Good hard sci-fi?

[renegade7]

well, I don't really mind soft sci fi (I love EVE Online, but that has more in common with submarines than with actual spaceships), but I think hard sci-fi in fiction, and especially games, is vastly underused. And being a physics buff and aerospace engineering student, the lack of realism sometimes irks me.

Anyway, what sci fi games, books, movies, tv shows can you recommend me that are based on realistic science?

I am particularly interested in games. I have seen very few hard sci-fi games anywhere. And with the big budgets of this generation of games, most devs end up going the "big flashy explosion laser boats in space" route. That's fun to play, of course, but it does kind of leave something to be desired.

I'm not a total prick about realism, obviously if it were totally realistic I'd be sitting in my ship for months with nothing to do, but just anything with a focus on realism would be nice.

 

[Kordie]

Well, I don't think this will fit you perameters exactly but it is still worth checking out...

http://en.spaceengine.org/
"SpaceEngine - is a free space simulation software that lets you explore the universe in three dimensions, starting from planet Earth to the most distant galaxies. Areas of the known universe are represented using actual astronomical data, while regions uncharted by human astronomy are generated procedurally. Millions of galaxies, trillions of stars, countless planets!" - From their webpage

I found it awesome to fly around and just see different spaces in the universe. There are some hi-res texture packs for planets like earth, I haven't tried them out yet. I find it's like a minecraft kinda relaxing game to play around with.

 

[Iyon]

You may have already played them but I'd recommend the X3 games.

It's been quite a while since I've played them and I can't really recall how realistic the science is, but I believe they're considered "space simulators" so it could be what you're looking for.

The games certainly aren't for everybody but I absolutely loved them. I found them to be more fun than EVE anyway.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X3:_Reunion
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X3:_Terran_Conflict

 

[Zack Alklazaris]

You really can't beat Star Trek on this, they (or at least use to) stick to science rather well. To the point where much of the original series still holds true to the science of today.

 

[Hoplon]

Most games a pretty fanciful. There are a few physics based space games out there though.

Most recent was I-war 2 I think but that was back in 2001.

Books wise... Greg Egan, the short stories collections Axiomatic and Luminous are good places to start.

 

[Casual Shinji]

Cowboy Bepop

Not that I'm an expert on hard sci-fi, but really, Cowboy Bebop?

I'd say that's actually a perfect example of science fantasy.

 

[Da Orky Man]

well, I don't really mind soft sci fi (I love EVE Online, but that has more in common with submarines than with actual spaceships), but I think hard sci-fi in fiction, and especially games, is vastly underused. And being a physics buff and aerospace engineering student, the lack of realism sometimes irks me.

Anyway, what sci fi games, books, movies, tv shows can you recommend me that are based on realistic science?

I am particularly interested in games. I have seen very few hard sci-fi games anywhere. And with the big budgets of this generation of games, most devs end up going the "big flashy explosion laser boats in space" route. That's fun to play, of course, but it does kind of leave something to be desired.

I'm not a total prick about realism, obviously if it were totally realistic I'd be sitting in my ship for months with nothing to do, but just anything with a focus on realism would be nice.

Well, there are plenty of books to choose from, though you usually have to go for the older ones. 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Forever War, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, generally the Heinlein/Clarke stuff with a few others mixed in.

On the other hand, I am also on an eternal quest to find decent games/movies/tv shows with hard science. I have yet to encounter many.

http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/rocket/index.php
The link above is to Atomic Rockets, a site designed to get writers and such designing realistic spacecraft, and I do mean ultra-realistic. It's just generally a good read.

Oh, and Orbiter. Now, Orbiter is a hyper-realistic space simulator, with realistic everything including flight times, g-forces, non-spherical gravity sources, radiation pressure and everything. The difficulty curve actually has an overhang, but it's rather fun if you can get any good at it. My record so far is landing from low Earth orbit, taking off again, travelling to and landing on the Moon, taking off again, and unfortunately speeding past Earth at about 15km/s.

http://orbit.medphys.ucl.ac.uk/

It's also got a good modding community, so you can fly not only the realistic spacecraft, but things like Serenity or the Normandy if you want to try.
And I do recommend you get the addon 'Orbiter Sound'. The vanilla game has no sound anywhere in it, and the addon just adds instrumental music when viewing from outside, and radio reports/engine noise on the inside.

 

[StriderShinryu]

Given your background you may already know about it, but you might want to look into Kerbal Space Program. Yes, it's got a cartoony look and there's not much actual game to it, but it's a fairly realisitic space vessel building, launching and flying simulator once you get beyond the cartoon facade.

 

[GundamSentinel]

All the 2001 books are great examples. The movies as well. Same with Larry Niven's 'Known Space' series (including Ringworld), though that's sometimes a bit too outlandish to be taken serious, especially the later books.

For something more recent, most of the books by Alastair Reynolds loosely fit into hard sci-fi. There's a lot of pseudo science in there, but a lot of the technology seems very real and sensible (also, no FTL to speak of). The 'Revelation Space' series and 'Pushing Ice' are great books.

Other relatively hard sci-fi:
Ghost in the Shell
Moon
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (one of my favorite films)
Gattaca

 

[RevTibe]

You really can't beat Star Trek on this, they (or at least use to) stick to science rather well. To the point where much of the original series still holds true to the science of today.

:? Which generation you thinking about? I'm only familiar with OG and NG, and that science was about as hard as pudding.

WARPSPEED MR SPOCK TO GREEN BABE PLANET

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Otherwise, I'd say Starship Troopers is pretty solid, apart from a single quirk or two.

If you want some pretty hard/awesome sci-fi in book form, go read A Mote in Gods Eye and Footfall (don't be put off by Footfall's cover, the "space elephants" look is really exaggerated).

 

[GrandmaFunk]

You really can't beat Star Trek on this, they (or at least use to) stick to science rather well. To the point where much of the original series still holds true to the science of today.

Ugh Star Trek is HORRIBLE for actual science. it just grabs vague scientific/technological terms and re-uses them in interchangeable sentence templates. This is a trope commonly referred to as "Reverse the polarity" or treknobabble.

see http://hyotynen.kapsi.fi/trekfailure/ for never-ending examples.

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A great example of hard sci-fi done right in the realm of anime would be Planetes. While the plot has some silly points, the science is very solid and it's one of the very rare portrayal of realistic space exploration.

 

[Zack Alklazaris]

You really can't beat Star Trek on this, they (or at least use to) stick to science rather well. To the point where much of the original series still holds true to the science of today.

:? Which generation you thinking about? I'm only familiar with OG and NG, and that science was about as hard as pudding.

WARPSPEED MR SPOCK TO GREEN BABE PLANET

----

Otherwise, I'd say Starship Troopers is pretty solid, apart from a single quirk or two.

If you want some pretty hard/awesome sci-fi in book form, go read A Mote in Gods Eye and Footfall (don't be put off by Footfall's cover, the "space elephants" look is really exaggerated).

Well of course your going to have sound in space (or it would be a very boring sci fi show), and general stuff like that. He's talking about a series. I generally have never seen a down right f-up in Star Trek.

 

[Muspelheim]

See if you can find a book called "The Andromeda Strain". It's not space-fairing sci-fi, but it's reasonably hard sci-fi.

 

[Esotera]

There's a Best Of anthology for Hard Sci-Fi, that's really good and will help you find a few more authors. As for sci-fi in games/tv I don't really know of anything that's amazing for realism, as they all have faster than light travel, wormholes, etc. I suppose Stargate was quite an interesting concept if you can ignore the gate system...

 

[Klumpfot]

Would you qualify the Half-Life games of the current millennium as 'hard' sci-fi? Or the Fallout series? Probably not.

In terms of literarity, I'd check out The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress (interesting even if you're not a libertanarchist) and Snow Crash. I hope they count!

 

[Da Orky Man]

You really can't beat Star Trek on this, they (or at least use to) stick to science rather well. To the point where much of the original series still holds true to the science of today.

Ugh Star Trek is HORRIBLE for actual science. it just grabs vague scientific/technological terms and re-uses them in interchangeable sentence templates. This is a trope commonly referred to as "Reverse the polarity" or treknobabble.

Star Trek is one of the worst examples of 'realistic' sci-fi i have ever seen. oh, it's entertaining, but the science is truly awful. The technobabble they employ is one of the reasons i went off it; to someone who knows what the terms actually mean, it's torturous. There are many, many areas i could complain about it, so i will:

- Gravity on a starship points towards the engines. We know of no force that can realistically be used for artificial gravity besides spinning and acceleration, neither of which are used.

- Their engines defy both Newton's Laws of Motion and Conservation of Energy in nearly every way.

- Stealth in space is pretty much impossible due to the way IR radiation works.

- Weapon ranges in space are on the order of thousands of kilometers, not the <1km we frequently see.

- I don't mind this so much but still; FTL is impossible by today's best estimates.

- Time-travel is also impossible by today's standards.

- 'Quantum' means 'A discrete package'. It doesn't mean 'fairy dust'.

- no force we know of can realistically be used to form a shield.

- The acceleration often shown would result in the crew being plastered against the wall.

- 150 crewmembers on a ship that size? A similar-size submarine today can run with about 10. (I think)

There, I think that's all the major points.

Remember that I still rather like Star Trek. The technobabble is somewhat grating, but it can usually be relied upon for better writing than most, especially certain TNH episodes. But it's closer to science fantasy than science fiction.

 

[RevTibe]

Well of course your going to have sound in space (or it would be a very boring sci fi show), and general stuff like that. He's talking about a series. I generally have never seen a down right f-up in Star Trek.

oh there's plenty. Ever seen "Spock's Brain"? Plus, all the humanoid aliens are a big meh, and the "yup all life is programmed to become humanoid aliens" NG episode makes it even sillier Then there are the space hippies and the greek gods. Hand of Apollo w/ Enterprise:

It's a fun as hell set of series, don't get me wrong (got the OG seasons in Tricorder-shaped boxes ). It's just so, very, very, veryyyyy soft.

 

[SciMal]

Anyway, what sci fi games, books, movies, tv shows can you recommend me that are based on realistic science?

Games I can't help you with. Not my cup of tea for gaming.

Books, though - if you want some "hard" Sci-Fi, take a gander at Alastair Reynolds' work. It's still future-based science fiction, but he's a retired Astronomer and former astrophycisist for the European Space Agency. It's part of the reason I still read his books. While shows like Dr. Who can't get fucking RADAR right, Alastair seems to keep up on what's going on with spaceship design and I haven't read a book of his yet where ships broke the light barrier. It's my personal "hard" Sci-Fi fix, though I've only studied basic physics and astronomy.

For movies... well... that depends on how "hard" you want to get. There are very few good sci-fi movies to begin with (but entire mountain ranges of utter shit), and even fewer stick to realistic science. Aliens is my favorite movie for a reason, but others (looking over my collection) that subscribe to some sort of realistic physics are: K-Pax, Serenity, and War of the Worlds. You've probably seen all of those but K-Pax by now, and K-Pax uses the sci-fi as more of an easter egg instead of an integral part of the plot. It's mostly a character piece, but I still find it enjoyable.

TV shows? Ha ha ha ha ha ha.... Oh man. Nothing I can think of. The problem is that the broader the audience, the dumber or more fantastic you have to go. Mythbusters is probably the only common show where you'll find science hard at work. Even the more infamous, older Sci-Fi shows basically read the CliffNotes on any of the scientific disciplines. Maybe... MAYBE Futurama since one of the head writers holds a PhD in mathematics (the body-switch episode in Season 7 produced a new mathematical equation they use to solve the problem), but all of the Science is more in-jokes and easter eggs than overt laws regarding the fictional Universe.