A great time to play the 25th anniversary games!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek ... uter_game)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_Judgment_Rites

so long ago, when i think about relatives and so on who used to watch and are no longer with us...

And it now looks so "out of date" in some ways, the way it depicts interfaces, computers, comms devices. the aesthetics are colorful and the tone optimistic and adventurous. A very different time, looking back

The aesthetic of TOS devices reflects 'what was available on a shoestring budget' in the 60s/70s.

Cant really blame them for having chonky crts, big physical switches, buttons, and knobs, and chunks of yellow plastic.

Admittedly, the chunks of yellow plastic are 'kindof' like a mix of SDCard, USB thumbstick, and NFC badge.

Many of the problems of each tech could conveivably be resolved with such a device, hilariously enough.

Big enough not to get lost easily.
no edge connector to break off (nfc!)
universal (most every portable device/laptop has nfc capabilities)
computer 'slot' is just an empty recepticle, with no contacts to get dirty/corroded (nfc)

If it needed more juice, NFC + Qi would do fine.

Only issue is that NFC is fairly low speed.

Just a funny thought, that later series replaced with edge connector equipped devices, that would have all the problems those have.

James T kurk is sexual menace that wants to French kiss every female species he sees.
Mr Spock is the WAY of the Federation.

“ Live long and Prosper “

Intel486dx33 wrote on 2026-09-08, 20:01:

James T kurk is sexual menace that wants to French kiss every female species he sees.
Mr Spock is the WAY of the Federation.

“ Live long and Prosper “

Not *really*...

Kirk takes in the gregarious eyecandy that Roddenberry's infamously well known 'cheesecake' addiction presented, but generally only really swoons a few times in the series. Usually under the influence of something.

There is a reason why you should NOT Go “Where no man has gone before”
Because it’s NOT Safe….
Stay on the Beaten Path

Grew up with Star Trek watched everything and I still wonder where they get their Sci-fi ideas from.

wierd_w wrote on 2026-09-08, 15:36:

Cant really blame them for having chonky crts, big physical switches, buttons, and knobs, and chunks of yellow plastic.

When you really think about it, many of the modern installations that are safety-critical and/or need long-term reliability actually still have chunky tactical buttons, switches with safety covers to prevent inadvertent actuation, etc. When you look at pictures of aircraft, water filtration plants, space launch or nuclear power facilities, you don't tend to see capacitive touch interfaces or something that looks like the U.I. was imagined by Sir Ive. Similarly, classified communication doesn't take place over common consumer electronics devices with standard commercial messaging software (the current U.S. administration notwithstanding).

Thinking about Star Trek, from the Kirk era, in particular, many of the plot lines were predictable, mediocre or just plain bad. Unless I'm forgetting a few, the only ones worthy of the time to watch again were "The City On The Edge Of Forever" and "Space Seed". Comments? Arguments?

A belated Happy Birthday to Star Trek, and may Gene Roddenberry's legacy one day be liberated from the clutches of the Ellison family, who are the exact opposites of everything that Star Trek stands for.

zapbuzz wrote on 2026-09-09, 09:45:

Grew up with Star Trek watched everything and I still wonder where they get their Sci-fi ideas from.

SF tropes are often older than you'd think.
My guess is that they didn't need to invent all that much themselves.
Rather, ideas were mostly recycled from literature (be it SF or otherwise).

For TOS fans, there is a continuation of sorts in a fan-made series "Star Trek Continues".
I remember liking it, really well made and it even had that sixties look.

mr.cat wrote on 2026-09-11, 13:55:

SF tropes are often older than you'd think.
My guess is that they didn't need to invent all that much themselves.
Rather, ideas were mostly recycled from literature (be it SF or otherwise).

In my experience, few in my generation are even cognizant of classic sci-fi prior to the Star Trek and Star Wars juggernauts completely overhauling the face of the genre. Robert A. Heinlein and even famed Christian author C.S. Lewis used science fiction as a setting to explore themes of contemporary humanity decades before Roddenberry turned the idea into a mass-market behemoth. Lucas had a vision to update the fantasy genre for a generation losing touch with it, but the result became a distinct phenomenon of its own (not unlike how Tom Clancy "invented" the techno-thriller, a special melding of several preexisting genres).

gerry wrote on 2026-09-08, 15:24:

and the tone optimistic and adventurous.

I have a theory which I've been formulating for several years. I always wondered why sci-fi and horror were always lumped together as genres in libraries until I heard Red Letter Media describe TOS as much more akin to horror (notable because the production had a lot of crossover with The Twilight Zone). Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is usually hailed as one of the first science fiction novels even though as the cautionary tale of the creation of a/the monster it more obviously lands, at least to my mind, in the horror category.

Ultimately I think the distinction is purely the dichotomy of outcomes. Sci-fi is horror without the horrific, where fictional science unleashes utopia instead of hell. And (classic) Star Trek happened to flourish in that window of time from around the 1930s to the 1990s when there was a collective belief in a positive vision for the future. Now everything is doom. But, hey, First Contact might turn out to be right - we need WW3 to happen before we join the interstellar community.

Watched it as a kid in the 60s... collected the bubblegum cards that on the back had a piece of a still from an episode with two kirks (you put them together to make a big still from the episode) ... and until about 10-15 years ago I thought it had aged really well. Same with all the Gerry Anderson series.

There were earlier sci-fi series obviously, the original flash gordon etc. And plenty of 1950s sci-fi films.

As to horror lumped with sci-fi, yeah that broad categorisation really used to piss me off in the 70s when I was at uni and reading Robert E Howard and HP Lovecraft. Conan books were put under sci-fi.

A lot of old sci-fi was horror though - look at Day of the Triffids.

Reminds me my mother used to hate me reading Marvel comics in the 1960s (she always thought they were horrible and scary).

Love seeing the reference to CS Lewis - I remember that trilogy (Out of the Silvet Planet, Voyage to Venus... and the other one...). I wonder whether that would count as sci-fi nowadays, or be classed with "magical realism"?

Big Pink wrote on 2026-09-11, 17:55:

But, hey, First Contact might turn out to be right - we need WW3 to happen before we join the interstellar community.

Ad astra per aspera.

I get the notion of "things will have to get worse before they get better". But can we at least try to get to the point where we claim our seat on the Galactic Council of Spacefaring Species without first having to nearly drive ourselves to extinction in a global nuclear war?

For people seeking a more optimistic take on the future, I highly recommend the streaming TV series For All Mankind. To me, it feels the closest in spirit to a Star Trek prequel of any show I've ever seen, even though it doesn't take place in the same universe.

Big Pink wrote on 2026-09-11, 17:55:

Ultimately I think the distinction is purely the dichotomy of outcomes. Sci-fi is horror without the horrific, where fictional science unleashes utopia instead of hell. And (classic) Star Trek happened to flourish in that window of time from around the 1930s to the 1990s when there was a collective belief in a positive vision for the future. Now everything is doom.

Hm. I'm afraid it could also have to do with today's special date..
About 25 years ago, the western society, but especially the home land of ST, was traumatized and it hasn't recovered yet.
Instead of rebuilding and growing through it, like portrayed in ST, a whole generation simply has given up and resigned. Maybe more than one, even.
The last ST that I could relate to was Enterprise, which was a prequel.
Ininitially, it didn't have the ST reference in the name (not ST:Enterprise yet) and was very optimistic. Then it got darker and darker..

As if the series had started with older stories already been written from before the incident.
Later, species like Suliban appeared, which might been a reference to the other "-bans" being in the news at the time.
I often wonder how different things would have evolved (incl. Entertprise) if things had went differently.
I mean, Mac OS 10.0 and Windows XP are mementos of a happy, optimistic time.
They were finished shortly before the change, when people still were joyful about the year 2000.

What is with all this French kissing going on in Hollywood ?
Just about every TV show and Movie I see has French Kissing ?

Jo22 wrote on 2026-09-11, 19:20:

Ininitially, it didn't have the ST reference in the name (not ST:Enterprise yet) and was very optimistic. Then it got darker and darker..

As if the series had started with older stories already been written from before the incident.

This is correct: the Xindi attack was meant to be a direct parallel to 9/11.

My country could not even manage to do what the people wanted: rebuild the towers much like they were, only modernized and better. Now, New York City is being run by characters openly in cahoots with the same sort who crashed those planes into those buildings. Earth is not going to become the galactic City on a Hill if we can't bring ourselves to overcome our own problems (nor do I not believe alien contact is going to be what spurs us to do so).

This is why I believe in American freedom: let individuals mature, learning their lessons the easy way or the hard way, into managing their own lives instead of counting on general society to solve our problems for us.

"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals and you know it."
-K, Men in Black

BaronSFel001 wrote on 2026-09-12, 15:12:

Now, New York City is being run by characters openly in cahoots with the same sort who crashed those planes into those buildings.

Let's leave the outlandish conspiracy theories for a more appropriate venue, shall we?

If people in your country would take a little time to actually engage in some brutally-honest collective introspection for a change, you might just emerge from the experience as genuinely better people. Your collective stubborn refusal to engage in the difficult thought exercises compounds the stark reality: you did not "get back up" quickly after the attacks, "better and stronger"; much the opposite. Those attacks inflicted a lingering trauma from which you have yet to even begin to emerge, even though you have convinced yourselves otherwise. From an honest outsider's perspective, you have been forever changed, yet you're too terrified to admit it to yourselves. The heightened distrust and paranoia are but a few of the symptoms. Maybe one day you'll find your way; maybe one day you'll trust enough to let others help you get there, but, clearly, today — 25 years later — is not that day.

ratfink wrote on 2026-09-11, 18:55:

Same with all the Gerry Anderson series.

My nephew loves Thunderbirds so I've been watching episodes for the first time since I saw them as a child during the 90s revival. While I know it's a show for children, Gerry Anderson, like Gene Roddenberry, injected a lot of his own ideas about the world into it (thankfully not all - imagine puppets expositing some of Roddenberry's wierdo Californian beliefs about the sexual revolution). It's jarringly earnest to see world government advanced as an aspiration rather than it be some Davos conspiracy! It's also funny to see how much they thought gas turbines were going to be everywhere. That whine is the sonic trademark of the show.

In the future worlds of Anderson and Roddenbery, Western liberalism has triumphed over the other systems - which at the time would have been understood to be the permanent vanquishing of totalitarianism. For the viewers that was the Soviet Union and China. For a lot of the people making TOS who served in the armed forces, the Nazis. Culturally too, what little we see of Earth outside Starfleet or International Rescue or Spectrum, etc, appears to depict Anglo-Americanism dominating the world. I haven't seen that subject to critical intersectionality in a four hour video essay.

If we really want to wade into the sociopolitical, only the Faustian culture of the West has been compelled to march into infinity on account of having circled the globe. Per the 'Decline of the West', Star Trek as a cultural work cannot embody these ideals anymore because the society making it no longer holds them. The West has decided instead to boldly go up its own arse.