Three Vampire: The Masquerade interactive novels have been announced, text only, to go on Steam.
They show an interesting variety of chronicle ideas:
Night Road has a courier travelling between domains, with a delivery wanted by more than one interested party. (I wonder if Jason Carl suggested this plot hook, as he mentioned a courier adventure idea when talking about the Camarilla anti-technology stance at World Of Darkness Berlin.)
Out For Blood casts you as a hunter discovering a fight between an elder and a group of Thinbloods.
Parliament Of Knives is a political infighting story, with the classic opener of the Prince of the city going missing...
I presume actually publishing them as numbered gamebooks would be more editorial effort? (Edit: following some more discussion on World Of Darkness News, it sounds like it would be a lot of work.)
We only got one gamebook once, as an April Fool...
Thursday 30 April 2020
D&D for Comic Relief
Questing Time host Paul Foxcroft to DM a D&D game for Comic Relief with UK comedy folks, including Sue Perkins, Nish Kumar and Sara Pascoe. Friday the 8th of May.
Thanks to Paco of G*M*S for the news.
Thanks to Paco of G*M*S for the news.
Wednesday 29 April 2020
A history of GEAS
Vivek Santayana presents a history of GEAS, the Edinburgh University RPG society that is home to The Watch House among many more, as part of his podcast.
Tuesday 28 April 2020
RPGnet 2020 Membership Drive
RPGnet is looking for members and offering PDFs of The Fall of Delta Green, BLAZON, and more!
Mage 20: Technocracy Reloaded
Technocracy Reloaded, a new sourcebook for Mage: The Ascension 20th Anniversary Edition, now Kickstarting and already funded.
Pterry
A good bookshop is just a genteel Black Hole that knows how to read.
Sir Terry Pratchett, born this day in 1948, in Guards! Guards!
Sir Terry Pratchett, born this day in 1948, in Guards! Guards!
Monday 27 April 2020
Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt chooses her own adventure
A trailer for the Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt interactive special on Netflix, following the Black Mirror special Bandersnatch which was a more common genre for this kind of TV gamebook.
I particularly like that the trailer says that yes, you can jump back and change a choice. :)
I particularly like that the trailer says that yes, you can jump back and change a choice. :)
Sunday 26 April 2020
A L I E N
Happy Alien Day, American friends. Here we celebrate on the 42nd of June.
Fria Ligan celebrates by announcing a Starter Set and a new big adventure for their A L I E N RPG. The Starter Set will contain a condensed rulebook which is still over a hundred pages. That seems like it could be pretty easy to condense, as the normal rulebook is laid out like an artbook with a game system in the captions. Most of the art is great, some a bit too obviously photoreferenced for me.
Gehenna Gaming will be interviewing one of the designers tonight at 9.30 UK time.
Need more art? The unmade game Aliens Crucible provides some.
It still packs a fair amount into its four hundred pages. It notably contains two supported playstyles, the standard Campaign where space marines and truckers get into various kinds of trouble and the one-shot-based Cinematic where PC agendas are built to clash and Stress to ramp up harder so that not everybody should survive.
It also takes advantage of the breadth of the licence (excepting the Predator and other crossovers) including those prequels and teasers for Alien Resurrection as it’s set circa ALIEN³, but also features concepts from the other unmade Alien 3 scripts like the Union of Progressive Peoples from the William Gibson version and the wooden hermitage planet from Vincent Ward’s, and more like the Church of Immaculate Incubation from the first Dark Horse Aliens comics and even the Harvesters from the Leading Edge Aliens RPG. This means you have a lot to draw from, including ideas from several incompatible alternate continuities.
The system itself is pretty minimal and straightforward, with four stats rated to five, a small number of skills and talents, and more space given to suggested emotional connections and visual tics playbook-style for the careers. It all runs on D6, and includes 6D6 random tables (like TOON!) for things like critical hits. Stress runs similarly to Hunger Dice in Vampire: The Masquerade Fifth Edition, replacing regular dice as it rises, while it has some advantages as well as the increasing risk of panic.
What could you do with the setting? Possibly a lot.
I’ve played Alien-related games before and often died - I once got to play Hudson in a runthrough of Aliens, and didn’t die because the session ran long - as well as borrowing from it rather heavily for The Stars On Fire, with the UPP being one of the things I swiped. Other “space sucks” settings like Traveller 2300 and The Expanse also focus on humanity going out into the stars and still keeping nation-states and fighting over resources while also prodding at dangerous first contact and the like.
I could certainly run a campaign like that again, and with the Stress and other systems this might be a good choice.
Oh, and one last ALIEN gaming connection for you... the Alien Anthology short film Harvest features a Xenomorph played by L.A. By Night’s Alex Ward.
Fria Ligan celebrates by announcing a Starter Set and a new big adventure for their A L I E N RPG. The Starter Set will contain a condensed rulebook which is still over a hundred pages. That seems like it could be pretty easy to condense, as the normal rulebook is laid out like an artbook with a game system in the captions. Most of the art is great, some a bit too obviously photoreferenced for me.
Gehenna Gaming will be interviewing one of the designers tonight at 9.30 UK time.
Need more art? The unmade game Aliens Crucible provides some.
It still packs a fair amount into its four hundred pages. It notably contains two supported playstyles, the standard Campaign where space marines and truckers get into various kinds of trouble and the one-shot-based Cinematic where PC agendas are built to clash and Stress to ramp up harder so that not everybody should survive.
It also takes advantage of the breadth of the licence (excepting the Predator and other crossovers) including those prequels and teasers for Alien Resurrection as it’s set circa ALIEN³, but also features concepts from the other unmade Alien 3 scripts like the Union of Progressive Peoples from the William Gibson version and the wooden hermitage planet from Vincent Ward’s, and more like the Church of Immaculate Incubation from the first Dark Horse Aliens comics and even the Harvesters from the Leading Edge Aliens RPG. This means you have a lot to draw from, including ideas from several incompatible alternate continuities.
The system itself is pretty minimal and straightforward, with four stats rated to five, a small number of skills and talents, and more space given to suggested emotional connections and visual tics playbook-style for the careers. It all runs on D6, and includes 6D6 random tables (like TOON!) for things like critical hits. Stress runs similarly to Hunger Dice in Vampire: The Masquerade Fifth Edition, replacing regular dice as it rises, while it has some advantages as well as the increasing risk of panic.
What could you do with the setting? Possibly a lot.
I’ve played Alien-related games before and often died - I once got to play Hudson in a runthrough of Aliens, and didn’t die because the session ran long - as well as borrowing from it rather heavily for The Stars On Fire, with the UPP being one of the things I swiped. Other “space sucks” settings like Traveller 2300 and The Expanse also focus on humanity going out into the stars and still keeping nation-states and fighting over resources while also prodding at dangerous first contact and the like.
I could certainly run a campaign like that again, and with the Stress and other systems this might be a good choice.
Oh, and one last ALIEN gaming connection for you... the Alien Anthology short film Harvest features a Xenomorph played by L.A. By Night’s Alex Ward.
20 Buffy hooks from Paramore by Paramore
Looking for a list of twenty to thirty evocative titles I went further back in the Paramore discography, as the extended release of their self-titled album has twenty tracks... Done on Twitter one at a time, minimal looking ahead.
Saturday 25 April 2020
Avengers Endgame
Avengers Endgame hit screens a year ago.
Getting a little emotional.
I love you three thousand.
Getting a little emotional.
I love you three thousand.
It belongs in a museum - just not where people can see it!
A collection of highlights from the museum curator battle CreepiestObject hashtag started by Yorkshire Museum. And for me, won by the Whitby Museum Hand of Glory.
Friday 24 April 2020
Little Demon
Little Demon, the forthcoming animated comedy from Dan Harmon, has Danny DeVito as Satan and his daughter Lucy as his daughter, and Aubrey Plaza as her mother.
That would work as a straight horror, and similar things have in the past. And as we know from Reaper that would probably make a decent Buffy setup too.
That would work as a straight horror, and similar things have in the past. And as we know from Reaper that would probably make a decent Buffy setup too.
Thursday 23 April 2020
Dead By Dawn Online
Dead By Dawn 2020 should be starting tonight. Instead, and before the November reschedule, a run of shorts online for the weekend, starting here.
World Book Night
World Book Night, the dark opposite of World Book Day, is tonight. (Although not nearly six months apart.)
Leverage is coming back!
Leverage is coming back!
Age of the geek, baby!
I TOLD you I had cool news!! ‘Leverage’ Reboot Starring Noah Wyle Ordered By IMDb TVDean Devlin
Ah, *that* was announced. Well, here we go here we go here we go now...John Rogers
I would note the article should have covered that fact that while @ChrDowney and I are consulting, the actual day to day showrunner is the amazing @NobleRorick , who was on THE LIBRARIANS, and it could not be in better hands.
Age of the geek, baby!
Wednesday 22 April 2020
Leslye Headland developing a Star Wars series
Leslye Headland, co-creator of Russian Doll, heading to Disney+ developing “a female-centric series that takes place in a different part of the Star Wars timeline than other projects.”
Force Friday! What a concept!
Force Friday! What a concept!
Expedition Volcano
Repeated on TV here last night and on BBC iPlayer, the two-part documentary Expedition Volcano features an international team of scientists and a safety adviser (who was once a Royal Marine sniper and also works on stunts for Marvel movies and hunts tiger traffickers) rappelling down inside a not-entirely-dormant volcano to find better ways to measure its activity. It’s the best documentary Neptune Foundation adventure hook I’ve ever seen.
Distant Worlds Here
Distant Worlds for Trinity Continuum: Aeon and Heinau’s Guide To Wasteland Beasties for Dystopia Rising: Evolution are now out to print.
Tuesday 21 April 2020
Monday 20 April 2020
New Bremen 20
Another World Of Darkness 20th Anniversary: New Bremen, the official moderated chat. I talked to Ian Watson about it and plans to revive it a ways back.
My favourite thing about New Bremen was the size meant it could support niche games you’d be unlikely to get players for elsewhere. I was an ER doctor in Central Hospital, which became like a medical drama with more vampires stealing from the blood bank.
My favourite thing about New Bremen was the size meant it could support niche games you’d be unlikely to get players for elsewhere. I was an ER doctor in Central Hospital, which became like a medical drama with more vampires stealing from the blood bank.
Sunday 19 April 2020
All that I want is to wake up fine...
Happy third birthday Hard Times by Paramore, the launch single for Buffy-idea-inducer After Laughter.
Friday 17 April 2020
The Clone Wars End
Like the end of season five with the non-standard but very Star Wars closing credits moment, the last multi-parter for The Clone Wars begins with the original Lucasfilm logo and then the John Williams theme. Altering the credits is serious business.
Scarred Lands PWYW sale
This weekend (until Monday morning) the new Scarred Lands PDFs for D&D 5e and Pathfinder 1, the Player’s Guide and The Wise And The Wicked are Pay What You Want.
JJ Abrams heading back to TV
The third JJ Abrams show coming to HBO Max is Duster, about a 70s gang getaway driver. I thought I’d headline it because people keep mentioning Justice League Dark and Overlook, it doesn’t come weighted with adaptation expectations, and it might not have so many mystery box concepts either.
Thursday 16 April 2020
Buffy jigsaws and the 2016 board game
On Kickstarter, shiny Buffy jigsaws and a reprint of the recent board game and its add-on Friends And Frenemies.
I’ve never seen this game myself, but the Big Bad based campaign play seem like a nice fit.
I’ve never seen this game myself, but the Big Bad based campaign play seem like a nice fit.
Wednesday 15 April 2020
Dystopia Rising: Evolution
Dystopia Rising: Evolution is out now to order in traditional print via Studio 2, and PDF and print from DriveThruRPG, the Storypath game based on the zombie-flavoured post-apocalypse live-action setting.
Tuesday 14 April 2020
Endymion’s Gate
Endymion’s Gate, a new streaming miniseries, with various Geek & Sundry players and GMed by L.A. By Night regular Ash Minnick, using the DramaSystem setting Dreamspace from Hillfolk.
“Lost in the universal unconscious, the crew of the dreamship Endymion searches for reality.”
“Lost in the universal unconscious, the crew of the dreamship Endymion searches for reality.”
Monday 13 April 2020
Toss a coin to your Witcher
Henry Cavill painting Warhammer figures is one thing, referring to them as plastic crack shows true understanding.
Sunday 12 April 2020
The Goodies
Tim Brooke-Taylor has died. The Goodies was one of the formative series of my childhood, a live-action cartoon where Tim, Bill Oddie and Graeme Garden were called in to deal with the likes of Bigfoot, moon creatures, ham radio, and a marauding giant kitten.
Saturday 11 April 2020
Pre-WWII poster macabre
Film posters, adverts, and safety announcements from pre-WWII Europe which are SUPER Goth. Thanks to Chaosium for the link! (Content note: roaches advancing on a crying baby...)
Teleconferencing
I have played by teleconference a few times now. I feel like I should GM something, but since my teleconferencing setup involves shouting at my tablet and it can cope with sending either audio or video but not both, I should probably leave it for the time being.
Although the isolation and unreliable headset comms could make for a great A L I E N game setup. But not the time...
I have seen LARP from home happening as well, with the teleconferencing being either talked around or more often incorporated, with games about spaceship crews, cyberpunk hackers and the like.
Although the isolation and unreliable headset comms could make for a great A L I E N game setup. But not the time...
I have seen LARP from home happening as well, with the teleconferencing being either talked around or more often incorporated, with games about spaceship crews, cyberpunk hackers and the like.
Nordic LARP 2020
Solmukohta, the Finnish edition of the Nordic LARP conference Knutepunkt, was held online this year, as covered in this Nordic LARP feature. Talks include interactive theatre and immersive experiences looking at the wiggly line of what counts as LARP and indeed gaming, the emotional effects of games and more.
Friday 10 April 2020
Sounds Like Hell, looks like this
The Spin, Marsden's campus-adjacent indie club:
Franc and Ben, managers of the Spin:
Franc and Ben, managers of the Spin:
Thursday 9 April 2020
Ask Ken & Robin
Ask Ken & Robin, a virtual panel - like Ken & Robin Talk About Stuff, but online in a different way.
Wednesday 8 April 2020
Twin Peaks
Television got quite a bit stranger thirty years ago tonight when Twin Peaks first aired.
Over The Edge would be a good place to start RPG-wise, and Chronicles Of Darkness supplies some useful tools for a wonky-reality mystery game.
I once helped the charity fire sale at Conpulsion by putting in some totally-not-Toblerone bars of the same name.
Over The Edge would be a good place to start RPG-wise, and Chronicles Of Darkness supplies some useful tools for a wonky-reality mystery game.
I once helped the charity fire sale at Conpulsion by putting in some totally-not-Toblerone bars of the same name.
Werewolf: The Apocalypse 5th edition writing team
A video introduction to the writing team for Werewolf 5. Some names I know, some new to me.
Tuesday 7 April 2020
Monday 6 April 2020
Sunday 5 April 2020
ScaledCon pub quiz
As played by two teams last night. See how well you can do!
(Answers to follow on, maybe Tuesday?)
(Answers to follow on, maybe Tuesday?)
The Forty Elephants
I’d read about the Forty Elephants, the very-long-running London shoplifting and black marketeering gang, before, but always nice to see a boost. Now where’s their TV show?
Saturday 4 April 2020
Thursday 2 April 2020
ScaledCon schedule
ScaledCon schedule including the quiz from 8 to 10. Better have some questions...
Wednesday 1 April 2020
Let Sleeping Dogs Play
For the record,
Cara Lawson
Akashayana
College athlete turned monster hunter
 |
| Holland Roden |
The result of me going last in character generation, everybody else being investigative or social, so I decided to channel never getting to play Buffy be useful in combat.
Faye: Cara was one of the few sane members of the PCs and we did not deserve her
Let Sleeping Dogs Lie
We have now completed this Mage 20, Vampire 20, Changeling 20 chronicle. Rules incompatibilities aside I think it went over really well.
And yes, I got to play!
And yes, I basically played Buffy The Akashayana. Shut up.
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