The Ravening Deep (Arkham Horror) by Tim Pratt

    THE RAVENING DEEP is the first volume of the Sanford Files that develops the character of archvillain Carl Sanford from the Arkham Horror (and Call of Cthulhu before it) games. Despite this being named after him, Carl plays a relatively small role in the book. Instead, the stars are Ruby Standish, Diana Travelers, and Abel Davenport. Two out of three being pre-established Investigators from the Arkham Horror card game.

    The premise is Abel Davenport (who I suspect is named after Cthulhu Mythos fiction author Matthew Davenport) finds a magical amulet that briefly makes him the prophet of a new Great Old One named Asterias (“Starfish”). Abel swiftly finds himself overthrown because he’s not evil enough to run a proper cult and is replaced by his inhuman clone, Cain. Wandering into the best place possible, Abel finds an unlikely ally in Diane Travelers who is not only an occult expert but also determined to stop the forces of darkness herself.

    Meanwhile, Ruby Standish is a cat burglar similar to Countess Zorzi and even predates her in the card game. However, Ruby doesn’t quite have the same level of charm as the Countess, though. Working for the starfish clones, called comets in-universe, she swiftly realizes that they are not people to trusted. This results in another coincidence where she ends up rescued by Diana and setting herself up against Asterias.

    Carl Sanford plays a relatively minor role as the heroes’ unlikely ally. Unlike the original Shadows of Yog-Sothoth, where Carl is someone who wants to awaken Cthulhu to destroy the world, this one is quite devoted to preventing that. He even quotes The Tick that the Earth is where he keeps his stuff (and props to Tim Pratt for that reference). Having an evil teammate is something more Call of Cthulhu/Arkham Horror games should have so I approve but his portrayal doesn’t give us much insight into the character.

    For the most part, it is a fairly self-contained plot as Asterias’ plan to take over the world is still in its early stages. He’s more interested in doing all of his criminal activities within Arkham, Massachusetts versus a globe trotting adventure. We also get to see the Silver Twilight Lodge from the inside a great deal, which I found to be amusing. Basically, we have to hope the guys defenses hold up for once because they’re being invaded by someone even worse.

    I appreciate the creation of a new Great Old One and his cult of monsters rather than just using preexisting ones but I can’t say that I like Asterias that much. He’s a little too much Starro and Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Still, I’m not going to begrudge the author because it was an, overall, entertaining book from beginning to end. Do I recommend it? Yes, I do.

Available here 

Art from upcoming The Rules of Supervillainy comic

We're working on a graphic novel for THE RULES OF SUPERVILLAINY with expectations for a Kickstarter around early 2026. We've already got some art coming up for Gary's adventures.

Alone in the Dark (2024) review

    ALONE IN THE DARK (2024) is a survival horror video game that reboots the seminal horror franchise. The original Alone in the Dark predated even the original Resident Evil and established the exploration of a haunted house with private detective Edward Carnby along with socialite Emily Hartwood. It also incorporated elements from H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos before they were as common as black clothing on Goths.

    As a huge fan of survival horror games and the Cthulhu Mythos, I was very excited about this game but am only now getting to review the work. I was also excited by the fact the reboot would star David Harbour as Edward and Jodie Corner as Emily. Really, I think both of them would have been good in a movie version. Certainly, it would have been better than the Uwe Boll version.

    The premise is that Emily has recruited Edward to help bring her uncle Jeremy back from the asylum that he is committed to. She has received a mysterious letter that indicates something sinister is afoot there. Upon arrival, they are surprised to find that the asylum seems to be a warm well-lit location full of lovable eccentrics than some sort of hellhouse. This sense of comfort swiftly dissapates, though, and the pair soon find themselves wandering between pocket dimensions full of monsters as Jeremy attempts to warn them away from whatever dark secret is affecting Decerto manor.

    Essentially, the game functions a great deal like Resident Evil 2. You wander around the mansion picking up ammunition, healing items, and keys inbetween solving simple puzzles. Sometimes you have to deal with the strange monsters that are half-plant, half-zombie. Combat is extremely simple with a pistol, shotgun, Tommy Gun, and melee weapon as your options during it. The melee weapons are breakable and you have a simple dodge button. Honestly, it's all very basic and not terribly difficult to master. The trick is not to run out of ammunition and being able to reload fast enough to take down enemies.

    The real heart of the game is the exploration as you follow the various clues scattered around the mansion before moving to your next room. The puzzles are a bit on the simple side but a few of them jump in difficulty and rely on things like astrology that I have almost no experience with. There's also the quest for forbidden knowledge items that can't be completed on a single run with the total of them requiring you to play the second game as the other player character. There's only two bosses in the entire game and I managed to beat them within a couple of tries.

    If it seems like I'm running the game down, I'm not. I like a light easy experience but it does play into the game's biggest flaw: it's not scary. It's far closer to PG-13 than R and while it does get more menacing in the latter quarter of the game, I feel like it should have probably started there. Too many of the characters are on the cutesy side and the art style doesn't help, being somewhat cartoonish contrasting against the protagonist's scanned faces. It creates an unintentional uncanny valley, though.

    The use of H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos and the 1920s Louisiana setting, though, really elevates this game, though. It's not just some scattered references to HPL's work here and there but a broad collection of them that tickled me every time I found one. The accents aren't always perfect but the developers made an effort to incorporate history from the Depression, Civil War, Prohibition, and Jazz eras. The characters may be a bit too goofy for a horror movie experience but all of them are memorable and enjoyable to deal with, which is a rare thing in video games. I actually wish the 7-8 hour game was longer so I could interact with them more.

    In conclusion, I really enjoyed Alone in the Dark (2024). It's not a spectacular experience like Resident Evil 2 or Silent Hill 2's remake but it is a fun and immersive video game that I enjoyed. Its biggest flaws are they could have gone harder on the horror and it's a little too easy (amping up the difficulty won't fix the puzzles ease). If you're a fan of 1920s Cthulhu Mythos fiction like the classic Call of Cthulhu, this will be absolutely up your alley.

Available here 

Space Academy Dropouts is free from December 3rd to 8th

SPACE ACADEMY DROPOUTS is available for free from December 3rd to December 8th. Enjoy the adventures of the galaxy's worst crew that are, sadly, are only hope. 

https://www.amazon.com/Space-Academy-Dropouts-C-Phipps-ebook/dp/B09Q1MS51G/

FROM THE BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF THE SUPERVILLAINY SAGA:

"Boldly going because they're completely lost."

The newly renamed Vance Turbo has sabotaged his own career at Space Fleet Academy due to a desire to atone for a training accident. Unfortunately, his actions result in him getting press-ganged into an expendable crew of misfits recruited by a legendary starship captain. Their mission? To recover a collection of lost sun-destroying missiles that could restart a galactic war. Unfortunately, Vance is smart enough to know something is wrong with this picture. After all, no sane person would recruit this crew to save the universe.

SPACE ACADEMY DROPOUTS is an all-new series from the hilarious duo of C.T. Phipps (Supervillainy Saga, Agent G) and Michael Suttkus (I Was a Teenage Weredeer, Lucifer's Star) that lampoons the space opera as well as military science fiction genres.

The Crimson Gutter review

    THE CRIMSON GUTTER is an interesting book and one that I am willing to give props to Renegade for creating even though I have my issues with it. Basically, The Crimson Gutter is a "By Night" city book without an actual city applied to it. It is a generic city book with a bunch of NPCs, locations, and plot hooks that can be applied to virtually any urban area. I've had that idea percolating in my brain for decades but always thought it had significant downsides. Does this game book overcome them?

    Not really. The Crimson Gutters is probably one of my favorite non-OPP Fifth Edition supplements after Blood Sigils but it's probably a three star, three star and a half book as my highest praise. The NPCs it creates for it's "Anytown, USA" are pretty generic. There's one who wants to be a Camarilla bigshot, a hypocritical Anarch, and a guy who just wants to use his second chance to be extremely rich. Yeah, those kinds of people. Inexplicably, they also don't provide a Prince, Baron, or Sheriff for the city.

    Ironically, the NPCs are the least interesting part of the book even though they're all fine. No, the biggest appeal of the game is that it is one of the rare WOD books that actually focuses on down and dirty street level gaming. The book presents the kind of adventures you must have when you are not going to be saving the world from Ur-Shulgi, Caine, or even likely to encounter the Sabbat.

    These aren't adventures that are particularly deep: one of them is a multi-chapter investigation of tracking down who is a local Kindred that has become a wight and then destroying him. Other adventures are figuring out who murdered a Church of Caine deacon, throwing a party for a visiting Archon, and impressing the various factions in the city enough to make them accept you as a member. It's the kind of low stakes gaming that works perfectly for the setting and we rarely get represented in the books.

    I like that the book also raises the Church of Caine to the level of the other two sects. I admit this is mostly because I like the Church of Caine as the Sabbat-lite and representing all of their intellectual religious side divorced from the ultraviolence. Also, able to have conversations with the other two sects. However, it also kind of falls into the trap that, "If it was just back to the old ways, it'd be better." Still, the Church of Caine really was the best idea of Cults of the Blood Gods and I have no issue with its prominence in non-OPP work (take from the best).

    A nice bit is also the game actually provides some scenarios and scenes based around feeding. With all the attention V5 pays to feeding as a super important part of Kindred RPGing, this is one of the few books to actually provide interesting scenarios for Baggers, Alley Cats, Osirises, and so on. It also gives a lot of ideas for how to gain and lose domain in a city.

    Still, I feel like the book suffers from the fact that it is somewhat bloated describing fairly straight forward scenarios with twenty words when five would be fine. The NPCs are also slotted into the story when we don't really give them the kind of personalities that would make them stand out. I will give the writers credit for one thing, though: the NPCs have new sections where they list how the NPCs would be as the PC's sires and also what it would take to get the NPC to betray the PCs--which is perfect for vampire.

    So I rate it...okay.

    It is the unfortunate fact that I think Fifth Edition's design philosophy will never reach what it did under OPP. This is a matter of preference in that they were massive lore nerds the same as me (and still are for their own stuff) while these books seem deliberately designed to avoid lore as much as possible. Still, I've always felt that the gritty street level of 1st Edition was the best place for Vampire and I think OPP agreed since that was how they designed Requiem (and I may be giving them a bit too much credit here--though they deserve a lot--since that was always Requiem's thing). But if you have to pick up a supplement, I'd say Damnation City is probably a better choice for the same topic.

Available here

To Sift Through Bitter Ashes (Grails Covenant Trilogy #1) by David Niall Wilson review

    TO SIFT THROUGH BITTER ASHES by David Niall Wilson is the first of the Grails Covenant Trilogy. The Vampire: The Masquerade franchise was once one of the biggest in the tabletop gaming world and in the Nineties and early Two Thousands, they created hundreds of novels set in the World of Darkness. The Grails Covenant trilogy was set during the Vampire: The Dark Ages period, specifically in the aftermath of the First Crusade.

    The premise is that a Lasombra vampire named Montravant has decided that he can use the Holy Grail to increase his power. Obviously, to do that he needs to first acquire it. Forming a order of holy knights with the help of Hugh DePanyen (real life co-founder of the Knights Templar), Montrovant sends his charges to Jerusalem. Along the way, Montrovant finds out that the future base of the Knights Templar is built over a powerful supernatural’s base that may hold the secret he desires. An ancient Nosferatu, Kli Kodesh, also seeks to involve himself in Montrovant’s scheme for pure amusement.

    David Niall Wilson is an expert in the First Crusade period and manages to properly depict the immense stresses the Kingdom of Jerusalem was suffering during the period. Politics and religion compete as the guiding force for the young state even as individuals take advantage of their incompatible goals. The vampire politics of the Pre-Camarilla era are less developed but no less interesting as individual undead play with the locals like chess pieces.

    The book benefits from the deliberate values dissonance of the period with the Templars considering the Muslims to be heathen pagans who need to be destroyed while otherwise being incredibly devoted men of God. The vampires have their own surreal views with Montrovant believing in religion only as a form of magic, Kli Kodesh viewing eternity as something endlessly boring, and the villainous Santos having lived longer than the Abrahmic faiths so he finds them all somewhat silly.

    This is a book without romance and there’s scarcely any female characters either. Minor flaw as this may be, it is a book that heavily gets into issues of faith and power. It really captures the social combat element of Vampire: The Masquerade. Everything is about politicking, manipulation, and building relationships among multiple characters before things explode into violence. Thankfully, the actual lore is pretty sparse and you could read this with no real knowledge of the tabletop game setting.

    I think my favorite character of the book has to be Kli Kodesh, who is a vampire older than Christianity but converted to it. Other vampires consider him to be mad, though, because he makes wild and outlandish (even blasphemous) claims about having known Jesus in life. He might be telling the truth or not but none of the Christian vampires would believe him while the pagan ones hold the religion in contempt anyway. For those who don’t mind a little religion in their books (written by a counterculture author), then this is handled very well.

    In conclusion, To Sift Through Bitter Ashes is a fantastic book and one that I recommend be listened to on audiobook versus in text form. This isn’t because the text version isn’t enjoyable on its own but because Joshua Saxon does a fantastic job narrating as well as bringing the various characters alive. This isn’t Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade but more like Kingdom of Heaven with fangs.

Available here (Amazon)

Available here (Audible)

Clan Novel: Malkavian by Stewart Wieck

    CLAN NOVEL: MALKAVIAN by Stewart Wieck is the ninth novel of the Clan Novel series. The Clan Novel series of VAMPIRE: THE MASQUERADE and the larger World of Darkness was an attempt to do a round robin kind of story that illustrated each of the thirteen clans. Some of the books were great, others so-so, and others still have complicated feelings from me. This is one of the complicated ones as I think it’s a great book in some parts and downright incomprehensible in others.

    The premise is Anatole, the Prophet of Gehenna, is an eight hundred year old Kindred who is driven by his incomprehensible visions. His companion, who is unnamed in the book and may not even exist, follows him around as Anatole attempts to figure out how the current events fit into the larger road to the apocalypse. Meanwhile, Prince Benison of Atlanta awakens from torpor and plots his revenge against the Sabbat. Simultaneously, Victoria Ash returns to Atlanta with the goal of executing her former torturer.

    Anatole is one of my favorite characters in Vampire: The Masquerade but he’s barely recognizable here. He claims to have lost his faith but there’s no real reason given for this and he still largely acts as a religious person. While I could figure out most of the metaphors and how they related to the larger Clan Novels, I have to say the Anatole portions were the least enjoyable part of the story. Surprisingly, I most enjoyed the Benison portions even as he was a former Confederate general. Benison wanting to avenge his dead wife was the most coherent motivation throughout the book.

    Victoria Ash is almost always 100% entertaining in any book she appears in. Her narcissistic personality mixed with the fact she can almost back up all of her claims of being the loveliest creature on Earth (as well as a ruthless predator) are endlessly amusing. Sadly, the book seems unwilling to let her actually succeed in her plans. The story also engages in manipulative revelations, giving false information about her relationship to Leopold that just serves to try to obfuscate later twists in the story.

    When Crossroad Press was contracted to reprint all of the original World of Darkness fiction in 2023, the Clan Novels were the first of the books to come out. There was also the attempt to do audiobooks for all of them. As a guy who experienced the books when they first came out in paperback form, I am doing my reread with both the ebook and audiobook editions.

    Of the two, I think the book is best experienced in audiobook format. Michael T. Bradley does a good job of narrating the various sections of the Clan Novel as well as the many individual characters. I think this is the best way to enjoy the entirety of the Clan Novels and while I enjoyed the books in text form in the Nineties, I feel they’re something fantastic in listened form.

    In conclusion, Malkavian isn’t my favorite of the Clan Novels. It has a lot going for it but it tries a little too hard to make Anatole’s sections completely incomprehensible and full of metaphor versus actually giving him a personality to enjoy. Despite this, we’re almost to the end of the series and a lot of plot points are finally coming to a close. The clan novels were a fascinating experience in tabletop gaming fiction and one that I still recommend decades later.

Available