garbage design around the friendship system the idea that you would stick something like this in is little more than fan service of the worst kind and it’s a shame as the main outfit designs are actually really good.
Conclusion
This is a bad game in terms of implementation and there’s no way I can dress that up. It feels like a compromise on every front and were it not a game gifted to me I would be trading it in. I do think there is scope for a proper RPG in the SAO world using a skyrim type approach with you being able to do lots of different things. This game though just feels like a soulless bit of marketing with a smattering of fan service thrown in to appease the likely target audience.
Recent events have forced me to put down all hobby but I have been able to keep an eye on social media and see the latest updates. The one which caught my eye was the new Ash Wastes box at £180 from GW direct. It didn’t catch my eye because of the contents; impressive looking as they are, necromunda is not my thing but the price caught my eye. £180.00 is a lot of money. I understand that it is a saving over the individual purchasing but £180 is a huge sum on what it a essentially a non-essential. I mean for me that is around two and half months of utilities or my entire energy and food budget for a month. I appreciate that times are hard but I do feel that at the moment GW’s price increase is moving the range beyond what I can really justify spending when I only really paint rather than play.
I also understand that costs are rising for GW so there is a dilemma for them. Reduce the profit margin and annoy stakeholders or hike the prices and cause issues for those buyers of ‘plastic crack’ who have to have the latest thing no matter what (there are plenty on social media spaces looking to sell things to cover the cost of new minis).
Ultimately, for me, 40k is a hobby and if I cannot afford it then I won’t buy it. Equally there is nothing coming down the new release pipe which is tempting me either so for the moment it is quite an easy situation. That being said I do wonder why GW does not issue a formal release schedule. Take the incoming heresy box set which is coming this year. It will be expensive so why not say to people that it will be released no earlier than x date. That gives people time to save, budget and plan ahead. This also opens the product up to those who don’t have £150+ lying around spare as if they know when they can see if there is a way to make it work. I do this all the time with collectible statues from anime and it means that I can buy ones I would never be able to afford.
I genuinely don’t see why GW do not do this and instead do a reveal and then say nothing until a few weeks before release. Yes it may drive FOMO a bit but given how GW likes to highlight how aware it is of social issues then surely it should consider looking at the socio-economic crisis as well and surely a simple release window is not going to hurt the FOMO that much?
Welcome to ‘Roll 3’s to Hit’; my blog for all my Warhammer 40k, Kill Team and other miscellaneous modelling and hobby projects. I will hopefully include some of the 40k fan fiction I plan to write this year (in addition to my normal science fiction writing) and will also include battle reports, updates and comments.
For 40k fans in the Northwest of England who are looking for a a bit of casual gaming on a Sunday I would recommend checking out ‘Northwest Miniature Gaming’ who play at Element Games when there is casual space. You can find them at https://www.facebook.com/ElementGamesNWGC/ (we do also consider other venues).
A little about me then. In my spare time I play 40k though for me the painting and the lore is more interesting than the actual game play. I left the hobby for a long time but have rebuilt my Necron army and am regularly tabled by the marine players in the group! In addition I have an interest in the following other games:
It has been a while since I did an anime figure unboxing and, if I am honest, this is likely to the last one for a long time. Whilst bigbadtoystore were excellent as usual the poor exchange rate, high shipping costs and the customs duty meant that this model had nearly 50% more expense simply from the logistics side of things. As a one off I can live with but more than that is a no. Shame.
Anyway to the unboxing. I ordered this one over a year ago as Black Lagoon is one of my favourite anime; mainly because I think it is rather unique in approach. There are no winners or heroes in it and whilst there are examples of loyalty and honour it is very much amongst thieves. Yes the action is great but there are also some deeply unsettling episodes such as the Hansel & Gretel episodes. If you can watch that and not be unsettled then you are a far stronger person than me. This model is a 20th anniversary one and is far more risque than I usually go for with this figures; but equally I can imagine Revy actually doing something like this for an undercover job if the money was good!
The usual box from bigbadtoystore though it was larger than I expected. The box was intact and I have to say the artwork on it was certainly…vivid in showing what is inside. You cannot say you were not warned with this one.
It was much easier than normal to open this one up and the model is pretty much assembled bar the whip. This is more expensive than any I have bought before and there is a big quality difference between this and the cheaper SAO ones I have had. The quality of the face, colour and hair tone feels more premium. The kit is the chair which has quite a large area, Revy herself in a single piece and the whip. She is not attached to the chair and just kind of perches on it when finally assembled and you can drape the chains as you will.
The kit was far larger than I expected and I actually struggled to find anywhere where it actually fit without catching the spikes, and the lack of a proper mount for Revy does make it a little unstable. A striking model for obvious reasons and as I say not something I normally go for but all in all this one is certainly a unique model.
All in all I am pleased with this one. The quality is good and everything arrived in one piece. It is just a shame the cost was so high but I guess that this is the world we live in these days.
Honour among thieves is the latest attempt to bring the popular role playing game to the silver screen; but this time it seems that Hasbro have finally managed to pull it off and create a movie which is actually a Dungeons and Dragons film. The early noughties efforts may have had the excellently overacted performance of Jeremy Irons and some decent special effects for the time but they were a DnD wrapper on a generic fantasy film. Honour among thieves is very very different.
This was actually the first film I had been to see since JoJo Rabbit released and I went into it with very low expectations. I have to say though that these were swiftly exceeded by an enjoyable cinematic romp which, although flawed, captures the spirit of Dungeons and Dragons perfectly.
The fim centres around the bard Edgin (Chris Pine), a lapsed Harper who is imprisoned for breaking into a Harper stronghold at the paid request of a wizard Sofina. Edgin has a personal goal in doing this as he seeks a tablet to bring his murdered wife back to life but the plan goes south quickly and he is imprisoned with his colleague Holga. Breaking out, needlessly of course, he finds that another member of his old team, Forge, is now lord of Neverwinter and travels there to find the latter is still aligned with Sofina and has also turned Edgin’s daughter against him. Another escape and Edgin and Holga resolve to rescue Edgin’s daughter and bring Forge down. To this end they reunite with Simon, a mage with a confidence problem and Doric, a tiefling Druid with trust issues. The four of them embark on the quest and also stop Sofina who is revealed to be a red witch of Thay.
I will deal with the bad first as, to be honest there is little that is severely wrong with this film. I would say that the exposition is pretty much non-existent and the narrative hops around the map without anything to really say where things are taking place. There is nothing as simple as an indiana jones style map movement scene so I did feel rather unconnected to the narrative. Time and distance all mean nothing here and whilst this does not spoil the film; it is something which could have been better handled.
In a similar vein the character growth is pretty slim if not non-existent. Pine is solid as Edgin but the character itself is so memorable that when I came out of the showing I had forgotten his name and had to look it up in order to write my notes. This is not a fault of Pine or his performance; it is the character which is paper thin. There are plenty of ideas but just not really carried forward. Much the same can be said for Holga who does not get much growth or backstory explained. Simon and Doric get a little and benefit from it but I think the film could have been made stronger with a bit more character development. I do have to say though that Hugh Grant delivers a wonderfully slimy performance as Forge which absolutely lands and is worthy of special attention.
The music that scores the film is complementary to the plot but it is again forgettable. Despite listening to the soundtrack a few times since seeing the film released I cannot remember a single track or part of one. It is not bad music but it neither enhances nor diminishes the flm; it simply there.
With the bad out of the way what about the good?
Well first is the plot. Yes it is so thin you could read a character sheet through it and the power of friendship does a lot of heavy lifting here; but films like this are not about nuanced story. They are about fun and excitement and this film delivers a plot which feels very much like a DnD one shot adventure. The main focus is rescuing Edgin’s daughter and bringing Forge down with the Sofina storyline being a bolt on side effect. I could totally see a DnD campaign or one shot being like this because it is very much what DnD is. This is where the older films fell down as they went for world ending calamity rather than a character driven ‘small’ approach that has been used here.
The spirit of DnD is alive and well in this movie. Plans are stupidly over the top and are exactly what a group of players would come up with. The reverse heist for example is something you could see a group of players come up with much to the despair of the DM. This again is a different approach to how the older films approached it and it is a wink to the audience when it happens. When these plans fail you could imagine the smirk on the DM’s face as he explains things to the party of players and I really like that the over engineered plans often fail.
The use of the main character being a bard and a major character being a druid is an inspired decision. The use of a bard forces the writing to move from a combat focused narrative to a more character driven one. Edgin is not really a fighter and aside from trying to brain people with his lute he is a supporter, a planner and this is a refreshing change from the hero being the centre of the action. Likewise having a druid in makes a change from the normal elvish ranger, dwarven fighter etc. Yes Doric is an exaggeration of a druid class but the rule of cool works well here and if it inspires a few people to play a druid or take up DnD then this is only a good thing.
There are enough easter eggs and lore tips for hardcore fans without the movie bogging down or it becoming a bar for none players to pass. The mimic chest, the underdark and the nod to the 80s cartoon series are just some of the eggs but they are handled well and placed in sections of the film where they work. There is no sense they are added just for the sake of adding them which is always a risk when adding these kind of things in. The writers also resisted the temptation of adding in Drizzt which is to be commended. This would have been an easy points win but also would have been a distraction with fans wanting to see Drizzt rather than the rest of the film. A sequel could probably safely add him in but I think the omission was a wise one.
Honour Among Thieves is a refreshing new attempt to bring DnD to the screen and I really enjoyed it. There is plenty of appeal here for people who like the setting but don’t or can’t actually play the game, but it contains enough for players of the game to recognise it for what it is. Yes there are flaws and issues, films like this always are flawed; but for the first time I can say that I watched a DnD film which captured the spirit of the game along with enough of the loe to also cover most of the letter of it.
So after 80 editions the Imperium magazine has come to an end. Thought I was clickbaiting for a moment there didn’t you? After 80 magazines worth of paint, sprues and brushes the question is whether or not it was any good.
It’s undeniable that the subscription, even at the premium tier which I had, is good value as the technical paints and tools are worth the issue fees alone and the subscription is a saving on the models at cost. It is also a fact that there are an additional ten volumes to come but these are extension issues so I do not think this review is premature. It’s also worth noting that the models in the additional ten are more than worth the £100 cost as it includes:
Paragon warsuits x3
Redemptor dreadnaught
Illuminor Szeras
Skitarri Marshal
Hexmark destroyer
Inquisitor Draxus
Some solid models there and given I messed my Szeras up when the kit first landed I am happy to get another crack at him as I still think he is the best looking necron character kit.
I digress. So how have I found Imperium? Well the magazine has been a regurgitation of existing fluff and lore so there was nothing new there but the datasheets were handy had I actually played an edition of 9th and the painting guides were absolutely excellent. On the whole it was a solid 7/10 but some sort of serialised short story would have been nice.
There were a lot of extras including mugs, artbooks, novellas plus tools which came with the premium sub and these were all useful bar the GW paintbrushes which were awful. Two were on their last legs when I got them and bar the dry brush none lasted long. Because of the brushes the extras were a 6/10 for me.
So how about the models? Well there was a better range than I expected in the core sub to be honest but I do find the omission of Guard from the core sub odd. I would have expected them over battle sisters but there we go. In terms of the premium sub I would probably have dropped the Tau box for an aeldari one; but it seems that GW really cannot decide what to do with aeldari. On the shole though I would give the selection and range of models a 8/10 and it was only really let down by the omission of Guard.
So what was the best model? For me it was the Firestrike turret. It went together extremely well, was surprisingly good fun and was just detailed enough to be a challenge but not detailed enough to be a chore. I made a mess of the decals on mine but on the whole I was happy with the outcome.
Most boring kit? Sorry marine fans but it has to be intercessors. They just do not create joy for me. They are not bad models but they are a bit too detailed to work on quickly and efficiently but not enough to be a challenge. I also dislike the moulded ultramarine bits as well; if they are generic troops then make them generic. I got fed up of sanding off U that in the end I gave up and just did ultramarines.
Kit I enjoyed the most? Greyfax but as this was an extra paid for kit it doesn’t really count. From the main sub I would have to say Calgar which surprised me as I generally disklike GW character kits as they tend to be over sculpted and over designed.
Worst kit? Flayed ones and it is not even a close competition. These are absolutely bloody awful to build. I don’t care how good they look when done or how powerful they may be in the game; this kit was needlessly difficult and fiddly. Seriously GW can you not just cast the arm and hand as one damned piece? In the end I never finished the kit off as just finishing one took far too long and nearly had me swearing in a way that no kit has done for a long time.
So was Imperium worth it? On the whole yes. It has taught me some skills I did not have and the model range has given me a lot of small forces. The technical paints were new to me but at the prices they retail at I have found vallejo alternatives. If the set came around again I probably would not get it now as I have everything I need for my necrons but I would certainly recommend it to anyone else; especially if they were just getting started with 40k.
I had not planned to do a GW article this weekend to be honest. I had intended to do an unboxing blog for my new anime figure and none of the pre-orders/new releases this weekend interested me. I like the new Farsight model but not enough to want a box of Tau (I still have my imperium ones) and the necron one doesn’t tempt me as with the exception of the destroyers I have the rest already.
Still, out of curiosity I logged onto the GW site around 11am GMT and found the below.
The Tau book was there but no models so a quick ebay search later saw that we were in familiar terrirtory.
From what I can tell the Tau box sold out in less than a minute, the common figure seems to be 37 seconds. I checked a few of the online stores I have used before which are a little more obscure and sure enough they were all out as well. One did have the necron boarding patrol but only the one still in stock. Deja vu all over again.
I wrote last week how the scars of indomitus made me cautious of any new GW release because they simply do not seem able to adequately support them. I said then that unless they had altered things then I saw a repeat happening and within days we see it again. Now, I don’t like attacking GW because to be honest it is like beating a child on a PC game. It is too easy. I used to think that it was simply a case that they still believed that they were the little company they used to be and are stocking accordingly but after so many repeats of this (going right back to the Aurelian release many many moons ago) I have changed my view.
I think GW simply do not care.
They know that they can do a small initial run, sell them all in seconds and say there is little they can do about scalpers. The subsequent restock means guaranteed sales and if people moan in the meantime well they always do this and they keep coming back.
Maybe I am doing GW a severe dis-service and they simply cannot manufacture enough stock in time but I struggle to see this. Certainly though it is promoting an increasing number of attacks on painting influencers who get the freebies. Personally I have no truck with that view but with the 10th edition release likely coming in the summer I can see things turning ugly; especially if there are a lot of new sculpts in the box. Personally I just want the rule book so I should be fine but I can see a lot of unhappy people in the near future.
GW can stop all this happening with made to order, larger stock build up and not playing FOMO games. If however you put a gun to my head and forced me to make a view though i will say now that nothing will change and we will be in the exact same position in around three or four months time.
So recently I have not been online much due to a mix of ill health and real life events. It’s no bad thing to take a break of course but predictably as soon as I went back online I saw that Magic the Gathering was trending. Never a good sign. So, ignoring all wisdom and common sense I took a look and saw the below.
Now after the recent Hogwarts’ Legacy/Silvervale/Pikamee mess I genuinely thought we had reached the bottom of the barrel what with people pinning fake suicide’s on streamers playing a game; but it seems that I was wrong. We can it seems get worked up over a small piece of card.
Now I do not play MTG and there are plenty of valid criticisms that can be levelled at the owners of the IP (price, stuffing its own lore down the tubes to sell cash in sets, quality etc) but this one seriously made me have to choose between chortling, weeping for humanity or projectile vomiting in disgust at some of the views. For those not aware the card is from a new Lord of the Rings set for MTG and shows the wedding of Aragorn and Arwen. All nice and canon so what’s the problem? Well it seems the usual ‘guardians again left wing pollution’ (their words not mine) have taken umbrage to the depiction of Aragorn as being a person of colour. The ‘complaints’ and believe me I am using that term very loosely include:
It is not loyal to the source material
Aragorn is whte
Mixed race undermines racial purity
It’s been done just for ‘woke’
Now I am not going to even dignify number three other than say that anyone who believes that abhorrent view need to frankly take a long hard look at themselves and the real world.
But what about one and two? I am not going into number four directly because its a pointless debate. The set has been released to make money and any decision relating to it is to further that goal. As for woke or not; in my view in corporate speak it is box ticking with the goal of furthering profit.
So what about the source material and is Aragorn white?
Source material
The first introduction to Aragorn is in the Prancing Pony in Bree and it is below:
Well not very helpful to either side to be honest. You have a description of a scruffy travel worn man frankly and not much else. Indeed there is not a better description through the remainder of the Lord of the Rings other than two other references, ‘fair’ and ‘pale’. The problem with these? They are both adjectives and not a noun i.e. they describe a colour rather than being one themselves and in respect of ‘fair’ it also has other meanings in classical English.
Tolkien was a linguist and his prose is precise and off a style which is lamentably long dead but at the time of writing ‘fair’ had a number of different meanings in respect to people. It could mean pale or light but it could also mean pleasant or nice to look at. A fair maiden referred to a beautiful and innocent woman and I think this is the meaning which Tolkien is attributing to Aragorn i.e. he is handsome. This is supported by the line from Aragorn,
What then about ‘pale’? Well this is an adjective used to describe a colour so pale white, pale pink, pale brown all mean a lighter tone. Technically it is referring to the amount of pigman in relation to color rather than a colour itself. In modern parlance it has come to be interpreted as meaning white or cream in respect of ethnicity but there is absolutely nothing in Lord of the Rings in my view that suggests it has to mean that.
So Aragorn being pale and fair? It’s totally ambiguous and open to interpretation and for me there is nothing to say that Tolkien wrote Aragorn as a white man.
Tolkien’s intentions
Well given that the man is dead this is a tough one. I will say at this point that I do think the character was written as a white man; but this is not for any reason relating to race. Tolkien grew up in an environment which was almost exclusively caucasian; the people he met regularly would have been caucasian because that what Britain at the time. As a result he would undoubtedly have been influenced that way. When coupled with the fact that his personal interest was in nordic and anglo saxon myths I can see why he would be influenced to use a caucasian character. This is not racism by any means; it is simply a reflection of society and world view. Had he been born and written fifty or sixty years later then I suspect the characters would be different as all the evidence about the man suggests he was very much a person who treated people equally and saw the truth; that evil and unpleasantness is not differentiated by skin color.
Does it even matter?
Honestly? No.
Aragorn is an iconic character who is very much defined by his intentions, actions and nobility. Indeed ethnicity and gender play little part in the Lord of the Rings. So for me this depiction is simply that. A depiction. What I will say is that I do not actually like the card itself as I find the depiction of Arwen to be rather mundane and the whole piece to be a little too busy. That’s not to say I don’t admire the artist’s skill; but I envisage Arwen as more ethereal than this piece portrays her. Each to their own though.
Equally the issue clearly does not matter to the Tolkien estate. Given how fiercely they protect that IP; I very much doubt they would have agreed to the artwork if they thought it was counter to what Tolkien intended or would damage said IP. If they are happy to sign off on it then that is more than good enough for me.
Conclusion
If you had told me growing up that the culture wars would reach the level of arguing over the skin colour of a fictional character on a small piece of card in a collectible card game I would have laughed at you. It seems though that this is where we are with the perpetually online extreme right and extreme left knocking lumps out of each other and everyone else sitting in the middle wishing both sides would go away and find a new hobby.
As for Aragorn? Well its entirely up to you in my view as unless someone can find something which lists Tolkien saying he is one or the other then it is for your imagination. If you are someone who finds other people’s imagination offensive then can i suggest you stay offline, go outside and also simply not buy the product.
Well that was pretty much as expected. Adepticon dropped the Lion and the new 10th edition as most people expected so it is save to say there were no shocks in this one; though there were a few surprises. I have just finished watching a re-run (seriously annoys me that GW focused the reveal in the US rather than the UK where they are based but the US wargaming scene is more profitable I guess.) and wanted to put my initial thoughts down.
The Lion
Not a surprise this one as the narrative desperately needed another loyalist Primarch and the Dark Angels have a big fan base. That includes me as i did once have a small Ravenwing army and plan to paint my heresy models as First Legion. This sculpt though was, in my view, the best Imperial one yet and I would go so far as to say he is a better rendition of the Lion than the Forge World model! I will be buying this one when I can, though won’t be playing FOMO games. I particularly like the aged and worn look and that bareheaded hood head option is perfect in my view. Big sword, big shield and a worn, grizzled look. It kind of reminds me or Mark Hamill in Knighfall if I am honest and even though I have no intention of collecting a 40k DA force I will be getting this one.
Oh and GW better release that Lion against Angron art or I will be most displeased because that is absolutely outstanding irrespective of your views on the game.
10th Edition
I wrote earlier this week why I felt it was the wrong time for tenth and my gut still feels that way but, and I stress it is a provisional but, there were some things in that reveal which would change my mind.
The free core rules and datasheets being available for all on day one. The mechanics of this are unclear but if this is the case and that basically the codicies will be for fluff, more advanced competitive gaming or bigger scale gaming then this would be a seismic change in the game. It would make it accessible and allow updates and FAQ releases to be done quickly and would mitigate power creep. There is a lot which was not said of course i.e. codex and I am not sure I can see GW just throwing away the idea of an essential £30 book to play the game (and I have already seen a lot of complaints from those who have just had their codexes drop in 9th which is fair) so I will reserve judgement on this until more is known but even if it is just during the transitional period this is to be welcomed.
Finally, GW have seen the light and realised that not every player is a min/max meta chaser so you do not need a legal documents worth of rules. The slimmed down data cards with the new layout do look similar to those in Imperium magazine and coupled with the stratagem reduction this suggests a shift back to casual and smaller scale games rather than the horrid focus on competition which has, in my view, broken 9th. I have already seen plenty of complaints from people on the ‘six strats’ approach. When I see the words ‘thematic, fluff and themed’ from players what I tend to find they mean is ‘my army which plays every advantage to mean I win.’ If this new streamlining forces people to actually play 40k like a wargame rather than just stacking strats like top trumps. I have said many times before that playing a game where your opponent is winning due to stratagems or rules holes is not fun at all. Much remains to be seen here but so far it is promising.
I tend not to read too much into GW reveals in terms of the lore so will reserve proper judgment until I have the rulebook and also some games. We do hear the accessibility line a lot but this time it does seem that GW are actually making an effort in that direction and they deserve credit for that.
As for whether 10th will be a better and balanced edition? Guess we wait and see.
You have to hand it to GW; they know how to both build a hype train and also shoot themselves in the foot at the same time. We’re a few days out from adepticon 2023 and they simultaneously drop this
Image courtesy if Warhammer Community twitter
and then they manage to send a model out which had not even been revealed yet.
It’s a cool model but come on GW that is seriously incompetent. I never advocate people losing their jobs but I think you need to take a long hard look at your corporate security and stock control measures. The art piece though is superb, GW may not be able to keep its own secrets but it does have some amazing artists in its stable. Pieces like this do make me lament the demise of the old art print shop they used to have in the early noughties with a much bigger range than what they do now. The image predictably sent the community into meltdown and the common consensus before the Dante leak was that this was probably the tenth edition being revealed but may be a new space hulk box game. Post Dante leak/reveal it seems that all all roads to indeed lead to the tenth edition. Personally though I think that a tenth edition now is a bad thing and a boxed game would be better.
Let me stress the now part of that sentence. I have not played a game in ninth as by the time that lockdown had ended it was clear the edition was largely broken due to power creep and my necrons, never competitive at the best of times, would struggle to do very much. Coupled with my destroyed social confidence and a host of personal issues I therefore just painted minis instead. I do think a tenth edition is needed but not necessarily now. Let me explain why.
Indomitus’ dark legacy
“There will be plenty for everyone”. The famous words uttered on the day of the 9th edition box reveal. Aged well didn’t it? The reality was shortages of stock reaching LGS, website crashes and scalping galore. I managed to get a box from a little game store in Birmingham but the whole thing left a very sour taste and the outcry led to the box ending up being made to order. It was a mess and whilst no box release since has been as bad; I simply do not think that GW has improved its stock ordering and handling to deal with a big launch. You only need to see the carnage when a limited edition book or model drops. FOMO drives sales and I do not see GW going made to order from the off; so I could see a repeat of Indomitus once again. A permanent range edition of a box game in the manner of Blackstone Fortress would certainly be less problematic; though ironically it would be more expensive for me. A tenth edition would just need me to have the basic rulebook as I have all the necrons I need so I would not even be remotely tempted by a starter box of Angels and ‘Nids.
The primaris problem
This is a can which GW have kicked down the road for four or five years now. Firstborn and Primaris. It is clear that the intention is to move astartes to primaris but how do you do this without infuriating those players who have armies of firstborn marines? Carrying this over into another edition with a new codex and the inevitable new marine releases which come with it will make this worse. The astartes codex is already so bloated it is ridiculous so adding more makes me doubt that it would even be workable; and a codex firstborn and a codex primaris just feels clumsy. There are narrative ways to deal with this of course but in the code light of reality you will annoy a large chunk of your base by doing it. Personally I would like a ‘kill off’ death or glory stand for the firstborn against the Nids with Primaris surviving but a legends rule set which allows the firstborn to continue in the new edition. It is clumsy but it would clean things up a little. Suffice to say simply having a primaris space hulk would avoid the issue altogether.
It’s all about the money
Am not going to lie; wargaming is an expensive hobby and GW is certainly at the premium end of the range. The new boarding patrols retail at £90 standard RRP and whilst some have new models (and I am not going into the Farsight choice to sell the Tau box debate); I do think most are overpriced for what they are. The necron one for example has nothing new, especially when compared to the kill team set, and whilst a saving over the individual kits it is a lot. The rate of drop for the Arks of Omen sets is also driving things up; though I have avoided all of these so the idea of a full new edition box which will likely be pitched around the £150 to £210 mark if heresy is anything to go buy is a lot in the current climate. Factor in new models, codexes, dice and the bill wracks up.
Now GW is there to make money and no one forces you to buy things but the hobby is known as ‘plastic crack’ for a reason. With new codexes running at around £30 a pop and every one usually featuring at least one new model/re-release at around £20-30 RRP you would still be looking at a £100 investment if you bought just the core rulebook, a codex and one new model. In the current times that’s a lot of money and we know there are plenty who will want more than just one. It’s there choice but the timing does not sit easily with me; this time next year would potentially be a very different matter.
meta, meta and more meta
I do not meta game. I play necrons so there is little point frankly and I play them because when I started the hobby they were cheap, decent and looked cool. They still look cool and I have sunk to much money to move factions. I also like the lore for them now that the 7th edition weirdness has been cleaned up a bit; but we all know at least one person who is a meta chaser. Currently the meta is stable because every faction is out there with a rulebook; it is broken of course due to power creep but it is stable. A new edition starts the race again.
Now GW can prevent this race happening (honest) by writing all the rules at the same time, playtesting them together and then releasing on a schedule with later books getting slight tweaks based on FAQ reversions. Players will always find a loophole or weird interaction you miss in testing as any IT developer will tell you but you can minimise things. Now it could be that GW already do this but if that is the case then I can only assume that the mess of power creep in 9th is deliberate to boost sales and that would be an appalling abuse of position in my view. Personally I think playtesting is done against the last two releases and written over time as it is the only rational way I can explain the absolute mess we are currently in.
lore block
There is however one reason why tenth could be a good thing in my view.
GW writers can create great narrative lore. The fall of Cadia, War of Armageddon, Badab War are all fantastic but what GW do not do is follow it through. Remember the Necron’s plan to seal off a section of the galaxy from the warp? Never pushed on with. War of Armageddon? left hanging and as for the Emperor well that one really needs pushing on. You cannot keep dropping signs and portents but never paying them off because eventually people stop paying attention.
Now personally I think the game needs a narrative reboot to clean the decks. That means either killing off the Emperor or bringing him back (even if still trapping him on Terra due to the webway breach) and also setting up a quasi civil war between the Church and the Emperor. This would open up narrative story lines such as Guilliman actually saying the Imperial Faith is wrong, a quasi-civil war starting causing the end times which then allows all the prophecies on the lost primarchs to come about so you can bring the Lion, Russ, Vulkan and Corax back into play (I cannot remember if the Khan is dead or lost so sorry White Scars fans). The distraction lets you build up Nids, Orks and Necrons as factors again whilst also giving some scope for the Aeldari story line to actually you know, progress in a direction.
So why do this now? Well ten is a nice round number and I am a simple soul when it comes to things like that. On a more serious note though it makes sense to do it now. I feel that 40k is a narrative wargame and the lore is a big part of that; but the lore is currently totally stagnant. If GW wants to move into other spheres such as TV, movies, games etc then a full on narrative shift makes that much easier (it can also allow some of the contradictions to be cleared up). If tenth were to do this then it would be a big sell for me as I love the lore and the images it evokes; though I accept it would also end up with a shed load of costly models, campaign books etc. It would be a massive risk though and would GW be willing to depart from its current status quo.
conclusion
To be honest I will be staggered if we do not get a tenth reveal on the 23rd (it was more open when I drafted this) but on balance I think that if we do then it is not the best timing for it unless GW make significant changes to its stock controls, ordering and playtesting. I would love to be wrong and for tenth to be an edition which makes me actually want to use the 3500 points of necrons I actually have but I just cannot see it.
What are your thoughts on a new edition? Do you think it is the right time for it and what would you like to see for your faction in any new edition? Add a comment below or reach out to me on social media and let me know.
Battlefield Earth is a classic piece of pulp science fiction where the bad guys are either capitalist, greedy business beings or priests, the good guys are so good that the main character is even called ‘Goodboy’ and the good guys not only win; they totally defeat the bad guys by using their own greed against them. It seems to be the perfect novel for the current rage against the machine generation so why is it not seeing greater coverage? Simple. Despite being relatively fun it is around 600 pages too long and, to be blunt, shit.
To many people L.Ron Hubbard is best known as the founder of Scientology; and whilst you do not hear much about it these days, it does tend to colour perception of Hubbard as a bit of a crank. As for Battlefield Earth well that is best known for being a truly awful film staring John Travolta. Make no mistake it is bad but I needed to pad out a birthday gift list so added this without much expectation of my family getting it me. Oops. Still, I had it so it seemed only right and fair to read it.
Battlefield Earth is set on a future Earth where humanity has been all but wiped out by an alien race called the Psychlos who are mining the planet out for the rare and expensive minerals that exist in abundance on Earth. They found Earth as a result of recovering an unmanned probe (implied to be Voyager 1) and using their advanced tech wiped out humanity with some form of gas and then moved in. Some humans survive however and one of them is Jonnie Goodboy Tyler.
Jonnie leaves the safety of his village and is captured by a Psychlos who wants to use humanity for his own get rich scheme. Treated as an unthinking animal Jonnie is given an education using a speed learning machine as well as old books he recovered in what is revealed to be the ruins of Denver.
Have some nightmare fuel
He discovers that Earth’s captors will die if they are exposed to an oxygen atmosphere and that the gas they do breath will explode if exposed to uranium. With the aid of some of the most stereotypical scotsman ever; the first half of the book deals with them learning to use Psychlo machinery in the aide of Terl, a security chief with a desire for money.
They then use this against him by hiding nuclear weapons in the caskets of dead Psychlos and subsequently blowing the Psychlo home planet to bits. The second half of the book deals with Earth becoming a galactic superpower and Jonnie having to deal with the machinations of a bitter and jealous priest from his childhood. I am keeping this high level because, if I am honest, the second half of the book whilst interesting in places was a lot less fun than the first.
They even made an album for it
So why then is this book so shit?
Well to be fair to it there are some good elements. The concept that Earth has been invaded for mineral exploitation and corporate greed is a good one and it makes much more sense than it happening just for the sake of it. Maintaining an empire is expensive so you would only do it to make money, as our own history tells us. This gives the story a reasonable background and the geographical representations of places seems accurate. Likewise there is nothing particularly horrible with the writing style itself and whilst the plot armour is strong it does at least wrap most things up when it eventually reaches its ending.
The problem here firstly is that the book is long. Really long. The version I have is over 1000 pages and whilst that is not necessarily a problem for me, I regularly re-read The Wheel of Time, the problem here is that the story just does not support 1000 pages of narrative. There is no real character development and the plot itself is extremely linear. Hubbard attempts to add in some intrigue but its pretty surface level and boils down to greed and corruption. Despite being fun to read, due to the pulp nature, it is paced so slowly that you do often feel like wading through treacle and there is nothing at the end to show for it. This book could have been half the size and still told the same story (in fact it probably would have been better for being tighter!). I read this in about a week but at the end it was more a sense of relief than “wow that was time well spent.”
I said above that the writing style is technically decent enough. It does however fall down on character development and the stereotypes are strong with this one. Some of that is due to the age of the piece but if you are offended by books where men and men (and pretty much exclusively white for large parts of the novel), women do the cooking, cleaning and (by implication) breeding then this book will hit all your triggers. I don’t like adding racial characteristics for the sake of it but the absence of any balance here is so stark that it borders on satire. I also have to be honest that the lead being a 6ft tall, muscular blue eyed blond a little uncomfortable; it feels a little too much as it were. Also, I don’t know if Hubbard ever actually met a scottish person but the characterisation here is straight out of Braveheart. The result is a technically proficient story that feels souless.
That lack of soul also comes through with the plot. At no point did I ever feel that the good guys (with the leader of course being American because this was after all written in the 1980s) were going to loose. If there is no feeling of risk then there is no engagement and feeling of reward when they do win. I felt no connection to any character when reading this and would be hard pressed to remember any of the side ones. Likewise the almost total absence of reflection on them committing genocide is stark here. The Ender books also deal with a species genocide and do it much better (arguably dwelling on it a little too much in Speaker for the Dead).
So would I recommend this book? No. It is overly long, stereotypical and jingoistic rubbish which is fun in that you don’t have to think very hard about it or pay much attention. It’s the sci-fi b movie you find late at night which makes you smile because it is so bad but then you forget about it and never watch it again. The one saving grace is that it is not as bad as the film it spawned and for that at least we should all be grateful.
Shards of Earth is a beautifully sculpted (and yes that is an intentional pun for those who have read it) piece of science fiction which manages to blend the technical depth of ‘hard’ science fiction with the character driven fast space of space opera. I will say from the outset that this is an excellent piece of science fiction which is well worth a read. It was however a book I picked up from my local library with no small degree of trepidation. You see, I have read a book by Adrian Tchaikovsky before, Children of Time, and I did not really enjoy it. Technically I appreciated the skill in the writing but it was not really what I was after and I struggled to really link to any of the characters. I had heard good things about Shards so I gave it a go. I do not regret that decision.
So shards is set in a distant future where humanity has reached the stars, encountered alien life and has managed not to destroy itself in a civil war. That is unusual in most scifi as there is usually a backstory of human internal conflict but that is a welcome absence here. The story starts with the revelation that Earth has been destroyed, well turned into a sculpture by an alien race called the Architects. This race have since disappeared following humanity creating the Intermediaries who by a means of empathy, telepathy and science were able to somehow make the architects leave. Post was humanity is riven by post war issues with the a natavist humans (pro human all the way), the devotees of the Essiel (an alien empire which is able to protect worlds from the architects), a myriad of smaller factions all squabbling and scheming. Finally we have the all female, lab grown warriors of the Partheni (who are totally not a version of the warhammer 40k sisters of battle; please Games Workshop don’t sue). Against this backdrop we have the crew of the Vulture God who discover that the architects may not be as gone as people believe and end up on the run from pretty much everyone.
I am deliberately excluding a lot from the above because I would not want to spoil such a good book for someone. There is a lot more going on here but the above is the high points as it were.
So why is this book so good? Well the first is the setting. The decision to start with Earth essentially a footnote is a bold one. Not many authors take the chance as it is much easier to use saving Earth as the narrative but here the war in that sense is over. Earth is a dead husk nothing more and that bold choice is both refreshing and interesting. It forces over narratives to the fore and stops an easy copy out. Greg Bear and Walter John Williams have both done similar things and it is always nice to see the change. In addition to this is the fact that the world feels lived in; it feels real and alive. Events take place before the characters arrive, carry on around them and then continue after they leave. There is no sense of the characters having to do absolutely everything as people go about their own jobs and do it. The story itself is, I have to say, fairly sci-fi generic with alien races threatening humanity etc etc but there are enough little twists to keep things fresh. Where Shards really shines is in its characters and their interactions. Idris and Solace receive the most focus but the other members of the Vulture God all get a respectable amount of page time and growth. For me though the character of Solace does the real heavy lifting in making this book accessible. I joked earlier about the sister of battle call backs but she is an extremely accessible character. Despite being a vat grown super soldier she displays very relatable issues and feelings. She is conflicted about her own role and place in life, she has doubts and fears. She has an image of what her own people represent but is repeatedly confronted with differing views and fuel to her own inner doubts. She is a brilliant piece of character building which, when coupled with the excellent pacing make this book a genuine pleasure to read.
Negatives? Well I have to say the ending felt a little abrupt and on occasions it became a little hard to follow when things went quite metaphysical. I also found a typo but beyond that this was pretty much a perfect piece of science fiction. I enjoyed it so much that I have already checked Book Two out of the local library and have my Friday night sorted.
I rarely make such overt recommendations as I know my tastes can be quite unique; but this book is an exception to my own rules. It is damned good and if you do not read it then you will be causing yourself to miss out on something brilliant.
High on Life is a game you play if you want less frenzied gameplay than Doom, less zany nonsense than Saints Row 3 and are a fan of the Rick and Morty animated series. For anyone else though this game is a glob of sheer meh all over your console or PC.
I am generally not an FPS player on the basis that I usually suck at them. Spectacularly. Halo is the one exception and that was due to its story. So High on Life is not something I would normally play but I had seen a few screenshots and it was being pushed on my recommendations as being new on Xbox game pass so I decided to give it a go.
Let me be clear at this point. I am not a fan of Rick & Morty as I simply do not find it funny; though I do appreciate the writing which is in places quite clever. Had I known that this game was effectively Rick & Morty the FPS but in a different suit then I would have given it a miss. I didn’t so this review is my feelings as they happened.
The plot is pretty basic. You play a gamer who has been left home alone with his drug-using sister when aliens invade Earth with the intention of turning humans into drugs. With the aid of a talking gun (which is actually an alien) you escape and become a bounty hunter bringing down the cartel of aliens who have invaded earth. I wasn’t expecting much from the plot but the writing was clever and I have no doubt that fans of Rick & Morty will find the humour great. I found some of it slightly amusing but after a while it just started to become noise in the background and indeed I played much of this game without paying any attention to the dialogue. This is far from the norm for me as I am a solo player story driven gamer. I like the game plot but here it was just noise.
The game itself does look excellent. The colour palette is varied and vibrant and it really does pop on the screen. I have a first generation Xbox one and it ran well with decent looking textures and I did not come across any loading or crash bugs bar the usual one you sometimes get with Xbox game pass games not loading correctly. If I were to be hyper critical the loading screens felt overly long but once I was in game it ran extremely well.
In terms of gameplay this was a bit of a mixed bag. It is basically a run and gun shooter and the movement felt fine but the targeting reticule and field of view felt a little off. I still cannot put my finger on it but it simultaneously felt too wide and yet too narrow. It may just be me but I found that I could not sit and play this for long periods as it started to make me feel a bit queasy in a way that I have never had before. The actual gun play is initially fun and there are some interesting mechanics such as glob shot, mind controlling enemies and stopping time but generally it is a case of keep moving and shoot. Your primary ammo never runs out and enemies drop shields so in terms of normal enemies it is very hard to die (at least on the story mode I was on). The bosses do have some tactical elements and environmental tricks but aside from them it became very repetitive very quickly.
The problem I had with this game was that it did nothing brilliantly. I could see where the game devs were trying to be humorous and I accept I am probably not the demographic but there are other games which do alien weapon silliness better such as Saints Row 3 and there are games that do aggressive gun play better such as the reboot of Doom. Halo offers more tactical gameplay and there is not the multiplayer elements or sheer mass of Destiny. As a result High on Life just sort of is. It is a passable FPS but nothing more.
I feel that this game is trading heavily on the Rick & Morty link and the fans linking into the humour which will be instantly recognisable. The problem is that if you are not really into that type of humour then there is not much else on offer. It may make you smile once but unless you are a major fan of Rick & Morty then this game, for me, is nothing more than a glob of generic meh all over my Xbox one’s hard drive.
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