3 Green Fish

Lois McMaster Bujold has firmly established herself as one of the masters of imaginative fiction with her previous work. Her Miles Vorkosigan series (which you should read, if you haven’t) is one of the best science fiction series I’ve read. In recent years she’s turned towards writing fantasy, and it’s clear that she has a solid sense of just how much to reveal to the reader, and when to reveal it. She manages to continually supply just enough information about this world of her devising to keep the story interesting.

It’s a nicely imaginative world, filled with just enough magic and mystery to seem fantastical, but not so much that it’s overdone. There are strange monsters known as malices, the magical groundsense of the Lakewalker people, and hints of a long-lost connection between them and the normal folk they protect. The story focuses on Fawn, a young farmer woman running away from home, and Dag, a grizzled, one-handed Lakewalker, the veteran of many battles with malices. You can see the romance coming from a mile away, but Bujold has a talent for writing these sorts of romances and characters, and it’s quite an engaging book.

Bujold has a knack for presenting setting in an unobtrusive way, a few short sentences here and there making up the bulk of the scenery description. It’s not enough to distract from the story, but just enough to give you the picture you need to go on. She also has a good sense of humor and an easy-to-read style that keeps the pages turning. My main complaint is about the narrative arc, as there seems to be a tendency for the stakes to be lowered rather than raised as the pages go by. The story starts off with a bang, and never quite gets back to that height by the end of the book. There is, however, a second volume that just came out in hardcover, so this tale might be one that needs to be read in full before such judgments can be made.

The Sharing Knife, volume 1: Beguilement, by Lois McMaster Bujold. New York: Eos, 2006. $7.99 in paperback. Amazon link.

Welcome to Round 3 of my conceptual* comparison of the three current generation video game consoles. You can go back to round 1 and round 2 if you like.

(*I say “conceptual” because I don’t own any of them. I have played extensively on the 360 and Wii, and very briefly on the PS3. This is not in any way based on direct comparative playtesting.)

Coming into this week, the Playstation 3 is barely in the lead, with the 360 close behind and the Wii trailing. It’s not really the Wii’s fault. Round 2 looked at power, an area where the Wii is outclassed significantly, and Round 1 despite being all about controllers, ended up a wash. Today we look a few things that the Wii just might have an advantage in: price, and backward compatibility.

For those who aren’t aware, backward compatibility is a feature in consoles that allow them to run games programmed for previous console generations. This usually increases a new console’s software library and also allows gamers to play their favorite games from previous generations, at least in an ideal world.

Playstation 3

When it comes to price, the PS3 is like a mugger demanding your wallet. Currently clocking in at $499 for the 60 GB model and $599 for the 80 GB model, it’s easily the most expensive console on the market. Still, I can’t ignore the fact that the components that go into the PS3 still cost more than the final price. As for backward compatibility, the cheaper model actually contains PS2 hardware(!), thus providing a great deal of support for PS2 and PS1 games. The newer models use software emulation for this feature, reducing the percentage of games that can be run. The number currently stands at about 72% in Europe (that’s 1,782 games), and a similar number can probably be expected in the United States.

Xbox 360

The Premium 360 (with a 20 GB hard drive) costs $349 in the US, while the Elite model (with a 120 GB hard drive) costs $449, undercutting the PS3’s price considerably. The less useful Core model, which lacks a hard drive entirely, retails for a mere $279, but is still more expensive than Nintendo’s rather cheap Wii. The cost for components on the 360 is actually less than the the current market price, but I’m unclear on whether Microsoft is really making a profit on consoles after things like marketing are added into the mix. The 360’s backward compatibility isn’t particularly impressive, and is limited to emulating the original Xbox’s software library. 394 Xbox games are currently playable on the 360. Since it took until November of 2006 for the critically acclaimed, award-wining Psychonauts to show up on the 360, It’s pretty clear that Microsoft isn’t too big on the whole backward compatibility deal.

Wii

The Wii is cheap. You get a console, a remote-shaped controller with a “nunchuk” attachment, and a Wii Sports game for just $249. Given that new games generally cost about $50, that’s about 200 bucks for the console itself. GameCube games can be played right out of the box, and Nintendo is releasing older games from its older console via its online Virtual Console (many of these require that a separate Classic Controller be purchased). With the exception of the GameCube games, these are all emulated, and the selection is entirely dependent upon what Nintendo chooses to release.

And this week’s winner is…

Next Week: The Media take over!

I got two pages done yesterday, and another two and a half done today, the last day of August. You know what that means! That means I need to look back at my goals for August… let’s see. Ah, yes:

1. Finish Part 1.
2. Average 2 pages per day.

Where am I at? Well, I didn’t finish part 1, although I came awfully close. I have another, say, two chapters and 10 pages, maybe, before part 1 is finished. Not bad. And, I’ll have you note, I accomplished goal #2, and just barely squeaked out 62 pages in a 31-day month. Woo!

I’m pretty happy about that. I also broke into the official ranks of the novel, by increasing my word count to over 40,000 words! Okay, so I’m at 40,920 words right now, but still. If I keep up this rate I’ll be at 120,000 words by the end of October. Pretty spiff.

On the flip side, I’m burning out again. Not really happy with anything I write, which means it’s time for another break. It seems I need a weekend every two weeks, approximately, so that’s not too bad at all. Especially if I make lots of progress in the meantime.

So yep, no excerpt as I’m too tired to find something I actually like that doesn’t give away big plot points. I’ll be back at it in a couple days, hopefully refreshed and working at a higher caliber. Have a nice Labor Day weekend, everyone!