Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="Greenfield" data-source="post: 7645603" data-attributes="member: 6669384">My point was that actual science can't actually do any of those things.&nbsp; No death-rays, no time machines, no reanimation of the dead.&nbsp; The huge spider from the Wild Wild West remake couldn't have stood up, or even existed:&nbsp; The metal legs depicted would have buckled, and putting that much weight onto that small&nbsp; an area is a great way to drive the legs into the ground.Now, story wise, the people depicted are great.&nbsp; Someone depicting a Girl Genius type world in which &quot;sparks&quot; set up rival city/states suggested that North America would be essentially divided between the Wizard of Menlo Park (Edison) to the east, and Tesla to the west.&nbsp; (They were terrible rivals.)Still, in most Steam Punk depictions their various sciencey vessels still used hollow tubes to carry instructions from the bridge to the engine room.&nbsp; So ignore the fact that jet packs would burn your backside off, and apply thrust so off center (compared to the center of gravity) tht you would be in a constant forward loop, and destined to slam head first into the ground whenever you tried to take off.&nbsp; (Note that the old reliable James Bond/Commander Keds jetpack you occasionally see at parades and other events can fly for less than a minute before it runs out of fuel.&nbsp; It runs on hydrogen peroxide.)So let there be &quot;science&quot;, but make it so arcane and elaborate that it might as well be magic.&nbsp; (I strongly recommend the old Vincent Price/Boris Carloff/Peter Lorre/Jack Nickelson film The Raven, where most magic required elaborate equipment and preparation.)</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Greenfield, post: 7645603, member: 6669384"] My point was that actual science can't actually do any of those things. No death-rays, no time machines, no reanimation of the dead. The huge spider from the Wild Wild West remake couldn't have stood up, or even existed: The metal legs depicted would have buckled, and putting that much weight onto that small an area is a great way to drive the legs into the ground. Now, story wise, the people depicted are great. Someone depicting a Girl Genius type world in which "sparks" set up rival city/states suggested that North America would be essentially divided between the Wizard of Menlo Park (Edison) to the east, and Tesla to the west. (They were terrible rivals.) Still, in most Steam Punk depictions their various sciencey vessels still used hollow tubes to carry instructions from the bridge to the engine room. So ignore the fact that jet packs would burn your backside off, and apply thrust so off center (compared to the center of gravity) tht you would be in a constant forward loop, and destined to slam head first into the ground whenever you tried to take off. (Note that the old reliable James Bond/Commander Keds jetpack you occasionally see at parades and other events can fly for less than a minute before it runs out of fuel. It runs on hydrogen peroxide.) So let there be "science", but make it so arcane and elaborate that it might as well be magic. (I strongly recommend the old Vincent Price/Boris Carloff/Peter Lorre/Jack Nickelson film The Raven, where most magic required elaborate equipment and preparation.) [/QUOTE]

Verification