Electronic Arts and Visceral Release New Chapter of Horror Sci-Fi Adventure

You start Dead Space 2 wearing a straitjacket. You couldn’t wield a weapon if you had one. Wanna live? Then mash the RUN key and run for your f**ing life, while hideous monsters called necromorphs chase you down, each of them eager to take your body apart in high definition. Good luck.

Dead Space 2 adds to the list of Electronic Arts (EA) Games I’ve raved about (namely Mass Effect and Dragon Age) that make EA the MGM of Video Games. These are more than just video games, they make you feel like the lead character in a movie. The level of detail in every aspect of the gameplay is sick. In a good way.

I just completed the game, and the folks at Visceral should be proud. They really did their homework. Check out this article from Wired that covers their disturbing analysis of anatomy. The writers spin an intriguing story, and the game designers know the tricks of pacing and timing. The musical score would give Howard Shore goosebumps, and I was pleased to hear Russian Circles contributing some audio kick-ass to the soundtrack. Dead Space 2 has an engaging plot, puzzles, environments, characters, conflicts and complications that distract you from the horror, and then… Well, let’s just hope you have a change of underwear handy.

Those familiar with shooters like Doom 3 are in for a surprise. There’s no pause button here. Browse through your inventory for too long, and your body parts are likely to become inventory for something else. Ammo and weapons are scarce, so you can’t just shoot at everything that moves. You eventually inherit a plasma cutter that’s about as dangerous as large Swingline Stapler. You’ll scavenge for clips to reload it, and you better make every shot count. No spray-and-pray here, Choirboy.

No more gentle deaths, either. No more, “Oh I’m floating up into the sky, looking down at my body! How peaceful! Is there a tunnel?” Trust me, watching yourself get pummeled, crushed, dismembered, skewered, decapitated by necromorphs or chopped in half by an airlock is not for the squeamish. One screwup, and you’ll get a lesson in internal anatomy: yours.

And just see if you can make it through a mini-game of running a drill press into your own eye. You need a steady hand for this one. In fact, you probably won’t get it right the first time, and even if you get it right and “win” it still looks painful.

Instead of downplaying the gruesomeness of the game, EA and Visceral Games embrace the horror. Check out www.yourmomhatesthis.com to see Moms’ reactions to this game. Marketing Genius.

More of the Same?

I won’t lie, Dead Space 2 is simply an extended version of the original Dead Space with a multiplayer option and some general improvements. You play the same character, Issac Clarke, and your story picks up several months after the end of events in Dead Space 1. I recognized plenty of graphics textures and sounds from the original game, as well as many of the monsters and weapons. Health monitor, stasis, suits, stores, benches, power nodes, upgrades and more are all straight out of the first game.

But this isn’t necessarily a bad thing. The original game was top-notch, and 2 is as good if not better. It’s safe to say that if Dead Space didn’t put you in the loony bin, you need Dead Space 2.

So What’s New?

Multi-horror… er, I mean Multi-player

Dead Space 2 adds in the ability to play with/against others online. I dig the occasional multi-player mayhem, but I certainly did not buy Dead Space 2 to play with/against others. The multiplayer option of Dead Space 2 seems like an afterthought to compete with L4D2 or cave in to fanboy demands, very similar to the way F.E.A.R. handled it.

I’d gladly trade in the multiplayer component of Dead Space 2 for pretty much anything else. More content in the single-player version, or a reduced price. Maybe they could sell the multiplayer component as a separate add-on for people who actually want it?

Zero G x 360

Dead Space 1 had a short section of Zero Gravity, but all you could do was jump straight across the room. In Dead Space 2, you have micro-thrusters built into your suit, so you can maneuver around in zero gravity. The controls are intuitive and you can press “Z” to reorient yourself to the floor. Zero G is unsettling all by its self, but when you add in 3-D 0-G puzzles, traps, necromorphs and a fricking countdown timer that shows how much air you have left before you DIE… well, the results are uberharrowing.

No time for posing, gotta go decapitate some necromorphs.

Story 2.0

The story from Dead Space 1 continues in the single-player version of Dead Space 2. You wake up in an insane asylum long after the events on board the USG Ishimura, and you have no memory what’s happened since then. The military wants you dead for reasons unknown. Religious zealots want you alive for reasons to horrible to mention. There really isn’t anyone to trust, not even yourself, since your exposure to the artifact has left you with hallucination scenes of your dead girlfriend that are possibly the most frightening part of the game.

Oh, and let’s not forget the necromorphs. Lots and lots of necromorphs, who want everything dead. Including you.

Especially you.

Weapons of Gross Destruction

There’s your old friends the line gun and plasma cutter, the assault rifle (my primary weapon), and the force rifle and flamethrower which are made for swarms of necromorphettes.  But one of the new kids on the block is the Javelin gun, which pins bad guys right to the wall. Gotta love that rag-doll physics engine. Use the line gun to sever creatures legs to slow them down, or their arms to limit their attacks, or their heads to limit their lifespan.

Ah yes, and you stomp on corpses to loot them, crushing them into bloody bits. Genius.  And the sound is spot on. [Editor's Note: How do you know this?]

In fact, anything you can pick up is a weapon: chairs, magazines, plants, debris… What the hell are all these long, metal spikes laying around for? Heh. And just when you thought it couldn’t get any more disgusting, use your telekinesis power to pick up and hurl body parts as weapons.

Breadcrumbs 2.0

Never thought I’d be comfortable playing an RPG without a map, but the stellar ‘breadcrumbs’ feature from Dead Space made me a believer. Just press a button, and a line on the floor shows you which way to go. No more getting lost or turned around. No more pulling up maps that take you out of the game.

In Dead Space 2, the breadcrumbs feature gets an upgrade. Now you can also use it to find the nearest store, game save location or upgrades bench.

Opportunities for Improvement

Weapons Improvement Matrix

I like the idea of using power nodes to upgrade your equipment, but whoever thought up the weapons improvement matrix should be shot with their own line gun. Power nodes aren’t handed out like Pez, you gotta work for them. Plugging power nodes into a matrix where they don’t actually increase weapon stats is a poor return-on-investment. While you can reallocate your power nodes, it’s still frustrating to have to pick some arbitrary upgrade path just to improve the features you want. Please. Either one upgrade per power node, or make them cheaper/more available.

EA Download Manager = Way Too Little, Way Too Late

Dead Space 2 comes bundled with an optional utility called “EA Download Manager”. Beware. This is simply a poor knockoff of Steam, a utility created by Valve that was released over a year ago and is Far Far Superior:

• Steam works with almost all game companies. EA Download Manager connects you to the EA store, which only sells EA Games. You can actually buy Dead Space 2 through Steam, but you can’t buy Blade Kitten through EA Download Manager. Nyah.
• Steam software keeps your installation media and keys in the cloud, and keeps your game software updated in the background. EA Download Manager only updates EA Games. Supposedly. It didn’t show Dead Space 2 after I installed it, even though that’s the game it came bundled with. WTF?
• Steam offers in-game voice chat and a picture uploader.
• Steam offers social networking. You can find your friends and see what they’re playing, and the lobby feature lets you gang up and hang out ‘backstage’ to make sure everything is working before launching into the game.
• Steam tracks stats and achievements.
• Steam did it first, and does it better.

Business 101 – if you want people to switch to your product, you have to offer something the existing competition DOES NOT OFFER. No one wants to run two gaming clients in the background, and no one’s going to ditch all their existing Steam friends, achievements, and purchased games just so they can run your limited knockoff.

The only thing EA Download Manager might be useful for is updating your EA game software. But shouldn’t this ability should be left built into the game? Don’t separate a necessary component from the game, connect it to your online store and call it a fucking feature.

Usability vs Piracy

The video game industry is still struggling to strike a balance between PC game accessibility and protection against piracy. Obviously, the game makers can’t just leave the game unlocked, but they also can’t have you calling in to their office with a note signed by your mother each time you want to play. Dead Space 2 hits you up for e-mail, username and password each time you start up. Yes, even to play the single-player version. Annoying, but you can cancel past that if you just want to play the single-player version.

Sadly, if that’s what it takes to make the game companies comfortable releasing games to the PC market, then I won’t bitch too loudly about it. Of course, these copy protection schemes doesn’t stop people from breaking the games and dropping them on torrents. Yes, I could probably get Dead Space 2 for free, but I don’t want game companies to drop the PC market for the console market. Notice that Red Dead Redemption is NOT available for PC, which is a shame. The way I see it, my money goes to a good cause, and is also a vote to keep game companies interested in the PC market.

Executive Summary: UberHorror + UberAdventure = UberAwesome

Dead Space 2 is a disgustingly gruesomely horrific masterpiece sure to give you paranoia, high blood pressure, a nervous tic, seizures, a heart attack, and (if you survive all that) post-traumatic stress disorder. In other words, bloody awesome fun, and worthy of the Conrad Zero UberCool Seal of Approval.

Occult Thriller Season of the Witch a decent start to the 2011 movie season.

Does Nicolas Cage ever take a break?  I mean, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice was only a couple months ago, and Drive Angry is only a couple months away, and this weekend Season of the Witch is released. Take a look at Nicolas Cage’s filmography on IMDB. Talk about busy.

And why do people rip on his acting? He doesn’t actually act, you know. He’s made a career of being himself on camera since I first remember seeing him in Raising Arizona, waaaay back in 1987.

Season of the Witch casts Cage as Behmen, a Knight of the Crusades who suddenly realizes that killing innocents in the name of God is not the path for him. Ron Perlman is Felson, his good friend and comrade-in-arms. Together, they desert the crusades and go off on their own, only to find a village with a witch problem.

The writing in Season of the Witch was good. A simple plot, but it keeps you guessing about who the bad person really is and what’s really going on. Reminded me of a Grimm’s Fairy Tale. Not as much sorcery and witchcraft as I would have expected, and the ending had a layer of cheese on it. Although the ending wasn’t a happy one, it also wasn’t disappointing. But the accents were. I don’t know how a New York cabbie got teleported back to Medieval England, but it did make sense that he was their guide.

The filming is gritty and dark, but not quite as dark as the Underworld series. (Could anything be darker than the Underworld series?) Score and soundtrack were good, and at the theater I saw it, the sound was damned loud. Guess I’d rather have the sound too loud than too quiet.

Overall, I rated Season of the Witch a 7 of 10 on IMDB.

Twenty-four years since Raising Arizona, and Nicolas Cage’s character in Season of the Witch isn’t so different from anything else he’s done. But I’m totally fine with that. Although in this film, I don’t recall him freaking out like this:

Alice In Wonderland turns 60

Believe it or not, we will soon be celebrating the 60th anniversary of the classic tale of Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll. Disney has the combo DVD/Blu-Ray all set to launch on 11 Feb 2011.

It’s not surprising that this story manages to keep us entertained after 60 years.  The dark, childish flexibility of the mythos lends itself to endless disturbing and fascinating reinterpretations. Here are several that I’ve enjoyed and highly recommend:

• A fun and twisted mini-series called Alice released in 2009, in which a 21-year old Alice (now a judo instructor) finds her way back to a futuristic, industrialized wonderland. Tim Curry stars, and Kathy Bates plays a deliciously evil Red Queen.
• A long-running series of gratuitously sexy and gratuitously bloody comic books released under Zenescope’s Grimm Fairy Tales started back in 2007 and continues to this day. It covers several generation of Alice’s family and their ties to Wonderland.
• A series of books called the Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor.His retelling has a cool twist – Alice told the story of Wonderland to Lewis Carroll, not the other way around as we believed. Not only did he think it was fantasy, he also got the story wrong. Alice is actually heir to the throne in Wonderland, the place where ideas come from. The Hatter is actually her personal bodyguard,  the Cheshire Cat is an assassin with nine lives working for the evil Queen Redd.
• There’s an accompanying soundtrack to Frank Beddor’s Looking Glass Wars which is quite good.
• Of course, there’s the 2010 feature length Disney movie starring Johnny Depp. Tim Burton? Yay! Disney? Boo. Adequate, but could have been better.
• For many many more, check out the wikipedia listing for Works Based on Alice in Wonderland. Add your favorites to the comments section below.

Do not ask Alice. Do not mess with Alice. This cover of the game was later replaced with a less-disturbing version.

A Dark Reimagining of a Classic

Of all the reimaginings of Alice in Wonderland, none were as entertaining to me as the video game American McGee’s Alice, an overlooked masterpiece released in 2000 that mixed interesting puzzles, weapons and baddies in a breathtaking, disturbing and cleverly-designed world (Well, breathtaking for games rendered on the Quake 3 engine back in 2000.)

American McGee’s Alice starts with a teenaged Alice institutionalized, the scars on her wrists and the hollow look in her eyes tell us that she hasn’t adjusted well to her parents dying in a house fire. You can watch the game intro (and entire game walkthru) on youtube.

A casebook packaged with the game, (handwritten by her psychologist) added a spooky level of realism. The cover of the game box got the mood right – Alice wielding a cold stare and a blood-stained butcher knife, her apron covered in blood and runes. The Cheshire Cat  is a caricature of a caricature – scrawny and hairless, sporting an earring and evil looking tattoos, and a deep rich voice in the game that I just loved.

The game was wicked fun. Disturbing and entertaining. Creepy atmosphere both visually and the audio score. Fun, problem-solving sections were buffered with cut-scenes and bosses that were problems to solve in themselves – each boss had a distinct weakness, and you’d have a hell of a time beating them unless you figured it out.

I’d give the game a 9 out of 10, and the only thing stopping it from being a ten was the lame-o ending cut scene that screamed, “OK, we’re out of time and money now, give us a quick Hollywood ending!”

Good thing that’s not where the game really ends…

A Dark Extension of A Dark Reimagining of a Classic

Soon, the mythos of Alice in Wonderland will be extended even further. The man who thought enough of himself to include his own name in the game title is back. Yes, American McGee is working with EA games to release another Alice video game called Alice: Madness Returns. This game picks up right were the original game left off. From the previews, we can expect another dark and disturbing retelling of Alice that I wished Tim Burton would have made. You probably won’t want the kids to watch this one.

IGN released a short trailer on youtube, and here is the official teaser trailer from EA games:

I can’t wait.

• Alice: Madness Returns – Official Site
• Alice: Madness Returns – Facebook
• Follow the @thewhiterabbit on Twitter

The Arkham Nights Convention in Roseville, MN

I’d tried to play Arkham Horror once before, and the game host was hoping to figure out the rules on the fly. Unfortunately, the rules for Arkham Horror would drive the sanest of people barking mad, so needless to say, Cthulhu was victorious on that day.

So when I heard about Arkham Nights at Fantasy Flight Games in Roseville, MN, I figured I would have to be insane to pass it up. The part-gaming-conference, part-product-placement event offered people the chance to sign up for all the different variations and expansions of Arkham Horror, as well as the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game, and the Call of Cthulhu card game, and a board game called Mansions of Madness that hasn’t even been released yet. Some of the games were being run by the game designers themselves. There was also a panel discussion with the game designers and a costume contest.

Friday I attended “How To Play Arkham Horror”  (See if you can find me in this pic.) On Saturday I played the Call of Cthulhu role playing game with one of the Fantasy Flight game designers.

Review of the Arkham Horror Board Game

For those who haven’t played it, Arkham Horror is preposterously complicated. In fact, if it bears any semblance to the struggle we’ll have to go through when Cthulhu finally does awaken…we’re fucked.

That said, the game is also preposterously fun to play. All players work together to kill monsters, close gates to strange dimensions with bad geometry, and at best, just keep the peace until the Ancient One hits the snooze button and goes back to sleep. If you’ve never played before, it’s good to have a moderator there to hold your hand, answer rules questions and give you sage advice. By the end of the game (5 hours, and we did win btw. Take THAT Elder Wimp!) the five of us noobs could have run a game without a moderator.

Review of the Arkham Nights Gaming Event

Facilities

The facilities were really nice, and just the right size for the over hundred people who showed up. I understand you can rent out table space and there are rooms in the back for those who want to run their campaign against the ancient ones in secret. Fantasy Flight Games offers a membership that provides discounts on game rental and table/room use. Yes, you can rent the games to play right there at the facility. And if you’re planning on actually getting into games like Warhammer 40K you’d be foolish to pass up that member’s discount. Just the core rulebook will set you back $75. But casual gamers won’t balk at the few bucks it costs to rent space for gaming.

No outside food is allowed, but there is a local pizza place that they will allow delivery. Pop, chips and other snacks are available in the facility.

Price

Asking people to pay twenty five bucks to play games you’re trying to sell them is steep. For the price of three people going to this event, you coulda pooled your cash, bought the game and figured it out over the course of several years. And $25 was the pre-registration price – the door admission was more. The real value in the Arkham Nights convention was the ability to play all the variations of the game, with all the expansions, (some of which are as expensive as the core game.) You also got to play with the game designers and with other enthusiastic fans of Lovecraftian Mythos. I’d say $25 was… almost worth it.

Conventions like Minnecon and Convergence charge  more than $25, but the offer way more content. Fantasy Flight Games could have offered a ten dollar Fantasy Flight Games  gift certificate with each paid registration, free membership, or better yet, knocked ten bucks off the admission price.

Programming

The discussion with the game designers and the costume contests were a nice touch, but really there could have been a lot more depth to this event. Focusing on the mythos of HP Lovecraft instead of the games (only) offered by Fantasy Flight would have made this a better event. How about a table for a local book vendor with a selection of Lovecraft’s books? How about local artists Lovecraft-inspired works? How about panels/discussions of the Chtulhu mythos? How about other vendors besides Fantasy Flight Games?

A convention with these things would pull in hundreds if not thousands of interested fans, instead of the hundred or so people who attended.  Perhaps they are building up to that. If so, this was a good start.

Scheduling

Strangely, the event organizers waited until the doors opened for people to register for game slots. This means people who showed up at the door had the same chance as someone who pre-registered to get in on the limited games. I was one of the first people in line and signed up at 6:10 for a game that started at 6:00. As you probably guessed, several games filled immediately, and other scheduled games had no one sign up for them.

Not cool.

The event coordinators should have taken game-slot registrations as people signed up. Then, the supply of available games would have been in-line with the demand of people who wanted to play them. Forcing people to fit into their ‘schedule’ didn’t really work. For example, I wanted to try out the Cthulhu card game, but Sunday was the only day I had available for it. There was only ONE Cthulhu card game on Sunday, which booked up immediately. As a person who pre-registered and paid a more-than-modest admission price, I was disappointed.

Hopefully, the administrators of Arkham Nights will take what they’ve learned from this event and use it to make future iterations of Arkham Nights even better. By offering a little more for a little less, and fixing the scheduling issues, Arkham Nights could really take off and become something to look forward to each year.

How can any fan of HP Lovecraft not pick up a book with a title like “The Mall of Cthulhu”? For those who aren’t familiar with Lovecraft’s work, one of his more famous writings is called The Call of Cthulhu, and deals with a tentacled monster from another dimension that’s so mind-numbingly horrific that to even describe it would drive you mad, mad I say, so as I public service I won’t describe it.

The cover art is top-notch, causing the book to damned near leap off the shelf at me. So with a quick run through my nearly foolproof book pre-screening system, and I was ready for some tentacle-laden, Lovecraftian, horror-comedy.

Publisher’s Synopsis

A decade ago, college student Laura Harker was saved from a fate worse than death at the hands (and fangs) of a centuries-old vampire priestess and her Satanic minions. Her rescuer, an awkward, geeky folklore student named Teddy, single-handedly slew the undead occupants of the Omega Alpha sorority house, spurred into heroic action by fate itself, inexorably intertwining his and Laura’s destinies.

After navigating her way through law school, Laura is now a junior FBI agent assigned to the Bureau’s Boston office. Unfortunately, she finds her job involves more paperwork than adventure. Ted, on the other hand, has spent the past decade perfecting the ultimate latte, and works as a barista in a nearby corporate chain coffeehouse named for a character in Moby Dick.

When Ted stumbles onto a group of Cthulhu cultists planning to awaken the Old Ones through mystic incantations culled from the fabled Necronomicon, calling forth eldritch horrors into an unsuspecting world. He and Laura must spring into action, traveling from Boston to the seemingly-peaceful suburbs of Providence and beyond, all the way to the sanity-shattering non-Euclidian alleyways and towers of dread R’lyeh itself, in order to prevent an innocent shopping center from turning into… The Mall of Cthulhu.

-From http://nightshadebooks.com/cart.php?m=product_detail&p=119

My Review

At 235 pages, The Mall of Cthulhu was a quick read. The pace was snappy. The writing was clean and error-free.

The plot flowed well, although there were a couple leaps of faith that require you to not suspend your disbelief as much as tie it up in a rubber gimp outfit. I know Providence, Rhode Island isn’t very big, but running into a Cthulhu cultist (one that you are looking for, no less) buying bayberry spice candles at Ye Olde New England Candlery in the mall isn’t a stretch, it’s a tear in the space-time continuum. However, running into a Cthulhu cultist buying bayberry spice candles at the Ye Olde New England Candlery is damn funny. Seamus does a good job of using comedy as an effective plot-patching, hand-waving, rubber-chicken-waving tool. When the plot jumped, I couldn’t stop laughing long enough to get mad about it.

The story is written from 3rd person limited POV, bouncing back and forth between two protagonists: Ted, the scruffy and emotionally damaged barista with the inner resources to lop vampires heads off with an axe when necessary, but not the ability to cope with the memories of his actions, and Laura, the hot and proper, emotionally damaged, lesbian FBI agent. The dynamic between these two is great, and the way it changes through the story (when a little red pepper is added…) is well done.

Those expecting a HP Lovecraft clone may be disappointed. This is a parody. However, fans of Lovecraft will get more laughs out of this story. The part where Ted is stuck in R’lyeh and ponders “…his own reality with its comforting, Euclidean geometry…” had me laughing so hard my stomach hurt. And the name dropping of August Derleth and such… well, if you don’t get it, it won’t ruin the book for you, but it adds to the humor if you’re in on the jokes.

Yes, HP Lovecraft was a Racist

Many of the reviewers on Amazon.com gave this book poor reviews because of references to racism and politics. The Mall of Cthulhu has plenty of references to HP Lovecraft as a racist / white supremacist. There’s no question that he was racist in real life. If there was any doubt, a little poem discussing the Gods creating African Americans should clear this issue up:

“…A beast they wrought, in semi-human figure, Filled it with vice, and called the thing a Nigger.”

- HP Lovecraft ‘On the Creation of Niggers’

Q.E.D. HP Lovecraft. Racist. But we can all agree that he wrote some amazing stories, and I don’t understand why it’s such a task to separate the artist from the art. Walt Disney,  Wesley Snipes, and Phil Spector might each have some whacked-out values that few sane people would agree with, but do we need to disclaimer all their art: Warning – Contents created by a nazi / tax dodger / psychotic, homicidal maniac! Of course not.

Seamus had the opportunity to show us by example that he didn’t approve of Lovecraft’s views by leaving that kind of segregation and hatred out of his own work. Instead, he chose to “hate the haters” and he created bad guys who weren’t bad enough because they were trying to destroy the world, they also had white supremacist pamphlets in their bathrooms, and called those opposed to their plans “Race traitors” (Huh? Wouldn’t it be more accurate to call people trying to destroy the world “Species traitors”?)

Whatever. I would have enjoyed the story more without the racial and political undertones. They were unnecessary and took away from the plot and humor of the story. But they didn’t ruin the story for me as they did for some people. If you are sensitive to these issues, beware. If you are secure in your political and racial views, then this book won’t upset you.

The Author – Seamus Cooper

You won’t find much online about Seamus Cooper. This interview of Seamus Cooper on brendanhalpin.com makes him out as a Luddite when it comes to the internet and a Harlan Ellison-ite about most everything else. But he seems to have come around since then, since he can now be found on Twitter and Facebook:

• Seamus Cooper on Facebook
• Seamus Cooper on Twitter

Free E-Book Sequel

Seamus has posted a free e-book sequel to The Mall of Cthulhu called Dog Walk Of The Dead, and depending on interest in the free e-book, he just might write/release more material for The Mall of Cthulhu mythos.

Free E-book of The Mall of Chtulhu

Due to a falling out with his publisher, Night Shade Books, Seamus decided to release The Mall of Cthulhu for free on Scribd, and for $2.99 on Amazon’s Kindle, in an attempt to undercut his unpaying publisher.  I can’t find either version now, 17 July 2010. This might be related to Seamus and Night Shade Books coming to some resolution, which you can read about here.

Yours Darkly,
-Conrad Zero

It isn’t supposed to happen like this, or so I’m told.

Back in Mar 2009, I tripped across a call for submissions to an anthology titled The Blackness Within.

The idea sounded refreshing and I needed a break from The Demonslayer’s Handbook. So, I took a week off to write up almost 5000 words, and sent it off, thinking no more about it than the fact that I should clear a virtual place for the rejection e-mail I was sure to receive.

On 2 May 2009, I discovered that I’d made the “Short List” whatever that means, and on 5 June I received the following e-mail:

‘Big Game’ is a great story, fast paced and quite different…I’d love to accept the story for inclusion in ‘The Blackness Within’.

Like I said, it’s not supposed to happen this way. The first story I’ve shown outside my circle of friends and relatives, written in a fit of spontaneity… not to mention my first submission ever… accepted?

The princely sum of 15 Pounds is probably enough to buy myself a copy of the book when it comes out, with enough left over for a lovely cuban cigar to smoke while I read it. But the real prize is that I will forevermore be able to say that Conrad Zero is a published author. (And I just might refer to myself in third person when I do it. Adds to the importance, don’t you think?)

So now, with a 100% acceptance rate, I’m terrified to ever make another submission. Don’t want to tarnish that perfect record, eh?

Meanwhile, The Blackness Within anthology should be out later this year by Apex Book Company.

Stunned,

On a recent book-scouting adventure in Minneapolis, I spoke with Roger over at Magus Books, and asked him if he knew of any books similar to my “Demonslayer’s Handbook” – a paranormal adventure set in modern-day Minneapolis. He highly suggested Emma Bull’s “War for the Oaks“. (Careful, the Wikipedia entry is laden with spoilers.)

I is considered to be the very first book to define the Urban Fantasy genre.

Emma Bull writes in the introduction of War for the Oaks that she doesn’t read author’s introductions until after she’s finished the book. After reading her own introduction, I would agree. I wish I hadn’t read her introduction before reading the story. Sadly, I cannot tell you why without spoiling the book for you. You can choose whether or not to learn from my mistake, but in the future I think I’m taking Emma’s advice.

War for the Oaks is deeply steeped in Minneapolis, Music, and 80s Fashion. Emma Bull’s taste in music is great, she constantly drops band names and song references throughout the story. Same with locations; you won’t forget the story takes place here in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis/St. Paul. The story bounces around to some of the best locations in town.

Fashions that might be laughable today are considered quite stylish for the 80′s, when the story takes place, and Emma nails them perfectly. Jean jackets with turned-up collars and high-tops? Yikes. Been there, worn that, stole back the pix and burned them.

The third-person POV story revolves around the main character, Eddi McCandry. Eddi is chosen as a magical savior in an upcoming war and assigned a Faerie bodyguard. In the first half of the book, the “War” is only a minor backdrop; shadowed by the relationships and band drama surrounding Eddi. She resigns herself to her fate as the Chosen One, and goes about constructing a new band amidst shifting relationships, and coming to terms with the bodyguard who won’t leave her side. The second half of the story gets more involved with the actual war, some of which spills into the real world, and climaxes with a classic duel of Good Vs Evil at First Avenue!

Emma Bull does a great job of making the other-world characters feel other-worldly. Their method of speech feels Victorian, and their manners and customs are notably different than that of humans.

As far as *research* goes, it was enlightening to see how another author approaches shifting between different realities, and descriptions of Minneapolis areas. Her writings on band politics and music technology are accurate, which makes sense, since Emma Bull was in a local band or two.

As far as *entertainment* goes, War for the Oaks is a good story for those who want a Disney faerie tale crossed with 1980′s Minneapolis urban fantasy.

Art Is Resistance
-Zero

Don’t believe the mediocre rating on imdb.com, Gabriel is a pretty amazing film. Great storyline, and fantastic set design, on a tight budget and tighter schedule no less. Ah well, what movie doesn’t cry about budget restrictions when they *only* have two-hundred grand to make a feature film? Ha! In Australia, no less.

The story takes place in Purgatory, where a group of angels is sent from heaven to battle against a group of demons for dominance of this middle-ground. The angel Gabriel arrives only to find that the angels who came before him are doing Very Poorly: those who haven’t succumbed to their pathetic humanity have disappeared completely, and several powerful demons are in complete control of Purgatory.

Fans of Gothic films like Blade Runner and The Crow should definitely see this film. And filmmakers will want to watch the “behind the scenes” on the DVD, which are Real Behind The Scenes, and not Production Crew Kissing The Director’s Ass.

It was great to see the guy who wrote the music score for the film whine about getting ONLY ten grand and a year to do it! They should have talked to me, I scored a feature film in a month, on a budget one-ten-thousandth of his!

Art Is Resistance
-Zero

Gothy places and events in the Twin Cities are difficult to find outside of Ground Zero. Not that the Heartland doesn’t have a dark side, far from it. It’s just that the cool events like the Zombie Pub Crawl and the Goth Prom get lost in the deluge of mook bars, DJs, and karaoke nights.

I try to help when I can, but even I miss out on things; for example, I didn’t hear about the Zombie Fashion Show until after it was over. And I’m sure there’s plenty of people who don’t want to wade through my slanderous movie reviews and delirious raving about DRM just to pick out the occasional gothy tidbit.

Therefore, the need for a website like darktwincities.com “Your source for all things Dark and Spooky in MSP”. They focus mostly on bands and clubs, but they also have music reviews and plenty of other goth-goings-on in the forums; fashion, news and whatever else your dark heart desires.

If you know of a Dark and Spooky event going on in the Twin Cities, make sure to stop over at darktwincites.com and post it in the forums, or e-mail their staff using the link on the homepage, they will even get your event flier posted on the frontpage.

Like the Jagged Spiral concert next Thursday, for example:

Art Is Resistance
-Zero

In a previous blog post, I raved about Neil Gaiman after reading Good Omens (which he co-wrote with Terry Pratchett), and his blog, and starting on his latest work, Fragile Things.

I knew Fragile Things was a collection of short stories and poems, and I thought it would be a good way to cover more ground with Neil Gaiman and get a more definitive sense of his writing style. I was right, but I was wrong to approach his writing that way. In the end, Fragile Things was a slight disappointment.

Don’t get me wrong, Neil Gaiman is a very good writer. He has a marvelous tongue for storytelling. Fragile Things runs through past, present and future periods of fantasy and poetry, adult fairy-tales and Gothic nearly-horror. He writes with clever turns of phrase, alternate realities, twisted mythologies, and interesting points-of-view.

But, the Things inside Fragile Things are just too Fragile; unfinished snippets or unused plot branches from other works; roughed-out ideas collected and published once the name “Neil Gaiman” on the cover of the book would sell more copies than anything inside it. (Hint: Check the last few pages to see where all the stories came from and when.) Few of the stories let me in deeply enough to really enjoy them.

So I got what I wanted, but it turns out it wasn’t what I wanted after all. Like I said, the ideas were clever, but not very flushed out. Fragile Things is like walking past the bakery and having a look and a sniff of the whole lot, instead of a solid taste of anything in particular.

So, I can’t really recommend Fragile Things to anyone but the most hardcore Neil Gaiman fans who have read Everything Else and still want more. I’ve added ‘Neverwhere’ and ‘Death: The High Cost Of Living’ to my Christmas list, in the hopes of getting something a little less fragile…

Art Is Resistance
-Zero