Between Kevin Kelly and Sly Stallone, What Trek's Writers Missed.

In Season Two of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, the writers had things go badly of the rails in the Demilitarized Zone between the #Federation and the #Cardassians. It's good plotline and not the problem. Things in the DMZ basically went wrong because the Federation signed a bad treaty. The #Maquis plotline shows us what happened to the #Colonists who stayed. But that is only half of the equation.

People in 24th century are smart. Are we to believe that nobody sensed that this treaty would be really bad and got out of dodge before the hammer fell? And where did those people end up? In my version of #StarTrek, some of these people founded the lasted version of Nothing, Arizona. Some people might say that doesn't gel with Star Trek as we know it. But I respectfully disagree.

Let's wind things back a bit and asked the question....Why did those colonists move out there in the first place? I would answer with a simple: Earth has become boring. But it's deeper then that. So I'd like to quote Kevin Kelly at this point:

“A world without discomfort is utopia. But it is also stagnant. A world perfectly fair in some dimensions would be horribly unfair in others. A utopia has no problems to solve, but therefore no opportunities either.”

Part of human nature is that to grow, to learn, we have to leave our comfort zone. #Earth (and the other core Federation worlds) have become one giant comfort zone. So to find growth, to find challenges, the colonists left and settled at the border of Federation space. And now those people are forced back into the core of the Federation. Where - having spent years on the borders - they no longer fit in. Or to quote the 1993 movie Demolition Man, starring Sly Stallone (and Wesley Snipes):

See, according to Cocteau's plan, I'm the enemy. Cause I like to think, I like to read. I'm into freedom of speech and freedom of choice. I'm the kind if guy who wants to sit in a greasy spoon and think, "Gee, should I have the T-bone steak or the jumbo rack of barbecued ribs with the side order of gravy fries?" I want high cholesterol. I want to eat bacon, butter and buckets of cheese, okay? I want to smoke a Cuban cigar the size of Cincinnati in a non-smoking section. I wanna run through the streets naked with green Jello all over my body reading Playboy magazine. Why? Because I suddenly might feel the need to. Okay, pal? I've seen the future, you know what it is? It's a 47-year-old virgin sittin' around in his beige pajamas, drinking a banana-broccoli shake singing "I'm an Oscar-Meyer Wiener". You wanna live on top, you gotta live Cocteau's way. What he wants, when he wants, how he wants. Your other choice: come down here, maybe starve to death.

Now replace Cocteau with the word Federation and you realize the exact pickle that these (former) colonists are in. So what do they do, they find a ghost town that is off the grid. That officially doesn't exist and where they can life as they see fit. Without the Federation breathing down their necks about 'correct' and 'healthy' living.

And thus the town of Nothing, #Arizona was founded once again in 2367. (I can't speak of the actual, real-life founding of 1977. I wasn't there. I wasn't even born.) Of course, this is just my #fanfiction interpretation. #Canon / #Official Star Trek has never addressed this issue. Hopefully it will do so one day.

(Just for the record. Once the town was founded, it attracted others that had fallen through the cracks of Federation society. Including, ironically, Cardassians refugees, deserters and dissidents. Fueled by the Dominion War, Nothing has a population of rough 900 people by the end of 2375.)

Regards,

Ruben Hilbers

PS: The Forgotten Frontier website is: https://startrekforgottenfrontier.eu/

Are the Clouds the key to Mass Effect 5?

 

I was thinking about the end of Mass Effect 3 and then I realized something. When we see the effect of the Crucible affect the Mass Relay network, we see it travel the galaxy. But, here's the thing, we see it travel ONLY the galaxy. 

How is this news? After all, Mass Effect Andromeda made it clear that the Reapers were only a Milky Way problem. Because if we zoom out just a bit, we see that the Milky Way has several satellite dwarf galaxies.

There's the Sagittarius Dwarf Spherical Galaxy and two Magellanic Clouds, one big and one small. And the end of the Mass Effect 3 shows crystal clear that they are not affected by the crucible's energy.

Which raises the question: Why? The simplest answers....Because they don't have any Mass Relays. They are outside the network. Which also puts them outside the cycles and the Catalyst's experiment. And in the millions of years and thousands of cycles, nobody has figured it out? I'm having a hard time believing that.

This also raises questions about the Andromeda Initiative and the Benefactor. Why foot the bill for a mission to Andromeda when there are three safe zones on your doorstep in universe terms? What's in those dwarf galaxies that the Benefactor doesn't want the people of the Milky Way to see? Could be our old friends, the Jardaan? Could the Benefactor BE a Jardaan? Let's ponder that for a second...

We know that the Andromeda Initiative's secret goal was to ensure the survival of the Milky Way species. But what if the Benefactor already figured out that the Milky Way species coming out on top was only a matter of time? And because the Benefactor is a Jardaan, they also knew what would happen once they were gone...a Jardaan invasion and enslavement of the Milky Way. 

So funding the Andromeda Initiative isn't about the Milky Way species surviving the Reapers. It's about them surviving what the Benefactor knew was coming after they were gone. And if Jien Garson figured out that was why the Benefactor footed the bill....well, that would give them motive to have Garson killed.

And that's all I have,

Regards,

Ruben A. Hilbers (@Dantes74302) 

Sorry, #Machinegames, but that's shitty writing...

So, I am a big fan of the #Wolfenstein games, but I have to be a bit critical of a scene they wrote in the New Colossus. After you liberate a cell in #NewYork, when you come back to your base, one of the new characters - SuperSpesh - freaks out at the sight of a working #toilet and quickly goes to use it.

Why is this such a big deal ? Well, the base in question is a nuclear SUBMARINE. And even a complete military nobody like me knows that the toilets aboard #submarines are special, pressurized and complicated gear. You can't just park a civy on the privy and hope it works out. It does in the game.

But, sorry #Machinegames, the most realistic outcome is that it would hit the van and everything and everybody else within a couple of meters. I know, eww !

Regards,

Ruben A. Hilbers

PS. The point of this article was to demonstrate then when you try to write a "hard" (meaning: following the rules of reality and physics) world, even missing the smallest detail(s) can break the immersion. This is true for all writing, but especially for computer game writing, since the player gets to walk around in your world and see it first (or third) person.

The Mass Effect spin-off of my dreams

BioWare Yep, I'm pitching again. So, enough preamble, let's get to it. Say hello to...

Mass Effect: C-Sec

One of the coolest - and most beloved - places in the Mass Effect Trilogy is the Citadel. A massive space-station that is the beating heart of galactic politics. There is just one problem with the Citadel....we get to see too little of it. Yes, we get snippets in all three games. (Which get smaller as the trilogy goes along.) But this place is MASSIVE, with so much potential for characters and adventures.

One of these characters is Owen Bailey. A Captain in Citadel Security when we first meet him in Mass Effect 2, he is promoted to Commander by Mass Effect 3. And it is this promotion that puts our character on a collision course with destiny. Because when Bailey is promoted, our (customizable) protagonist is promoted to take over his old post...

The Story

Our hero - let go with male and call him Mike - is promoted one week before the start of the Reaper War. Mike has barely read-up on all the files and gotten his new clearance level nailed down when all hell breaks loose. He now has to keep his people safe and do what he can to protect the innocent from the horrors of war. And then there's Cerberus...

The main story would end with the Crucible firing. It would be dependent upon which ending you picked in Mass Effect 3 and how much War Assets you had. But what if you didn't play ME3 ? Plan B is what I'm calling Citadel Readiness Points. You can gather these by completing side-missions. If you didn't import a ME3 save, the game would instead use the CRP's to decide the ending.

So if you did play ME3, the CRP's are useless ? Nope, because there are....

DLCs

The proposal is to do two DLCs. The first would be Aftermath. Which is exactly what it says on the tin. Aftermath picks up after the Crucible fires. In this DLC, you play as Mike's second-in-command. You have to find Mike and pick up the pieces aboard the station. If you had enough War Assets/CRP's, Mike is alive and you go back to playing as him.

If you have low CRP's, Mike is toast and you have to finish the DLC as the second-in-command. The CRP's and which side-missions you completed also decide who you have to help you and what resources you have to work with.

The second DLC would be Fuel Depot Alpha One. This is the fuel depot the closest to the Citadel when its in the Widow Nebula, One of big moments that didn't fit inside Mass Effect 3, was the Reapers taking over the Citadel and moving it to Earth. The main story will fill in this (major) blank from the INSIDE of the station.

FD Alpha will give us a glimpse of what this event looked like from on the OUTSIDE of the station. You will play the commander of FD Alpha as husks swarm the depot. Your job is to get everybody off the depot and somewhere safe.

How much of the Citadel would we see ?

The idea is took take all the sections of the Citadel already created and connect them to form the game world. I would also propose adding the pieces of the Citadel that previous games only let you visit once. A good example is the pre-fab factory where you confront Harkin in Mass Effect 2. In ME: C-Sec, this part of the Citadel would be converted into one giant refugee settlement.

Another example would be part of the Citadel that you visit for Thane's loyalty mission in Mass Effect 2. In the original game, you can only access the upper level. C-Sec would add the full section. (Basically, all the loose parts created for ME2 and ME3 would be integrated into this Citadel 2.0.)

But wouldn't this make the Citadel where predictable if you played the trilogy ? After all, you would know where everything is already, wouldn't you ? Not necessarily. For example, the Volus Banker Barla Von moved offices between ME1 and ME3. So, who is using his old digs now ? And then there is the AI that committed suicide BEHIND his office.

So what is there now ? The Human embassy in ME3 is clearly NOT the same room where you sparred with Udina in ME1 and ME2. And the less said about the mess we made out of Chora's Den (which never reopened) the better.

There are more examples, but the point is that the Citadel has changed a lot during the trilogy. Which leaves plenty of room for new characters and stories.

Trumpvilles?

Hi Alex,

A while ago, I started my own Star Trek RPG. I need a place to start my story and for reasons, I picked the ghost town of Nothing, Arizona. The rest of the story doesn't matter for this letter. 

What does matter is that by the 24th century, Nothing is a shanty town made out of tents, converted shipping containers and all sorts of makeshift homes. There are even a few brick and mortar buildings.

Nothing is home to roughly 900 people who fell through the cracks of the United Federation of Planets. But the most important thing is that the people of Nothing are there voluntarily. 

And all of this was some harmless fun....until Trump called the National Guard into Washington, DC. Which made we wonder....

How long before life imitates art ? How long before Nothing, Arizona really is repopulated. Except this time, there will be nothing voluntary about it. This time, it will because people will be forced into these...Trumpvilles (or Tarkin Towns if you've seen Star Wars: Rebels)...at the barrel of a gun. While that...chimpanzee...in the White House sells it as....*does his best Trump voice*....his Big and Beauty final solution for homeless people. *end Trump voice*

After all, what better place to dump the homeless the a ghost town. No locals to complain, no votes to lose. *Trump voice* After all, it's not like these homeless people as allowed to vote. And if they are, I'll pass another Big, Beautiful law to end that. *End Trump voice.* 

I really think this is scenario is a distinct possibility. Alex, Americans....please, worry.

Regards,

Ruben A. Hilbers (aka @Dantes74302 on X)

PS. Alex is not a real person, it is my version of Hello, Kitty/Dear Sigmund.

My Pitch for Wolfenstein: Youngblood 1.5

Hi Alex,

There's an old saying that says that all good things come in threes. So far, I've pitched two game remakes. One for Mass Effect and one for Star Trek. To complete this trilogy, I thought I should do something different and leave the world of Sci-Fi games behind. 

Why Wolfenstein: Youngblood ?

Back in 2019, Youngblood was not as well received as its predecessors. And here in 2025, Machinegames has finished Indiana Jones and the Great Circle. This means they now have the resources to start working on the final game in their Wolfenstein series...Wolfenstein 3.

The problem is that Wolfenstein 3 is probably years away from releasing. And because of Youngblood's reception, there is not that much buzz for it (yet). So my pitch is for a Youngblood DLC/Expansion that will hopefully do something about that game's reputation and give the series an injection of activity. Also, by going the DLC route, players won't have to wait as long as they would for a full game.

The Set-Up

In Youngblood, we learn that the @ssh@ts have just lost a major battle over the Strait of Gibraltar. Whoever they've been fighting in Africa is about to cross over and bring the fight to them. In this DLC, we learn that like in our timeline the Organization of African Unity was formed in 1963.

However, unlike the real OAU, this version has only one goal...to fight and kill the @ssh@ts. And for the past seventeen years, that is exactly what they have been doing. Pushing them out of one country after another. And now they invading Spain and Portugal. In this timeline, the @ssh@ts betrayed Franco and conquered the country. 

There is, however, one major barrier between the OAU and Berlin...the French-Spanish border. The enemy has fortified this border for just this scenario....

Cue the Blazkowicz's Sisters: ...which is where the sisters come in. Due to the Jess and Soph wiping out countless @ssh@ts in Paris, things are looking up for the Resistance in northern France. They've been able to steal supplies, re-establishing/reinforce cells in other cities...etc, etc. 

The plan is to drop the Sisters in the a southern city, so they can revive the Resistance there are well. Then the revived Resistance can start chipping away at the Border from the other side. Killing key officials, sabotaging supply routes, blowing up important factories, etc, etc.

The Setting

The @ssh@ts are kind of expecting this move, so they increase security in all major southern French cities. But the Resistance outsmarts them by sending the Sisters (and their ally Abby) to Monaco. 

In this timeline, Monaco is not a playground for the rich. It was invaded and all it's bank accounts were plundered by the Reich to pay for the fortifications on the border. Then they build a big uber-concrete wall around it and turned into a Ghetto. (The European counterpart to New Orleans from the New Colossus.) 

The Real-life reason is that Monaco is relatively small. You can map out a large chunk of it, maybe all of it (relatively) easy. And it is next to the sea, so you have a build-in perimeter for the map already. The wall on one side and the water on the other. And by making it a separate map, you don't have to mess with the pre-existing ones. Back to in-game...

...The Resistance also picked Monaco because it has a harbor. This allows for a supply line from the OAU. And once the Sisters help free the city, they can hijack the Wall's defenses and turn them against the @ssh@ts. 

The Secondary Plot-line

After liberating Monaco, the Jess and Soph go back to Paris. And here comes a chance to shake up the Status Quo if you've complete the main campaign already. Once you've done that, and completed all the side missions, there's not much reason to keep playing the game. Post-endgame, it just become a lot grinding to level up. 

The idea for a the secondary plot-line is to do a partial reset of the Paris maps to give players who have finished the campaign more Post-endgame content.

The Plot:  

While the Sisters were away, a new Uber-@ssh@t arrived in Paris. He ordered all the codes changed (the codes for the doors in the Brothers, the drone dispenser code, etc.) and had people going around placing new padlocks all over town. He also had all the entrances to underground maps sealed up. This is a major problem for the Resistance. So Abby comes up with a plan..

...which is to frame the Paris' chief @ssh@t locksmith. The current locksmith is loyal to the @ssh@ts, but his aide is a Resistance spy. She sends to Sisters on a couple of missions frame the locksmith and make the enemy think that its the other way around. Once the @ssh@ts execute the locksmith, the spy will be promoted to take his place.

That done, the Sisters must find a way to kill the new Uber-@ssh@t, so he doesn't catch on or cause more trouble. (Which is complicated by the fact that he moved into a heavily guarded apartment in New Berlin.) 

Once the new Uber-@ssh@at is dead and with the spy in place, the player can then proceed to find the new codes, destroy the padlocks and re-unlock all the underground areas. This is also where any potential expansions of the Paris map could be sneaked in. As sites for side-missions unlocked by this new key spy. (*Moans at that pun.*) 

And that's all I have.

Regards,

Ruben A. Hilbers (aka @Dantes74302 on X) 

My Pitch For Mass Effect Andromeda 2.0

 

Hi Alex,

First of all, I know that the tradition is to make an elevator pitch. But this subject is too long. So let's call it a boardroom pitch. And thanks for listening to my ramblings. So, here we go...

Boardroom Pitch for Remaking ME: Andromeda

To begin with, the folks at BioWare have made it clear that Mass Effect 5 will be a sequel to both the original trilogy and Andromeda. I'm not making this up, Mike Gamble - the big cheese himself - has said this. 

The problem is that to do that to properly, you will need to able to import choices from Andromeda into ME5. 

Now, I know that there are probably Andromeda critics thinking that there can't be that many. Or that they aren't that important. Well, let's see what I can think off from the top of my head. Ready ?

1. Tell me about your Ryder. Scott, Sara, somebody custom to your play-through ?
2. How is your Ryder doing in the romance department ?
3. Which loyalty missions did you do ?  
4. How did things work out with the Krogan for you ?
5. Did you cover for the Asari Pathfinder or reveal the truth ? Did you let her stay or replace her ?
6. Who rules Kadara Port these days ? 
7. Did you get all the golden worlds to full viability ? 

And I'm sure there are more waiting in the wings. But this is where we hit a major issue. Because Andromeda is runs on the Frostbite Engine, whereas ME-5 will be a Unreal Engine game. And those two pieces of software are not compatible. As things stand, you cannot import an Andromeda game save into Mass Effect 5.

But dude, Andromeda sucked anyway. They'll just do an interactive recap comic like they did before.  

First of all, I know that Andromeda was not everybody's cup of tea, but that is just rude to people who did like it. Keep it polite, please. Second, that would be a long comic. And if you know nothing about Andromeda, you'd be taking shots in the dark. Not to mention the simple fact that making Andromeda 2.0 - a Unreal Engine redo - might crank up Andromeda's sales numbers.

There is also a long-term argument to be made. Andromeda 1.0 came out in 2017...now, let's say ME-5 comes out in 2029 and is a giant hit. ME-6 gets green-lit and releases in 2035. That's great, but what if you want to do another Legendary Edition ? One that collects Andromeda, 5 and 6 ? 

As the last couple of years have taught us the hard way, the video game industry can be a volatile place. In 2040, are there still going to be people who know Frostbite ? Or it is going to be as obscure and forgotten as both the planet and code of Kobol ? (If you get the reference, good on you. If you don't, see what I mean ?) It's going to be much easier to upgrade Andromeda if it's already in (a version of) the Unreal Engine. 

Finally, anything you bring over from Andromeda to ME-5 is going to have to be redone from scratch anyway. Basically, if you don't redo Andromeda, you'd end up teasing the people who did like it with a game they'll never get. You risk turning off the Andromeda fans from your franchise. 

And for those complaining about Andromeda's writing....Who knows what other changes can be hung off this redo ? Which brings up to the big question....

Who Would Do This Remake ?

BioWare has recently laid off a lot people. And they are going to have their hands full with ME-5 for the next couple of years. If they are supposed to do this after ME-5, it's going to take forever to come out. My suggestion would be to outsource it. But to who or whom ? One word....Obsidian. Why ? 

1. Fallout: New Vegas proved that Obsidian can make games in franchises they didn't start and get the flavor right.
2. Obsidian made The Outer Worlds in Unreal Engine. Not only do they know the engine, they have the chops and knowledge to do a space RPG. Which brings us to reason 3...
3. Availability. Once Outer Worlds 2 is out the door - which will happen this year - Obsidian would be able to start this project. Let's look at some other options...
1. Machinegames....Just finished Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, now knee-deep into making the final Wolfenstein game.
2. Bethesda....Hands full remaking their own old titles. And we don't want a game full of glitches and bugs.
3. EA....simply don't trust them to get it right. 

Also, if anybody could tweak the writing in Andromeda, my money would be on Obsidian. And let's circle back to the long-term roadmap above. Andromeda wouldn't have a hard deadline. You could release ME-5 in 2029 and then drop Andromeda 2.0 anywhere you want in the gap between 5 and 6. Essentially slicing the time between releases.

Not to mention that with a planned release in the gap, you could add story to Andromeda 2.0. You could wrap up the loose ends of the Kett and the Quarian Ark. Yes, I know there was a novel about the Quarian Ark. But that only dealt with the virus. 

The Ryders still need to save their bacon from the Scourge and the Kett. You could even end Andromeda 2.0 with Ryder and company leaving for the Milky Way, with ME-5 showing the other end of the trip. (Not to mention that extending the story would give you even more choices for the game save to import, which would change things in ME-5 and give that game even more replayability.)

That's all I have,

Regards, 

Ruben A. Hilbers (aka Commander Shepard) 

P.S.

The Alex this 'letter' is addressed to is not a real person. It's my version of Kitty / Dear Sigmund. 

As for the pic that comes with this letter....I'm writing a Mass Effect Fan-Fic about the SSV Ain Jalut, the original SR-2 / Normandy's sister-ship, and made my own assignment patch for the ship.