Seek the Wolf in Thyself!
Year 2604. After surviving a major global war, environmental collapse and an alien invasion, Earth is rule by aristocracy, at the top of which is the monarch King Thayone. Terran humans have returned to the stars using technology taken from their alien invaders, allowing them to build new interstellar capable exploratory ships. The HMS Icarus…
Ever since I have gotten back into Dark Conspiracy, I have felt conflicted about various things about the setting. One is the general dynamic of the game itself. It’s the “near future” where the whole economy has collapsed, corporations rule the day and governments are struggling to even exist. I get that. There is a…
Part of the reason I wanted to do this series was because it was old movies like this that inspired my childhood imagination more than anything else. Yea, I know, reading probably should have too, but I spent most of my reading time in novels based on screenplays of the movies my parents would not let me go see. I have vivid memories, though, of watching old 50s and 60s sci-fi and horror on Saturday or Sunday, and I was fascinated by some of them. This was one that stuck out in my mind.
In 2013, my wife and I picked a couple of cons to go to. First on the list was Mysticon in Roanoke, Virginia (February 22-24). This is a con with an interesting history. In the 80s, Mysticon existed for 3 years and I am not sure about the circumstances behind it’s collapse back then. It is now in its third year in its new incarnation. I remember working with some of their concom, helping them with advice when I worked in the fandom con business. They are good people, very smart about their approach to the business and I think they are going to see the fruits of that intelligence for years to come.
After several months of hinting and some false starts, Justus Productions would like to announce our latest project. Jeff and I have been talking about something like this for a while. Back in 2006 to 2009, I wrote for a web site called gamingreport.com, and later for Scrye magazine after their publisher bought the web…
You awaken on the cement floor, naked and covered in goo, surrounded by huge tanks with other humans. You see that you have fallen out of a similar tank, conduits and wires dangling. You are in some kind of experimental facility, dark and strange, and all you know to do is ESCAPE!
Thus is the basic premise of Level 7. It has the feel of other games similar to it with some interesting twists. It is a heavy thematic game with interesting mechanics. One to four players can play a character who must escape from the Subterra Bravo facility while dodging armed guards and alien clones.
Alfonso Brescia, Italian director and movie maker, churned out 4 movies between 1977 and 1978. I have seen two of them and these films could easily be connected directly as sequels. Both have similar sets, costuming, and themes, and some actors are in both films. They are also equally as bad. So bad that I felt they disserved to be lumped together in one article.
All four films in the series are Italian low budget films that were put out to capitalize on the Star Wars craze. They have all the great elements of a sci-fi B movie Star Wars rip-off – space ships, rogue pilots, robots, aliens and disco music. These two films were shot basically back to back, obviously.
I saw Planet Hulk the other day and am finding as I watch many of the Marvel and DC animated movies, there are some really cool ideas you can draw from for a sci-fi RPG. The best idea I got our of Planet Hulk was the Spikes. For most of the movie, you are told…
When I first started this idea of watching B-movies as inspirations for GMing, I knew there were bad movies that I would get nothing out of or at least struggle with. Well, this movie is one of them, I suppose, but not because it is bad. It! is a story that has since been told in many ways, some better and others not so much. It has much of the 1950s sci-fi trappings of low budget filming while at the same time had some interesting aspects to it as well.
Few games bring about more emotional reaction than Fortress America, in my experience. It has come to epitomize the American style of board game. You either love it or you hate it. There are very few who are in-between those extremes about this game. This game has a lot of history for me and for others in the gaming community. And that history has brought out these reactions. I own and have played the original for years and have thoroughly enjoyed it, so my history with it is already fairly positive.