Where the Wheat Grows Tall zine on Kickstarter

Gaming Zine Quest Kickstarter post #2: 

Where the Wheat Grows Tall is an old-school fantasy adventure for low level characters inspired by Slavic myth. The adventure starts at an abandoned farm, and from there the player characters have a variety of options involving ancient spirits, long forgotten tunnels, and more across a map with twenty keyed locations.

I remember first seeing Evlyn's art on gaming blogs and the early days of G+, and I really like it. It has a whimsical look at first glance, although there is always much more under the surface and in all that detail work.

This zine will be unlike the usual Dungeons & Dragons adventure and well worth your time. I recommend that you check it out.

GRIDSHOCK zines are now on Kickstarter

GRIDSHOCK is a Post-Apocalyptic Superhero Road Movie.

My friend Paul has been working on a tabletop RPG setting for several years now. I remember reading the bits that he would share back on G+, and how I looked forward to seeing it arrive in its final form. 

Now, you can help bring it into the world as a finished product by checking out the Kickstarter for GRIDSHOCK 20XX, a part of Kickstarter's ZineQuest 3 gaming zine extravaganza.

GRIDSHOCK 20XX describes a superhero world where something went very wrong in 1986. Reality was warped, civilization collapsed, and the world as we knew it was turned upside down. Now the bad guys are in charge of what's left – but a new breed of superhumans called Vectors strive to restore freedom to their ravaged world.

Art by Steven De Waele

Because of its influences GRIDSHOCK 20XX will seem familiar, yet it is a original and creative world with its own unique backstory. Fans of Akira, 80s action figures and cartoons, Final Fight and similar arcade games, and synthwave music will find a lot to love here. 

It's ready for any supers RPG rules you want to use, although the stats present in the book are powered by ICONS under the OGL. If you've familiar with the original Marvel Super Heroes from TSR, it will be a snap to get started or convert to another system.

I can't wait to see this in print, and if you are a fan of post-apocalyptic sci-fi or superheroes (or both!) I urge you to check it out. 

Pandemic blogging

If you're here from DIY & Dragons, welcome, and thank you!

It has been a while since I updated here, even before the pandemic hit. I've been working from home normal hours since my library closed its doors and the campus went to online teaching only. Also during that time my face-to-face gaming groups took to Zoom and Roll20, and I've joined new online games. I'm trying to sneak in more movies when I can. We finished a re-watch of Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings last week. I just got the first Hobbit movie on DVD in the mail from Netflix. My re/watch of John Carpenter movies continues, the latest being PRINCE OF DARKNESS (1987).

Despite staying at home except for grocery trips, my days have been filled up. It reminds me of when retired folks say they are now busier than ever. My creativity was low before though and this medical emergency hasn't helped any, hence the lack of posts. I need to do some housekeeping here -- cleaning up old links, and maybe a new template and colors.

Put Kaijuville in your favorite feed reader and stay tuned for something to pop up. I never know when that spark will hit.

Still here, part 2

As mentioned in Part 1, I've been posting more elsewhere and I need to refresh this neglected blog.

Along with more gaming content, I want to update the Hammer horror movie list here, update links,  and provide some updates on what I've been watching.

Two months ago was Shawtember -- all Shaw Brothers kung fu movies, and following that was an October full of Hammer and Godzilla films. This month is Noirvember, a deep dive into the underbelly of crime films. Speaking of Godzilla, my look at the brand new Godzilla set from Criterion will be up soon.

At the beginning of the year I planned a John Carpenter retrospective re-watch over a few months, but I only got as far as DARK STAR. Now I'm thinking that the Christmas/New Year's break might be a good time for it.

Still here, part 1

I haven't had an update here in a while, posting what I might put here on Facebook, Twitter, and Discord. I hope to have some actual gaming content here soon, particularly my take on the "New New Crobuzon Challenge" in a few days.

Non-gaming content in Part 2!

Godzilla: The Showa Era films on Blu-ray from Criterion!

The rumored, highly-anticipated announcement finally arrived yesterday. The Criterion Collection's spine #1000 milestone has a massive subject to match: Godzilla: The Showa-Era Films, 1954–1975. The fifteen original films and extras are spread across eight Blu-rays. Nine of these movies will be on Blu-ray for the first time in Region A! The discs are packaged in a 10" x 14" hardcover book with notes on each film and new full-page illustrations from sixteen artists.

The highlight of the set might be the inclusion of the Japanese version of KING KONG VS. GODZILLA (1962) in HD. This will be the first time it has ever been on home video in America (or anywhere else outside Japan, I believe).

I'll keep my Classic Media DVDs, and Media Blasters and Kraken Releasing Blu-rays of these titles for completeness, however. The US versions of GODZILLA, KING OF THE MONSTERS (1956) and KING KONG VS. GODZILLA are here, but the only other English dubs included are for INVASION OF ASTRO-MONSTER, SON OF GODZILLA, DESTROY ALL MONSTERS, GODZILLA VS. MEGALON, GODZILLA VS. MECHAGODZILLA, AND TERROR OF MECHAGODZILA. These are the Toho International dub tracks, not the AIP or Titra dubs many of us remember from Saturday afternoon movie matinees or TV showings.

Despite not being as complete as many fans would like, this is still a monumental achievement. Every Showa-era G-film is now on Blu-ray. Seeing an entire block of Godzilla films joining a prestigious film collection like this, and with the symbolic designation of #1000, should make all kaiju fans proud.

Happy 113th Birthday, Robert E. Howard

Today marks the 113th anniversary of the birth of pulp writer Robert E. Howard. It has become a
tradition on this date for Howard fans to read a favorite story and raise a toast.

Howard wrote something for every interest: sword and sorcery, hard-boiled detectives, weird horror, historical fiction, boxing, westerns, pirates, and poetry.

Two-Gun Bob's fans who are also tabletop gamers are seeing another resurgence of products, with the Conan adventure board game (recommended), and the main rulebook and many sourcebooks for the Conan RPG out now. This month Marvel Comics released the first two issues of their new Conan comic series, with Savage Sword and other new books on the way.

One of the best brief introductions to Howard is the mostly true, somewhat fictionalized film THE WHOLE WIDE WORLD (1996), based on the writings of Novalyne Price Ellis.

For more information on his life and career, start with the following sites:

• Robert E. Howard Days
• The Robert E. Howard Foundation
• Howard Works bibliographic database
• The Cimmerian (archive; no longer updated)

I highly recommend Mark Finn's Howard biography, the Locus and World Fantasy Award-nominated Blood and Thunder: The Life and Art of Robert E. Howard available as an expanded edition from the REH Foundation.

Update, part 3 -- Board games

Forgot to mention in one of the previous posts -- I'd like to get in more board games this year. I have Monolith's Conan and Everything Epic's Big Trouble in Little China, and of those I've only played Conan once.

I'd also like to play some of the games that friends of mine own, like Rising Sun and the different flavors of Zombicide.

Update and what's next, Part 2

Part 1 is here.

Podcast Idea
Interviews and discussion linking two of my favorite things: games and movies.

Movie-watching Projects
This year, in an effort to keep more data and as reminders to myself, I started tracking each film I watch and creating a separate to-be-watched list. Right now the lists live in a notebook. I keep forgetting to sign up for Letterboxd, where I'll eventually post these for myself. So much good stuff is out there waiting to be seen, and I'm trying my best to carve out more viewing time to fit in as much as possible, especially over the holiday break and the rest of the winter.

With that in mind, a few themes are showing up in the watch lists:

John Carpenter -- Pure Cinema Podcast's fantastic two-part Carpenter retrospective, where they examined all the films and paired each with another film as a double-feature, gave me the idea to try a back-to-back watch of the catalog myself. It's an opportunity to revisit old favorites and discover some of his films that I've haven't seen yet.

Charles Bronson -- Over the last year or so, several Bronson movies have hit Blu-ray, either singles or in affordable multi-packs. A collector's edition Blu-ray of the action/thriller/slasher 10 TO MIDNIGHT is out early next year. All this recent attention has inspired me to take a deep-dive into his catalog of films. Bronson has always been a favorite of mine, but like Carpenter there are many that I missed. I might try watching chronologically if possible, but that might depend on availability. More likely I'll just pick and choose at random.

Spaghetti Westerns -- Like the recent Bronson releases, we've had a couple of good years for Euro-Westerns. The recent Blu-ray of Corbucci's THE GREAT SILENCE, Kino Lorber's releases of Leone films, Arrow's Ringo and Django films, along with their box set of Sartana movies, just to name a few highlights. This year I also picked up Mill Creek's 44-movie DVD box for a cheap sale price. It's an economical way to see many of the popular titles (a good hit/miss ratio) and it was the only way to get Monte Hellman's CHINA 9, LIBERTY 37 on disc. Over the holidays I'd like to dig into this set and The Complete Sartana box.

Cyberpunk movies -- Continuing my research for a cyberpunk RPG by moving down the list of cyberpunk and related near-future sci-fi movies. Next on my Netflix queue is RUNAWAY (1984) with Tom Selleck.


Thanks for reading this far. I hope that this gives some idea on what to expect here at the blog in the new year -- more gaming and movie reviews, more game setting and mechanics ideas -- and an incentive for me to keep it going.

End of the year update and what's next

I'm trying to write a catch-up post, and hardly knowing where to begin. With the death of Google+ being moved up closer, I think longer posts will end up here on the blog more often.

Game Ideas in the Works
I've got two game ideas that have been percolating for quite a while: first, a smaller kaiju-themed RPG code-named "The Kaiju Hack", and the second is a D&D 5e-based cyberpunk game -- my version of Shadowrun. I'll post more notes about those games here. It's time to stop thinking about them, and actually get something tangible done and completed. I thought that I'd work through these games in posts on G+, but alas... if you can't tell, I'm really bummed-out about the loss of G+ and its gaming scene.

The next month with 30 days is April, which might be a good opportunity to post something about one of these games everyday using the #DIY30 hashtag.

Secret Santicore
No Santicore this year, and we are still working though layout for Santicore 2017. A new layout designer is looking over the project, and I hope to have more to report about that soon. Eventually we will have a free PDF, entries posted to the blog, and (with luck) an at-cost print-on-demand book.

After the holidays, I'll send out some requests to get the band back together again for an early start to Santicore 2019, along with finding a new home for the G+ Santicore production community.

Folk Horror (gaming and movies)
I backed the Kickstarter for Howard Ingham's excellent book We Don't Go Back: A Watcher's Guide to Folk Horror, and I'm hoping to read it over the holiday break. It's an expanded version of his blog posts covering aspects of Folk Horror in movies and other media, and well-worth a look for gaming inspiration or for those interested in the subject on its own. I also have the more academically-minded Folk Horror: Hours Dreadful and Things Strange by Adam Scovell (a gift from Age of Ravens) which I have also started, and I need to finish.

More in Part 2 later today...

A quick word

Was my last post four months ago? Time moves quickly. Expect a longer post here soon to catch up on what has been happening, what to expect here in the future (More posts! A new look for the new year?), and so on.

I've been much more active on Google +, but of course the long-rumored demise of  The Plus was moved up in a dramatic way, so reviving the blog seems like a logical way to proceed. Game design ideas I would have posted on G+ will be here instead.