C.T. Phipps's Blog, page 14

Vampire: The Masquerade: Bloodstained Love review

    BLOODSTAINED LOVE is the latest supplement for VAMPIRE: THE MASQUERADE and I have to say that it is a supplement I was looking forward to a lot. I admit not entirely for beneficent reasons because my reaction to the premise, "a book about roleplaying love" was basically, "Okay, this will either be awesome or a car crash and I'm there for it either way." It's horrible but I'm being honest here and you can't tell me some of you weren't thinking the exact same thing. I'm a big fan of storytelli...

Renfield (2023) review

    RENFIELD (2023) is an action horror comedy starring Nicholas Cage, Nicholas Hoult, and Awkwafina. Bluntly, whether you enjoy this movie will probably be decided purely on whether the prospect of Nicholas Cage as Dracula intrigues you. If you like the prospect of Nicholas Cage as the Prince of Darkness, know that he could have played the role in a subdued as well as dignified fashion. Nicholas Cage did not do this. Instead, he went the full Cage and everything enjoyable about this movie can d...

Vampire: The Masquerade: Swansong review

    VAMPIRE: THE MASQUERADE: SWANSONG is a very difficult game to review and is basically a heart monitor when it comes to quality. There's parts that are magnificent with incredibly good writing, world-building, and character interactions. Finding these parts of the game requires you to read large chunks of the in-game codex and use of a guide since there's no indication you should be looking for these parts. Plus, there's parts of the game that are just outright broken and deeply frustrating i...

Tiamat's Wrath (Expanse #8) review

 
    TIAMAT'S WRAITH is the latest volume of the Expanse. The Expanse struck science fiction like a breath of fresh air and is basically serving as Game of Throne's slightly less successful brother in bringing genre fiction to the mainstream. It's a high concept series about wealth, power, politics, and an alien molecule that defies the laws of physics. Honestly, you can tell how much I like the Expanse in the fact that I'd still be happy to read the series if they ditched all of the alien techn...

Lasombra (Clan Novel #6) review

Clan Novels Reviews

1. Toreador
2. Tzimisce
3. Gangrel
4. Setite
5. Ventrue
6. Lasombra

    LASOMBRA is the sixth novel in the Clan Novel series that began with TOREADOR and will continue until it reaches thirteen volumes with a bonus anthology. It is the trademark series of Vampire: The Masquerade and was written roughly between the end of 2nd Edition and the beginning of its Revised. Gehenna, the apocalypse of vampires, is nigh with a war being fought between both the Camarilla (evil vampires) ...

Ten Recommended Vampire Novels

There was a time when vampirism was considered overdone, passe, and trash literature that was just popular because of its transgressive overtones that nevertheless allowed a bunch of a mostly female fandom to enjoy it without crossing too many taboos. That time was 1897 where Bram Stoker was already jumping on a very popular literary trend that most people had forgotten had been going on for decades by that point. Varney the Vampire for example was published a good fifty years (!!) ea...

Five Recommended Indie Novels for 2023

I made a point to read about three hundred books this year and while I cheated somewhat in my list, counting comics, I have to say that I enjoyed most of the works I read and managed to get my TBR pile underneath 230 books. Which is impressive because it started at about 300 and I was determined to read them all but kept adding. Yes, it is a vicious cycle, addiction to reading. Soon I’ll be begging on corners for Joe Abercrombie and possibly going to those vicious dens where they give out...

Ventrue (Clan Novel #5) by Gherbod Fleming

Clan Novels Reviews

1. Toreador
2. Tzimisce
3. Gangrel
4. Setite
5. Ventrue

    CLAN NOVEL: VENTRUE by Gherbod Fleming is the fifth novel of the Vampire: The Masquerade Clan Novel series. It is a series published in 1999 and told a thirteen novel story about the conflict between Sabbat (bad vampires) invading the cities belonging to the Camarilla (less bad vampires). A magical artifact called the Eye of Hazmiel was serving as a wild card during it and each new book's protagonist was a glimpse i...

Persepolis Rising (Expanse #7) review

    THE EXPANSE is one of the best series currently out there. It's also a series which has had its ups and downs. Some of them I've given 3 stars and others I've given 5 stars. I've always come back to it, though. Here, PERSEPOLIS RISING is setting the stage for the end of the line as we time skip 30 years to when our heroes are now in their 60s. They don't act like they are sixty so maybe it's a case of "sixty is the new thirty" thanks to advanced medical technology of the future but they do c...

Werewolf: The Apocalypse Fifth Edition review

Warning -This review has a LONG intro that I couldn’t cut down.

    WEREWOLF:THE APOCALYPSE has always been about third or fourth in my favorite of theWorld of Darkness games. Which is not so much an insult or a question of itsquality as the fact that I was an obsessive Vampire: The Masquerade and Mage:The Ascension player. Furthermore, I was brought into my fandom by Changeling:The Dreaming which was always the odd man out but a lot better game thanmost people ever did.

    Thepremis...