taddo

I must say that I had mixed feelings for this series when I first heard that it was announced. I still think that Star Trek itself should take some time off so that it can stew back into pop culture, but I was plesantly surprised at Broken Bow, the pilot episode. Consecutively, I've found that Star Trek series have had better and better pilots. TNG's being one of the worst that I've seen, leading to the better DS9 (albeit a bit boring), and the same with Voyager (also a bit boring, but better than the previous two), culminating with this one. It was fun to see familiar faces in a different light, like the first encounter with the Klingons and how humanity feels about the Vulcans.

The acting was standard issue for Star Trek, with a bit of scene chewing by Scott Bakula, "I'll knock you on your ASS!", and some of the familiar Vulcan non-emotional arrogant emotions. (I still think they haven't portrayed the Vulcans right since TOS.)

I think this series is set up to have some true potential, and is definately better than Voyager. Deep Space Nine is still my favorite, but it had to grow on me, I didn't like it at first. I hope this one grows on me too.

This has to be one of my favorite shows on TV right now. I just absolutely love watching these robots kick the crap out of each other! The new seasons keep getting better and better, with the current 3rd season looking to be the best yet.

For those of you that haven't seen this show yet, or just saw the spots on the Tonight Show, here's a basic breakdown.

People build some robots in varying weight classes. They then sic the robots on each other in a large cage filled with "hazzards" such as a 200 pound sledge hammer that slams down on one of the robots, or "killsaws" that spring up out of the floor. Enter laughter at the silly excitement.

Watching newcomer Mechagore carve Vlad the Impaler (the odds on favorite for the heavyweight class) into metal sushi was a trip! It goes to show, that there's all sorts of new ideas out there. I personally like the bots that are designed to kill the largest design style of robots, that being the wedges.

Personal favorites:

Lightweight: Ziggo Heavyweight: Mechagore and Mauler Superheavyweight: Toro

Now that the show is one hour long, its even more of a treat. Even if you hate machines, its a show that touches on that primal urge to break expensive stuff. (Some of the bots had over $20k put into parts/design/etc!)

This game isn't that bad for a FPS. The graphics, courtsey of the Quake III engine, are really crisp and flow really well. The game designers also noted some good features from other games, such as the alternate weapon function of Unreal Tournament, the BEST FPS IMHO. The plot revolves around you being a member of the newly created Hazzard Team. Your objective is to protect the ship from dangerous aliens. Sort of like the Starfleet Marines. I do agree with the other posters here that the beginning is truly unique and has a fresh feeling, but towards the end, especially once you invade the station, it feels more like Doom than something with some sort of intelligence or challenge. It felt nice to have all the cast members voice their characters, even Chell, a small part that appeared in 2 episodes shows up as one of the major characters in the game.

I found one mistake the designers made was making the game WAY too linear. I wish you had to pay the consiquences for your actions. Say if you disentegraged Tuvok, which I did many times to see what would happen, how the plot would then change. Maybe you could join the pirates and take over Voyager, and then try and free yourself from the forge from there. I think allowing you a little more leway of what you can do and where you can go would have spiced this game up a bit more. I also found the reactions of the bots to be really rude. If I had a weapon I wanted to disintegrate them. So if the designers are thinking of making a sequel, they should try some of the above approaches. I think that could make a very interesting game. That and ditch the Quake III engine, which is nice but not as pretty as the Unreal Tournament engine.

As for the multi-player aspects of the game, they were pretty standard fare for a FPS. You had your capture the flag, free for all, etc. Commanding the bots on your team was a bit of a hassle. It was rare that they listened to you and managed to just stand around. These are some minor flaws however. Over all this is a nice game, and definately something to add to your collection if you're a fan of first person shooters (FPS).