Welcome home.
This is Audio EXP for the 8th of July, 2023, and the episode title is “The battle against IAs and midnight”
[The following is a transcript of Audio EXP: #203]
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The Grinning Frog is in the Spotlight this month, as voted for by Patreons.
I’m in touch with the publisher, there should be an interview with The Grinning Frog, and the ball is in my court. You’ll have heard me say that before.
Now, we’re staying in the same territory, but I’ve already kinda lied. This is the podcast for July 8th, but it’s not July 8th. I’m recording this at 1 am on July 9th.
Oh, it’s not that I think anyone clock-watches and waits for the podcast to come out. We have a few hundred people on the mailing list, some of whom may prefer a regular delivery, but just last week, we made 3 am the new midnight. So, if I rush, I should make it.
I’m back late for numerous reasons, one was visiting a dead teddybear graveyard, a feature piece in a new pub near me with arcade game cabinets in the basement. Podcasting at 1 am is not a tale of woe, and I mention it only because we’re getting close to August.
In August, Edinburgh, where Geek Native is based, becomes a festival city. It’s surreal. There are thousands of shows, street performers, international media, authors, artists, and poets, and the city doubles in size due to the tourists.
The Geek Native team, for sister site Edinburgh Reviews, will be trying to cover as many shows as possible. Sorry to say, Geek Native’s heart will beat throughout this time, but I predict it’ll be quieter.
While the festival season is yet to start, we can reflect on what’s just closed up here on Geek Native. That’s Superhero Week, and that’s a tradition longer than some editions of D&D survived.
Bronwen concludes for us with a thought piece on Which Superhero Could Protect Us from the AI Uprising?
I was invited to make some suggestions and, without much time needed or asked for, I quickly said Cyborg, the machine-empath who I hoped would have some punch. I also thought Magento could wreak havoc with robots and hard discs.
Bronwen considered The Scarlet Witch and Doctor Doom two solid choices and looked beyond Omega-level before revealing the top pick. That honour, or obligation, goes to Mr Terrific. Terrific is super-smart, an AI builder and sponsored by Bruce Wayne.
Who would you pick?
Or would you pick the AI?
Bronwen also looked forward to the upcoming Rebel Moon. This is a Star Wars-inspired sci-fi, a clearly Star Wars-inspired movie from Zack Snyder, which will come in two R-rated parts. It looks great.
In turn, I picked out a weird anime. Not all anime are that weird, but this one is called The 100 Girlfriends Who Really, Really, Really, Really, Really Love You. That’s the actual title.
One of those anime in which the geeky guy next door gets attention from a dozen attractive women? Yes, but no.
The official synopsis says that they die or are likely to. Our hero prays for guidance – which is an important word. He does not pray for people to fancy or fall for him. He prays for help. In exchange, a god appears and says that all those times he has been rejected were errors, and now he’ll have 100 dates.
Sound good? No. If Aijo does not return the sincere feelings of love and affection that his dates have for him, they’ll die in horrible yet hilarious accidents.
Wow.
That’s pretty intense. Now, I’ll admit some on social media have said the synopsis does not nail the script, but I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.
It’s not all entertainment coming to us this week because, as I’m sure you’ll have noticed, Meta launched Threads.
I think they did it really to upset Musk. They could have taken on Twitter at any point, but doing so is good timing for Meta.
If you’re a European listener from outside the UK, you can’t access Threads. It does what most Facebook does and sends the data back to America. America isn’t governed by GDPR-strict policies, and Threads has been the first big app that’s tried to launch since those rules. As a result, and because it fails to comply, it’s blocked.
I’m not that bothered. I’m pretty confident I can control or manipulate what Meta knows about me. Threads seems to be proof of that, as the app’s content system seems to think I like sportsball.
What’s more significant is that Threads is an extension of your Instagram account. It’s not a standalone thing. Delete one and lose the other, although you can opt out of each wing.
Geek Native has been curating a list of geeky, RPG and tabletop accounts to follow there. I’ll try and add some more later.
There are also new RPGs. In particular, DriveThruRPG launched PocketQuest 2023 with a theme of Space.
PocketQuest is like a giant game Jam, and this year there are more than 50 aspiring tabletop creators in it. Nicely, DriveThruRPG is helping promote the work of those who participated.
One particular standout in this help is the First Time Partners bundle of assets which should cost nearly $200 and actually cost $100.
Outside of PocketQuest there’s plenty of action as well. For example, Basic Fantasy is free to download.
I don’t mean Chaosium’s Basic Roleplaying. Instead, Chris Gonnerman’s Basic Fantasy RPG is a different game entirely, Creative Commons and without preview. It’s designed to be quick, OSRy, and suitable for adults who want to tell stories.
As generous as they are, both offers are dwarfed in scale by the digitally massive rollout of D&D 5e to Roll20 through DriveThruRPG.
There are some big discounts if you still need any of the official D&D, and I think it’s pretty much all there for your Roll20 system. A banner on DTRPG says these official D&D installs represent up to a 40% discount.
Despite that generous deal, some will see this as an attempt to rinse the last cash from these 5e titles before the next D&D is out next year. Next, but not new, Wizards of the Coast insist.
Or, flip it, and see if you could be generous. Also part of the Superhero Week is W.H. Arthur’s Avatar of Gaia RPG, part of their Superhero Cinematic Universe TTRPG.
You can pay as much or as little as you want for this game in which heroes go up against Kaiju and try and save the world.
Also to look forward to are the ENnies at Gen Con. We’ll get to see which RPGs and accessories that thousands of gamers voted best. I won’t go though all the nominees, just announced this week, but I will do best rules. They are;
- Avatar Legends: The Roleplaying Game, Magpie Games
- High Guard Update 2022, Mongoose Publishing
- Hunter: The Reckoning 5th Edition Roleplaying Game Core Rulebook, Renegade Game Studios
- Rivers of London: The Roleplaying Game, Chaosium
- Trophy RPG, The Gauntlet Gaming Community, Hedgemaze Press
Elsewhere on the web I saw the dodgy New York Post take a shot at the hobby. They’re saying that a NYC school faked English class credits by playing D&D instead and calling that learning.
Hmm. I think it’s just clickbait rather than weird American politics. However, many experts believe that tabletop RPGs are good for academic and vocational skills.
Someone with more academic skills than me won’t use this expression, and I know Bronwen hates it… but. Amazon’s Prime Day is actually two days. Despite the multiple uses of ‘ Day ‘, I’m calling it a Heckin’ Two-Day Prime Day’.
The team at Fun.com is doing something similar, and for the US only, you can visit Fun for Prime week. It’s running from now to the 12th with everything from baby Yoda sneakers to magic girl ramen bowls included.
If you are going to do an Amazon Prime Day shop, then coming to Geek Native first and clicking on a Prime Day link immediately before your click rampage is a great and generous way to support the blog.
On that note, and without waiting, let’s finish by calling out some sales you can get right now. Cartographers and mappers may benefit from Worldographer at the Bundle of Holding. It’s software for, you guessed it, making maps.
There’s also a Glen Cook bundle. Cook authored The Black Company; this is a good chance to dig into other ranges.
And on that note, let’s wrap up there, be mindful of our new AI overlords, and I’ll see you next week.
You're welcome to share observations about this article in the comments.
