T.K. Wade -- Author: June 2024

Wednesday, June 26, 2024

Fairy Tale Spotlight: Brown John's Body [Short Story Review]

[I spoil the entire story.]

"Brown John's Body" is a short science fiction story written by Winston K. Marks. It was published in 1955. It's a rat story!

This was a very short and grungy story about a cold-hearted, evil man who lived his life away from society. He incurred the distrust of most people by just being surly with everyone. It also didn't help that he shot a kid's dog for being near his property. Also his name was Erd Neff. What kind of horrible name is that?!

Anyway, the thing that made this man so interesting is that he had a pet project at home. He managed to teach a rat, named Brown John, how to speak English, although the muzzle of a rat isn't really made for pronouncing words fluently. This is something that I feel the author handled extremely well. That rat would pronounce the first letters of the alphabet like this: "Eh, bih, fih, dih, ih, eff, jih, etch..." It was about as good as a rat could do it.

Erd did not treat the rat good at all, although he would feed him food. It was a vile relationship, but it was something the rat put up with in order to get free snacks. That's actually very much rat behavior, but if you think on it, Erd was kind of acting like a rat too. It was a human rat owning a real rat.

I didn't really want to spoil such a great story, but it's just so short and I want to talk about it. The thing Erd didn't understand about Brown John is that animals may seem like they are your friends, but they are still animals at the end of the day. There comes a point where Erd was invaded by a group of kids who were sore about him shooting their dog. They tied him up and locked him up in his own unventilated home.

He calls for his Brown John to come and gnaw the ropes off him, but the rat is a bit more interested in the free meat that Erd seems to be offering him. Yep, little Brown John may have learned to speak English, but he's still a rat. Why would he pass up a meal like Erd Neff? It's a brutal ending, but it's honestly perfect.

I absolutely loved "Brown John's Body." I tend to like rat stories anyhow, such as with Percy in the Oz books. Winston Marks did a good job showing us the dark side of rats, and I really appreciate him for doing so. I recommend this story a whole damn lot.

This blog was written on May 24, 2024.

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Monday, June 24, 2024

Fairy Tale Spotlight: The Test Colony [Short Story Review]

[I only spoil the main premise of the story.]

"The Test Colony" is a short science fiction story written by Winston K. Marks. It was published 1954.

The title of this one is pretty on point. It involves the first interplanetary colony from Earth. They land on a planet they think is uninhabited, but they soon find out that there is a primitive yet intelligent alien race living there. This gives them some concern since they don't know if it will prove a problem or not.

These natives obsessively drink from a fruit called a "tala" which makes them drunk. They also seem to live their lives for fun and play... while also being drunk. So the race tends to lean towards hedonism. Also they only live for like three years, so I figure that might not be such a bad thing if you want your race to survive. Short lives mean quick breeding.

The problem for the humans was that the colonists were beginning to get the same habits from the aliens. The leaders become concerned that this could pose a problem for their colony. Everyone needs to help one another and do their assigned work... not just live their life for play. This is when the leaders begin considering the genocide of the entire race of aliens.

The idea is this: they give them free tours of their medical facility. When they get to the X-ray scanner, they give them a dose that will render them all infertile. In only a few years, the entire race would be wiped out. The idea of this is enough to make one sick which is why they kept this plan from most of the colonists.

Now, this plan does not go entirely as they expected, and I do think this story is good enough not to spoil. It's not the best scifi I ever read, but I think it still deserves to be recommended. "The Test Colony" does a good job of not pulling punches on some very serious topics. The consequences of people's actions are well explained, and I think its a story ultimately worth reading.

This blog was written on May 24, 2024.

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Wednesday, June 19, 2024

Fairy Tale Spotlight: Robocop: Rogue City [Video Game Review]

"Robocop: Rogue City" is a video game released in 2023. I am actually a fan of all three Robocop movies, including the third one that everyone hates and also the remake. I do think that the third movie is severely weak though. I also owned the first Robocop video game for the NES when I was a kid and played it to death. Ironically, I played the game without actually having seen the first movie at all, but I still loved it.

This game was not the first attempt to turn Robocop into a first person shooter, but it is the one that they got right. It takes place between the second the third movie which means that we get to keep his partner Lewis. (To be honest, the fact that Lewis is killed in the third film is one of the major reasons the film isn't very good. I actually liked his jetpack thingy!)

The new game actually goes with the design scheme of the original films. Everything looks like it came right out of the 80's/90's. Detroit looks... well... pretty much like it does today. In fact, I always thought it was odd that they somehow managed to make it a bit more violent than it actually is, which is really saying something.

Graphicly everything is crisp, but they did not do a very good job animating people's faces. It looks like everyone is dead but still somehow talking. This is more something I was used to seeing in the early to late 2000s in games. Seeing it now is a little off-putting. Everyone's characterization was great though!

As far as the gameplay... well... You're Robocop doing violent Robocop things. Criminals show up, and you blow their limbs off with the world's most unfair pistol given to a cop. It is just as violent as the movies, and I am glad they did that. They even have a modification you can add to your gun that has no other purpose but to make gunshot wounds more gory. I thought that was hilarious.

The plot of the game was always interesting. It had to do with a man named Wendell who had found some way to cause Robocop to glitch. It's being seen by the people of Detroit which is lessening their opinions of the project. There's also a lot of other things too, because this game has a lot happening at one time. There's a project to rebuild Detroit to get rid of crime, a political campaign you can get involved with, and some sort of project that can make people immortal... or something. There's also crime. Like... just regular crime.

The latter is referring to the fact that you are occasionally just sent out to solve small cases. Some of these are very good, but others are as simple as printing tickets for parking violations. I personally found most of these segments to be a bit boring. After all, Robocop cannot run. He walks everywhere, and you are not allowed to drive a vehicle... ever. The idea, however, is to make it clear that you are actually a cop and not just some robotic killing machine... although you are a robotic killing machine.

I do have a couple annoying complaints. One has to do with a political campaign happening in the game. No, no. It wasn't because their was a political problem per se. I actually liked that part. The two candidates are both trying to get your endorsement, which is a neat idea. The execution, however, kinda sucked.

Sometimes you would give your endorsement from telling them you do, and other times just talking to a candidate would be the same as endorsing them. How is that even a thing? You can talk to a political candidate without endorsing them. It's called communication! But the real fawx pas was when they finally ask which candidate you endorse towards the end. I did not want to suppose either of them, but the option they give you makes him say "I support no one." Big fail. Even though this is technically true, it would have made more sense for him to say something like, "I support the people of Detroit." I would have loved that so much more, and it was what I really wanted to say when I chose the non-political option.

The second annoyance was the pistol upgrading system. It was a needlessly complicated mess. It took me a long time to figure out how it worked, and, even when I did, I still hated it. I just about wanted to ignore it entirely, but you kind of have to figure it out by the end of the game or else your gun will be too underpowered.

Those two criticisms aside, this game was 21 hours of brilliance. I loved it and I do recommend it. You should play this game. It captures the look and feel of the old Robocop movies and most importantly treats the character with a lot of love. It's nice to see a game come out that isn't full of political garbage now and again.

This blog was written on May 20, 2024.

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Monday, June 17, 2024

Fairy Tale Spotlight: Mate in Two Moves [Short Story Review]

[Only minor spoilers included.]

"Mate in Two Moves" is a short science fiction story written by Winston K. Marks. It was published in 1954. It was a bit longer than most of his works, so it took me a while to read it.

This story is fairly relaxed. It is about two medical scientists named Murt and Phyllis dealing with a rather amusing problem. The world seems to be going through a very strange pandemic that is causing people to fall hopelessly in love. An actual "love bug!"

The problem with this virus is that it is so powerful that it keeps everyone very distracted, sometimes to their detriment. People are quitting their jobs over the obsessions they are having with the opposite sex, and some of them are getting married without really thinking any of it over.

Even worse is that people who are already married are also affected. They get extremely depressed or jealous whenever away from their spouse. As silly as the virus is, it is actually making problems in the world, and the two scientists are working to figure out a cure... that is until they get infected themselves.

That's all I want to spoil about this one. The thing I like about this story is how well the characters are presented. They seem like real people dealing with a very odd problem. The ending made me smile. I honestly don't really have a complaint for this one.

Yes, I recommend "Mate in Two Moves." It's mainly for more casual readers though. This is more like soft scifi. It's there to give you something to think about, and it leaves you with a smile for having experienced it. Give it a read if that sounds like fun to you.

This blog was written on May 15, 2024.

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Wednesday, June 12, 2024

Fairy Tale Spotlight: Star Wars: Dark Forces Remaster [Video Game Review]

"Star Wars: Dark Forces Remaster" is a first-person-shooter game developed by Nightdive Studios and released this year in 2024. It is the remastered version of the old LucasArts game from 1995. I had a bone to pick with this one since I spent a lot of time trying to get it set up with controller support (a hobby of mine), and I just could not swing it. It was always a disaster, and it made playing the game a chore. I also played the Playstation version from 1996 back in the day, and I did not enjoy the controls for that one, although I think I did beat it.

This game is the first in the "Dark Forces" series which spanned five incredible games. It was good that Nightdive managed to bring it to modern gaming machines so that we could all enjoy it again. It's rough though. I mean, it looks like they did as good as they could, but I do have some issues.

The story is about rebel mercenary Kyle Katarn as he battles the empire with an assortment of guns. Seriously, the whole game is him murdering an absolute ton of Storm Troopers. He's a one-man-army. But there is more to it than that. There are specific mission critical elements that you have to fulfill, which was one of the first FPS games to try that sort of thing. I'm both impressed and annoyed by this.

These mission objectives are sometimes really difficult to figure out and often leads to confusion. They did not always make what you were supposed to do clear in those old games. The Sewer and Detention Center is a good example of this. I ended up running in circles, not knowing where I was supposed to go.

Also I think a button in the Fuel Station was bugged. There was a button that just would not activate if I did not just go directly to it at the beginning of the level. That drove me crazy! I restarted that mission almost five times.

Apparently all of these problems are from the original game. Nightdive just left them in and fixed everything else. This is a bit surprising because Nightdive is known to slightly improve the games they refurbish. I guess they either did not want to or couldn't this time around.

Other than those problems I mentioned, this game is an absolute blast. When you aren't trying to figure out objectives, the combat in this game is very satisfying. The Imperial Base was probably my favorite. They had the most enemies in that all lined up for slaughter, even on easy mode. I guess the game is kind of a mixed bag, but I liked it.

There is also a single new level to play called "The Avenger." This was apparently the original first level that was scrapped because they thought it was too hard. I kind of agree with that. It felt like a level that would have been more appropriate much later in the game. I did enjoy it though, and I am glad they included it. It somewhat incentivized the high price of $30, but honestly I would have appreciated some map revisions as well. Darn.

I do recommend "Star Wars: Dark Forces Remaster," even for the price. I think it is pretty awesome that they took such an antiquated game and brought it to the modern era. This is something that needs to keep happening. I hope they continue on with the rest of this series as well.

This blog was written on May 10, 2024.

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Monday, June 10, 2024

Fairy Tale Spotlight: The Hour of the Gate [Book Review]

"The Hour of the Gate" is the second novel in the "Spellsinger Saga" written by Allan Dean Foster. It was published in 1984. I reviewed the first book ("Spellsinger") a while back.

If you tried to read this book without reading the first one, then you'd be 100% screwed. This does not feel like so much of a sequel as it does the second half of a giant book. It absolutely does nothing to help you with the first book in any way. You pretty much have to read "Spellsinger" to understand anything. It's kind of a shocking way to do a second book in a series. I haven't quite run into this phenomenon before.

The story continues the adventures of Jon-Tom, a law student that was zapped into a fantasy world with talking animals, as he and his party attempt to thwart an attack by a race of insects called the Plated Folk. The Marxist dragon Falameezar is back again, but not quite as much as the last time. And there is a new riverboat pilot character named Bribbens, a frog, who joins the party.

There is also spiders. Yes, there is a whole race of spiders called Weavers introduced in this book. Not my favorite thing to read about, but Foster did a fairly good job at making them seem beautiful in some way. My only complaint is that all of their dialog is written without any capital letters. I think he was trying to make them sound like they were whispering, but I would have rather he had typed it out normally.

The first book was actually full of a lot of humor, but this one was so serious that I barely found myself smiling at all. It was a book about war, armies, and trying to form allies. There were a lot of scary parts too. It was all well told, but I kind of missed the humor of "Spellsinger."

Once again, Allan has trouble with pacing, although they did seem like they kept moving in this one. There were not as many scenes where they were just standing around for full chapters just talking to each other. I did feel like slow progress was happening.

Where Allan did seem to have trouble was in managing a large group of main characters. At times, the main party could have up to nine or more characters, and some of those characters would not be mentioned at all for full chapters. This made me sometimes forget that they were there or think they had left the party altogether. And then suddenly they say something, and I am left shocked that they were still present. This was unfortunately a problem for the entire book.

The ending was a bare pass. It worked, but I have read better conclusions in other books. I've heard that the rest of the series is much more light-hearted than this one. It seems to be the black sheep of the whole set. That's good, I guess!

Now, I did recommend the first book, but I feel bad about not recommending the second. After all, the first book is half the bloody story. I think the completionism factor of "The Hour of the Gate" is good enough to recommend, but you should just be forewarned that it is a slow, dark, and very serious story with an ending that just barely manages to handle its wrap-up in an appropriate manner. In short, it's good enough!

This blog was written on May 9, 2024.

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Wednesday, June 5, 2024

Fairy Tale Spotlight: Forsyte's Retreat [Short Story Review]

[I do not spoil the ending of this story.]

"Forsyte's Retreat" is a short science fiction story written by Winston K. Marks. It was published in 1954.

The story here is about a man named Sextus Forsyte, a man who really does not like being out in the open. He doesn't want fame or fortune. He just wants a job where he can be out of the way where nobody knows or cares about him... like a hotel manager!

The hotel he ended up with was very small, offering something like 250 rooms. But there's a problem. The hotel has been modified so that the elevators can take the guests to the same rooms but at different times in history. Therefore the hotel actually has thousands of rooms available. Despite this, the hotel only has enough employees for if it was just a regular hotel, causing the place to be severely understaffed.

On top of the chaos, the mechanism that allows the hotel to operate in this way is breaking down. This is causing some people to just spontaneously appear in people's rooms as the time field collapses here and there... and Mister Forsyte has to handle all of these complaints.

Now, this story has a hilarious and fun ending, and I think this story is so good that I won't be spoiling it. I do recommend it, and I think you should dig it up and read it. The stories of Winston K. Marks are easy to find. In fact, you might be able to just listen to his stories over YouTube or something. Give this one a read; you won't regret it.

This blog was written on May 6, 2024.

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Monday, June 3, 2024

Fairy Tale Spotlight: Breeder Reaction [Short Story Review]

[I completely spoil this story.]

"Breeder Reaction" is a short science fiction story written by Winston K. Marks. It was published in 1954. This one had me scratching my head.

So the whole story is from the perspective of a man working for the advertising wing of a cosmetic company. One of the women there claims she has a new product with a new additive in it that supposedly makes a person look radiant. And the proof is there that it does indeed work. Even so, the guy just doesn't like it and so turns her down, but she tricks him into signing an agreement to do it anyways.

Turns out this stuff works so well that they have to put the special element into all their products which makes everyone... absolutely everyone... become radiant looking. The problem is, however, that this new element has been untested. The testing actually begins after it takes the world by storm.

Hilariously, we find that the untested element just makes people pregnant... somehow. Even men. So now everyone's pregnant. That's pretty much how it ends. It ends with everyone pregnant. Use lipstick and get pregnant. Use shampoo and get pregnant. They even point out that the men will need Cesarean sections just to get the poor babies out. (Right. Yeah. Even Winston didn't wanna go there.)

What in God's name is this author's obsession with pregnancy and men getting pregnant? He did this back with "Unbegotten Child," which I thought was just him pitching his version of evolution. But no! This guy really seems to like or at the very least think a lot about people getting pregnant! Everybody! You, me, your cousin Joe, the president... everybody gets pregnant. Why? Why, I ask you?

Anyways, the story actually wasn't so bad. I recommend it because it's so short, and you might get a chuckle from its delivery. Maybe the guy was just trolling us. I don't know.

This blog was written on May 4, 2024.

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