July

Well, next month is RPGaDay and that starts tomorrow.

Saving the world or ruling it?

The X-Men comics for the past few years have been about the superpowered mutant nation of Krakoa, complete with the Met-style Hellfire Gala as an excuse for diplomacy, intrigue, and fashion / formal versions of lots of superheroes’ costumes.

(Seemingly being annual in and out of character also means time passed faster than usual in comics, so the era lasted a few years for the characters too.)

We have apparently reached the status quo button, but it lasted longer than is often the case.

Ever done something like this, putting your perennially struggling PCs and their allies on top for a while?

Not the one or two session version changing the setting to try it like House of M but for real and for a long arc?

Star Wars had the New Republic last a long time in books and about an hour in the Sequel Era.

Angel kinda did it in season five, though they weren’t happy about it, and Buffy The Vampire Slayer kinda did it in the season eight comics.

The tricky part would be to make this fun. The Krakoa era feels kind of like a Vampire: The Masquerade game shifting from scrappy Anarchs to the elite in Elysium, not exactly what the players signed up for so will they enjoy it?

Marvel Multiverse RPG

The Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game is out for GenCon, and looks like it’s changed extensively since the playtest version a year and a bit ago, to make a D&D-player-friendly beginner game. Rob Wieland gives an overview at Forbes. It sounds like not my kind of thing, and the ranking of characters by power discouraging mixed power level teams seems like a downer, but it sounds like it does its job otherwise.

SAW X

When your series title is so short, Latin sequel numbering can be risky.

Darkness Emergent Additions

Darkness Emergent, the big V5 LARP in Texas in November, now has two spinoff games during the event hosted by other organisations, which I think is cool. Not much to steal plots from yet, but here they are, FIRSTLIGHT and Shattering of a Dream.

(Also, I just got the CAM pun.)

Talk To Me

Talk To Me (trailer) is an Australian indie horror distributed by A24. A Ouija-style ritual which goes further than usual becomes a party game. Sort of Flatliners but even more out of control. Its most modern touch is how much time everybody spends on their phones, including recording the ritual.

It has a couple of impressively horrible scares. some gross-out humour here and there, solid performances, though it left me wanting an answer to at least one major question.

(And this weird thing being treated so casually in a pretty grounded world made me think Chronicles Of Darkness plot hook.)

The truth is very out there

What if we had proof of alien contact and nobody much cared?

Secret Invasion 1.06

Marvel’s Secret Invasion

1.05: Home

I wish they’d changed the line about Russian tanks at the Ukrainian border, among other things I wish they’d done differently.

Trinity Continuum: Aegis

Trinity Continnum: Aegis on Backerkit. The new eras for the Trinity Continuum so far have been within a lifetime of the existing games. Aegis is a couple thousand years earlier than that.

Barbie

Greta Gerwig’s Barbie looks like a live action Toy Story take on what a toy means and how they might feel about that, but then it goes off in another direction. At times wildly funny, touching, visually striking and inventive. Not 100% sure about the super ineffectual Mattel pursuers. Nice to see Michael Cena still has some Scott Pilgrim moves. A big speech gets a cheer, as well as laughs for how direct it is.

Gaming! A fictional character heading into reality, as would people going the other way.

Oppenheimer

The main evening IMAX screening of Oppenheimer was sold out on a Monday, which surprised me for a downer biopic. And the mostly closeups of intense faces wasn’t a big use of the giant screen. But the sound system really did get a workout.

Christopher Nolan intercut the flashbacks and frame story (and the flashbacks in the frame story) but largely kept things clear through use of colour.

The frame story also provides dramatic uncertainty that the main story doesn’t for anybody going to see it who knows who Oppenheimer was. I didn’t know who Strauss was, for one.

Quantum Leap

The new Quantum Leap series I mentioned here last January and rambled about the RPG possibilities of the setup has reached UK streaming on Paramount+. It’s a nice update blending the problem of the week with a more serialised plot back at HQ, and new leaper and hologram Ben and Addison are nice company.

Strange New Musical Express

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is doing a musical. On top of the live-action Lower Decks crossover, the last Spock spotlight and getting Ethan Peck to model the infamous Spock helmet in a promotional bit they’re really (boldly) going for things Trek never quite got around to before. So it’s early for this specific show to go this weird, just not the universe in general. It took Buffy six years to get here, after all. It still feels like risking a Xena situation, especially with its short seasons, of not having enough normal episodes so the weird ones outweigh them.

RPGaDay2023 announcement

Dave Chapman and Anthony Byrd discuss the tenth anniversary RPGaDay ahead of the August 1st start, the first year’s questions and this year’s revised return for it.

The Marvels trailer

SDCC lacking panels, we do still get trailers. The Marvels full trailer establishes that it has an antagonist (Zawe Ashton) as well as a place-switching premise and Brie Larson doing great silent comedy reaction shots.

SDCC 2023

San Diego Comic-Con is still on despite film and TV writers and actors striking so the big movie and show panels are all off.

io9’s Germain Lussier photographs some of the displays on preview night.

And a separate slideshow for toys and other merchandise.

Someone I know who’s there my sources indicate Barbie is winning the cosplay battle.

I believe there may be news about comics too?

Apollo 11

Neil Armstrong stepped out of Apollo 11 on this day in 1969. We can do amazing things.

Secret Invasion 1.05

Marvel’s Secret Invasion

1.05: Harvest

Okay, the episode titles will probably not make a sentence.

Olivia Colman continues to be delightful as Evil Olivia Colman. Surprise reference!

City Of Angels 1.02

“Okay, first of all, what the fuck?”

Paris

After being dropped into a shared Memoriam of the Anarch revolt in 1944, I have to go watch L. A. Confidential.

Earth

Earth, presented by Chris Packham, a tour of moments in geology, starting with the late Permian extinction.

Rose Bailey's Resurrectionists

Rose Bailey on how to run The Resurrectionists, a Vampire: The Requiem one-shot, heist style.

Protect the surfboard-borrowing sea otter

Sea Otter 841, the hero we need. A petition for her protection.

Ms. Marvel de-exclusivised

Ms. Marvel season one to be shown on ABC, the first Disney+ show to be repeated on offline TV, ahead of Kamala appearing on the big screen in The Marvels. And also a good way to full hours during the WGA and now SAG strikes, of course.

Die Hard at 35

Die Hard came out in the US 35 years ago today, and The A.V. Club interviewed writer Jeb Stuart about how the script came together to celebrate.

Snöfrid

The First Night Of The Proms (the BBC-sponsored annual classical music concert series) included the new to me Snöfrid by Sibelius, with dramatic reading by Lesley Manville, which would make a great intro to a doomy fantasy RPG. Starting here.

“Choose me and you choose the tempest.”

Billie Eilish, What Was I Made For?

Billie Eilish, What Was I Made For? from the Barbie soundtrack.

Talk and interview link at The A.V. Club.

V5 one-shot at Rolling Stone

For their last show, the Rolling Stone Twitch channel got Jason Carl to run a Vampire: The Masquerade one-shot. Apparently this show did a lot of gaming stuff, not something I associate with Rolling Stone.

Cloak & Dagger

Marvel’s Cloak & Dagger (as discussed in 2021) is now on Disney+, having been on Amazon Prime since it came out about five years ago, before D+ started. (And S1 is still on Prime to buy.)

A few weeks after they pulled Runaways, which has a crossover episode. Not the best timing.

I wrote about it after the announcement that producer Christine Boylan was working on a World Of Darkness series, and in that lens it’s particularly interesting as a fairly grounded urban fantasy show. (Note also that it gets really grim in season two.)

Secret Invasion 1.04

Marvel’s Secret Invasion

1.04: Beloved

I continue to wonder if the episode titles are going to form a sentence.

V5 Last Dance feedback

Rick:

we have a big gig coming up, and were bouncing ideas for setlists. And I was recommended that CHVRCHES did a really good cover of Cry Little Sister, on a Netflix movie with Krysten Ritter called Nightbooks.

I might have earwormed myself badly for the last two days.

Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One

Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One is the longest of the series yet, even longer than its title! But it mostly rattled along quickly.

The Mission: Impossible film series went more team-based with MI:III being a big episode of Alias, this has all gone a bit...

Is getting a ticket an adventure? Maybe a golden ticket.

I do not understand really big event ticketing. That is all.

V5 Last Dance 2.03

Tonight in Vampire: The Masquerade - Last Dance, Preston the Toreador failed to make a Nosferatu feel bad on purpose and then succeeded by accident.

The question now is... will he figure out that she let him know she was there?

Indiana Jones And The Four New Boardgames

Four Indiana Jones games appear! Do I need them? Will I ever play them? No.

But Sands of Adventure has miniatures of Indy, Marion, Marcus and Sallah. I would like to know the scale...

Update: about 40mm. And kinda long leggedy.

And Cryptic has handouts and floor tiles.

And Throw Me The Idol has a smallish safe to throw idol.

And there’s a Pops card game as well.

Taylor Swift, Castles Crumbling and I Can See You

Taylor Swift, Castles Crumbling (Taylor’s Version) featuring Hayley Williams

Released after news that Paramore will be supporting the Eras tour in Europe next summer.

Also, I Can See You video with heist action featuring The Princess star Joey King, who was in a Swift video as a kid, among other callbacks.

The Book Festival

The Edinburgh International Book Festival programma is out and online. Will have to take a look.

The Film Festival

The wee holdover Edinburgh International Film Festival programme is out. It happening at all is nice.

And there's a thing I’d like to see. (The new version of Jekyll & Hyde.)

Indiana Jones And The Dial Of Destiny spoiler post

Scheduled a week after writing, with a More cut, and still keeping some stuff vague.

The NHS

The NHS was founded 75 years ago today. Its core principle is that high quality healthcare should be available to everyone, regardless of their wealth. Thank you to everyone who has made this anniversary possible by working for, or contributing to, our National Health Service.

Secret Invasion 1.03

Marvel’s Secret Invasion

1.03: Betrayed

Talos continues to be great grumpy fun. Otherwise it’s mostly waiting for the next Skrull reveal or other twist.

City Of Angels 1.01

I just got to play V5. That was weird.

And imitation and flattery and all, I realised I swiped Paris’s first outfit from Faye in Nocturne.

Yes, she has the vampire superpower that lets her run in those shoes.

The 4th of July

I should like to visit the USA again sometime.

If you ever wonder if RPGs helped anyone...

The Critical Role Foundation’s senior girls’ dormitory at Shanti Bhavan home and school in Tamil Nadu, India, is now in use.

Rain stops jousting

I decided not to go the jousting at Linlithgow Palace as the recent rain might hamper it. Rain stopping jousting is the kind of thing that would seem like oddly detailed worldbuilding in a historical or fantasy game.

RPGaDay 2023 announcement

The prompts for the tenth anniversary #RPGaDAY2023 are up with a month to prepare.

Though I usually go in with a cursory look to see if I can spot a theme and improvise from there day to day, this year I’ll make an exception.

The bolded words in each question can also be used as single word prompts, as explained below!

Certain words in each prompt have been presented in caps/bold. Over the many incarnations of #RPGaDAY we've experimented with simple questions and single word prompts. This, much like the crew of the Enterprise experienced, is the best of both worlds. This presents you with THREE ways to approach each day in August -

1) If you've never taken part in #RPGaDAY before, or came to this more recently, simply look at the prompt for the day and use it to inspire a social media post to spread the word of everything cool and, above all, positive, about tabletop roleplaying games.

2) If the prompt doesn't inspire, look at the highlighted word and use that as the prompt. For example, day 4 asks 'Most RECENT game bought'. If you haven't bought a game for a while, or don't want to share what it was, you can use the word RECENT as the prompt and talk about a recent game you played, or actual play you watched.

3) The other way to do #RPGaDAY, and this is the one I'm very interested in, is to use the prompts to inspire a social media post as normal, but if you took part in the first #RPGaDAY (or have a very good memory of what you would have answered back then) compare your answers. It can reveal if your favourite character has changed, or favourite game system. It'll be interesting to see if your opinions have changed over the years. If you are doing this, some of the questions have '(this year)' added so you don't simply repeat the same answer.

Remember, this is about spreading the positivity. No moaning about anything, or saying something is bad. Tell us what you love, what you enjoy playing, great games you've experienced, and how these games have had a positive impact on you.

Remember also to tag everything #RPGaDAY2023. And also remember, this takes place in AUGUST. I always share the prompts a month in advance so that we can get translations shared to get as many people taking part as possible, and to give those vloggers and podcasters a chance to prepare their episodes in advance and take some of the strain off of trying to produce 31 posts in a month.

Thank you everyone again for taking part, I hope you have fun again this year seeing how things have changed.

So for my gotta-do-it-twice option, maybe do every option.

And yes, I was there in 2014, and I see the similarities...

This year it might well be on Mastodon, or the new thing if I can get on it.

Baby Storme, this city is a graveyard

I’m haunted by your love...

July

Happy Canada Day, among other things!