Messages

Interesting news this. I really enjoyed Flintlock, Brawler didn't quite have enough to sustain my interest. Newstand distribution seems a bit suicidal from what I've read, but I hope this takes off.

If you do fancy any of Wagner's old Battle stuff, HMS Nightshade is brilliant. I'm a big fan of Invasion 1984, I think both are available as collections.

Like IP I'd say Song of the Surfer and Button Man are essential and the early 13th Floor is also fantastic. The Rok books are really good but if you don't like football then I suspect you'll get less out of them than I did.

Cheers Broodblik. I originally wrote "Who did the cover? Was it Keith Burns?" but I backtracked in case it wasn't and I looked daft. Brilliant choice of artist for this.

[Dredd]

Another enjoyable Prog for me too.

Dredd – Wrapped up a little quicker than I would have liked, but a very enjoyable Dredd tale. I suspect we've not seen the last of some characters here.

The Out – Pretty action heavy episode this week and not all that easy to follow in places. Still totally great.

Joe Pineapples – It's far from amazing but it's nowhere near as bad as the opening few episodes and if it's the last ABC we get, it's a lot better than the last actual ABC Warriors we got. I'm enjoying it for what it is. That full page shot of Joe and Sue is really Bisley-ish.

The Order – There's a real retro feel to this I think and it's an easy, enjoyable read. Agree that the line "Meanwhile, in Ben Franklin's duodenum" is fantastic.

Proteus Vex – Best thing in the Prog (again).

That's an auto-purchase for me. Who did the cover? It's perfect.

Great looking page, that - love the way it's put together. I actually prefer it in black and white.

So I've picked up a damaged copy of the two-player FF set Clash of Princes. The books are in a manky state, with ripped pages repaired with tape etc, but they're readable and playable.
Anyone fancy giving it a go?

I totally understand where you're coming from: I've got some pages where the frame would cost more than I paid for the art and it's a bit of a dilemma. I've framed my really expensive bits, and a couple of older pages from the 80s, but not sure what to do with the rest. What kind of folder do you store yours in? I could do with something like that for pages I don't have up.

From my reading and conversations with my local framing guys, the big things to consider are acid free mounts and special glass to protect it from sunlight, so yeah, you should be ok there based on my understanding. Obviously don't glue or blue-tack the art to the mounts or the backboard - mine are hung from the top of the mount with some kind of archival mounting tape.

We suspected it from the link in the shop, but here it is: Garth Ennis, John Wagner, this looks bloody amazing.


https://comicbook.com/comics/news/battle-action-garth-ennis-2023-rebellion/#7

That is known as a 'lockdown bowl' in my house.
See also eating sandwiches or cake straight off the breadboard - "I'll just use a lockdown plate."

Good point!

That's a great image. I don't actually think it's worse than some in the book - the barrel full of heads, for example, or Xakhaz himself. It's definitely no worse than some of the images in Falcon: Rack of Baal! As a kid I think the only image I found a bit scary was the hanged dude in House of Hell. I think I would have loved this one.

And yeah, totally into this book. It's gory and atmospheric but it's also loads of fun to play. I did have another go yesterday, thought I was doing better but ended up getting absorbed by a horrible chair / blob. I feel like this and Creature of Havoc have been a real high point.

This is pretty cool looking.
I occasionally fire up old games like this out of nostalgia and they're usually a bit painful, so not sure I'd actually play it, but this guy has done a great job of creating it. Yup!

[Beneath Nightmare Castle]

It's the Holmgard Lone Wolf books I have. I can't really afford to get another atm but it's the sort of thing I might ask for as a gift - and they feel gift-worthy tbh, as they are, as you say, biblically thick.

Anyway, it's back to FF for me and I am venturing...

Beneath Nightmare Castle

Three attempts, three deaths so far! Here's my litany of failure.

The intro casts you as a down on their luck adventurer on their way to visit an old comrade in arms, Baron Toldur in his seat at the market town of Neuburg. The book then starts with you immediately getting caught by a gang of 'Southerners' - stock 80s sinister Arab types that you and Tholdur campaigned against - and dragged off to a dungeon which is where you start, blindfolded and tied hand and foot..

As I am coming to, a voice whispers to me in the darkness, offering to aid me and cut my bonds. I shift over and indicated and feel the rope cut from my wrist - removing the blindfold reveals I'm in a cellar, with only some stairs up and no sign of my mystery friend. A search of the cellar reveals nothing, but it does delay me for a fatal amount of time as the Southerners arrive, club me unconscious again and I am dragged off to be tortured to death by barely human, mutated monstrosities. DEATH number 1 in just a handful of moves. And so the tone is set!

Starting afresh, this time I flee the cellar at once, recovering my sword on the way. I'm in a tower on Neuburgs east gate, but from what I can see the place is deserted and silent, with not a soul to be seen and no sounds of bustle from the formerly busy town. The gatehouse itself is locked and I lack the strength to simply batter the door down, so instead I wait and ambush my captors when they open the door instead, cutting them down to a man (although I do take 2 wounds from a guy with skill 4) and fleeing into the town. There I do see signs of life, but the few people I do see are hastily barring their doors and windows. I find a tavern of my past acquaintance and after banging on the boards gain entry. The innkeeper, friendly once I reveal my link to the Baron, promptly fills me in on the tale of doom. The Baron returned from his last trip South with a bunch of sinister foreigners in tow and since then has secluded himself in his castle. Meanwhile people are vanishing throughout the town, and at night unknown things stalk the streets leaving strange tracks: the townsfolk hide in terror as those out after dark simply disappear, although sometimes odd tracks, or pools of blood, are left behind..
He urges me to remain indoors at night, and tomorrow to go visit Old Huw at the ruined temple. Obviously I don't do this, instead climbing out of my room at the first chance to stalk the deserted streets where I encounter the source of the townsfolks terror: eyeless, hairless clawed beasts, like huge dogs, but with bulbous distended stomachs and a mass of tentacles where a mouth should be. I kill two, but this leaves me on a single point of stamina so I climb back up into my room and hide under the covers until dawn.

The next day brings a hearty stamina-restoring breakfast and I decide to look about the town instead of heading straight for Tholdurs keep (the titular Nightmare Castle, one would assume) to find Old Huw in the temple district. Huw found (and he is old indeed) he fills me in with more exposition: Neuburg was once the site of a battle between the priests of Oiden (a nice god) and Xakhaz, archmange of the evil gods of Zagoula. Xakhaz was defeated and his spirit sealed beneath the castle: all was well until Tholdur took it into his head to visit Zagoula and came back with a wizard and some warriors in tow. It seems that Tholdur has fallen under the influence of said wizard and Xakhaz is on his way back, baby. Huw suggests I go up to the keep and sort it all out before Xakhaz powers up and that I would be well served to also locate the Talisman of Loth, a relic of Oiden that was last seen in the possession of the last guy to head up to the keep and stop Xakhaz.
Hiuw also mentions there could be a fragment of a powerful magic weapon in the junk stalls of Neubrug, so after getting some blessings from Oiden I head into town and off to the market. In the light of day things seem a little more normal here: I'm robbed by a child pickpocket (I do not give chase, as I have been told of the infamous section where you are set upon by, and must kill, a gang of starving children) and buy what looks like a garden fork, but is obviously the top of a trident, from an old goblin pedlar who gives me a hint that the shaft of the trident can also be found beneath the castle, as it was swallowed up by the earth in the battle there against Xarkhaz. I also pop down to the docks where the Southerners are unloading crates, one of which contains a mass of animated severed limbs - a true horror that I seal back in once I have fought them off.
This done I head up to the keep, where taking Huw's advice I avoid the front gate and instead take a side-entrance into an overgrown garden. It's here that I find a statue that, when a mechanism in it is activated, dispenses a strange green liquid. I drink some, only to discover it is concentrated magical fertiliser and I transform into a tree. DEATH #2

Third attempt: this time I follow more or less the same path, but I don't go out of my room at night, and when I get down to the docks, I push the crate of limbs into the canal without opening it. Heading back into the garden I encounter a sinister tree - another victim of a fertiliser accident, I suspect - who warns me off two of the towers around the garden and directs me to the gardener in a third. I enter the tower and kill a frenzied ogre wearing a funny hat, which upon close examination seems to be some sort of horrible alive gelatinous brain-eating parasite. Putting the ogre down enables me to free the gardener, who after we share some food reveals that I do indeed have part of a weapon (The fabled Trident of Skarlos) and not a garden fork, as well as showing me a secret entrance into the cellars.
Descending the dank, dripping tunnels below I am offered a choice of two paths - a dark tunnel into the cellars or a door held shut. I figure the rest of the trident is likely to be off the beaten track, so I take the door and head down further still into a moist, warm cavern complex. I kill some kind of blind bat monster, then climb up into cobwebbed, long deserted corridors and eventually find a cell containing two emaciated prisoners, chained and hooded. I free the first but when she opens her mouth tentacles erupt from it and she attacks me. I put the pitiful thing out of its misery and lock the door behind me.
Continuing on I navigate an obvious illusion trap (and a pit) and find myself at a door guarded by a pair of masked and riobed southern fighters. I have few options here and have to fight them: they are tough opponents and some poor dice rolls sees the second defeat me, cutting me down in the corridor. DEATH #3.


Loving this book. The atmosphere is totally different from previous books: Neuburg is very Warhammer old world-esque, and there's more than a creeping hint of both Howard and Lovecraft about the backstory, whilst the various horrors are more than a little Cthulhu mythos. The battles are not too tough - I was both unlucky and clumsy to die when I did - and the book feels logical so far rather than arbitrary. Best of all the plot feels compelling - it's quick moving but engrossing, atmospheric, more than a little gruesome, and the book is well written enough to be both creepy and slightly lighthearted with it's turn of phrase in places with it. Art is amazing. I'm going straight back to this when I have some free time later this week.

Cheers Rogue! If you have a really nice, or expensive, piece I'd really recommend getting it professionally framed. It's not cheap, but if it's going to be up on a wall for any length of time it protects the artwork and stops it from fading or becoming damaged. Also I think it makes the art itself look way cooler with the mount etc. If you do hang something definitely post a picture on here of it, seeing peoples collections is awesome.

I much prefer having art up, rather than in a folder, but that's way easier said than done. It's also one of those collections that hard to show off as most people who come round to my place either don't care, or just think it's a page cut from the comic.

Oh Wow that's amazing Barrington Boots. I have a number of Simon Fraser pages but a John M Burns Dante page is very close to the top of my wish list. Magnificent.

Show us your Frasers Colin!