Media SF - Silicon and paper (2800 words)

By Brian Clegg

In the first two instalments of this series we've travelled the airwaves with TV science fiction, and sat riveted in our seats at the movies. Now we move to the more intimate worlds of silicon and paper. It might seem that books and computer games are miles apart, but though there's a great technical gulf, they are the closest in flexibility and imaginative impact, making them ideal companions. If you think science fiction isn't for you, check out some of the book recommendations - you may be surprised.

THE EARLY DAYS

Way back in the dark ages, computers and games didn't go together. Computers were huge, costly devices that had to be put to a serious use all hours of the day. It was only the new breeds, like DEC's early mini-computers, that made computer games possible. The ancestors of all modern games are Spacewar and Adventure.

Spacewar dates back to 1962, punched up on paper tape for the DEC PDP-1 at MIT. Put together by E. E. Smith fans, [bookmark to EESmith in Space Opera section], Spacewar was not only a true computer game, it was even two player, featuring two battling rockets circling around the gravitational field of a star. I played Spacewar in the Cambridge computer lab in 1977, and it was still thrilling - nothing had appeared to better it in 15 years. Spacewar goes straight for the adrenaline - for more cerebral stimulation Adventure was to follow.

Though based on a primitive Xerox game, Adventure defined the text adventure. Developed at the Stanford AI Lab on a DEC PDP-10, it was an attractive form for early developers. Almost anyone could put a text adventure together, and the typical subjects appealed to the Tolkeinesque fantasy boom of the time. Although the original theme of Adventure (soon to spawn many followers, most famously Zork) was pure fantasy, some later adventure games would have a science fiction theme.

The earliest days on paper are harder to pin down, partly because the term "science fiction" was coined long after the first books were written. The clearest early example is Mary Shelley's [http://www.netaxs.com/~kwbridge/shelsite.html] Frankenstein [http://www.literature.org/Works/Mary-Shelley/frankenstein/ ] . More correctly Mary Godwin's, as the 19-year-old author was not yet married to Shelley, the original Frankenstein is pure science fiction, despite the horror movie antics that have followed. Like most writing of its time (1816 to be precise), Frankenstein is heavy going today. Even so, the combination of the then very new possibilities of electricity, the macabre biology of the recreated man, and the creation's philosophical musings (the original creature was anything but a grunting monster) are worth battling with.

SPACE INVADERS

Spacewar set the scene for the future. Apart from a brief excursion into ping-pong, the first computer games many of us experienced were variants of Space Invaders [ ]. From arcade games and consoles, the space invader rapidly appeared on early home computers. Looking back at the blocky graphics, buzzy sounds and jerky motions can make a games player who wasn't around at the time wonder about the sanity of their elders. Today simulations of the original games are tedious after about five minutes, but back then they were exciting and fresh.

Most of us are familiar with Space Invaders' totally unnatural image of wave after wave of ship descending the screen in jerky unison. In terms of gameplay and graphics this is several steps back from Spacewar, but the game was hugely popular. Asteroids , which followed soon after, put you in charge of a ship in a field of floating space debris. Your mission was simply to survive. Closer in feel to Spacewar, though without a live opponent, Asteroids threw in the difficulties of controlling motion and inertia.

Our most famous literary invaders appeared in an early scientific romance by H.G. Wells. Wells churned out books, from very successful romances to turgid future histories and political polemics. At his best, he kept things simple, and The War of the Worlds [http://www.literature.org/Works/H-G-Wells/war-of-the-worlds/] remains powerful today. This 1898 masterpiece triumphs by the way it plonks aliens into the very ordinary life of suburbia. Wells' Martians are genuinely frightening and the whole book remarkably atmospheric. I'll come back to Wells in other categories, but it isn't possible to leave the turn of the century without also referring to Jules Verne. Verne's books were more pure adventure and the science of a lower order. His From the Earth to the Moon, for instance, has its astronauts propelled by a giant gun that would have left them splattered across the back of the shell. Verne's writing does not read as well a century later as Wells', but even so his influence is considerable.

Space invaders remain a common theme to this day. In skimming though the last century, it's impossible not to stop at John Wyndham's rather cosy invasions, which are probably all the more effective because of their attack on middle England. Day of the Triffids is the best known, with its unlikely mobile killer plants and a blinded humanity, but more effective is the Midwich Cuckoos , [MIDWICH.JPG] where the invasion takes place in the much more subtle context of alien impregnation of the women of a village. The golden-eyed children who result are treated with as much conspiratorial secrecy as anything in the X Files.

SPACE OPERA

It wasn't until the 1930s that science fiction changed. Writings of this period were aimed at the cheap American pulp magazines. The typical output is described as Space Opera, a cross between the fairy story and swashbuckling Zorro adventures translated into space.

Like the movies, most games continue to inhabit Space Opera. Films like Star Wars typify all that is best about this style. Some of the best games have been spin-offs from cinema and TV, but there have been plenty of pure titles. Look, for instance, at the Wing Commander series. Starting as a fairly simple shoot-em-up, the latest edition Wing Commander IV, [XXX PIC] has become a multimedia experience. Apart from the time spent in missions, flying a simulated spacecraft through reconnaissance and battles, Wing Commander has plenty of video, linking the missions with a well-written story, acted by solid Hollywood actors.

It's only with these high budget movies that games have achieved the true glory of Space Opera. Without the need for high quality graphics, the books have always revelled in descriptions of huge ships, literally earth-shattering explosions and strange rays. Although many of the big names of science fiction who were to flourish in the 1950s first started in the 30s, much of their early output does not compare well with later efforts. John Wyndham, for instance, produced some potboilers under other names that are decidedly heavy going.

To sample written Space Opera at its gung-ho best, we have to turn to the otherwise obscure E. E. 'Doc' Smith. His Lensman [http://168.150.253.1/~zlensman/lensfaq.html] ] series is gorgeous. It spans a huge period of time, has big beefy heroes, strange looking aliens, wonderful technology and all the blasters and force fields you can cope with. Smith wrote plenty more, but none are such perfect examples of Space Opera as the Lensman books.

SPACE ADVENTURE

From Space Opera, science fiction gradually became more subtle, producing the great names of the fifties and sixties. Oddly, though there are some good examples, games don't represent this phase so well. About the only mainstream game to originate on the BBC micro, Elite proved an early example. There were elements of the game that are pure opera, with 3D space battles that provided the basic screen format for all the greats like X-Wing and Wing Commander, but there was more. The basis of Elite was trading, travelling from planet to planet in an astoundingly detailed galaxy, buying and selling like an interplanetary Del Trotter. You could deal in legitimate items, or more dubious goods, risking the wroth of the police. It was this extra dimension that brought Elite forward a generation.

Finding a modern equivalent is harder. The Dune games, based loosely on Frank Herbert's mixed series of books are pretty good (though not a patch on the book. Dune [http://www.dune.org/museum/] [] effortlessly combines an epic family saga with Lawrence of Arabia, impressive pseudo-spiritual texts, and wonderful atmosphere on the desert planet Arrakis), but I'm going to plump for Mechwarrior 2 in its latest incarnation, Mercenaries [XXX PIC]. This is a land-based battle game, but again the simple sequence of follow a mission and return to base is expanded by a business aspect to the game as you build a team of mercenaries to take on missions and make money. While lacking the video impressiveness of a Wing Commander, Mercenaries is wonderfully compelling.

When it comes to written science fiction, the 50s onwards was a period of incredible richness. But before delving into the classics of that time, I ought to skip back to H. G. Wells. His second great, The First Men in the Moon, is very much of this class. With tongue-in-cheek humour and exciting adventure, it bypasses Space Opera and is good reading to this day. Picking a handful of classics is almost impossible. But there are some names that can't be ignored. First on many lists is liable to be Isaac Asimov [http://www.clark.net/pub/edseiler/WWW/asimov_home_page.html]. With a prodigious output in fiction and non-fiction, Russian born but American to the core, Asimov typified the new breed of writer. His characterisations might have been weak, his love interest minimal, but his science and rich spattering of ideas were wonderful. Probably best to illustrate this particular period are Asimov's trilogy Foundation, Foundation and Earth, and Second Foundation. Throw in his robot short stories collected in I, Robot [ ] and you get a perfect sample.

Next down the line has to be Robert Heinlein. Heinlein's best period was in the middle of his output. The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag contains two gems. And he built a crooked house about a house shaped like an opened-out hypercube that collapses into itself so that each of the eight rooms joins onto each of the others, and All You Zombies … where a man becomes his own father and mother in a twisted time travel paradox. Of his novels, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress [] is a wonderful description of a future revolution on the lunar colony, helped by a self-aware computer, and though Stranger in a Strange Land marks the start of his woffly phase, it had a huge impact and is tighter than the subsequent books.

There are so many others who could be included. A familiar English name is Arthur C. Clarke [http://www.lsi.usp.br/~rbianchi/clarke/]. Clarke's early successes included whimsical stories, set around a pub in a P. G. Wodehouse style (Tales from the White Hart ), but from 2001 onwards, it was the technological epic with spiritual overtones that proved to be Clarke's speciality. To pick two other names almost at random, Fred Pohl has produced consistently enjoyable books, probably best represented by his joint work with Cyril Kornbluth. Try The Space Merchants [ ] for a brilliant humorous adventure, pitting the hero against the worst excesses of a world run by big business and advertising agencies. Clifford Simak is another who has steadily produced wonderfully readable books, set in rural America. His work is much gentler and more people-oriented than the typical SF novel. Oh, and spare a thought for Irish writer Bob Shaw, who has never quite reached big name status, but from this period onwards produced many excellent books. Check out Other Days, Other Eyes [ ] for the classic SF invention of slow glass, a glass that light takes weeks if not years to pass through, providing windows that look out on beautiful views wherever you are, or even capable of witnessing a murder.

ALTERNATIVE FUTURES

Most science fiction concerns alternative futures, but a particular branch poses "what-if" questions on the outcomes of history. The classic scenario is "what if the Germans won the Second World War", but there are many more subtle possibilities. In computer form, this approach is more common in adventure games and even there no great examples spring to mind.

On the printed page it's a different matter. Take The Alteration [] by Kingsley Amis. Although a mainstream writer, Amis has a long association with science fiction, and his book portrays modern day England without the reformation. The Catholic Church still holds sway, and the best choirboys are kept for the church through castration - the alteration of the title. Amis's book is a lovely example, beaten only by the master of this style, Keith Roberts. Roberts' first attempt, Pavane, [ ] is brilliant. Again set in a world under church control, Pavane has a wonderful mix of modern people, a culture kept back to feudalism, and technology limited to the steam age. Roberts has gone on to produce other equally impressive strange futures in Kiteworld and Molly Zero. Great stuff.

Future and past mingle in that other great SF theme, time travel. Once again, H. G. Wells is there to the fore with The Time Machine. This isn't as readable as either of my two other recommendations, but has to be mentioned as setting the format for everyone to follow. Although time travel is such a strong concept, and generates many possibilities for paradoxes and confusion, it has not inspired any masterpieces in either the game or written world.

CYBERWORLDS AND DISASTERS

The blame for the proliferation of the "cyber" prefix lies at the door of writer William Gibson, but the best known media cyberimage is the sleazy cross between a high-tech future and a detective story in the film Blade Runner. This feel has pervaded a good few games, particularly graphical adventures. Still very playable, the elderly Beneath a Steel Sky [XXX PIC] puts the wise-cracking hero into a technological nightmare, while The Pandora Directive's [XXX PIC] blockbusting five CDs contain a superb state-of-the-art rendition of this particular style. In Pandora you are trying to find a missing scientist who was involved with an alien landing, while attempting to keep your private life together. Brilliant.

On the page, Gibson's Neuromancer seems to define the approach, but it owes a lot to the glitzy sixties work of Samuel Delaney and Alfred Bester. Try Babel-17 by Delaney or Tiger! Tiger! and The Demolished Man by Bester to see where space adventure crosses over into something more bizarre. An excellent adventure that pre-guesses much of the online world is John Brunner's underrated Shockwave Rider. Brunner is a hugely variable writer, but here he is on top form, setting an individual against the wired masses, his scenario is based on the predictions of Alvin Toffler's predictive best seller, Future Shock.

Most cyberworlds are pretty unattractive, so they fit pretty well with the disaster story where the earth has undergone some terrible change, often down to man's stupidity. I'm afraid I find disaster books a turn off, so there are no recommendations there.

SEX AND HUMOUR

Science fiction has a reputation for being weak on sex and humour. In games, humour at least comes through quite strongly, but there's very little sex, probably reflecting a peculiarly American morality that thinks it's okay to show people being splattered in horrific detail, but finds sex is impossibly corrupting.

Written SF discovered sexuality in a big way in the sixties, with writers like Philip José Farmer and Michael Moorcock exploring the possibilities of future sex. Humour has been around longer. Fredrick Brown with Martians, Go Home and E. F. Russell with Next of Kin typify early attempts, where the tongue was so far in the cheek that it came out the other side. These are basically adventure stories with a humorous approach, rather than the out-and-out hilarity best typified by Robert Rankin's Brentford trilogy, [ ] which strays wildly into magic and lunacy, but still has a science fiction basis. Terry Pratchett had a couple of goes at funny SF before settling down to his epic disc-world series, but science fiction seems less susceptible to pure humour than fantasy. Douglas Adams proves (as usual) the exception to the rule.

SPIN-OFFS

Both silicon and paper are heavily influenced by the other media. Apart from tedious novelisations, there are plenty of books set in the worlds created on the screen. Spin-off books are almost always second rate, but games are a different story. The Star Wars films have spawned a whole industry from the definitive space dogfight game X-Wing, [XXX PIC - TIE FIGHTER] through the more arcade-like Rebel Assault to the Doom clone, Dark Forces [XXX PIC] - and there's more to come. Star Trek has also had an impact. One of the earliest computer games was a text-based version of Star Trek that was almost a mobile version of battleships, played against computer Klingons. Latterly there have been a number of successful adventure games based around Star Trek stories. These haven't been at the leading edge of the graphical adventure, but the likes of A Final Unity combine a good story with reasonable game play.

Science fiction has never been more part of culture than today, helped along by the increasing power of the computer in our lives. Often portrayed by the media as an attempt to predict the future, SF is really about the friction and excitement generated by the interface between people and technology. It doesn't pretend to be high art, but good science fiction continues to combine a sense of wonder with a gripping story. Long may it continue.

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