"Dude, where's my Blaster?" Topic

"According to the pulp sci-fi novels of yesteryear, we should be colonizing space, have flying cars, jetpacks, and of course, laser guns! However, the reality is that we are still stuck in orbit of Earth, no flying cars unless your drunk, jetpacks set your pants on fire. However, you would think that laser-based weaponry would be possibly. Soldiers today carry IR aiming lasers on their M4 assault carbines via the AN/PEQ-5. Despite a few next-gen toys, our soldiers are using a rifle designed in the 1960's, while their opponents are using a gun developed in 1940's! Where is the blaster that sci-fi promised me?The US military is working on deploying lasers in the role of munitions interception, and are massive systems at the moment, not even close to a blaster.

One of the reasons that I really felt laser weaponry was just around the corner was it seemed that high-tech was all over the place in the 1980's. When I was a kid, all the cool sci-fi characters had Blasters, Battlestat Galatica, Buck Rogers, Boba Fett and everyone's favorite Nerf Herder: Han Solo.My favorite G.I. Joe was Flash during my childhood, and he had the uber-cool XMLR-1A laser rifle. However, the best thing about Growing up in the SDI Reagan-80's, you really believed at backpack laser were around the corner. After all, we had Lazer-Tag, why couldn't the Army zap the bad guys? If you grew up in the 1980's, than you may have played, or owned the two coolest toys of the mid-1980's, Photon and Lazer Tag…"

Main page

link

Armand

Yes, the slow development of directed energy weapons led me to write one of my science fiction novels with the premise that energy weapons never became practical and space ships were armed with rail guns and such.

I think the real limitation in personal energy weapons is the energy density of batteries (or the lack there of.) Chemical reactions currently still win on storage and output.

Thanks!

Armand