Geek News Roundup for 11/08/09 - "We're Fighting Time Itself, and I'm Gonna Win!"

Fans of Doctor Who have waited half a year to see what happens to the Doctor on Mars... and now they have.  "The Waters of Mars" aired today on BBC, and is the third of five special episodes intended to bring David Tennant's tenure as the Doctor to a close.  The final specials, currently titled "The End of Time" (how ominous) are set to air December 25, 2009, and January 1, 2010.

"The Waters of Mars" is less a straight-up adventure like the previous special, "Planet of the Dead" was, and more a cerebral tale of what it is like to be a Time Lord.  Knowing when things are supposed to happen, knowing what can and can't be changed, and trying to follow the laws of time.  And of all the people that he's saved, and all the people that he's tried to save, are there people that even he is not allowed to save?  Is he supposed to serve history or is history supposed to serve him?

In a way, this is a good thing, for if it was a straight-up adventure, then it would've sucked to have waited half a year just to see a story that could've easily been another episode of a regular season.  It's also even better, for it sets up the next special, which Who fans only have to wait a month and ten days for.  (And then the next one after that airs a week later.)

In promotional materials, Adelaide Brooke, played by Lindsay Duncan, is called the Doctor's new companion for the special.  But the story is less about the Doctor and his companion saving the day, and more about the Doctor's internal debate about his role in time.  In the end, I don't consider anyone to be the companion in this episode, and would have rather had the Doctor be considered alone, for that's what he seems to be for most of the episode.  Alone.  He's been deliberately ostracizing himself for a while now, ever since saying goodbye to everyone he'd met over the past few seasons (everyone who survived, at least), and he even denied Lady Christina de Souza a lift at the end of "Planet of the Dead".  It remains to be seen what changes his mind at the end of "The End of Time", but fortunately we won't have long to wait.

Anyway, forget about water on Mars, NASA's found water on the moon!  Back in June, they attacked the moon with everything they had (which, due to funding cuts, apparently wasn't much), and in October, the attack was shown to be successful.  So what's next?  It's obvious: moisture farms!  (But only if the water isn't contaminated, of course.)

But speaking of New stuff on the Moon... actually, I'd rather not talk about that.  I'd rather talk about Square-Enix!  They've made a few key announcements this past week, but I'm not holding my breath.  First of all, the long awaited Final Fantasy XIII is set to be released on March 9, 2010 for both North America and Europe.  Given past delays for some of Square-Enix's other offerings, I will only believe this when I see the game with my own eyes.  The second announcement will come as a major surprise to the fans of a lesser known series.  A new game is in the works called "The Lands Cursed by the Gods", in a series known as Estpolis in Japan, and Lufia in North America.  The game will be developed by the original team that made the Lufia series, but apparently Square-Enix has picked up publication rights.  It'll be so weird to see a Lufia game with the Square-Enix logo on it and not the Natsume logo.

Meanwhile, the Call of Duty series has smashed records.  The new game, Modern Warfare 2, has sold 4.7 million copies!  Now if we had more games like this coming out in the next few weeks, the recession would be over.  Or everyone will have declared bankruptcy after buying them.  I don't know which it is, and right now, I don't care.  I need to get back to my NaNoWriMo novel, which currently stands at 28031 words.