Climate Change and Hurricanes
Climate Change is a topic I’m both interested in and concerned by. I’ve written about it before in relation to my own work in games (e.g. here and here) and it’s also a theme of Dark Future too. I’m thinking about it a lot as the news of the hurricanes and flooding so far in 2017. I wanted share some of the links and articles that I’ve been looking at. What I hope we get is a tipping point in the media/political understanding of climate change – that’s this is what we’ve been warned of for decades. That future is now here.
Not only had scientists and activists warned us of this – writers (and game designers!) had too:
That failure to act is costing us all huge amounts of money and most importantly – lives, the irony being one of the arguments against action was that it would cost too much… Inaction is proving to be far more expensive. For example:
Open land in Florida, with its porous terrain, can suck up the energy of the storm. But when passing over developed land, a storm can retain more of its power. Bochnak, the wetlands scientist, said the Everglades could provide necessary water storage but the marshes have been “half-developed into cities and roads,” cutting down on the ecosystem’s potential to lessen the impact of a storm like Irma.
“It’s bad but it’s the hard reality we live in,” said Bochnak. “When we develop these areas, we lose our natural protection.”
Predatory delay is everywhere. Corruption erodes the very foundations of our democracy. Disinformation floods our media. Civic sabotage and broken governments slow progress to a crawl. Outdated thinking clouds our sense of what’s truly possible. The Carbon Bubble looms. Many who claim to also desire climate action throw up fierce hostility in defense of a destructive status quo. In Blue America, anti-climate politics isn’t about disputing science, it’s about denying what science tells us about the need to act quickly. Delay is doom, but delay has many champions.
Ah, #CthulhuThursday with comings and Mi-Goings…
Let’s start with some art and Mi-Go! (Source)
Bit more art… some period of H.G.Wells – while these are not explicitly Mythos creatures, they do have something of the ‘night’ about them!
On the subject of Wells and Lovecraft – do check out this.
Also cool is the news that the great people of the H.P.Lovecraft Historical Society have collected all of Lovecraft’s work in audio format!
For the first time ever, the H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society has produced an audio recording of all of Lovecraft’s stories… this collection spans his entire career from his earliest surviving works of childhood to stories completed shortly before his death… This audio bonanza features seventy-four stories adding up to more than fifty (50!) hours of Lovecraftian listening fun, professionally performed and recorded for your enjoyment.
(Cthulhu Thursday is a dose of Mythos to brighten darken your week. More on the idea can be found here and a list of posts thus far, here. Also some upcoming Cthulhu news, sign up to the Auroch Digital’s newsletter. Enjoy!)
Game Dev Quick Links – Aug 2017 (I read lots of game dev stuff so you don’t have too!) Few day late edition!
Following on from July’s quick links: Each month I put together a few links that get added to the Bristol Games Hub newsletter. As an active games developer, I do read a fair amount around game dev, bizdev and the art and culture of games development. We also get posted links in the hub discussion space and sometimes people send me links. Here’s some context for them…
A great thread on diversity – The Guardian’s Keith Stuart talks about why diversity matters for the games industry. Speaking as part of that industry he’s totally right. Worth a read though.
https://twitter.com/keefstuart/status/887597813655367680
Nintendo’s mobile sales surge 450% – While most of the indies I know are focused on PC/Steam (for many reasons, mainly that free-to-play is an expensive club to join) mobile continues to the be the biggest part of our industry both in player numbers and income. Nintendo is making good use of mobile to get its game out there and make money. BTW here’s how mobile fits into the wider picture of games (source Digi-Capital):
Team17: Digital storefronts need a radical rethinking – Good on Team17 for pointing this out. Discovery is a major, major issue. App stores are often feedforward loops, as in popular titles get more visibility so more players, so become more popular. Helping players find new things they might like is a major issue.
GI.Biz – VR, Steady as she goes – Lots of digital ink going into looking at VR and what it might (or might not) be. However what seems key to me is to not expect huge changes, but to see a medium adapting to both existing markets and creating new ones.
PS. Like this? more here! Also sign-up to our newsletter too!
Infected! We’ve been dosed with #CthulhuThursday
Hello! Another week, another mythos set of pics and links. Starting with a congratulations to Modiphius for winning a Gold ENnie Award at GenCon! for the miniatures set below…
Next is very, very cool thing 🙂
These deep sea creatures really do look like inhabitants of R’leyh… (hattip to Reddit)
This is a bit fascinating & odd – how Lovercraft might bring people back to Christianity?!?
The piece in question comes from conservative Christian C. R. Wiley, who argues that Lovecraft’s weird fiction can actually help to bring Christians closer to God by giving them a “taste” of the “weirdness” of God. It’s an unusual argument, and perhaps one that Lovecraft would find amusing, if not offensive.
Did you know about Ogrethulu? You should…it;s an Ogre-Cthulhu hybrid for the game Ogre. (PS. You can wishlist the classic Ogre here!)
Finally, this is great – Lovecraft quotes added to ‘inspirational images’:
(Cthulhu Thursday is a dose of Mythos to brighten darken your week. More on the idea can be found here and a list of posts thus far, here. Also some upcoming Cthulhu news, sign up to the Auroch Digital’s newsletter. Enjoy!)
Best Tweets from #eclipse (have a missed any?)
So over in the US (not where I am) we had an eclipse. While over here in the UK I didn’t get to see it, I did get to enjoy the response….
There was of course amazing images of the eclipse. From the ground…
From a plane…
From space…
The eclipse as a backdrop for the ISS…
As a backdrop to make the important point about how we know there will be an eclipse..
I loved how the data shows how people responded to it, following its path over the USA…
And of course – as a cultural phenomenon..
https://twitter.com/michaeldweiss/status/899703984214220802
https://twitter.com/41Strange/status/899679847126937600
And of course, the one from Chainsaw Warrior!
Come Hither, Come Listen to my Tales of #CthulhuThursday
Ah! ’tis Cthulhu Thursday once more…
I’d mentioned the ‘King in Yellow’ themed board game, Carcosa before – the eZine have an interview with it’s creator, which you can see here. Worth a read!
There is some pre-Alpha footage of Frogwares Lovecraftian nightmare game, The Sinking City which looks really nice! Check out the official game page here.
Finally for this week, another image. Again from Reddit – and I agree it’s an original take on the Great Race of Yith, image is by deviant artist “the bloodfire”:
(Cthulhu Thursday is a dose of Mythos to brighten darken your week. More on the idea can be found here and a list of posts thus far, here. Also some upcoming Cthulhu news, sign up to the Auroch Digital’s newsletter. Enjoy!)
Theatre of the Macabre & Lovecraftian – it’s #CthulhuThursday
For Cthulhu Thursday this week I have a couple of images to show..
The first is poster art from the original Theatre du Grand-Guignol and it’s very macabre! (Source here and more pics!)
Not a million miles from this vibe is the new RPG game based on The King in Yellow – backed it on Kickstarter, it’s been funded and I’m looking forward to it! (You can pre-order it too)
The next image is more mythos and very creepy too! It’s from Reddit and is an Innsmouth priest (source here)
(Cthulhu Thursday is a dose of Mythos to brighten darken your week. More on the idea can be found here and a list of posts thus far, here. Also some upcoming Cthulhu news, sign up to the Auroch Digital’s newsletter. Enjoy!)
Ogre Steam page Launches! #PlayOgre
The team at Auroch Digital have been hard at work for some time now adapting Steve Jackson’s classic Ogre to PC/Steam. We’re really exciting to say the Steam page is now live – wishlist it now!
The coverage for it has statred… 🙂
https://twitter.com/Charlie_L_Hall/status/897863588458704897
I’m super excited. My first encounter with Ogre was around 1983? My aunt got me 3rd edition (one on right in image below!) as a present and I loved the game from there. So this project has been amazing to be part of and I’m so proud of the team here and the work they’ve done and SJGames have been brilliant to work with!
So excited – release is 5th October!
Summer Ends, Winter is Coming. It’s #CthulhuThursday
Took a bit of a break last week as had a lot on! All will be revealed soon… Anyhow time to share some links you ‘y’all…
First off, do check out the interview with weird fiction writer John Langham. He has a story in Autumn Cthulhu from 2016 too!
This image caught my eye (saw it on Reddit, it’s ace!) – Blue Plate Special by Jeff Lee Johnson
SyFy Wire has an article about Lovecraftian movies. It’s an interesting list, it’s different from films that are mythos heavy (something I’ve touched on before) more ones about … more about the films that have the concepts and atmosphere of Lovecraft’s work I was very pleased to see the list has ‘In the Mouth of Madness’ in which is a brilliant film:
Finally for this week – and it’s a note for all month – Modiphius have declared this ‘Month of Madness’ for the brilliant set WW2 set RPG, Achtung! Cthulhu… well worth checking out!
(Cthulhu Thursday is a dose of Mythos to brighten darken your week. More on the idea can be found here and a list of posts thus far, here. Also some upcoming Cthulhu news, sign up to the Auroch Digital’s newsletter. Enjoy!)
Travel to Carcosa for Cthulhu Thursday! #CthulhuThursday
So what’s on the menu for today’s Cthulhu Thursday?
First off, we backed this amazing looking game on Kickstarter… Carcosa! So excited to play it. (For the uninitiated, Carcosa is the mythical city created by Ambrose Bierce in a short story, then taken up by Robert Chambers for the King in Yellow and Lovecraft too, recently popularized as a location in season 1 of True Detective.)
Next up, has a good article about Lovecraft up too:
A century ago, a gaunt, sickly young man of 26 years sat down to write what would become the first piece of an oeuvre which would far outlive him. The short story was called The Tomb, and as opening gambits for literary immortality go, it perhaps doesn’t have the hallmarks of an instant classic.
The image they use for the article is also very cool!
Plus we’ve added an update to our Vote Cthulhu game (see Vice article on it)
Have you seen the Cthulhu Wars Onslaught 3 Kickstarter yet? Looks really amazing!
(Cthulhu Thursday is a dose of Mythos to brighten darken your week. More on the idea can be found here and a list of posts thus far, here. Also some upcoming Cthulhu news, sign up to the Auroch Digital’s newsletter. Enjoy!)
A Great Becoming... 