More Posts By Peter
Collected: Primordia by Wormwood Studios
COLLECTION: Primordia is a beautiful and atmospheric point-and-click-game, following the story of Horatio Nullbuilt, an android living in a crashed ship in the desert wasteland, who has his life turned upside down when a hostile robot steals his ship’s power core. Horatio is determined to scavenge the post-apocalyptic wasteland for a new core, but Crispin, his self-built sidekick, suggests that perhaps it would be easier to find one in Metropol, the city of glass and light…
Review: Blue Mars – Kim Stanley Robinson
Part 3 in the Mars Trilogy – With the terraformation of Mars well underway and the Earth recovering from a series of apocalyptic floods that reshuffled the deck of power, tensions between the planets start to rise as overpopulated Terra views the the unsettled lands of Mars with jealous eyes. Once more, the members of the First 100 must play their part in the politics that ensue to save the Red Planet from a wave of Terran imigration that will swamp the ambitious Utopian project on Mars.
Review: Children of Mother Earth/Kinderen van Moeder Aarde – Thea Beckman
Part 1 in the Children of Mother Earth Trilogy – Following the nuclear apocalypse of World War III and a resulting shift in the Earth’s axis, the formerly ice-covered island of Greenland has turned into the lush paradise of Thule. Its inhabitants are determined to build a society that will not devolve into the violent cauldron of pollution and hatred that was 21st century civilisation. Pacifistic, matriarchal, and deliberately not-industrialised, the culture of Thule rejects everything that led to the destruction of the previous world order. But when Thule is ‘discovered’ by steam-powered warship from the Badener Empire that arose out of the ashes of former Europe, all of Thule’s beliefs are challenged.
Review: The Peripheral – Amazon Prime
Flynne’s brother is hired by a shady company out of Columbia to beta-test the most real sim videogame ever played. Flynne subs for him, and can hardly believe what she is playing. As her suspicion towards the simulation grows and she pushes to speak to their ostensibly Colombian employers, she learns that this is no mere simulation. This starts a process that will rock Flynne’s perception of the world she lives in to her core.
Review: The Peripheral – William Gibson
In near future rural US, Flynne’s brother, a retired marine, makes a little money helping rich folks beat video games. One day, Flynne subs for him, dropping into a surprisingly real game world where she witnesses the gruesome death of one of the game characters.
In a not quite as near future London, Wilf Netherton drops out of contact with his former boss after an attempt to make a documentary on the inhabitants of the great pacific garbage patch goes south spectacularly. A new opportunity to use his skills as a publicist soon presents itself.
Review: Caliban’s War – James S.A. Corey
Part two of The Expanse – Jim Holden and the crew of the Rocinante once again find themselves at the center of the solar system’s politics when they discover that the use of a secret weapon on the agricultural moon of Ganymede is about to turn the tension between Earth and Mars into a war that may cause the end of all humanity. Meanwhile, Bobby, a Martian marine caught in the fighting, forges an unlikely alliance with Chrisjen Avasarala, a foul-mouthed grandmother who happens to hold a lot of strings in the Earth government.
Review: The Priory of the Orange Tree – Samantha Shannon
On the island of Inys, the queen of a thousand-year old line is believed to keep the coming of the Nameless One, the great wyrm from the Abyss, at bay. One of her handmaidens, brought by an ambassador from the far south, is far more than she seems. Across the ocean on the other side of the Abyss, on the dragon-worshipping Island of Seiiki, a young girl dreams of joining the clan of dragon riders, training hard every day to force her dream to come true. In the same city, an old man spends his days on a trading post, banished from across the ocean and dreaming of lost love and his return. As the wyrms of the world stir, their fates will converge.
Review: Your Name – Makota Shinkai
A girl from a small town and boy living in Tokyo find themselves swapping bodies in their dreams through a mysterious twist of fate. As they navigate each other’s lives and share unique experiences, an unexpected connection forms between them. However, just as they start to unravel the enigma behind their extraordinary link, a startling revelation threatens to upend everything.
Review: Green Mars – Kim Stanley Robinson
As the terraforming of Mars progresses and the population continues to grow, the influence of the big metanational corporations that control the earth is starting to grow as well. An ‘underground’ movement of early settlers and their children forms in response, seeking to channel the powers that be towards the political and climatological future for Mars as they envision it.
Review: Dune Messiah – Frank Herbert
Part two of the Dune Saga – his entire life, Paul “Muad’dib” Atreides has struggled against his fate. Now that he has attained it, what is left for him is to safeguard his family and his legacy against enemies within and without of the palace, some as far away as the edge of the universe, and some as near as the inner circle of the emperor himself.
Review: BioShock: Rapture – John Shirley
In this prequel to the BioShock video game series, ultra-wealthy tycoon and passionate libertarian Andrew Ryan sets out to build a city at the bottom of the sea, to escape the looming threat of atomic war and the constant interference of parasitic governments and petty morality. As the project advances, however, others try to take advantage of Rapture’s ‘freedom’. As art, scientific experimentation and exploitation of the working classes run rampant and the city itself starts to spring its first leaks, will Ryan and those loyal to him be able to maintain their ideological positions?
Review: Red Mars – Kim Stanley Robinson
In the near future, mankind sets out to colonise Mars. But as tensions within even the first 100 colonists starts to rise and the first cracks begin to show, the question rises whether mankind will ever come to an agreement on what life on Mars means for the shared future of humanity.
As the colonisation progresses and man’s impact on the planet keeps growing, the disagreements between the first 100 turn into full blown gloves off interplanetary politics. Still, the personal relationships between those first settlers may prove pivotal in preventing worse.