Thor:Metal Gods isn’t brilliant but it is fun

 While I have become a big fan of cape punk, I’ve found, as a rule, books based on existing superhero IPs are generally pretty weak. In other words, books based on Marvel or DC haven’t clicked for me. 

Thor: Metal Gods by Aaron Stewart-Ahn, Jay Edison, Brian Keene and Yoon Ha Lee has proven to be an exception to that rule.

My understanding is that it started out as an audio book, which might be part of why it works. (I’m also pretty sure the four authors rotated writing chapters) My theory is that different media require approaches and DC and Marvel heroes come with so much baggage. The MCU worked by ditching the baggage and being self-contained.

Anyway, that’s a never-ending topic. Back to the actual book in question.

Metal Gods is a cosmic epic where Thor and Loki have to deal with an eldritch abomination that both of their poor choices have helped get a tentacle in the door to get released. I particularly like that Loki’s involvement was slumming in a rock band in the 80s because he was bored, as opposed to an evil scheme to conquer the nine realms.

Okay, no more spoilers.

There are two closely linked things that Metal Gods does that makes it work. First of all, it creates it own continuity. Tons of references to Marvel’s cosmic setting and alien races but still its own thing. The interpretation of Thor is a mix of the cinematic and comic book version, more cinematic, but its own thing. The second thing is does is that authors make that continuity good.

If you spent your childhood reading lots of Marvel comics like I did, there’s lot of Easter eggs for you to find. However, if you just kind of  know Thor is a superhero, you’re good to go. Metal Gods isn’t high art but it is a lot of fun.

Phonogram ends on a treatise about growing up

 Earlier this year, I read the first two of the three volumes of Phonogram by Kieron Gillen, a comic book about music and magic. I finally got the third volume and finished reading the series. 

Upfront, the series absolutely peaked at the second volume, The Singles Club. But the Singles Club is a high water mark, one of those comic books you use to convince non-comic book readers to read a comic book and to prove that comic books are real literature. However, The Immaterial Girl was still a strong finish.

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Phonogram is set in a world exactly like ours, except some people are able to use music to perform magic. How much is it like our world? All of the literally hundreds of musical references are for real acts. Fortunately, there is also a detailed and snarky  appendix at the end of each volume, explaining all the references. That said. I honestly think the actual stories are clear and easy to follow, even if you don't know who 75% of the artists are.

The magic phonomancers use is much less flying and fireballs and much more about redefining yourself and influencing other people. Really, its really just describing how so many of us use music couched in magical terms. Heck, the Singles Club could be revised to remove all the phonomancy elements and still be just as strong.

The third volume focuses on reoccurring character Emily/Claire. She used phonomancy to basically split her personality in half, exiling the one half to a world of music videos. The conflict in the story is the banished half fighting back and  how the two halves ultimately reconcile.

 

And it's good plot. Like the first volume, it has some definite influences from Garthg Ennis's first run on Hellblazer but that is not a bad thing at all. But that's not what I took away from the Immaterial Girl.

Virtually every phonomancer is an arrogant, self-centered poser. More than that, that seems to be pretty much a requirement.  (The one exception is Kid-With-Knife, who is, at best, a phonomancer by association and who we only see use magic once. Honestly, I think the point of the character is that he's comfortable with who he is and doesn't have any need for phonomancy) The Immaterial Girl is about the passing of an era, the cyclic nature of social behavior and just plain growing up.

Gillen uses the death of Michael Jackson as a powerful end of an era moment. A point where the older characters realize that its time to start acting like a grownup. And when the younger characters start taking over and look to be doing the same darn thing. The moral of The immaterial Girl is kind of obvious, growing up is rough but it sure beats remaining an immature brat, but its still true and it does a good job telling it.

Now that I have seen Phonomancer as a whole piece, its good all the way through.

Good bye, my beautiful black cat

Yesterday, as of the posting of this, we said good bye to our cat Cleo.

She was eighteen years old and spent sixteen of those years with our family. She was solid black, including her whiskers and nose leather, with bright green eyes. Over the years, she ranged between fourteen to eighteen pounds. She was a big girl with a big personality to match.

She jumped into my wife’s lap at the Treehouse cat shelter in Chicago. Cleo knew she belonged with her. We weren’t dating at the time but I helped her bring Cleo home from Treehouse and that was the start of a long, wonderful journey.

Cleo lived with us in Illinois and Arizona and Florida. She played and argued and cuddled with two kitty sisters who she outlived. She demanded love but she gave so much love back.

Near the end, she had a number of geriatric issues, including severe arthritis that limited her mobility but not her spirit or voice. In the end, none of them were enough to stop her and she passed away from an unrelated stroke.

I have so many memories of Cleo. She was a part of our lives before our marriage and our son. She was our sassy, beautiful Chicago alley cat.

Haven Park is a lovely escape from reality

 When our family saw Haven Park, a indie game about anthropomorphic bird learning to be a park ranger, we figured it would be right up our alley. And we were right.

In Haven Park, you take on the role of Flint, a little yellow bird with a backpack. He is taking over management of the titular Haven Park from grandmother. While there is a storyline, that really isn't the focus of the game. Instead, you wander all over the park, gathering materials and repairing camp sites and other facilities.

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While it's honestly not the main focus, Haven Park has a story. Or, more precisely, it has three story beats, which are enough to give us a sense of who Flint is and what his character arc is about. The resolution of his story arc isn't even remotely surprising but its still sweet and emotionally satisfying.

I'm actually struggling to have a lot to say about Haven Park. There are a couple of side quests but the game is really about wandering around, gathering up stuff to build or repair camp amenities and talk to campers. The game is really about walking around a park. but that's the point. Flint can't die or even get hurt. Instead, you just enjoy a pleasant and lovingly rendered environment.

But that's the point. Haven Park is a cozy game, a relaxing, possibly even healing, experience. part of the Iyashikei genre.

An important milestone in our cozy gaming and in cozy gaming in general was A Short Hike. It is impossible for me not to see Haven Park as a spiritual successor to A Short Hike. A Short Hike is about a young anthropomorphic bird exploring a park while Haven Park is about a anthropomorphic bird learning to take care of a park. They are about different stages of coming-of-age.

That said, A Short Hike is the stronger game. It has a much more focused, often funny, storyline and a lot more activities and side quests. There's just more to do, period. The game has become a classic of the genre for a reason.

Which isn't to say that Haven Park is a bad experience. Comparing it to A Short Hike is comparing it to a peak experience and one that apparently was a game changer for designing cozy games. Haven Park is an excellent escapist experience.

If you are looking for a challenging game, Haven Park is about as far from that as you can get. If you need to gently explore a wilderness with camping facilities, it is perfect.

Rules issues make me struggle with Wilderness

 Wilderness is a free Print-and-Play Roll-and-Write game that has decent theming and bog-standard mechanics. While I like some of the thematic ideas in the game, its biggest selling point is that its free.

In Wilderness, you are filling an ecosystem with animals. You have to make sure that animals go into their right environment and you have to make sure that the predators are all fed.

In practice, you are drawing shapes on a grid. I have literally no idea how many times I've seen that. And there are some games built around the mechanic that I do enjoy so it's not a bad one. But by this point, you have to make it sparkle.

The grid has three different types of terrain. Water, fields, forest. You will be drawing animals of different shapes of squares on the grid and there are environmental restrictions. For instance, fish can only be in water.

Each turn, one die gets rolled. Consult the handy dandy table and draw the appropriate animal. Each animal is going to be the same number of squares as you rolled. Almost all of the numbers give you a choice of two animals to draw in with six being wild. You can draw an animal in the wrong environment but they will get crossed out and not count for either scoring or the food chain. 

Okay, here's the clever bit. Animals three squares or bigger are predators.  They must have a prey species touching them or they get crossed out. If they do have a prey animal, that gets crossed out. But the predators are worth more points so that's okay. And they can't share prey. Every predator needs their own supper.

The game ends when no one can make a move. (Some players may get more moves) All animals that aren't crossed out are worth their squares in points. Most points wins.

And here's where there are issues. The whole game, rules and all, takes up half a sheet of paper (you get two copies with every print out) and this is a case of needing more details. 

There are some rule ambiguities about who preys on what. The examples show storks eating snakes, which are the same size and also a predator. Which does happen in nature but I also don't think storks eat rabbits, which are smaller and a designated prey species. I could be wrong but that just highlights the problem. Not having clearly defined food chains makes the game confusing. Can the vulture prey on every other species or even another vulture? Common sense answers don't always give clear answers and a rule book should never depend on common sense.

Which is a shame because the food chain is what makes Wilderness interesting. As it stands, we have only eight different types of animals interacting on a small grid and we need some clarification on how those interactions work.

Wilderness feels like a work in progress. I think a game built around food chains and natural environments has a lot of potential.  I'd like to see Wilderness with a cleaner rule book and a slightly expanded variety of animals. (That's a dangerous path because too many could make things muddled but the game feels too limited as it is)

Look, Wilderness is free and low-ink and requires no construction after you print the page. I don't regret trying it. However, it needs a little work to become much better.

I have real concerns about Men of Tomorrow but there is value as a comic book history in it

 I had seen references to Men of Tomorrow by Gerard Jones for years. My understanding was that it was a history of early comic books from a publishing angle as opposed to a creator angle. When I finally got a chance to read it, I took that chance. And it turned out to be a wilder read than I expected. 

Let’s take care of the elephant in the room first. In the time since the book was written and I first heard about it, Gerard Jones was convicted and sent to prison for crimes that I honestly don’t feel comfortable discussing on a family blog. And that did color my reading of the book. 

And I do feel there is an agenda. I felt like every comic book creator in the entire book was depicted as being emotionally damaged. And, while Jones rightfully derides Fredric Wertham’s theories about comic books, some of his arguments about how comic books work sound very similar.

Okay. Is the book actually worth reading? Yes, it is.

The book is very anecdotal but is also very clear about that. In a lot of ways, it’s an oral history of the origins of comic books. The sources are very clearly laid out and when I cross referenced more factual elements, they matched up. (Of course, sometimes other sources cited Men of Tomorrow as their source)

The through line of the book is Jerry Siegal’s legal struggles with the ownership of Superman. (Superman is the only property discussed at any length and, yes, there is a lot less focus on Joe Schuster) That said, since that is already well known and documented, I found everything else more interesting.

For instance, I had never heard of Harry Donenfeld before the Men of the Tomorrow. And he was Superman’s original publisher so I’d have really thought that I would have. However, he was also a mobbed up publisher of racy magazines so I can see why DC Comics tries to ignore his existence. 

Interestingly, when I looked into Donenfeld more, I found out that he helped hundreds of refugees flee Nazi-occupied Europe and helped found the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Jones glossing over that just reinforces my impression that he has an agenda beyond historical information.

On the one hand, I think it’s important to approach Men of Tomorrow with a very critical eye. On the other hand, it covers a lot of information that the popular history of comic books leaves out. It has legitimate flaws but it is also an important work.

My only problem with Cursed Court is the theme but, sadly, that enough

 During a learning game of Cursed Court, one player said "Oh, so its like Texas Hold 'Em?" As soon as I heard that, I felt like that was actually the best one sentence description of the game.

The game consists of a board with a grid of nine characters who look like they spent a lot of money at a Renaissance fair, a deck of cards with three of each character and betting chips in player colors.

At the start of each hand, cards are dealt out face down between each player and one card is dealt face up. You can look at the two cards next to you. There are four rounds of bidding, with an additional face up card being dealt before each round.

The short version is that you are bidding on what cards you think are actually dealt out since there will be plenty of cards that remain in the deck even by the end of the round. You can outbid other players but you have a limited number of chips. Otherwise there wouldn't be a game.

There is more to the game than that but that's the basic idea. So, it also has an element of Liar's Dice as well as Texas Hold 'Em or has their shared elements.

Mechanically, I feel like Cursed Court holds together. Texas Hold 'Em has to count as one of the most popular games in the world, even if it has a different audience than other board games. Liar's Dice, in one form or another, has been around for centuries. Cursed Court has good bones.

However, I found that I wasn't very engaged by the game. When I read a comment on BGG that the game would make more sense as a game about a casino than a fantasy court, that really clicked for me. The theme and the mechanics do not mesh for me.

I don't mind a pasted-on theme and I love me a totally abstract game. The theme and the mechanics have to downright clash for me to have a problem and, quite frankly, that doesn't happen very often. However, in Cursed Court, the theme distracts me from the mechanics. If someone told me the developers fell in love with the art and just couldn't let it go, I wouldn't be surprised.

Cursed Court has a very good mechanical design, tapping into bluffing and deduction mechanics. Unfortunately, I'm not going to be interested until it gets a better theme.

Tile laying when my brain isn’t working

 As life and work have become increasingly hectic, I have found myself revisiting Potato Carrot Tomato as a quick, lunchtime game. 

I have written about Alexander Shen and how they have a real genius for creating games and puzzles that can be played in a coffee cup’s worth of time. And I’ve written about the need for brain fog games, games you can play and enjoy without concentrating on them. And Potato Carrot Tomato is a game where those two ideas come together.

It’s a solitaire tile-laying game consisting of fifteen tiles, plus some scoring tiles. Each tile has one to three sections. Each edge will always be a potato or a carrot or a tomato so the divisions are in the rest of my life, instructor hands-on environment, always diagonal. Edges don’t have to match, but you only get points if they do.

At the end, you will score each of your largest groups. The twist is that their values will be randomly determined. At the start, you will randomly determine which vegetable will be worth one point per symbol. At about the 2/3 mark, you then randomly figure out which one of the remaining two will be worth two points and three points.

Potato Carrot Tomato is, frankly, not a good game. In fact, it is easily the weakest Shen game that I will play on a semi-regular basis. I have found that my scores end up almost always being in the same general range, high fifties to low sixties. In fact, I feel that the game doesn’t actually offer real choices, more pattern recognition with the variation in scoring being luck-based.

There are a couple of other games I’ve found myself thinking about in regards to Potato Carrot Tomato as a brain fog game. Shen also has Blankout, which is also more pattern recognition than strategy. However, I think the patterns are prettier. And there is Dice Fishing D6, which is my ultimate brain fog game. There’s no real decision making but it’s a chill process tied up in a nice package.

Apparently, I’m in the mood for a tile-laying mindless activity. (For the record, I think Ambagibus requires some actual decisions and doesn’t count. It is a very chill game though) And I’m sure Potato Carrot Tomato will fade away again but it is helpful right now.

So who is this Sentry?

 I figure at some point before the end of the year, I want to see the Thunderbolts movie. Quite a few of my friends liked it. However, while I am familiar with a couple different versions of the Thunderbolts, I actually have read almost nothing about the Sentry.

So, I decided to correct that and read the collected edition of the original miniseries.

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I feel like I just read an homage to Alan Moore‘s version of Miracle Man. I also felt like I read a revision of Christopher Priest’s Triumph without editorial interference.

A Joe Shmoe wakes up to realize he he is the Sentry, a nigh omnipotent hero who is like the Silver Age Superman take to the next level. More than that, he helped the Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, the Hulk, the X-Men and more get started as superheroes. However, all of his history has somehow been erased.

The twist is that his arch nemesis, the Void, is actually him and that the Sentry had to be functionally erased from existence to keep the Void from, well, killing everyone.

I understand that the Sentry has gone through multiple interpretations and origins in the, by comic book standards, relatively short time he’s been around. One part that seems to have stuck is the idea that he was originally a junkie who drank the stuff that gave him his powers to try and get high. That wasn’t in the volume I read but it was hinted at enough that I wondered if it was missing an issue.

I am of two minds when it comes to the Sentry. Taken as a standalone work, it’s quite strong. I was interested and engaged the whole way through. The original series is a good story.

On the other hand, as part of the greater continuity of Marvel Comics, I’m not as keen. I’m not a big fan of works that say ‘everything you’ve read for decades is wrong.’ Twists like that are great in standalone works. You know, where they were planned from the start. On the other hand, revising hundreds of stories by dozens of different authors doesn’t work so well.

(Crisis on Infinite Earths, as a counter example, did work but it also did so by restarting everything, not by saying ‘oh, it was a lie all along’ Eh, it’s complicated)

Frankly, I think the Sentry is a really good character but interacts with the Marvel setting in a weird way. It sounds like making him work as a reoccurring character was a struggle. Like the Catcher in the Rye crossed with Spider-Man.

And, now looking at reviews of his later appearances, it sounds like writers just don’t know what to do with the character. Which, to be far, isn’t unreasonable. The Sentry is on a power scale beyond virtually any other Marvel character but, even more problematic, is in a different genre.

Still, I did enjoy this first story.