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Author: Andrew Zimmerman Jones

Andrew Zimmerman Jones is the Physics Guide at About.com and author of String Theory for Dummies. His work, which includes fiction as well as non-fiction, has appeared in Black Gate, Pink Floyd and Philosophy, Heroes and Philosophy, Abyss and Apex, and various other publications.
Vincent N. Darlage reviews Age of Cthulhu: Death in Luxor

Vincent N. Darlage reviews Age of Cthulhu: Death in Luxor

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gmg7001coverlargeIf you’re in the mood for some good horror encounters with the dark forces of the Great Old Ones, then the new Age of Cthulhu line from Goodman Games may be of interest.  Vincent Darlage reviewed the first installment in this set of game modules. (Links to other Cthulhu resources at the bottom of this post.)

Age of Cthulhu: Death in Luxor

by Harley Stroh
Goodman Games (48 pp. Softcover, $12.99)
Reviewed by Vincent N. Darlage

This time, intrepid investigators are on the hunt for things man was not meant to know in Egypt, rather than Arkham or Dunwich – a nice change, so far as I’m concerned. A Lovecraftian horror is locked beneath Luxor in Egypt, and is unleashed, bringing with it a new era of darkness that will blast all of mankind, unless the intrepid player characters can stop it. The adventure is heavily focused on investigation, not on combat, which was nice to see.

The finding of the clues and the free-form nature worked well for me; Luxor doesn’t seem to railroad the players much, if at all. I especially liked the investigation summary on page four. The summary goes through each scene and lays out in a few sentences what is revealed and where it leads. For a free-form adventure, this is essential as it details which scenes have which clues. More adventures need to do things like this. …

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The Meta-Reality of Fandom

The Meta-Reality of Fandom

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Did I say I was an unapologetic geek? My wife, Amber, offered our son to a dragon at GenCon!
Did I say I was an unapologetic geek? My wife, Amber, offered our son to a dragon at GenCon!

I’m an unapologetic geek. I don’t just watch genre shows and read genre books, I immerse myself in them. The ones that stay with me, that I actually decide to devote myself to, linger with me, becoming part of the fabric of my internal world, the thought processes that help me deal with the mundane levels of reality. I analyze these cultural components, trying to pick them apart to figure out why the events unfolded the way they did and, more importantly, what I can learn from it. (For an example, consider how I found an excuse to talk about Thor on my Physics blog, using the film as a lesson in how to be a good scientist.)

Black Gate is also dedicated toward this sort of exploration, publishing not just fantasy fiction but also thoughtful commentary on the genre, in both the magazine and also on this blog. (At this point, I feel the need to point out Aaron Starr’s recent excellent post “The Gods Never Urinate,” which is an exceptional case of this.) Even on our Twitter feed, @BlackGateDotCom, we try to share as much of this sort of material as we can.

But let’s really think about what’s going on here. The genre of science fiction and fantasy, more than any other, reflect upon the fundamental nature of reality. They can do this literally, metaphorically, or (when at its best) in complex combinations of the two. So you have reality, and then you have the genre literature which is reflecting upon that reality.

And the truly motivated fans don’t just read the literature. Remember, the word “fan” comes from “fanatic.” If you don’t obsess at least a little bit, you aren’t a fan, you’re just someone who likes the show or the book. Fans go a step further, and we reflect upon the genre. We reflect in our own minds, and through the written word, both online and in print, in podcasts and vidcasts, and in person at gaming stores, comic shops, bookstores, conventions … or, let’s be honest, any time more than two of us are in contact with each other. The depth of the analysis can vary widely, of course, but that reflection on the genre is the defining trait of fandom.

Fandom is the process of reflecting upon the reflection of reality. …

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Jeff Mejia reviews Conan: Ruins of Hyboria

Jeff Mejia reviews Conan: Ruins of Hyboria

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Conan is one of the most influential characters in all of fantasy. His influences has always been felt in the background, but he’s getting a lot more press lately due to an upcoming film adaptation (complete with new trailer). This supplement, reviewed by Jeff Mejia, focuses  not on the man so much as the setting … or rather, a type of setting which is woven into many of the greatest Sword and Sorcery tales (and games).conan-ruins-of-hyboria-vincent-darl15-med

Conan: Ruins of Hyboria

Vincent N. Darlage
Mongoose publishing (156 pages, $29.95, June 2006)
Reviewed by Jeff Mejia

Like many of you, I’m one of those who actually read The Lord of the Rings decades before the movie came out. I would get the books out every couple of years and reread them, and as I did so I would wonder what this locale would look like or how to create that character using my favorite gaming system. When Peter Jackson’s epic movie trilogy came out I was an instant fan; sure they left out a couple of favorite characters and missed a few beats here and there, but for all of that I finally had a glimpse of Middle Earth beyond the Brothers Hildebrandt calendars. For me Jackson’s The Lord of The Rings was a feast for the eyes. And such is the case with Ruins of Hyboria.

From Conan to Thundarr, Ruins have been a staple of Sword and Sorcery fiction. In Ruins of Hyboria by Vincent Darlage, we are not only provided with a system to help create and flesh out ruins of our own creation, we are also treated to full descriptions of some of the more famous ruins in the Conan saga.

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Supernatural Spotlight – Episode 6.20 “The Man Who Would Be King”

Supernatural Spotlight – Episode 6.20 “The Man Who Would Be King”

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The Archangel Castiel is confronted about his recent actions.
The Archangel Castiel is confronted about his recent actions.

This week begins with the Archangel Castiel praying in a cemetery, recounting to God some of the wonders he’s encountered over the ages: a fish crawling from the water, the Tower of Babel (there’s only so high you can pile dung), Cain/Abel, David/Goliath, Sodom/Gomorrha, and so on … up until the Apocalypse, which “was averted by two boys, an old drunk, and a fallen angel. The grand story and we ripped up the ending and the rules and destiny, leaving nothing but freedom and choice.” (A lot of good dialogue in this one, so it’ll be a quote-heavy review.)

Except now Castiel has doubts, that maybe he’s made the wrong choice, and he’s seeking guidance from God, so he begins to tell his story.

With the Winchesters, Castiel is still pretending that he doesn’t know whether or not the demon Crowley is alive. In reality, not only is Crowley alive, but he’s currently dissecting Eve’s corpse. “Eve’s brain, dead as a tin kipper, and yet, for some reason, she keeps laying eggs.” Creepy, fish-like eggs, which he pulls out of her guts. And when he electrocutes her brain, it causes seizures in a vampire they have tied up (just for these sorts of experiments, apparently).

Crowley’s concerned that Castiel is distracted, that his affection for the Winchesters is putting their plans to open Purgatory in danger. They’re bickering like an old married couple. “The stench of that Impala is all over your overcoat. I thought we’d agreed, no more nights out with the boys.”

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Supernatural Spotlight – Episode 6.19 “Mommy Dearest”

Supernatural Spotlight – Episode 6.19 “Mommy Dearest”

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Sam and Dean have a chat with Eve, who decides to take the form of their dead mother.
Sam and Dean have a chat with Eve, who decides to take the form of their dead mother.

Eve’s up to no good in the town of Grant’s Pass, Oregon, by being unusually charming to a college student (named, as we shortly learn, Edward Bright). She runs her hand across his cheek, which cannot be a good thing. He wonders away from the bar she enters. Eve kisses another boy, then walks through and begins touching people. The whole place goes insane with a monstrous, vampiric feeding frenzy, as she sits and calmly watches.

Dean is making bullets filled with Phoenix ashes, but isn’t sure it’s going to work. The ashes certainly aren’t burning him. In fact, it’s all a bit of an exercise in futility without a location, so they summon Cas to try to get a bead on Eve. He has no information, but Sam has the idea of trying to track down an empathic monster to see if they can get Eve’s location from one of them.

Castiel is able to track down a cult favorite: Amber Benson, from Buffy: The Vampire Slayer fame. (For those who weren’t avid Buffy fans, Benson played Tara, the lesbian love interest of Willow. Her season 6 death at the hands of a misogynistic nerd nearly triggered the destruction of the world at Willow’s hands. Tara also had the best song in the classic “Once More, With Feeling” musical episode of Buffy, also from Season 6. If you have not seen it, Season 6 of Buffy is some of the best television ever made.)

Fortunately for fanboys like me, Benson also played the non-killing vampire Lenore, who was introduced briefly in Season 2 of Supernatural.

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Andrew Zimmerman Jones Reviews Pathfinder Supplements

Andrew Zimmerman Jones Reviews Pathfinder Supplements

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pathfinder_rpg_core_rulebook_coverPaizo publishing’s Pathfinder RPG is both familiar and innovative, as it brings the best of Dungeons & Dragons 3.5 into a fresh new approach. In this review, I explore the core rulebook and a couple of their supplements, explaining why you should look into the game system if you haven’t already.

Pathfinder Roleplaying Game: Core Rulebook

Jason Bulmahn
Paizo Publishing (575 pages, $49.99, Aug. 2009)

Pathfinder Module: Crypt of the Everflame

Jason Bulmahn
Paizo Publishing (32 pages, $13.99, Sept. 2009)

Pathfinder Adventure Path #25: Council of Thieves (1 of 6): The Bastards of Erebus

Edited by Sean K. Reynolds
Paizo Publishing (92 pages, $19.99, Aug. 2009)

Reviewed by Andrew Zimmerman Jones

Your first look at the massive tome that is the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game: Core Rulebook can be a bit intimidating. I first ran across it piled high on a mountainous table at GenCon’s Paizo Publishing booth in summer 2009 and, I admit, I wasn’t even sure what it was. Yet another fantasy roleplaying game? Elves, dwarves, and halflings? It sure didn’t seem worth much attention, and I didn’t really get what all the hype was about.

Then I realized what it was… this was my old mistress, Dungeons & Dragons v3.5, all dressed up in a new outfit and ready to go out on the town again.

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Supernatural Spotlight – Episode 6.18 “Frontierland”

Supernatural Spotlight – Episode 6.18 “Frontierland”

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Sam (left) and Dean (right) go to the Old West.
Sam (left) and Dean (right) go to the Old West.

The episode starts out on Sunrise, Wyoming, March 5, 1861, with a high-noon shootout duel on the street … and one of the participants is Dean Winchester. Right as they draw, the episode cuts to a revamped old-west-themed title sequence.

The next scene takes place 48 hours earlier (or 150 years later, depending on how you look at it), and the boys and Billy are cracking into the Campbell family’s hidden stash of demon-hunting lore, which is now free for the taking since Samuel died a couple of episodes back. It’s an extensive collection and they’re looking for “anything that’ll put a run in the octomom’s stocking,” meaning Eve, the mother of all monsters.

Billy finds something indicating that “the ashes of a phoenix can burn the mother,” but they don’t know anything about a phoenix … except that, according to Samuel Colt’s journal (also part of the collection), the gun maker and demon hunter had killed one on March 5, 1861, and it left behind a pile of smoldering ashes.

The search for a Delorian is on.

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Andrew Zimmerman Jones Reviews Goodman Games Supplements

Andrew Zimmerman Jones Reviews Goodman Games Supplements

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fhfangfistsongWith the release of Dungeons and Dragons 4th edition, there came the opportunity for independent game companies to introduce whole new lines of products that focused on expanding the gaps left in the core materials presented by Wizards of the Coast. In this review from Black Gate #14, I look at supplements from two of these product lines, published by the fine people at Goodman Games, covering various races and character classes.

Since the review was written, Wizards of the Coast has filled many of those gaps with their own materials, such as the D&D Player’s Handbook Races series, which includes the official supplements for both the Tiefling and Dragonborn races.

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Supernatural Spotlight – Episode 6.17 “My Heart Will Go On”

Supernatural Spotlight – Episode 6.17 “My Heart Will Go On”

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SUPERNATURAL
Sam (far left) and Dean (middle) are frozen in time while the Archangel Castiel (right) begins negotiations with Fate.

After a few weeks without Supernatural, I’ve been looking forward for the show to come back. There are a lot of dangling cliffhangers this season and I’m looking forward to seeing how they come together.

This episode contains a riff on the Final Destination theme, where events are conspiring to create elaborate death scenarios. The first death involves a man triggering a Rube Goldberg-like series of events that end in being decapitated by his garage door.

It turns out that there have been a string of bizarre deaths, several of them within the same families. This draws the attention of Sam and Dean, but it’s bigger than what they find. They find a piece of gold thread at each of the death scenes, but not really any other clues. Billy’s wife, Ellen, discovers that …

Yes, that’s right, Billy’s wife, Ellen. Her daughter, Jo, is out investigating a connected series of deaths in California. Now, for the reader and viewer who’s been following the show, this may seem startling for a number of reasons. Billy’s not married, for one, and Ellen and Jo are hunters who died last season.

Anyway, Billy’s wife, Ellen, discovers that the families of all of the victims came over to the U.S. at about the same time in 1912. In fact, they came over on the same ship … called the Titanic.

See where this is going?

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Andrew Zimmerman Jones Reviews Shard RPG

Andrew Zimmerman Jones Reviews Shard RPG

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shardI first discovered the Shard RPG at GenCon in 2009. Despite being one of the most beautiful books I’ve ever seen, I was instantly enthralled by the premise. If the review below wets your appetite, then you can get more information (including a free Welcome Booklet download) from the Shard RPG website.

Shard RPG Basic Compendium

Aaron de Orive and Scott Jones
Shard Studios (352 pages, $39.99, August 2009)
Reviewed by Andrew Zimmerman Jones

One of the pleasures of going to GenCon is to stumble upon some of the small press games, which are like little treasures sprinkled throughout the dealer’s room. The last time I went, one such treasure was Shard, a game with a spark of originality that is rarely found even in the gaming industry.

Don’t get me wrong, I love traditional fantasy settings and even love the permutations where tradition is turned on its ear, such as the way mythical creatures are portrayed in White Wolf’s World of Darkness line.

But still, there’s something to be said for a game that doesn’t rely on mages, elves, vampires, werewolves, and so on as the basis of their originality.

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