Mecha & Martians

This post seems to be getting a lot of play according to my blogger stats. I found this second trailer on You Tube and I still believe that this would make for one kick ass RPG campaign. Mechs, steampunk, political drama and action all rolled up into one.

As I thought about what system I would use to run this, it occured to me that the mecha niche seems to be missing the plethora of OSR clones and rules add ons. Thinking on it I would probably use Stars Without Number, with a few modifications. I noticed the Core rules have stuff about mecha in them so that might be worth checking out. In fact I've been considering adding yet another blog project called Mecha & Martians. Seems like it would be a lot of fun.

Guardians of the Galaxy

I've known for while that this movie was coming. To be honest I didn't really give a shit. But I have to say after watching this trailer I think I just might like this movie. Hell I might even give the comic a shot. A friend of mine is following the series and says its pretty rad so maybe he's on to something here.

If you're receiving this transmission, make no attempt to come to its point of origin...

There is only death here now...

Over the past few days I've been catching up on a bunch of movies I've wanted to see for a while. Theses days I'm not much for one going out to the theatre and since I got Netflix I don’t really rent DVD's all that often either. All this is a round about way of saying I finally watched Prometheus.

I'm not sure how I feel about this movie. On the one had the visuals were pretty amazing. It also hit a lot of the same notes as in previous instalments in the Alien/Predator franchise. But I don't know, some how it just fell flat.

Warning if you haven’t seen this film then what I'm going to talk about next will probably spoil things for you. You've been warned.

What I did find interesting was the concept of God and the creation of life. So the basic idea here is that the Engineer alien race created humans. Then for some reason they decided that us humans needed to be terminated by some kind of bio-engineered virus. Or maybe the idea was that humans were just stage one of the Engineers plan. Phase two was the introduction of the mutating alien virus. Which begs the question of why they would want to either kill us all or turn us into some kind of new mutant species.

Now were talking about something interesting. Maybe were dealing with a sort of reverse terminator scenario. Maybe the Engineer's were afraid of what humanity might one day do to them. That we had become to violent to control. Maybe Earth was the failure. Like lab rats that served their purpose it was time to put them out of their misery. Maybe there were other Earth like planets that served their purpose better than we could. Maybe we were the cain to this alternate Earths Able.

Or was it that the Engineer race was divided on what to do with us. Maybe this was a rogue group who was out to do some kind of terrorist act versus it's own species. Turn us humans into a bio-weapon to be used against a more powerful political entity in the Engineer's home world.

Or were humans being used as bio-weapons against some far greater enemy. Another alien species even more hell bent on destruction than we humans ever imagined possible.

I guess it also changed my view on what a Creator-God might really mean. Someone who creates just because they can. Some kind of artistic drive for no other purpose then it seemed like a good idea at the time. That maybe, like an abusive parent this God might not be so nurturing and benign to it's creation. If anything it makes me less inclined to believe or have any sort of loyalty to any God/Creator if one did exist.

Ultimately from a gaming perspective it really breaths new life into aliens for me. I've had this idea for some time about having a intergalactic war between a species of aliens and humanity in my Digital Dark Age campaign. The idea of an alien race who has left archaeological traces of existence for mankind to uncover, and whom mankind believes to be extinct, only to return with a vengeance is one that really appeals to me. Prometheus has if anything really sparked my imagination in terms of why and what this war with this returned alien race might mean and be about.

So in the end I guess in some way Prometheus was a success. At least from the point of view that it entertained me, and then let my my reflect on hidden deeper meanings within the film. It sparked my imagination in a way that I had never anticipated. New interesting possibilities lie ahead...           

Lazy Sunday - Lo Pan Style

I found this video over at Advanced Dungeons and Parenting. Being a fan of the oh so classic film Big Trouble in Little China (and really who isn't?) I just had to share it. I found it pretty funny, your milage may vary. Have a gnarly gnarlington Sunday.

The Digital Dark Age: Appendix N

So heres a list of the major influences on the Digital Dark Age Campaign. None of it is presented in any particular order of importance. It's a sort of a freak show of science fiction with tones of cyberpunk, noir, pulp, and of course weird. Some are fairly self explanatory, others not so much.

• The Hyperion Cantos (Dan Simmons)
• Ilium/Olympos Cycle (Dan Simmons)
• Red Harvest (Dashiell Hammett)
• The Takeshi Kovacs Trilogy/Market Forces (Richard K. Morgan)
• Hellboy/B.P.R.D comic series (Mike Mignola)
• Path of Fury/ Honorverse (David Weber)
• Neuromancer (William Gibson)
• Snowcrash (Neal Stephenson)
• Northwest Smith (C. L. Moore)
• The Shadow Over Innsmouth (H. P. Lovecraft)
• Star Wars (George Lucas)
• Total Recall (Philip K. Dick)
• Firefly/Serenity (Joss Whedon)
• Appleseed (Masamune Shirow)
• Warhammer 40,000/Necromunda (Games Workshop)
• Heavy Gear RPG (Dream Pod 9)
• Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0 RPG (R. Talsorian Games)
• Shadowrun RPG (FASA)

A Dwarf, An Elf, And A Troll Walk Into An Elevator….

The elevator doors gently close behind them. Soft elevator muzak plays in the background. The three humanoids are wearing perfectly tailored black Armani suits, white silk shirts, and thick black ties. Each of them draws a large handgun from well-worn shoulder holsters. As they check over their weapons in the cramped space an idle conversation begins.

Dwarf: We should have shotguns for this kind of deal.
Elf: How many up there?
Troll: Three or four.
Elf: That's countin' our guy?
Troll: Not sure.
Elf: So that means there could be up to five guys up there?
Troll: It's possible.
Dwarf: We should have fuckin' shotguns.

The elevator doors open with a ding into an open and luxurious penthouse apartment. The human occupants of the room freeze in place at the unexpected rush of the armed trio as they burst into the room.

Troll: Everybody be cool, this is a robbery!
Elf: Any of you fuckin' pricks move and I'll execute every motherfucking last one of you!
Dwarf: [Grumbling under his breath] We should have fuckin' shotguns…..

If that seems familiar its because I stole it from Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction. Man, that would be the bomb! Just imagine how sick a Tarantino/ Rodríguez collaboration on a Shadowrun movie would be!

Anyway, I’m not sure exactly what made me think of this. But part of it was as I was looking for some ideas and inspiration for this Deadlands campaign I was thinking about. One rarely walks a straight line when searching for shit on the internet, and before I new it I was side tracked. I saw on some gaming site a mention about the racial tensions in Shadowrun. It also talked a little bit about the standard framework for a stereotypical SR adventure, and some other stuff, but it was the racial tension thing that grabbed me. That’s an idea I would love to explore one day.

Obviously it doesn’t have to be in a SR game. Imagine for a minute if you implemented something like that in a standard D&D game. As things typically stand, all the standard races pretty much get along. OK so half-orcs are outsiders, dwarves don’t really like elves (but lets face it, dwarves don’t really like anyone that much), and lets just not even talk about drow. But basically speaking D&D comes off like some kind of fantasy version of Star Trek. Once your apart of the Federation no one really is all that racist about you anymore. I know that’s not strictly true, but you get my point.

So imagine a D&D world where in typical fashion the Humans were on top. They are the rulers of the land, they make the laws and call the shots. They have beaten every other race into submission, taken their stuff and their lands, and enslaved their people. That sounds about on par for what we’ve done to people of our own species so it’s not difficult for me to see us doing it to other species.

Right, so the other races are enslaved as indentured servants. They have a few rights and can walk around the city with out the need for shackles. But for all intents and purposes it’s a pretty miserable life. Soon an secret resistance starts. Human sympathizers aid in an underground railway of sorts and smuggle out as many slaves as they can. However humans for the most part are the bad guys in this. Slave Masters employ human wizards to tattoo their mark on their property. Many of these magical tattoos are used to keep track of and scry on them, and if need be strike them dead, or blow them up in a fiery conflagration.

In a world controlled solely by humans, every other specie is forced to live in impoverished ghettos around the city. Seeking a better life than the filth and squalor around them many of these races band together and strike back at their cruel masters. Some rich human merchants and nobles take advantage of this anger and redirect it towards their enemies. This buffer provides these disreputable movers and shakers plausible deniability and wholly unaccountable if for some reason things should go horribly wrong.

Yeah, that would be a great campaign….
　
　

Total Recall 2012

Looks like they remade the original Total Recall. Not sure how I feel about this. Sure it looks nice, but i dunno....I mean a Blade Runner remake sure, but I don't see any mutants in this trailer. No Quato or that chick with the three tits. Guess well just see what we see. But seriously, I thought we were past all the remakes. When are we gonna get some more original shite like Inception, The Matrix, stuff like that.

Cowboys and Aliens

I'm still jonesing to run a western adventure. I'm strongly considering picking up the Savage Worlds explorers guide very soon. With that said, one of the movies I'm really looking forward to coming out this summer is Cowboys & Aliens. Directed by the same dude who did a kick ass job on the last two Iron Man movies, Jon Favreau, I have high expectations for this one. The movie is based on a comic book and not only does it star Daniel Craig, but Harrison Ford as well. Talk about winning! I feel like theres something refreshing about this movie. OK, so it's based on a comic book, but with all the remakes of various franchises out there its nice to see something that's at least a little original.