Search Results for: "discovering robert e. howard"

Modular: Pathfinder 2nd Edition Announced – Never Say Never

Yesterday, Paizo announced an upcoming playtest for a 2nd Edition of Pathfinder. Wow. For years, Paizo officials have said that there would never be a second edition. I suspect that all evidence of those statements have been scoured from the Internet. A quick search didn’t find any. There might have been qualifiers along the way, such as ‘unless the demand is too great’ or some such. But I remember the message as ‘We won’t do a 2nd Edition.” With the inference,…

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The Top Black Gate Posts in January

Ryan Harvey was the man to beat at Black Gate in January. He claimed three of the Top Ten articles — including our overall most popular post last month, a review of the new animated film Godzilla: Planet of the Monsters. Bob Byrne came in at #2 with his Conan pastiche review round-up, “By Crom: Some Conans are More Equal Than Others…” Fletcher Vredenburgh took third with a look at J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Children of Húrin. Derek Kunsken’s review of…

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Why I’m Here – Part Two: Some Thoughts on Old Books and Appendix N

Four years ago, I posted an explanation of what I’m trying to do with my reviews for Black Gate. My stated goal was, and remains, to be someone who says to readers, “Here’s a book I think you’ll get a kick out of.” There were several people who did that for me, turning me on to books and authors I still hold dear, and I want to do that for others. Like most fans of something, I want to convince people the things…

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The Top 50 Black Gate Posts in December

Bob Byrne ruled the charts last month, with no less than three articles in the December Top Ten — a new record. Well done Bob! (But you’re still not getting a new office.) Bob’s most popular piece was his report on the new Robert E. Howard pastiches coming in 2018, followed by a detailed look at the notorious takeover of gaming company SPI by its arch-rival TSR in 1982. His investigation of Heroic Signatures, a new venture to create digital properties based on…

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By Crom: Some Conans are More Equal Than Others…

I’ve been in a bit of a Robert. E. Howard mood lately, so I re-read some of his Solomon Kane stories (fine stuff). But, as always, I gravitated back to Conan. And that inevitably led me to the pastiches. A quick count of the shelves produced 42 non-Howard Conan tales, excluding the de Camp/Carter books, of which I’m missing two or three, I think. I’ve read at least a third of those pastiches, I’d say, maybe close to half. Except…

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A Day at Black Gate World Headquarters: What’s Coming in 2018

Here’s a look behind the curtain at the Black Gate World Headquarters in the Windy City: I walked into the opulent penthouse office of Black Gate Global Headquarters. It was the first time I had been higher than the second floor mail room, where I mopped the floors every Thursday evening. I felt like Conan traversing the savannahs as I waded through the plush carpet. I imagined myself as the mighty-thewed Cimmerian, searching for lions as I… “BRYNE! Quit your…

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By Crom! New Robert E. Howard Pastiches Coming in 2018!

Of course, you saw yesterday’s Black Gate post on Heroic Signatures, the new digital/gaming partnership, which includes the rights to about two dozen Robert E. Howard characters and stories. With the recent releases of Modiphius’ Robert E Howard’s Conan: Adventures in an Age Undreamed Of RPG, Monolith’s Conan board game and Funcom’s in-beta Conan: Exiles video game, Conan is a very viable gaming brand these days. And Funcom’s Age of Conan MMO (which I play) is still going strong as it approaches the…

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Heroic Signatures: REH Digital Rights Part of $10 Million Deal

Funcom is the developer of the Age of Conan (AoC) MMORPG. They’ve currently got a resource/action RPG, Conan: Exiles, in beta, scheduled for a May, 2018 release. I’ve played quite a few hours of AoC and think it’s a very good MMO, mixing elements from Robert E. Howard’s original stories and some of the pastiches. I haven’t tried Exiles yet. Cabinet Group LLC owns the rights to Robert E. Howard’s non-public domain works. Cabinet Group and Funcom each will own…

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The Top Black Gate Posts in November

Sean McLachlan was the Black Gate MVP for November, with two articles in the Top 5: “Happy Halloween! Here’s Some Nightmare Fuel” at #3, and “Ten Ways You Know Your Evil Empire Is Doomed,” which scored the #5 slot. Hot on Sean’s heels was Ryan Harvey with two Pellucidar posts, his review of Edgar Rice Burroughs’s Savage Pellucidar (#6) and the Series Wrap-Up (#10). The most popular article last month was our survey of Marion Zimmer Bradley’s Sword & Sorceress anthology…

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The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes: Cthulhu Casebooks (Vol 2) & The Thinking Engine

Last December I wrote about Sherlock Holmes & the Shadwell Shadows, volume one of James Lovegrove’s Cthulhu Casebooks trilogy. And this December, it’s on to book two, Sherlock Holmes and the Miskatonic Monstrosities. I wasn’t quite as fond of the second installment, though not because it’s a bad book. As I wrote in that first review: The basic premise of the… trilogy is that Watson made up the sixty stories in the Canon. He did so to cover up the…

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