posted
Bernd, As I was visiting your website, I noticed those infamous Star Trek files gave you names and registries of a few Akira class starships. My question is, are they all from ST-FC or are they from VOyager and Deep Space Nine as well? Thanks in advance.
------------------ Remember when we used to be explorers? - Capt. Jean-Luc Picard - Star Trek Insurrection
posted
One was from MiB, I'm not so sure about the others. Honestly, I don't have the issue yet, I only got the list. Maybe you should look at Steve's website:
------------------ http://frankg.dgne.com/ Quintesson: "You are the Autobot named Kup. You are Cybertron's chief of security." Kup: "Nah, my name's Teaspoon, and I'm Cybertron's chief dishwasher."
posted
The Fact Files are official. Paramount recognizes and endorses the files. In the announcement for the new Star Trek magazine, the official Star Trek Web Site mentions their counterpart-the Fact Files. I believe this resolves the issue of the official-ness of the Fact Files.
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posted
I think they are endorsing the new Star Trek The Magazine which is said to be similar to the Fact Files (maybe it is the Fact Files in Britain??) I don't think they endorse the ealier issues of the Fact Files, in fact I think I remember that Sternbach posted a message about this and said something to the effect that they do pretty good work for not having official info. He's also stated that recently he has provided official info for the Star Trek the Mag. people to use.
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
Unless the producers have become a bit more "creative" lately (I have just received issue #65, and it's around #110 in Britain), there a only few facts in the Fact Files. They seem to include only information that has been confirmed again and again. I didn't spot any major errors, despite the paper weight of some 10kg. On the other hand, regarding the "error vs. information density rate" it is rather a bit worse than the Encyclopedia.
posted
The Akira article (in #119 I think) is a real break from the norm. Lots of text and some of it seems to completely new. They tend to follow the DS9 TM but even point out one instance where the TM doesn't make sense (number of forward torp tubes).
There are mistakes: they give the Thunderchild a different registry than the Encyclopedia. They say that the USS Spector is the ship from MiaB (okay, possible, but it's still an odd name) but give it the registry that we normally associate with the Thunderchild. And which episode is the USS Rabin from?
The large picture is gorgeous. It clearly shows that there are four forward torp tubes in the weapons pod. Harder to make out how many rear tubes there are, it could be 2, 4 or even 6! The accompanying schematics are very accurate when compared to the imagery from the Star Trek magazine pictures.
One mystery is where are the other three phaser strips (the article copies the DS9 TM by saying there are six, but only three are visible, and we have schematics of all five views). Similarly there isn't an obvious lower torp tube, but torp tubes are easier to hide than phasers strips so that's no real problem.
All five shuttle bay doors (two aft, three forward) are clearly marked. They seem confused as to where the shuttle control tower is, the text places it at the rear of the saucer but the schematic places it in the weapons pod.
They mention saucer separation - an idea I first saw at UPII but they keep the bridge on the saucer rather than taking it (and a slice of the saucer) with the enginering hulls as UPII did. The don't tell us where the warp core is which is vital to understand if saucer separation is to make sense.
posted
Oh, and they also say that the class was in service long before first contact with the Borg, which is a great big up yours to sites like UP (and LUG) which seem to think that this is some sort of Borg killer. :-)
The First One
A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he's pissed
Member # 35
posted
Oh, C'mon, Steve, we all know that the UP idea of the Akira as a really new ship when it was seen in First Contact was abandoned as soon as the registry number of the Thunderchild was confirmed in the Encyclopaedia II! Don't be bitchy. . . 8)
How recent was #119? Anything that contains 'gorgeous Akira pictures' is a must for me!
I can't scan the picture as it's bigger than my scanner.
And the UP idea (making all the ships seen for the first time in FC brand-new-super-borg-killers) was stupid. There are still web sites out there that say this and LUG have even recreated this idea. Grrr.
The First One
A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he's pissed
Member # 35
posted
Cool, thanks. I'll pop into Forbidden Planet, they usually have the last few ones there.
But seriously, you can hardly blame people for thinking that the FC ships were all new. It was a hypothesis as good as any other at the time, albeit one that was swiftly disproved. But it put the whole idea of starship-watching 'on the map' and got a lot of people, including me, interested in the subject for the first time.
Remember, before, you hardly ever saw any starships, just interminable stock footage of Excelsiors. All of a sudden you had these new ships, 4 new classes (at one point there were thought to be 6) all kicking ass and, as it were, taking names. . . It was obvious that labelling them all 'brand-new-super-borg-killers' was a real stretch, but so what?
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