A Certain Point of View: Writing, Film and Stuff

© 2021 Killerfish Games  Hi, Dear Reader. It's been a while since my last post, hasn't it? I have been busy building up A Certain Point of View, Too over on WordPress, and although I initially thought I'd be able to write regularly in both of my blogs, that idea quickly went out the window many months ago. (You know that old saying about the road to Hell is paved with good intentions? Well...)  To be honest, I focus more on stuff there more than here for several reasons. First, the original A Certain Point of View has enough material - 1,360 posts, including this one - to sustain itself for a while without my input. I get fewer views than before the fateful Facebook block that forced me to create our WordPress sister blog, sure, but this blog still gets decent traffic and ad revenue without me publishing one post a day.  Another reason why I need to be more active on WordPress it's because I have to pay annually for the Premium package and a domain name. It's not a

  © 2017 Killerfish Games If you are a regular – or semiregular – reader of A Certain Point of View, you probably know that in July I purchased Killerfish Games’ 2017 submarine game Cold Waters from Steam. I had been wanting to get it for some time, but I waited till it was on sale; I didn’t want to shell out nearly $40 for a computer game, even if said game billed itself as the a spiritual heir to MicroProse’s 1988 classic, Red Storm Rising. Like Red Storm Rising, Cold Waters has Training, Single Mission,  and Campaign modes; unlike Sid Meier’s game, which is based on the late Tom Clancy’s 1986 best-selling novel, it gives players the option to play as an American, Soviet, or Chinese submarine commander in Cold War-turned-hot campaigns set in three distinct eras (1968, 1984, and 2000) in alternative histories which take a turning point in world affairs – say, the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in August of ’68 – and tweak it so that the two blocs that waged the Cold War find

© 2017 Killerfish Games Do you like military-themed simulations or games based on hypothetical wars? Do you like submarine games? Are you a fan of Tom Clancy’s 1986 novel Red Storm Rising or its computer game spin-off from 1988? Then have I got a computer game recommendation for you! In the early 1990s, back when the original version of MicroProse was the go-to source for user-friendly military simulations and strategy games, I played a game called Red Storm Rising.  Based on the eponymous 1986 novel by the late Tom Clancy, Red Storm Rising was a nuclear sub simulation set in a fictional Third World War between the still-in-existence Soviet Union and the U.S. led North Atlantic Treaty Organization. In it, you played the role of a U.S. Navy officer in command of a nuclear-powered fast attack submarine assigned to seek and destroy surface and submarine units of the Red Banner Northern Fleet to thwart the Soviets’ offensives on land and sea, as well as to

Actual screenshot taken from a Quick Battle scenario I created. That is a Sverdlov- class Soviet light cruiser sailing out to escort a Soviet amphibious force. © 2017 Killerfish Games  Well, as you know, I’ve been dividing my COVID-19 stay-at-home time between writing on my two blogs and entertaining myself as best I can without being online. This means that I’ve been getting back to reading on a more-or-less regular basis, which is something I have not done since Mom got sick in 2010 and endured five hellish years struggling with a long – and eventually futile – rehabilitation effort after back surgery and the devastating effects of dementia. Between dealing with the legal, financial, and emotional repercussions of Mom’s death in 2015 and the life changes that followed, I really haven’t made much of an effort to return to my old routine of reading something at least once a day. I’ve also started gaming again, although I no longer do marathon sessions where I’ll start pl

The Battle of the Fulda Gap, August 1, 1985. Actual gameplay screenshot from a session I played of Flashpoint Campaigns: Red Storm. Images © 2014 Slitherine Ltd./Matrix Games and On Target Simulations Hello again, Dear Reader! Welcome to yet another edition of Bloggin' On, the no-reviews, no-politics section of A Certain Point of View. It's Friday, February 28, 2020, and it's a chilly day here in my corner of Florida. Currently, the temperature in my neighborhood is 58℉ (15℃) a few minutes after noon; it was colder earlier, of course, and I don't think that we'll see anything warmer than 60℉ (16℃). The low tonight is expected to be 46℉ (8℃), which reminds me of how cold my apartment in Sevilla (Seville), Spain, could get in late November or early December 1988. I usually like to start writing early in the morning; it doesn't matter if I'm working on a new script, a short story, a review, or a blog post, but I'm tap-tap-tapping on my keyboard no

© 1990 MicroProse Software/MPS Labs and Retroism  Hello there, Constant Reader! It's Wednesday (Hump Day), November 20, and it's a chilly (by Florida standards anyway) morning in my corner of the world. Currently. it's mostly sunny here, with the temperature at 51℉ (11℃); per the forecast on my Weather app, we are expecting no rain and a high of 72℉ (22℃) later today. This is as fall-like as we've gotten so far in 2019, and after a long hot summer and a tense hurricane season (which, by the by, ends on November 30), it's literally a breath of fresh air. I was going to try and write a review today, but I woke up a bit too early and I don't think I can pull that rabbit out of my hat, so I'm going to give you one of those "lightweight" list-type blogs till I can get my shit together as a writer. As a regular reader of A Certain Point of View, you know of my fascination for the Second World War. You also know that this interest in the largest a

Screenshot of the "Main Title" game-is-loading screen from Silent Service II. (C) 1990 MicroProse Labs In the late 1980s and early 1990s, around the same time that I started working as a freelance writer and writing consultant in Miami, I spent much of my free time playing computer games. I went out with friends to the movies or to eat at inexpensive chain restaurants such as Denny's or Ruby Tuesday's, but I mostly stayed at home and spent countless hours at my computer desk playing my favorite games and simulations.  This era was also the Golden Age of the now-vanished MicroProse Software, a company co-founded by Sid Meier and retired Air Force Col. William "Wild Bill" Stealey in 1982. Based in Hunt Valley, Maryland, MicroProse was one of the first companies to publish easy-to-play yet challenging strategy games ( NATO Commander, Crusade in Europe, Conflict in Vietnam ) and simulations with a military flavor to them ( F-15 Strike Eagle, Gunship ).