Adventures In Manga Maker Comipo #239.

Adventures In Manga Maker Comipo #231.

This Year In Hell

So, once more we find ourselves at the end of yet another. Honestly, where do these things keep coming from? We should probably get someone in to look at that, the damn things seem to breed like cockroaches. Just when you think you finally gotten rid of one, another one shows up. Thus making years the opposite of buses. But I digress.

Every year I try and do a little write up of stuff that I thought was good. Not in any strict top 10 whatever kind of sense, but just as an exercise in forcing myself to remember that maybe not EVERYTHING is horrible. As time goes on this seems to get more difficult. I'm not going to lie, this has been a rough year, and my ability to look on the bright side has been atrophied to the point of extinction. But that's enough about the last series of Doctor Who. We're trying to be positive here. So let's begin shall we.

What Comes After? - Notes On An RPG Setting For Overpower

As the seasons change and the wheel of the year moves inexorably onwards, a young man's thoughts turn, inevitably, to RPGS. Well, the thoughts of the younger men anyway. I'm feeling about 80 over here. But some members of the collective (who presumably are only feeling about 60) have expressed the desire for playing a new RPG game. And one of them said:

Quite fancy something rules-light...and theme-wise I'm feeling superheroes or modern horror (zombies, etc.)

Which got me thinking.... Why not both?

How To Pick Up Poop And Influence Nothing.

I think I've mentioned before how one of my great hopes for Jurassic World was that, irrespective of the quality of the actual film, it being such a high profile release should at least inspire some new Dinosaur themed games. There's always been a frankly embarrassing dearth of prehistoric monsters in the Steam listings, and the few titles there were available were, for some unfathomable reason, largely confined to online FPS bullcrap. Even if we didn't get a shiny new updated version of Operation Genesis (which, let's face it, is all we really want) at least someone would step in to fill the void with some sort of unofficial spiritual successor. After all, I'm pretty sure that the concept of Dinosaurs is fairly firmly within the public domain.

To say that Jurassic Island: The Dinosaur Zoo is the game we've all been dreaming of is to imply that there simply aren't anti-psychotic medications strong enough to help us. The only way to get through a night like that is to NEVER SLEEP AGAIN. EVER. 

S&W Episode 3rd Edition: A New Setting

I've been thinking a bit about RPG stuff lately. Specifically about super hero RPGs. After all, we've been playing quite a bi of Sentinels Of The Multiverse recently. In addition to which the spectre of actually trying to get an RPG going has been mooted, and I've actually had some positive feedback on the notion of running Overpower. Which is gratifying. It's always nice when you manage to do something that people actually enjoy. So, on the way to work one morning I was thinking about setting ideas for games, when I had a REALLY good idea. One of those rare ideas you have where the more you think about it, the more sense it seems to make, and the less you can believe that someone hasn't already thought about doing it.

What if you ran a super hero game set in the Star Wars Universe?

Enemies Of The Chocolate Business

Nerds, Loners and countrymen, lend me your ears. I come to ignore my issues, not to bang on about them at tedious length. Just because there are some people who apparently can't actually be happy just being happy unless they take a day out to rub everyone else's faces in it at the behest of an industry that JUST BY PURE COINCIDENCE happens to manufacture the ultimate comfort food doesn't mean that the rest of us have to give them the satisfaction of us spending the weekend locked in a darkened room rocking back and forth and sobbing quietly to ourselves.

Seriously, fuck those guys. In the strictly metaphorical context.

You know the sort of metaphor I'm talking about here.

This is of course a rather long winded and roundabout way of saying that rather than giving in to the constant nagging bullshit in my head, I elected to spend the weekend in a slightly constructive manner and have been catching up on some painting at long last.

Card Games On Motorcycles

I was recently given the somewhat dubious privilege of arranging for a sealed deck style Yu-Gi-Oh tournament for a friends birthday. And, as is often the case when I end up being in charge of these things I like to come up with some special rules and features to make things a little more interesting for everybody. And this time around my major inspiration came from the fact that I'd been playing a LOT of Stardust Accelerator. For those of you who are unaware, that's a 5D's era game. So you know what that means, right?

Quite Possibly the 2014th Years End Review You've Read This Week

Urg, it's that time again. For some reason I feel it customary to write some manner of year end summary / review thing. But I have to admit I've been putting it off somewhat. It's not that I haven't really had the time, it's just that, for me personally, this past year has been absolutely fucking AWFUL. So it's kinda hard to maintain the whole cheery "look at all this cool stuff" vibe when being confronted with the start of a new year only makes you wonder if, having barely scraped through the last one, THIS will be the year when you finally kill yourself.

This is why I'm no fun at parties. New years are like birthdays: only celebrated by those who actually have a future.

Still, despite having a full on breakdown I suppose the year wasn't entirely bereft of tawdry consumption, so let's have a look at some of that and just pretend that I didn't bring up the whole inevitable self-termination thing, shall we?

Skirmish Game Campaign Setting Introduction: Intergalactic Terror World.

In her initial paper outlining the analysis of the mysterious alien mineral that would eventually come be to be known as Ouroborite, Professor Heisen noted that when properly refined and controlled the substance could be employed to produce a near limitless source of energy.

She also noted that in it's naturally occurring unrefined state it had a tendency to rip the head of physics, shit down the neck of sanity and thence merrily bugger the corpse of the space/time continuum. All the while laughing hysterically at the very concept of objective reality.

Potent stuff.

Reports Of My Battle May Be Greatly Exaggerated: Dino-Might

It's time. The minis are painted, the scenery stocked up and the dice lying in a big pile of 1s and critical failures like they usually do. We're going to have a go at actually PLAYING Dino-Might.

You didn't think I was doing all this for FUN did you?

The Land Of The Lost World Part 3: At Least It's Better Than The Last One

Whilst this isn't really the time to be getting into a full scale discussion on the subject, a brief overview of the current trilogy of Jurassic Park films would be that the first one is distinguished be being rather good, the second is distinguished be being shockingly awful, and the third at least has a Spinosaurus in it. I guess it's somewhat serendipitous that this series of miniatures posts is following a similar format.

Although, just for the record even I wouldn't call any of paint jobs as bad as Jurassic Park 2.

The Land Of The Lost World Part 2: The Sceneryic Route

As I may have mentioned previously, I've been working on some Dinosaur miniatures lately, with an eye to maybe one day actually using them for some kind of game. I mean, there's got to be SOME novelty value in spending on all this time and money on miniatures and then actually using them for something other than dust magnets, right?

Anyway, the idea of at least attempting to assemble the necessary components for having a game appealed to me, so I resolved to have a go at sorting out some scenery. On that note I should probably point out that this may not be the most exciting minis post of all time.

The Land Of The Lost World Part 1: Let's Get This Party Startered

So, as I may have mentioned I've been gripped by a strong interest in the paleontological arts of late. Dinosaurs are, I'm sure we can all agree, pretty cool after all. But whilst my attempts to combine this fledging interest with my hobby of video games were stopped short by the fact that apparently all games featuring Dinosaurs have to be multiplayer FPS (because what else would they be apart from literally ANYTHING EXCEPT THAT), I did recall that there was another hobby I'd been neglecting which would combine quite perfectly: that of miniature painting.

Dinosaurs are, after all, the perfect subject for such pursuits, seeing as how the group consists entirely of awesome monstrosities of varying types and sizes. Although scale could well be a consideration as, let's face it, most of the popular Dinosaurs aren't exactly famed for being small.

Try doing THIS in 28mm. I DARE YOU.

However I did recall something from back when I was working on my Silurian conversion. A range of Dinosaur models made in 10mm scale from Magister Militium. So I figured I'd get some and see what happened.

Friday The 2013th

Another year over. And you know what that means don't you? Tedious "Best Of X" lists. Millions of them, slithering out of the internet and into your disinterested eyes like some kind of ghastly occular leech intent on draining out your ability to feign even the slightest interest in the most hideous fashion possible. Only when it finally heaves it's twisted bulk through the screen it finds that there's not actually anything left to feed on as all mental resources have been depleted in pretending that you don't hate your friends, family and the miserable excuses for presents they gave you, even though you would probably be happier setting them all on fire. Thus, defeated it slinks off to die in a pit of rotting feculence and the twitching corpses of it's decaying brethren.

Happy New Year?

That metaphor rather got away from me there. Still, never mind eh? It's time to trawl the archives and try and work out what things from my past year didn't actually suck. As always actual release dates are less important than when I actually first experienced the item in question. So with the rambling and provisos out of the way, let's get on with it shall we?

Holding Out For A Heroclix. Or Not.

Man, I'm not having a lot of luck with games lately. I mean, The Bureau was the video game equivalent of a giant car crash (there's bit's going all over the place, and whilst it looks kinda cool from certain angles you can't help but wonder why a merciful god would allow this level of suffering) and the pacific Rim video game was apparently designed by one of those Nigerian princes you keep hearing about.

£2.69 for a character that's ALREADY IN THE DAMN GAME? Sure......

So it was I figured I'd retreat from the realms of digital abuse back to the tabletop. It's been a bit of wait, but the Pacific Rim Heroclix are finally starting to become available. You'd have thought maybe getting the stuff on shelves whilst the film was still showing might have been a better idea, but I am not the king of marketing, so what do I know about anything? Anyway, having exhausted all other (legal) avenues for getting more Pacific Rim action I figured I'd grab the starter set. I mean, if nothing else it'd provide me with a couple of minis and an evenings entertainment, right?

Oh dear, oh dear oh dear. How could it all have gone so wrong?

Not Exactly X-Rated Action.

You've got to feel sorry for the developers of The Bureau: XCOM Declassified. Throughout the long and troubled production of the game they never really caught any breaks. No matter how good a game the final product may have actually ended up being, coming out and announcing an FPS Prequel to a beloved franchise to the internet was never going to end well.

This is not marketing. This is SUICIDE.

And then after weathering the inevitable shitstorm all their thunder is suddenly stolen by the surprise announcement of a "proper" XCOM game. Which, unsurprisingly is VERY popular. And then they start scrambling around trying to be more like this new version. Because desperately aping whatever happens to be popular always works SO WELL. But they do it and they finish the game and then just before it's finally released, what happens?

MOTHERFUCKING CHICKEN LEGS HAPPENED.

The great big incredibly awesome expansion for Enemy Unknown is suddenly announced out of nowhere. And just like that nobody gives shit about The Bureau again.

Which, in all honesty is probably for the best.

Wild Knights, Hot Crazy Box

If you'll indulge me I'm going to be doing something a little different today. Generally speaking I try and keep things kinda general, or at least not overly technical. But today I feel like talking about a particular Yu-Gi-Oh card. And this, obviously, is going to get fairly specific. So if you're not all that into playing Yu-Gi-Oh then I guess there's a strong possibility that none of what I'm going to say will mean anything to you.

Just remember:

Now, having said all that, let's talk about Number 85: Crazy Box

Back In Black

If I had to describe Shadowrun Returns as a character class, I guess it would be a Dwarven Street Samurai.

Like this, only with streets.

It's good at what it does. It's slick, beefy and high tech. It get's the job done and gives you what you asked for in a professional manner. But at the end of the day you can't help but think that maybe it's a little on the short side.

Perfectly Ultimate Great.

I could give any number of reasons why it is my blogging output has been so lax of late, but if we're being brutally honest then it's going to mainly because of Yu-Gi-Oh.

And we all know just how brutal Honest can be in a game of Yu-Gi-Oh Am I right?

This is due in part to finally getting one of the DS games. Which is rather unfortunate as it rather derailed the post I was planning on what an awful, gimmicky system the DS actually is because I was to busy actually playing the damn thing to do anything else. Still, having finally completed the story mode I've been left thinking about Yu-Gi-Oh games in general. Their strengths, weaknesses and how they could be improved. And so it is that I find myself writing this article, in an attempt to design the Perfect Yu-Gi-Oh game.

SPOILER ALERT: It isn't this. Not even slightly.