All posts by Mike

I’m an amateur astronomer, photographer, web writer, professional journalist, and a big science fiction and fantasy fan living in Metro Vancouver.
Climate, Environment

NASA finds 2014 hottest year in recorded history

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Boardgame Empire | Where board gaming, astronomy, science, science fiction and fantasy meet.
by Mike Clarke 
With files from NASA and the NOAA

It’s official. Last year was the warmest on Earth since record keeping began 135 years ago in 1880.

The announcement Friday, Jan 16, follows two separate analyses by NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA ).

It’s the third time in a decade, the Earth has set a new global temperature record.

NASA map global temperatures 1880-2014
Map showing global temperatures in 1880 (left) and 2014 (right). (NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies)

Earth broke NOAA records set in 2010 and 2005. The last time the Earth set an annual NOAA cold record was in 1911.

“The 10 warmest years in the instrumental record, with the exception of 1998, have now occurred since 2000,” said NASA in its release.  “This trend continues a long-term warming of the planet.”

Continue reading NASA finds 2014 hottest year in recorded history →

Board Game, Space

Xia: Drifting into legend

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by Mike Clarke

It’s not often you come across a game that’s such a joy to play — that takes you back to the days where you and your friends faced off across a board with a game you all knew well for a wild contest of one-upmanship with no quarter asked and none given.

Xia box shot

Xia: Legends of a Drift System is a go-anywhere, do-anything, sandbox-style adventure that brings back those heady days of oh-so-playable games where you didn’t think about rules. You just played the game.

That’s Xia. It’s  easy to learn. Its game play is intuitive. After a few sessions, you don’t need to keep looking things up.

In Xia , you’re the lowly captain of a bargain basement space scow with “brown nylon interior, low-muck, brown flooring and Humkar leather crew seats.”

Unless, of course, instead of the Swamp Rat, you pulled the Numerator, a former lifeboat for the Queen Mary XVIII with the nice white vinyl interior and metal grating on the floors.

swamp rat and numerator
The Swamp Rat (left) and the Numerator. One’s a fancy lifeboat, the other – not so much. Both are small and vulnerable.

Ignoring the faint smell of urine and cheap wine, you take the controls and power up the FTL drives.  You grin as you prepare to leave behind your old life as an accountant in one of Kemplar II’s minor principalities for a new life of danger and adventure in the largely unexplored and unpredictable post apocalyptic drift system known as Xia — the only drift system in the galaxy stable enough to support the civilizations that nearly blew it to hell more than 400 years ago.

Now I made up that narrative.  But it was inspired by the back of a couple of the ship cards and some of the history contained in the rule book. Not bad for a game that one reviewer described as dry as toast and wondered whether it needed an event deck to spice it up.

Continue reading Xia: Drifting into legend →

Science, Space, Video

Comet Lovejoy leaving solar system after surviving encounter with Sun

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Comet Lovejoy
Comet Lovejoy from the International Space Station (NASA)

Comet Lovejoy will be visible to the naked eye for the first couple of weeks in January near Orion’s belt.  For the rest of the month, you can watch it with binoculars.  The long period sun-grazing comet will not pass this way again for another 8,000 years.

Still barely visible to the naked eye as a smudge among the stars, Lovejoy has been steadily gaining visibility over the last month. On Dec. 16,  it survived a close encounter with the Sun many astronomers thought would rip apart its icy core.

Watch Comet Lovejoy encounter the Sun

NASA Youtube video loops 3 x

An armada of unmanned spacecraft documented something many astronomers thought impossible.  Lovejoy flew through the hot atmosphere of the Sun,  only 120,000 km above its surface and emerged intact — its distance from the Sun far closer than the Moon is to the Earth.

“I did not think the comet’s icy core was big enough to survive plunging through the several million degree solar corona for close to an hour,” said  Karl Battams with the Naval Research Lab in Washington DC.

At least five spacecraft recorded the comet’s close encounter:  NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory and twin STEREO probes, Europe’s Proba2 microsatellite, and the ESA/NASA Solar and Heliospheric Observatory.

Lovejoy was discovered on Dec. 2, 2011, by amateur astronomer Terry Lovejoy of Australia.  Researchers quickly realized that the new find was a member of the Kreutz family of sun-grazing comets.

Named after the German astronomer Heinrich Kreutz, who first studied them, Kreutz sungrazers are fragments of a single giant comet that broke apart back in the 12th century.

With files from NASA and space.com

Essay, featured, Universe

The universe is an egg

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ReAndy-Weir-Author-Photo-Croppedprinted with permission from author Andy Weir, this short story was named one of the four best Stumbles of 2014 by StumbleUpon. Read more from Andy at http://www.galactanet.com.

You were on your way home when you died.

It was a car accident.  Nothing particularly remarkable, but fatal nonetheless.  You left behind a wife and two children.  It was a painless death.   The paramedics tried to save you, but to no avail. Your body was so utterly shattered, you were better off. Trust me.

And that’s when you met me.

“What…what happened?” you asked. Where am I?

“You died,” I said matter-of-factly. No point in mincing words.

“There was a truck..and it was skidding…”

“Yup,” I said.

“I…I died?”

hidden lighthouse“Yup.  But don’t feel bad about it. Everybody dies, “I said.

You looked around. There was nothingness. Just you and me. “What is this place?” you asked. “Is this the afterlife?”

“More or less,” I said.

“Are you god?” you asked.

“Yup,” I replied. “I’m God.”

Continue reading The universe is an egg →

Board Game, featured

Duel of Ages II: Arena combat in a Riverworld-style fantasy

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  • by Mike Clarke
This review was first published to BoardGameGeek in Sept. 2013 
 I played Duel of Ages II last weekend and what a trip that was.
This is an adventure game on an epic scale and it’s all about the theme.  You’re playing fiction and non-fiction characters from across four ages:  Ancient, Colonial, Modern and Future. It reminds me of Riverworld where people from all ages are crammed into a single arena.

 

The back story in Duel is set in a virtual reality game of the future in which you absorb a personality matrix to become one of a number of fantasy, sci-fi, historical or fictional characters: Roy Rogers or Robin Hood anyone? Beowulf, Pat Garrett or Little Annie Oakley — she’s awful good with a gun!

Continue reading Duel of Ages II: Arena combat in a Riverworld-style fantasy →

Board Game, featured

Android: A belated apology to Kevin Wilson for killing his baby

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by Mike Clarke

This review was originally published to BoardGameGeek in January, 2011.

Much has been said about Android and what a confusing game it is. After having played it a few times since purchasing it last week, I can safely say the only thing confusing about Android to me are the criticisms that have nearly killed it and with it the hope of future expansions or additions.

What a shame.

Those who don’t get the game see Android as a collection of confusing mechanics with less than adequate game play. Many of the reviews I’ve read sum up Android with an air of authority based on, in many cases, only one play.

On one hand, they complain about how complex the game is, but are unwilling to invest the time to discover it. Many of those who had a hand in killing it crowed about its unique theme, and original mechanics, but couldn’t be bothered to devote much effort to exploring them.

Continue reading Android: A belated apology to Kevin Wilson for killing his baby →

Board Game, featured

Merchants and Marauders: Why I sailed over galleons of water for a frigate rumour

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by Mike Clarke

This review was originally published to BoardGameGeek in January 2011.

Merchants and Marauders is an epic tale of plunder and trade in the Age of Piracy. You start as a slovenly pirate with grand ambitions in a lowly sloop or a small-potatoes merchant with dreams of wealth and adventure in a bucket-of-bolts flute.

During the course of the game, you’ll ply thousands of miles of open ocean through the seas of the Carribean and along the coast of South America.

Along the way you’ll plunder and trade your way to ‘Glory’ acquiring better vessels in the form of frigates and galleons and living a story told through the ‘Events’ that shape your world, the ‘Rumours’ you find in port and the ‘Missions’ that the less adventurous denizens of the land pay you to undertake.

In so doing, you’ll be living your own personal story, which due to the rumours and missions, the different captains you get to command, their different starting ports and the random nature of the goods in demand, will be different each time you play it.

Continue reading Merchants and Marauders: Why I sailed over galleons of water for a frigate rumour →

Board Game, featured

Mice and Mystics: Is it more than a kid’s Game?

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Boardgame Empire | Where board gaming, astronomy, science fiction and fantasy meet.

by Mike Clarke

This review was originally published to BoardGameGeek in November, 2012.

Like many of you I was wondering whether Mice and Mystics would work for gamers without kids. I even opened up a forum post on the subject and got mixed reviews so I went ahead and bought the damn thing.

Last weekend, my now grown kids, former role-players both came over to try it out. Here’s our story:

We settled in around the table with some snacks and after spending a little time catching up and setting up the game, I read them the intro and off we went. Now the intro could have been a little shorter.

It’s hard to sustain an audience for a new game with a long read. However, I kept them interested by telling them they should pay attention to the characters beause they were going to be choosing which of them they wanted to play. That helped them focus on the story a little better.

Continue reading Mice and Mystics: Is it more than a kid’s Game? →

Board Game, featured

Dominant Species — or how I learned to stop worrying and love the bits

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by Mike Clarke 

This, my very first game review, was published to BoardGameGeek in December 2010. 

Since its release, Dominant Species has been coming under criticism for a number of perceived shortcomings that nearly caused me to pass on the game.

So this is a review addressing some of the criticisms which might make you reluctant (like I was) to pick it up. I’m not going to review the game play. That’s been done several times already.

People have complained the components aren’t thematic, that the board is too plain, the tiles are too thin and their artwork too simplistic and that the cards and the element tokens make the game play too random.

I was intrigued by the game, but these criticisms made me postpone buying it until there was only one copy left in my area. However, faced with the prospect of waiting until March 2013, I took the plunge and bought the last copy.

Continue reading Dominant Species — or how I learned to stop worrying and love the bits →

Board Game, featured

Ascending Empires: Is it spouse friendly?

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by Mike Clarke

This review was originally published to BoardGameGeek in June 2012.

A fellow gamer asked me to write up my thoughts on Ascending Empires as a two player spouse- friendly game after I spent a week researching a 4X (explore, exploit, expand, exterminate) game I could play with mine.

So here it is. Let’s start with: Is she clumsy?  Ascending Empires has one fairly unique feature. It uses dexterity instead of dice to simulate randomness.  You flick your ships over a smooth puzzle-piece board on, or within, a planet’s orbital “ring” allowing you to set up outposts and transfer troops as you expand your empire.

ascending empires star wars
A shot of the orbital rings on a set customized with Star Wars labels. (Jeremy Laverty/BoardGameGeek)

It’s light for a 4X game, but has a decent amount of strategy that includes a tech tree for customizing your ships.

It’s a 2-4 player game with each player represented by a coloured world. Each world has its own colour tech.  You accumulate more tech by exploring  worlds and unlocking the tech represented by that world’s colour.

Continue reading Ascending Empires: Is it spouse friendly? →