X-Plorers now at Noble Knight Games!

If you've got a list of stuff you're planning on getting at Noble Knight--and they're a regular shop you buy from--you can now get X-Plorers in softcover. Hell, pick up a few cool pulp sci-fi minis to fill out your crew while you're at it--and some dice--and you're ready to roll!

You can of course get the game direct from its publisher Brave Halfling as well. :)

THIS is the Star Wars revamp we NEEDED!

Harrison Ford is cool, but no one is more badass than Steve McQueen accompanied by A BEAR.

Also, I'm actually quite depressed that this prequel didn't happen:

Slightly more depressed at the thought of this one as a possibility. Though Jan Michael Vincent is pretty badass.

Bonus: DUNE-PUNK!

Via artist Sean Hartter, check out the rest of his alternate universe movie poster creations.

P.S. the Death Star makes me giggle.

A habitable-zone exoplanet discovered in new crop of 50 finds

Star HD 85512; image via ESO and Digitized Sky Survey 2; Photo by: Davide De Martin

Let's get something straight--digging up exoplanets can be tedious work--but the pay-off can sometimes be incredible. Using extremely sensitive equipment, astronomers look for a "wobble" in a star's path that might be caused by a planetary body. When the technique was first used to find possible planetary systems, gas giants made up the early finds (Saturn and Jupiter-sized) because they were big and had a lot of mass to indicate planet's orbit.

As the technique has been refined, smaller planets often considered to be rocky like Earth--though there's no definitive proof yet of their composition--are now being picked up. Five such smaller planets have recently been detected--one of them lies in the Goldilocks Zone that would allow for liquid water and possibly life to exist. This exciting news comes from the BBC:

Of the new finds, a total of five planets have masses that are less than five times that of Earth.

"These planets will be among the best targets for future space telescopes to look for signs of life in the planet's atmosphere by looking for chemical signatures such as evidence of oxygen," said Francesco Pepe, from the Geneva Observatory, who contributed to the research.

The star HD 85512 lies some 35 light-years away and hosts a potentially habitable planet. One of the worlds, called HD 85512 b, is estimated to be only 3.6 times the mass of the Earth.

It is located at the edge of the habitable zone - the narrow strip around a star where liquid water can be present on the surface of a planet. Liquid water is considered essential for the existence of life.

That's the star pictured above. Get the full story or check out the Exoplanets link above for more resources.

NASA snaps detailed flyover photos of moon landing sites

All images: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/ASU

These are some spectacular new photos from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) probe launched by NASA back in June of '09, which is still in service and snapping images of the moon's surface.

The craft has returned pictures showing imprints left behind by astronauts and their equipment on Apollo missions 12, 14, and 17. From NASA:

At the Apollo 17 site, the tracks laid down by the lunar rover are clearly visible, along with the last foot trails left on the moon. The images also show where the astronauts placed some of the scientific instruments that provided the first insight into the moon's environment and interior.

"We can retrace the astronauts' steps with greater clarity to see where they took lunar samples," said Noah Petro, a lunar geologist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., who is a member of the LRO project science team.

All three images show distinct trails left in the moon's thin soil when the astronauts exited the lunar modules and explored on foot. In the Apollo 17 image, the foot trails, including the last path made on the moon by humans, are easily distinguished from the dual tracks left by the lunar rover, which remains parked east of the lander.

While it's exciting to see that the equipment is still there, it's pretty awesome that the actual footpaths are also intact!

Check out more photos and the full story at NASA's site



Props to Beam Me Up

Star Trek turns 45 today!

Today is the 45th anniversary of Star Trek's debut on primetime television on September 8, 1966! Here's a few fun links from around the web today:

• Funky infographic on the franchise via Geeky Gadgets.

Click to see the full version on GG.

• There's a new three-part interview with the original cast over at the official Star Trek website.
• Wired has a look at wacky ST merchandising over the years, including Romulan Ale by the case and a talking Worf lunchbox.
• Here's a report about a possible new TV series in the works (take with a warp core-sized grain of salt!)
• This Haynes Manual for the Enterprise is one of my favorite new books--chock full of cut-a-ways and Trek tech, and written as if it were the actual users manual! 
• If you're Across the Pond, there's an Star Trek Art Exhibit going on in Manchester; here's a slideshow preview of the work being showcased.
• UPDATES: 
• The blog The Invisible Agent has a great post on the original sell sheet used to pitch the show to advertisers and includes dropped characters from the main cast like Chief Medical Officer Piper (not DeForest Kelly as Bones), Communications Officer Alden (not Nichelle Nichols as Uhura), and Yeoman Smith (who was cast as Kirk's arm candy). Also George Takei was pitched as "Physicist Sulu". (Via Retro Thing)
• Musings of a Sci-Fi Fanatic just posted a round-up of the best and worst episodes of the original series from SciFi Now magazine.

Here's to boldly going to the final frontier for 45 years! I plan on celebrating by catching a few original episodes on Netflix this weekend.

So how has Trek shaped your world/games/geek life?

X-Plorers RPG is NOW AVAILABLE!

CALLING ALL X-PLORERS....

X-Plorers is now available as a box set, softcover print-on-demand, or a no-art FREE download. You now have THREE WAYS to start conquering the galaxy--and you could be doing so as soon as THIS AFTERNOON while you wait for your box or softcover to arrive in the mail. Here's a look at the inside of the softcover....



The game is rules-light and can be played as-is, but it's REAL strength is in it's ability to be fiddled with under the hood. Personally, I like to tinker and I'm working on my own setting using the rules. If you're looking for more resources to help get started, check out the X-Plorers tab on the top of this blog.

On a side note, the venerable Space Admiral and X-Plorers Publisher John Adams is holding a new character sheet design contest. The winner will receive a FREE box set of the game! So submit your designs to Brave Halfling.

In the mean time, pick up the game right now and start X-ploring!

Expiscor Eternus!