After a long hiatus, I’ve decided to revisit Jorune. From Wikipedia “Skyrealms of Jorune was based on a science-fantasy background (of the planetary romance subtype) created by Andrew Leker, initially for a school writing assignment. The setting was somewhat comparable to the Barsoom of the John Carter novels of Edgar Rice Burroughs, in that it…
23rd Letter RPG
The time is now. Psychics exist, not many, but enough – enough to worry those in power, and interest those who seek power. Governments and Corporations fight over them. The Network provides an imperfect refuge for those that escape the clutches of those who would abuse them or their powers.Thousands are maimed and killed each…
Not the first time I’ve been Left4Dead
From the Wikipedia page for Left4Dead Left 4 Dead is a co-operative, survival horror, first-person shooter game by Turtle Rock Studios. “Left 4 Dead puts four human playable or AI-controlled Survivors of an apocalyptic pandemic against hordes of aggressive “Infected” (zombies). These Infected are controlled by an AI that dynamically balances difficulty and mood depending…
Solipsist RPG Review
I ordered Solipsist yesterday, paper and PDF, and spent a bit of last night poring over the PDF version. I’ll start out this potted review by saying that it’s shockingly good, easily one of the best Indie games I’ve read. Ever. What is it about? There are people who think so strongly and individually, that…
What’s an ARG?
The Technology column in the Guardian writes: An ARG is an interactive narrative in which players work together to solve puzzles and co-ordinate activities in the real world and online, using websites, GPS tracking devices, telephone lines, newspaper adverts and more. All of which sounds like it must require even more effort and resolve than…
There are video games that you can actually live inside.
The following quote is from “Cybergeneration”, an RPG dating from §993 by R. Talsorian Games. With direct visual feed, projected ICONs at will, and a way of interacting with these projections, all the pieces were now in place to create what we now call VIRTUALITY; a state where Net images and Realspace are combined in…
The Great Game
Alternate Reality Games (or Layered Reality Games) are going to be big. When someone mentions ARGs, I always think of Total Recall (the film) [thanks Eamon]. The protagonist takes a virtual holiday which interweaves the real world with a spy conspiracy in his head (or is it?). Everything in his life becomes involved in the…
6 – Terminology
(Though I’m still unsure of the final name to call this game, for the time being I’m going to be referring to it both by the nom de plume ‘6’ and the nom de guerre ‘CONTROL’. I hope that suffices to confuse) AGENT – highly trained civil servants. Because of their skills and experience, they…
Viking Ghost Hunt – a ‘hyperlocal’ Dublin-based game
While down at the National Digital Research Centre last week, I saw a brief presentation from two Dutch guys, Soren and Mads, who were making an iPhone game which overlaid a game on top of reality using GPS and cell tower triangulation. From NDRC: Viking Ghost Hunt will capitalise on location based gaming. The interactive…
Fonts, fonts, my kingdom….
I’m having trouble identifying a font I used for the original printing of ZOMBI and this is the replacement I have come up with. The original was quite clean and had a name like ‘corroded’ or ‘corrupted’. The potential new one is CM Corruged by Charly Masci (link is down). I think it’s actually an…
zombi
I’ve spent the last week working on the PDF version of zombi. I’ve been updating bits and pieces as well, adding in references for “Fast Zombies” and other things which have been popular in the years since the book was released. Hard to believe that it’s nearly ten years since it was first published.
Superheroics
I’ve been reading a lot and prepping my ‘superhero’ game and though I love the concept of GODLIKE and Wild Talents, it’s really turned into an exercise of accountancy. I don’t like point buy systems which encourage you to minmax. I’m frustrated by this because I can’t therefore find a system I want to use….
The WhiteChapel Project
The Project in Whitechapel was formed in September 1941 as a subsection of the Special Operations Executive (SOE). The SOE was directed to encourage espionage behind enemy lines and build the core of a resistance cell in the event of a land invasion. As a result, they were entirely dependent upon the security of radio…
Two Worlds: A State of Frenzy
“We’re doomed I tell you. That planet is hurtling through space towards the Earth and we haven’t the power to stop it.” Doctor Henry Warwick of the Royal Observatory could hardly have known that as he spoke, a rocketship sped through the ether towards the rogue planet on a mission to save the planet. Doctor…
Two Worlds
What if Prospero didn’t just loop through time and space but also dimensions? What if it revealed to the modern world the battleground of an unknown war, the genocides of a victorious hero, the possible fates of our world if he, and his two companions had failed in their attempt to stave off the destruction…
It’s been slow here…
…and I apologise. From June last year until July this year I was working in a very low creativity (but nicely paid) job which meant that from the very minute I left the office, I was bursting with creativity and had to get stuff written. In July, I left that job and started working as…
MURDERDROME: iPhone comic reader BANNED!
Wednesday afternoon I popped round to Paul’s house for a quick chat (and a couple of headache tablets) and I saw a demo of MurderDrome, the first iteration of a new comic application for the iPhone. There have been a few comic reader apps for the iPhone/iPod touch out there, most notably ClickWheel Comic Reader…
Dectet
The Decktet is a deck of cards with suits, ranks, and named images. It is structurally unlike ordinary poker and tarot decks, meaning that you can do different things with it. This looks very cool and makes me think about the SeaFarers game. For each suit, there is an Ace and a Crown. Between them…