Fanboy Horror!!!

Few things cast terror into the hearts of the true fanboy, however the one thing that always seems to get their bat-boxers in a twist is a left-field casting decision.

You'll probably get the feeling that this isn't going to be an especially horror-centric post and you'd be right, but with huge swathes of the internet laying into the decision to cast Ben Affleck as Batman in Zack Snyder's sequel to Man of Steel, I wanted to put by own tuppence in.

First, I was surprised. No, really surprised. In all of those inevitable discussions on who should be cast as which character, Affleck never made the table once. Not just for Batman, post Daredevil I thought that wold be it. I also admit that my dislike for Daredevil was a whole lot more to do with my ambivalence for the character, than the movie itself.

Following this announcement, my mind wandered, but had a hard time getting past Daredevil in looking for evidence of how Affleck would fare in the role, after all - Mallrats and Chasing Amy weren't really in the right territory, Paycheck sees him far more hunter than hunted and everything else that came to mind just couldn't convince me. I still wasn't opposed, but I couldn't see the wisdom.

I tried to explain to my wife, but as is so often the case had to put things in context of films she is a fan of - in this case Jersey Girl. I was still no nearer to convincing myself though, but things were starting to seep through.

I was basing so much of my concern, I think, on the fact that so many of the films I was thinking about were pre Bennifer, and darn, that was a while ago now. I looked at the slew of pictures that were circulating alongside all the "OMG Affleck!" posts and thought that, hang-on, visually he's a far better Wayne/Batman than some and in fairness, he has been known to act on occasion (he was, after all, "da bomb in Phantoms").

And then, this memory came to mind...

Hold-on a moment...

Wings! Now!

Dogma!

Lets bear in mind the way that Affleck carries most of the movie as the affable but weary Bartleby, before flipping personality into someone who is dark-edged, highly-driven.

Remind you of anyone?

I'm probably not the first to point this out and am unlikely to be the last, but I think Affleck has as good a chance as any of pulling this off, as long as he doesn't channel Nic Cage's "Big Daddy" in the process.

So yeah. Affleck. Batman.

I can probably live with that.

Breathe and begin again

Well, all work on Carpe Tenebris was put on hold whilst I attended to a life-changing event. However, life has changed and all that and it is time to turn back to this.

I have a team coming together nicely, some good ideas for the website and all those other little bits and pieces coming together.

So I apologise for the break, now, back to work!

State of Decay

When it comes to video games, I tend not to be a "first day" buyer, rather I'll give it a few weeks (or occasionally months) before getting that game I've waited ages for already. This week saw me brak that pattern with the release of Undead Labs' "State of Decay" on XBox Live.

As I've been busy, I've not been able to devote as much time to it as I'd like, but it's certainly shaping up nicely and is probably closer to the spirit of The Walking Dead than the most recent tie-in.

Although I had other plans, I suspect a little in-game video of this will move up my priorites list, as will a full review.

We'll keep a welcome in the hillside.

Many moons ago, I used to live in Cardiff and attended a few science fiction and comic events, where generally we had a good time, met some great people and marvelled at the quirks of fandom (I'm just sorry that in the many moves I made I lost the "Mantis Man" sketch that artist Mark Buckingham did for a small group of us).

What there wasn't though, was a good horror event.

That seems to be being addressed now, however, as new Horror Expo, SCARdiff 2013 is scheduled for 27 October 2013 at the Mercure Holland House Hotel, Cardiff (That's Wales for those international folks). With a line up of Horror writers and actors in attendance. Not much additional info yet on screenings or other activities, but with tickets starting out at an introductory price of £6.66, before rising to £9.00, its got to be worth checking out if your in the area. Me, I'm not in the area but I've been planning to visit and catch up with friends for a while so...

Government Spooks

Japan's Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, was elected last December and despite taking power he has, as yet, failed to move into his official residence, a move akin to the British Prime Minister refusing to move into 10 Downing Street. Why? Well officially it as nothing to do with ghosts. No sirree.

Officials in the Japanese government are currently denying that the Prime Minister is refusing to move because the place is haunted.

Whilst there have been tales of strange goings on in the house, which was subject to two notorious massacres in the 1930s, they are certainly not keeping the Prime Minister out. Honest!

Mind you, given that my experience of Japanese ghosts comes primarily from Ju On - The Grudge and Project Zero/Fatal Frame...

Odds are you'd have a hard time getting me in there either.

Still, there's some good story potential in here, so I'm going to look into this a little more.

Site news

Well, as things chug along nicely now, its time for me to devote some time to tidying up the site this weekend, so lord knows when it will be available (not that there's much there yet). If you've come here from the site, you'll know where it is, if not its at www.carpetenebris.co.uk. Simple, huh?

In addition, I'll be putting the links in to the new forum I've set up for the project, which is pretty presumptious of me considering we haven't actually released anything yet, apart from this blog. Still, its all part of a grander plan, so if you want to look for now, drop by at http://carpetenebris.lefora.com. don't be surprised if its awful quiet so far, that's only to be expected and I'm just trying to get all the infrastructure in place first.

Thursday Night at the Movies

A few years back, someone organised a fab little website devoted to movie which were good sources of inspiration for the Dark Conspiracy RPG. Well, I lost track of it ages ago, but now the fellas behind Protodimension Magazine have taken matters into their own hands and launched their own version.

It is a bit bare bones at the moment, but still reminded me of a couple of films I need to try and track down on DVD. Take a look over at Dark Conspiracy Movie Database.

The Truth Is Out There

Given that this whole project is about horror, the supernatural and conspiracy theories, let me make one thing very clear from the outset, I am not one of these people who believe in everything. I do not consider myself a conspiracy theorist, rather I find myself fascinated by them and the way they form, especially when they seem to go to greater lengths than any conspiracy to be justified.

I don't believe in every supernatural story I hear, although in a lot of cases (to paraphrase the X-Files again) I'd like to believe, everything has to be tempered by evidence.

I guess, what I really like is the unknown, which is probably why I became drawn to horror stories, conspiracy theories and the supernatural in the first place. The RPGs I've enjoyed the most as a player, are those where the truth behind the world is revealed in small chunks, with dawning realisation coming as a true joy (but more of this in an upcoming podcast episode).

Of course, everyone has a different opinion and I value this, but please don't expect me to automatically support every ghost story or creature tale I come across. I'm neither a Mulder nor Scully, just someone who has had a fascination for the unusual as far back as I can remember.

Music to my ears

Music has always been a big part of my gaming experience, so when I first started podcasting, it became a part of that also. however one of the biggest challenges I faced with Project:Shadow was finding a suitable theme tune.

You would think I'd remember a detail like that before setting out to select a theme for this new project, wouldn't you.

Of course not.

With podcast and video segments to take into account, the right music became all the more important and I wanted something not only to suit the subject matter, but also capture some of the energy and sense of fun I hope to bring and stay distinct from other shows I'm sharing genre-space with.

I started listening to music through the "podsafe" sites almost two months ago.

Tonight I spent some time on freemusicarchive.org, looking through a potpourri of genres and found quite a few candidates (certainly some that will appear in the shows at some point). Then, finally, I found it. A tune that caught my attention immediately and virtually taunted me to use it. Well, it now sits on my hard-drive ready for use.

I'll say no more yet, you'll have to wait for the full unveiling first, but I'm very happy with this and it means another part of the project is hammered down now.

How close?

Well, I promised myself I'd be up and running by June and whilst that is still on schedule, I can't help but feel that its alarmingly close.

There's still a little team-building to do here and some write-up work on some of what I've already prepared, but the formats are slipping together nicely and I have the base-level equipment I need, with some nice technological assistance sitting in the wings to help take things to the next level.

I guess the next stage is to get the website live prior to launch, so that should keep me busy this weekend, as what I have in place so far shows up slightly different across the three browsers I've tested it on (with Chrome, impressively, giving the best results).

Come together... right now

Well, things are slowly progressing here. I've managed to pull a lot of the background resources I need together and whilst there's still a lot to go, I've been laying the seeds for the gameplay video work I need to do, but now have to get a reliable team together for the outside broadcasts.

You see, CT is planned as a highly multi-media site, with written work, podcasts and video segments, all taking slightly different approaches to the subject matter, so all in, I'm giving myself a lot of work. All I can say is thank goodness I have a wife who may not share my crazy interests, but gets me enough that she'll allow me to indulge them in this way, after all, she has been good enough to help me record some of the early footage I'll be using for our introductory video.

Old Project:Shadow listeners will have heard my partner-in-crime before, as she did the bumpers on the old shows, so I wouldn't be surprised if she ends up cameoing in this new work.

Groovy!

In honour of the release of the new Evil Dead movie, Eden Studios are selling their Army of Darkness RPG in PDF format for the knock-down, drag-out price of $10 (which is significantly less in good old British cash).

Considering that this is a Unisystem game like Buffy, Witchcraft and All Flesh Must Be Eaten and the original paper version is still in my collection despite numerous purges, I'd say this is a pretty good offer. Check it out over on Drive-Thru RPG whilst the offer still lasts.

Todd Breitenstein...

Like many other gamers, I was saddened to read about the passing of Todd Breitenstein, creator of the Zombies!!! series of board games, amongst others including the excellent When Darkness Comes.

Clearly I wasn't the only one saddened, as Pinnacle have gone to the extent of releasing a special edition of one of their Savage Worlds PDF supplements, Zombie Run, with the proceeds going to Todd's family.



So if you run Savage Worlds, or just like horror zombie games, or feel like being nice in general, follow the link above and drop $7.99 on this.

Welcome Aboard

Woo, yeah. Post number 1!

Sorry, thought I'd get that out of the way.

Welcome the the Carpe Tenebris blog, which is where we'll be keeping you up to date with news about the site and about anything we feel is related to our subject matter. We'll try to keep site news to a minimum and will occasionally link outside when we come across something we feel may be of interest.

The bare bones of the site are currently beginning to come together on www.carpetenebris.co.uk and whilst I'm not planning on having everything in place before June, there's every chance that it could be runnign with all the basics in place by then.

As a heads up, when we create new RPG material on the podcast, or create our own spin on myths and legends, the plan is to release gaming stats for two systems, Three Hombres' "Dark Conspiracy" and Pinnacle's "Savage Worlds", with the ultimate plan of building up enough background to create a reasonably cohesive campaign world for either of these games (part of a setting I previously coined "Dark Secrets" when I first started putting things together some years ago).

Anyway, enough for now, read on and enjoy.