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Rockets, Rayguns and Really Nice Tea
In case you didn’t know, I’m running a larp event at Hebden Hey Scout camp, the weekend of Friday, 30th March 2012.
It’s called Rockets, Rayguns and Really Nice Tea, and it’s a game that evokes the excitement of Dan Dare action stories and the creeping horror of Bernard Quatermass.
It’s a set in a world of two-fisted justice, rocket powered heroism, hidden horrors, lurking conspiracy and exploration. Square jawed heroes team up with brilliant academics and savvy politicians to unearth the wonders and horrors of a world still reeling from the Second World War. It is an alternate history larp that features very little steam, hardly any punks and a huge amount of fun.
Want to know more? Some handy, printer friendly downloads are here:
Setting information and timeline
Societies
Event Invite
Rules of the game
Equipment List
Booking Form
You can also email Rocketlarp(the at symbol goes here) gmail.com.
Did I mention it's a system that uses NERF? It uses NERF.
EDIT: A quick update. As described elsewhere, I eventually gave this project to very good friends to handle. They’ve done amazing things with it and you can find out more up to date information here:
Inner City Versus Outer Space
Riffs on the idea of an alien invasion have been redone countless times. Marauding creatures from beyond the stars have been defeated by everything from cowboys to Santa Claus in the past. But Aliens versus South London Hoodies? There’s a novel idea. What happens when you take a tedious British movie about urban decay and how tough it is to be a youth on the streets and drop alien monsters into the mix?
The result is Attack the Block. Director Joe Cornish1 has taken UK Film Council money and made a B-movie reminiscent of the sort of fun films Hollywood used to make in the 80’s, such as Critters, Gremlins and CHUD. It’s refreshing to see a British movie that’s fun for the sake of being fun, and a B-movie that isn’t trying to be anything else. That’s not say it’s not got subtext and clever social parody; of course it has, it’s been partially funded by Film4 so we expect that, it’s just that’s also has big monsters eating people.
The story is tight, the characters fun and interesting. Humour is injected throughout the movie, but so is a constant feeling of danger and terror. One flows naturally into the other, neither is particularly forced.
I wonder what would have happened had the aliens landed in Glasgow...
I would say that the first five minutes of the movie are the least promising; it really does start out as yet another British movie about how crap Britain is, even though those opening scenes are done suberbly. Maybe it’s the strength of the opening scene or the raw talent of actor John Boyega’s performance, but I utterly fail to have any sympathy for the lead character, Moses. Whereas the rest of the hapless hoodies all seem to be kids way out of their depth, Boyega’s “Good kid in a bad place, doing the best he can” fails to elicit any empathy; I suspect I’m supposed to feel for him, but I don’t. Boyega is simply too convincing as a thug. In a way this is a good thing as it lends a heavy dose of pathos2 to movie.
If you have a spare couple of hours and like monster movies of this ilk, you could do a lot worse than check this out. I hope to see more from Joe Cornish in years to come. It would be awesome if the UK could continue to produce this sort of scary fun.
1: Jo from Channel Four comedy programme Adam and Joe. Sad to say, no toy pastiche action in this movie. I’m sure someone will do one.
2: Pathos is like salt; you may not notice it’s missing when you first tuck into your meal, but once it’s added, it can improve things immensely.
Rich Man, Poor Man, Beggar Man, Thief
They are, broadly, two different ways you can tell a story about spies; one involves gadgets, explosions, exotic locations and beautiful women. The other tends to involve paper work, surveillance, anonymous corridors and grumpy looking old men. We tend to be more familiar with the former, which is a pity, as the latter can be every bit as thrilling and exciting. Good spy thrillers mix action with paranoia to keep you on the edge of your seat throughout the story.
The movie Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is two and half hours of grumpy old men being extremely paranoid at each other. As unappealing as that sounds, it’s very good. But then, of course it is, because each component of the movie, from the script to the direction is exactly right. The cast is brilliant; any film that sticks Toby Jones1, Gary Oldman and John Hurt in a room together would have to try pretty hard to fail, and Tinker Tailor does not disappoint. At the start of the movie, they spark of each other brilliantly and this sets the atmosphere for the rest of the feature. The rest of the cast are equally superb; Benedict Cumberbatch is perfect as the steadfast and brilliant Peter Guillam and Tom Hardy is equally superb as the heroic yet tragic Rikki Tarr.
Gary Oldman has been Sid Vicious, Dracula and now George Smiley. That makes a strange sort of sense, in many ways.
The sheer weight of talent on the screen is enough to carry the movie through. However, as it’s a clever adaption of a John le Carré directed by Tomas Alfredson2. The result is brilliant, and I firmly expect it to sweep up all the Oscars. Even the imaginary ones.
In essence, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is a period piece about Cold War paranoia. This is a movie that is soaked in the fear and misery of the that time. The 70’s back-drop is drab and grim, nobody smiles and everyone is expecting the world to end in nuclear fire at any moment. Every element of the movie, from the direction to performances drips terror of an age we were all very happy to see the back of. This is not a spy-movie, this is movie about Intelligence agencies and the paranoia that surrounds them.
If tense, brilliantly directed, superbly acted dramas about paranoia, creeping despair and the spying game aren’t your thing, then avoid this. Otherwise, go see it if you haven’t all ready.
1: Yes, it’s another review about a movie with Toby Jones in it. What can I say, he’s probably one of the best actors around right now.
2: He directed Let the Right One In. Y’know, that brilliantly evocative vampire movie that was doing the rounds a couple of years ago? If you’ve missed it, seek it out.
Let’s stomp some Orks…
The recently launched Onlive Service gave me the opportunity to try out a recently released video game for the princely sum of £1. Being a massive nerd, I chose Relic Entertainment’s Space Marine. Onlive works by live-streaming the game onto your PC, which means you get to play games that use high-end graphics on any sort of PC, provided you’ve got a decent internet connection.1.
Space Marine is a big bucket of fun. It’s not subtle. It’s not going to win awards for clever storytelling, innovative game design or revolutionary insights into First-Person Shooters. What it does do, very well, it let you play a nine-foot tall genetically engineered super-soldier clad in power armour wielding a chain-sword.2 You run round killing Orks in brutal, almost comical ways, and when you’ve killed enough Orks, you pick up a jet-pack and big glowing hammer kill some more Orks.
The game is breath-taking in its simplicity. You shoot the baddies, and when you’ve ran out of bullets, you hit them with some sort of cool melee weapon. It’s brutal. It’s violent. It’s highly entertaining. At the same time, it evokes the grime and futility of the 40K setting; a world where we’ve conquered the stars, yet mankind is trapped in a Dark Ages mentality, surrounded on all sides by hostile forces that want to see the galaxy burn.
Ultramarines; The Manchester United of Space Marines
The plot focuses on Ultramarine Captain Titus, and his two squad mates, given the daunting task of preventing invading Orks from looting the most valuable assets from a world under siege. It comes with a supporting cast of normal, everyday humans (The Imperial Guard) who are mostly there to look strong, brave and die horribly. They also make for the most compelling characters in the game.
Level design is a little dull in places, but as the game is set on planet-sized factory, that’s forgiveable. Still, in the grim darkness of the 41st millennium, people seem to use a lot of lifts. The cut-scenes aren’t terribly intrusive, and exist to not only herd the player toward the fun, but also add to the overall atmosphere. They are a handful of stand-out sequences (particularly one on the train), though it’d be lovely to see more. Dawn of War fans will be pleased to know that they are some nods to that series of games, and lends a consistent feel to the ongoing narrative. Warhammer 40K is at it’s a best when you get a feel for the how incredibly big the setting is.
It’s a fairly short game, taking about eight to ten hours to get through, and it really does feel like it needs a sequel (and much more plot). Still, Space Marine is worth a look, if you like first-person shooters, and definitely worth a look if you like FPS and Warhammer 40K.
1: Onlive works fine as a service. There is a very short wait to get your selected game to load during peak times, and it dropped out on me once during ten hours worth of play. That’s pretty good. My only criticism is that other users can watch you play and vote on how well you’re doing. This is bad, because I suck at video games. However, you can be easily turn off this function, which means I can hide my shame.
2: A chain-sword is a chain-saw sword, obviously. American science-fantasy gives us light-sabres. British science-fantasy gives us chain-swords, which are way cooler by a magnitude by awesome. This is why Warhammer 40K is better than Star Wars. Fact.
Geek? Me? Of Course I am.
“Speak out with your Geek out” is an online campaign/meme/idea/excuse-to-write-about-cool-stuff/ thing doing the rounds this week. The idea is to talk about the geeky things that you do.
I am relatively un-convinced that geeks need an ‘awareness campaign’ however. Because the modern definition of a geek has changed so much over the years.
30 years ago, to be a geek meant you where someone who did gross things for money. 20 years ago, it meant someone who had poor hygiene and social skills who also happened to have some sort of all consuming hobby or obsession. But the hobby aspect was just icing on the (rather smelly) cake, it was the lack of social skills and the stink that defined a ‘geek’.
These days, when we describe someone as a Geek (or to use the more British version of the term; Anorak) we mean “Someone who spends way too much time on an area of knowledge, often one with no practical use.”
And that’s a pretty broad church. We get Steam Geeks , Car Geeks, Table-Top Gaming Geeks, Video Game Geeks, Vintage Toy Geeks, Anime Geeks, Football Geeks, Art Geeks, Science Geeks, even Geek Geeks. This list is so large, you need to be a Maths Geek to care about how big it is. Fashion Geeks have invented the term ‘Geek Chic’. Ironic t-shirts with obscure references can be found easily (and are used by many as a way to break the ice). Film geeks have filled movies and TV shows with pop culture references. To be a geek is the norm these days.
This makes sense. It’s in our nature to study almost anything to the point of obsession, and that does not have to be a bad thing. Human beings devote their time to a plethora of activities, and to mock someone for having a hobby displays that you have a lack of character. Healthy, happy people have multiple skills, multiple obsessions and do stuff in their spare time.
Do not mock the guy who’s just spent 40+ hours writing an intricate D&D campaign for his 6 friends, mock the idiot who’s spent 40+hours passively sitting on their arse watching whatever happens to be on telly. After all, you wouldn’t mock someone for preferring Coke over Pepsi, so why would you ever mock someone for wanting to play ‘Warhammer 40,000’ rather than watch Eastenders?
The only time Geek gets used as a pejorative term these days is when that obsession gets in the way of said Geek enjoying life. The Manchester United Geek who misses their own daughter’s birth in order to watch the match has a problem, as does the World of Warcraft Obsessive who stays up all night fighting murlocs on the night before that all important job interview. And that’s not an issue caused by being a geek. That’s an issue caused by not being a grown-up. Being a geek is an excuse to celebrate the things that fascinated us when we were young, but it isn’t a reason to not embrace the joys and trials of adult life.
If you like to do something, why aren’t you learning as much about as you can? Being a Geek is to be human.If you aren’t a Geek, what does that make you?
Ed Fortune 