Recommend some strange new worlds

[Daigohji]

One of my favourite types of science fiction is where the story centres around the exploration of an alien environment that operates by its own strange set of rules. I'm looking for some recommendations of stories of this type in any medium. Some of my favourites are: (films) Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Tron, Stalker, (games) The Dig, Dark Seed, (novel) Rendezvous with Rama.

Any ideas?

[Minzoku]

My favourite sci-fi is Mortal Engines, which is Earth in the far future--so far it may as well be an alien planet except for how they view our present

Oddly enough, I just don't dig space stuff. TOO exploratory, and I can't identify with it anymore.

[Never_Scurred]

I take it you're into Douglas Adams?
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is about as much sci fi as I can take. Reading his stuff pretty much spoiled me.
Do you like Terry Pratchett's stuff?

[kengou]

When it comes to sci-fi I always have to recommend the Dune series. In terms of fully-realized worlds and cultures, Frank Herbert is the master.

[Warp_Rattler]

Do you like a longer read? Try Neal Stephenson's Anathem. It concerns a world where the general populace has essentially become so dumb and terrified of science (or supposedly, the wars that it brings), that all intelligentsia are pretty much exiled into these monastaries where, depending on one's place in the order, the gates to the outside world only open once every year, decade, century, or (rumor has it) millennia. It seems like a pretty straightforward premise, but things get pretty epic pretty fast, and the Science is very much put into the fiction. What gives the book a bit of its exploratory flavor is there is a lot of made-up languages corresponding to real-life objects and concepts; there's an included dictionary for cheating but part of the fun is trying to puzzle through some of the language on your own.

In a similar vein, Walter Miller's Canticle for Leibowitz is about a monastic order in a post-apocalyptic America trying to preserve fragments of humanity's scientific knowledge until such time as they might be of use again. The knowledge people have of the pre-war America is fragmented at best, giving the novel a very exploratory feel, as you're essentially reading about people trying to understand and catalog concepts and items that for us are generally common knowledge.

And if you like the STALKER games (love 'em myself), I recommend trying to hunt down the original novella they were based on: Roadside Picnic by Boris and Arkady Strugatski. The English translation is long out of print and a bit spendy, but a decently equipped library (university libraries with interlibrary loan programs are best) might be able to procure a copy for you; I do recall stumbling across a PDF version of the title at one point as well. It might as well be a novelization of the games, as aside from the Chernobyl setting, a lot of the details are the same. Also recommended is Tarkovsky's film, Stalker. It's about three hours with not much at all in the way of action, but it absolutely drips with atmosphere, and a great example of movies that pack a lot of storytelling into minimal dialogue.

[Drum]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solaris_(novel)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Crystal_World
Movies: Barbarella!
Games: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_Blood_(video_game)
Another World
Star Control 2

Outside sci-fi:
Jim Woodring's Frank
Tove Jannson's Moomin books

[xris]

Deathworld by Harry Harrison
Dune by Herbert is good
Perdido Street Station by China Meville, oh my god how can somebody be so creative? The story in this is a little rough around the edges.

[neorichieb1971]

Matrix is an obvious one.

Inception (coming out)

Dark City

Lawnmower man

Imaginarium of Dr Parnasus

Mr Magorums wonder emporium

Star Wars

[szycag]

Caprica and Firefly for TV stuff.

[antron]

the original Solaris (movie)
Slaughterhouse 5 (book or movie)
Dune (book+1)
2001 (book+1)

[Obiwanshinobi]

Books:

The Book of the New Sun (+ The Urth of the New Sun), The Fifth Head of Cerberus, The Island of Doctor Death and Other Stories and Other Stories (sic! I'm recommending this collection as it should contain the Tracking Song story) by Gene Wolfe.

Roadside Picnic (even if you didn't like the film Stalker at all, have no fear; the novel is VERY different), Snail on the Slope, The Doomed City and many others by Strugatsky brothers.

The Cyberiad by Stanisław Lem (provided the translation is good).

(Whoa, just found out that Michael Kandel translated Marek S. Huberath's debut. Way to go!)

Non-Stop, Hothouse and The Helliconia Trilogy by Brian W. Aldiss (provided you can stand the protagonists).

The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury.

...und so weiter, und so weiter.

Comic books:

The World of Edena and Arzach by Moebius (the latter being virtually textless, go for the version with good print quality first and foremost).

...and many, many other comics, really. Maybe I'll come up with another handful of suggestions.

Anime with outstandingly depicted worlds (make sure to watch 'em with the original voice acting each):

Last Exile (don't listen to the shitsayers, rather watch it twice for it really is that good).

Eureka Seven - need I say more?

Seikai no Monshou (Crest of the Stars), Seikai no Danshou (Seikai no Monshou Birth), Seikai no Senki (Banner of the Stars), Seikai no Senki II, Seikai no Senki III (I'm talking the TV series and OAVs, not the feature films). Judging from the anime, the original novels should be good as well.

Sunabouzu (Desert Punk) - even if you initially find it impenetrable, watch at least first four episodes, will you?

Planetes (ΠΛΑΝΗΤΕΣ) - the stories are a little bit too deus ex machina for my liking, but it's a fine show.

Wolf's Rain - somewhat clumsily directed (think RahXephon) show and - again - deus ex machina all the way, but there is something magic about it.

RahXephon - see Wolf's Rain, except in hindsight the RahXephon's story isn't too bad.

Tove Jannson's Moomin books

Which reminds me of Kino no Tabi (Kino's Journey). You simply cannot go wrong with it.

In a similar vein, Walter Miller's Canticle for Leibowitz is about a monastic order in a post-apocalyptic America trying to preserve fragments of humanity's scientific knowledge until such time as they might be of use again. The knowledge people have of the pre-war America is fragmented at best, giving the novel a very exploratory feel, as you're essentially reading about people trying to understand and catalog concepts and items that for us are generally common knowledge.

Ah, yes. It's commendable.

Also recommended is Tarkovsky's film, Stalker. It's about three hours with not much at all in the way of action, but it absolutely drips with atmosphere, and a great example of movies that pack a lot of storytelling into minimal dialogue.

Speaking of Tarkovsky's films, I'd recommend Andrei Rublev rather than Stalker or Solaris (1972). If you're gonna watch a film by Tarkovsky, you can as well go straight for the main course. They are all about equally uncompromising anyway.

[GaijinPunch]

I read very few books a year. Current one is Japanese, so that wil take like 2 years. I do, however, watch a lot of documentaries. You want strange new worlds? How about real ones.

1: Mysteries of the Solar System (BBC): all kinds of wacky shit in our own (relative) backyard
2: Into the Universe with Stephen Hawking (Discovery): a 'theoretical phsyics' look at universe. Fascinating although the visuals aren't as good as #1.
3: The Universe (History Channel): Some episodes are cheesy, but some are pretty interetsing. It's nice to get 45 minutes devoted to one specific part or concept of the universe
4: Blue Planet (BBC): If you own a BluRay player and not this you suck. It will open your mind as to just how little of your own world you know.

[Never_Scurred]

[ST Dragon]

We have similar tastes. These came immediately to mind:

Video Games:

Unreal (1998) - After crash-landing you find your self in a vast alien world with 2 suns where you have to travel and explore through some of the coolest & strangest landscapes and locations you've ever seen. The graphics are still an excellent sight to look at, especially the impressive sky, water, temples, etc...and the music is excellent. The exploration, sci-fi, mystery elements are what you would expect from a film and with 45 non-linear stages you're in for a big treat! The story unfolds in an unpredictable way as you find your self in the middle of of situations that you would least expect.
Basically it covers everything that you're looking for:

One of my favourite types of science fiction is where the story centres around the exploration of an alien environment that operates by its own strange set of rules

Novels:

World Without Stars - Poul Anderson

Excellent sci-fi story that takes place on a remote planet in the furthest reaches of our Galaxy where the brightest object on the night sky is the Milky-way its self as the parent star is a faint white dwarf close to the end of its life. There the crash-landed crew, explore a very strange alien environment and interact with even stranger local beings.




Films / Series:

Star Trek Voyager

I'm not a Star Trek fan but this specific series was very enjoyable. The crew find them selves stranded 70000 light years away in the unexplored Delta Quadrant of the Milky-way and during their journey back to earth, they explore / interact awesome, never before seen alien worlds, beings and phenomena, face unimaginable odds and situations (each with different rules) and many episodes are very similar to Ulysses Odyssey on his return to Ithaka from Troy.
Generally, the exploration factor goes over the top in STV, compared to the other Star Trek series / films or other Sci-fi films / series for that matter.

[ST Dragon]

http://i.imgur.com/frLHu.jpg

I've seen that slide show before in an animated gif and still find it amazing & mind blowing every time I look at it!

However, I had not seen the part about Humble telescope discovering that huge Galaxy 13 billion light years away!
But I don't think there is a Galaxy containing 1 trillion stars and the part mentioning that:
“it is so large, it technically shouldn't exist according to current physics theories”

That's a bit off-shot, why couldn't it exist and which theories specifically?

edit - didn't need to see that huge-ass image displayed twice in the same thread /mod

[sven666]

obvious videogame answers are another world and flashback, with the second being highly playable still today.

im sure theyre downloadable on wii/xbox360/psn somehow.

[GaijinPunch]

Trying to comprehend the universe is just fucking nuts. I try to do it every time I get high and I realize how small we all really are. I like Carl Sagan's views on the Earth, it's inhabitants, and some of the foolish things we've done (Google "Pale Blue Dot" and you can find a nice sum up).

[Ghegs]

obvious videogame answers are another world and flashback, with the second being highly playable still today.

im sure theyre downloadable on wii/xbox360/psn somehow.

You can buy Another World for PC easily even today, but Flashback's case is a bit more complex. Though it appeared for gazillion systems in its heydey, I think the game's rights are all over the map now, meaning there aren't any current official ports. There is, however, a rewrite of the game's engine available for many systems but it requires the original DOS data files in order to actually work.

Come to think of it, I think I still have my Delphine Collection cd somewhere...I do love that game.

[Observer]

Mmm, you could try the Homeworld series for PC. It's really damn good and several missions have a lot of quirks and strange things occurring, including environmental phenomena (nebulae, strange distortions that will cause a lot of trouble, gravity wells and more).

Oh, maybe Dan Simmons' Hyperion saga. That if you can stomach the characters and some concepts they used. Plus the idea I had in mind of the Shrike doesn't come nowhere near as close to the imagery used for the book covers. Most of it is terrible anyway so Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion fall under the "don't judge a book by its cover" category.

Did anyone mention Macross yet? Not sure if the original could do it (definitely check the movie "Do you remember love?") but Macross Plus might fit the bill as it's set in a different planet and things get quite weird... and awesome.

mmm, maybe the Xenosaga series (Episode I mainly, with its OST performed by Yasunori Mitsuda and a full orchestra so it sets the ambience of a "space opera" quite well) and perhaps Star Ocean 3, which features Motoi Sakuraba's trademark prog-rock feeling.

[sven666]

You can buy Another World for PC easily even today, but Flashback's case is a bit more complex. Though it appeared for gazillion systems in its heydey, I think the game's rights are all over the map now, meaning there aren't any current official ports. There is, however, a rewrite of the game's engine available for many systems but it requires the original DOS data files in order to actually work.

Come to think of it, I think I still have my Delphine Collection cd somewhere...I do love that game.

well, a snes/md with the gamecart is hardly a costly investment so its not really a problem to get hold of.

I also remembered i have an old PC game called "alien worlds" or something like that, its a bit like "elite" i guess where you travel around the universe looking for aliens to talk/trade/fight with... never played it to any extent but it has nice graphics and seemed like a game you could waste alot of time on..

[Obiwanshinobi]

obvious videogame answers are another world and flashback, with the second being highly playable still today.

im sure theyre downloadable on wii/xbox360/psn somehow.

You can buy Another World for PC easily even today, but Flashback's case is a bit more complex. Though it appeared for gazillion systems in its heydey, I think the game's rights are all over the map now, meaning there aren't any current official ports. There is, however, a rewrite of the game's engine available for many systems but it requires the original DOS data files in order to actually work.

Come to think of it, I think I still have my Delphine Collection cd somewhere...I do love that game.

The PS2 port seems to be broken, though, at least on certain PS2 units.
Do not forget about the 100% kosher, free PC port of onEscapee. Just sayin'.
Moreover, Another World 15th Anniversary Edition is technically still playable (no more obligatory up for jump). The puzzles, at least some of them, are still pants on head bonkers, though.

[Jon]

Zeno Clash?

[monkeyman]

In terms of books you could try the Exiles saga by Julian May (Many Colored Land, Golden Torc, Nonborn King and The Adversary) - quite literally about exploring new lands. Though be warned, the first act of the first book bombards you with ideas and concepts so it can take a while to get a handle on it.

Games / film and TV seem to have been covered pretty well.

[oli_lar]

Try Iain M Bank's novels. Currently reading Consider Phlebas, though I've read some of the later ones too.

[Klatrymadon]

One of my favourite types of science fiction is where the story centres around the exploration of an alien environment that operates by its own strange set of rules.

You should definitely check out The Demolished Man and The Stars My Destination/Tiger! Tiger! by Alfred Bester. Ursula Le Guin's The Dispossessed, too. I recommend these novels more because they all have intriguing "sets of rules", which they use to meditate on various sociological and political concerns, than because they take place in fantastical environments. Oh, and because I'm completely obsessed with the idea of teleportation at will, which features heavily in Bester's works and which RULZ OK.

[Engineer]

I don't think anyone has mentioned Ring World by Larry Niven. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_world

I've seen that slide show before in an animated gif and still find it amazing & mind blowing every time I look at it!

This one? http://veehd.com/video/2091014_Star-Size-Comparison

[moozooh]

Which reminds me of Kino no Tabi (Kino's Journey). You simply cannot go wrong with it.

Weren't going to respond at this point, but this recommendation surprised me in a very good way. KnT is indeed a real gem that any fan of philosophical fiction should be able to enjoy*. Not much "science" aspect there, though (rather fantasy, some steampunk at times), but it's really good no matter how you look at it.

* — You are going to be bored out of your mind if you're looking for fast pacing and cheap thrills in this show. It's slow, thoughtful, and ridden with philosophical attitude to the point where every second line of text looks like a metaphor or a full-blown aphorism (not joking). The stories themselves are basically visualized popular ideas put through the prism of a thought experiment, with no definite moral or a course of action expressed in the end.

An interesting diversion not to spend the 2000th post on a topic of videogames. :)

[ColonelFatso]

The Gods Themselves by Isaac Asimov. No physical exploration conducted, but a great deal of discussion.

[antron]

The Gods Themselves by Isaac Asimov. No physical exploration conducted, but a great deal of discussion.

+1 Asimov

The Foundation Series
The God Makers

[ST Dragon]

I don't think anyone has mentioned Ring World by Larry Niven. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_world

I've seen that slide show before in an animated gif and still find it amazing & mind blowing every time I look at it!

This one? http://veehd.com/video/2091014_Star-Size-Comparison

No I meant this animated gif:

It compares more stars than the video

That's a cool video by the way, though the "black hole" soundtrack is not very fitting imo...
And Uranus planet is missing from our solar system some reason!

By the way, that "Pistol Star - White Hyper Giant", I read about it recently (maybe in these forums) but can’t find the info now...

By the way, what is it that gives to all these stars their distinctive colours (Yellow, white, blue, Orange, purple, etc…)?
Do all main sequence stars (like our sun) which fuse hydrogen in to helium, always have this yellow colour? Is the colour of a star defined by the stage / phase of their life that they’re in?

Are there any other main sequence stars like our sun with a red, orange, white, blue, purple, colour, etc…other than yellow? Or is it only stars which have used up all their hydrogen fuel and have began fusing helium that their colour changes from yellow to something else?

And is there a star with Green colour?