Der PigDog's PigBlog

Watched those two movies this week. Never saw any of the Godzilla movies before. Damn this post would be better with pictures but it's low-effort late-night blogging and you get what you pay for. In Shin Godzilla, the monster just walks. People say this a couple times through the movie, and it's a great line, so it's worth repeating. The monster did all that... and it just walks. It doesn't want anything. It isn't angry and it doesn't hate you. It's not trying to hurt you. It just walks. That's a fantastic(al), alien portrayal of a monster. Monster as natural disaster. (Everybody else has already made the comparisons with the tsunami and nuclear incident, which is intentional, but none of the reviews on wikipedia talk about how the monster just walks.) (Ok it smacks people and shoots lasers when somebody is attacking it, but that barely counts.) Still from Shin Godzilla; the monster's first form, adorkable! I love how fishy it looks The monster is to...

The PbtA community regularly refers to a distinction between "hard" and "soft" moves,. But this distinction is foreign to the game Apocalypse World itself, and should not be backported to it. You can run an internet search to see people trying to establish this distinction in that game. My reference edition here is Apocalypse World 1e (2010), because it's available for free . Cover of AW 1e We find our first reference to the hardness of a move on page 117: Generally, limit yourself to a move that'll (a) set you up for a future harder move, and (b) give the players' characters some opportunity to act and react. A start to the action, not its conclusion. However, when a player's character hands you the perfect opportunity on a golden plate, make as hard and direct a move as you like. It's not the meaner the better, although mean is often good. Best is: make it irrevocable. When a player's character make a move and the player misses the roll, th...

Recently I have been reading a lot of comics, including a lot of Alan Moore (V for Vendetta, Swamp Thing, Miracleman, Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?, Watchmen, From Hell). A mixed bag, but he constantly opens up interesting topics. In this series of posts I'm going to go through each of his writings that I have read, in publication order. I'm particularly interested in Moore's treatment of race, sex, gender, and authority. I'll try to talk about art as I go, but I'm not well-educated on the topic. Consequently I'll be giving the artist short shrift, and probably assigning Moore too much responsibility in plotting and conceptualizing the comic.  V for Vendetta I first read this as a child, without any strong preconceptions for what comics "are like" or "should be". Therefore its innovative formal qualities were totally lost on me. I had no idea that comics didn't usually feature changed page orientations or musical interludes, a...

I've been trying to drum up a Marvel Super Heroes game for a few weeks now, but my schedule has not been complaint. Nevertheless I am going to  keep  trying, dammit, because it has so many cool things. Here's an example: rules for magic use that are unique, flavorful, and downright badass. I read these rules and I cannot wait to get them in action. I'm doing some slight rephrasing and renaming here.  Any hero with Magical Training and Good (10) or better Psyche can use magic. If you start with Magical Training, don't start with any other powers. If you don't start with Magical Training, spend a year or more in study under a master to gain it. This master should be played like any other NPC with beliefs, wants, and needs, affected by the hero's Popularity, blah blah blah; in other words, you play out an ongoing relationship, part of the situation, you don't just press a "get magic now" button. Once you can use magic, you simply declare what you do, ...

 Here's my prep for the game: There's some heavy stuff in there; content warning for sexual violence, drugs, and all kinds of prejudiced -phobias.  A disclaimer about the depiction of Mormons in this scenario: it's totally fictional. I know/have known many Mormons, none of whom were serial killers. This scenario is based on a paranoid fantasy of Mormon-Pentecostal syncretists. Unlike modern Mormons, the villains in this scenario still believe in polygamy (now forbidden by the Church of Latter-Day Saints), they make and take drugs (always forbidden by the LDS), they worship the cross, speak in tongues, and handle snakes (Mormons don't worship the cross, and the latter two activities are Pentecostal), and they kidnap, rape, and impregnate women to serve as their "wives" (which is not something I associate with any modern religion). Prep and writing  This scenario evolved from a dream I had, in which killer hillbilly farmers worked a pumpkin patch, and simultaneo...

This post is for me more than you. I'm using it to track my reading history and to read list. You might get some recommendations out of it. You might give me some recommendations, too. If I write about any of these comics, I'll link them here. I might otherwise put in a little blurb, quick thoughts. I didn't think I was a big comic reader but I guess I am.  Comics I have read, in roughly autobiographical order Archie Comics. Used to buy them in the checkout line at the grocery store.  Bionicle. Can't be any good but at least it's an impressively fantastic world. Tintin. Haven't reread it but I bet it holds up. Mad Magazine, most issues from the mid 60s to the mid 70s. My father had a stack of these a foot high that he gave to me. Fuckin fantastic back in the day, nowadays probably too goofy. Ultimate Spider-Man, Fantastic Four, X-Men.  The  superhero comics of my childhood. I sprinkled in some other stuff when it was available at the library -- selected Marvel Z...