C.T. Phipps's Blog, page 20

The Tree of Azathoth is now available

"The Dreaming City has a million stories."

The world has finally reached its final hours with Yog-Sothoth devouring time itself. John Henry Booth is not content to die and seeks out an old enemy to provide him an escape from the dying Earth. This results in him being transported to a strange monster-filled city where millions of humans live in a bizarre hodgepodge of eras. John soon finds out he's been here before, or at least some variant of him has, and he is soon founded by faces long thought ...

Ten Recommended Dragonlance Novels

Awhile ago, I wrote an article that proved popular called TEN RECOMMENDED CLASSIC DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS NOVELS. Being a lifelong Dungeons and Dragons fan of a certain age, I have read hundreds of novels across most of the campaign settings. For a long time, the novels were as much a source of revenue for the TSR/WOTC company as the actual product they were producing.

However, if I were to list where my heart lay, I would have to say it was Dragonlance. I fell in love with the setting after reading...

Dungeons and Dragons: Honor among Thieves review

    DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS: HONOR AMONG THIEVES made me tear up a bit at the end. It was an involuntary reaction, I certainly didn't intend for it to happen, but it's something that occurred nevertheless. Against my better judgement, I came to care about these characters and whether they managed to make it through the end of the movie. So, in the words of Rick and Morty, "You son of a bitch, I'm in."

    The movie isn't perfect by any stretch of the imagination but it is recognizably and explicitly...

The fall of Predestiny and it's rebirth as Dark Destiny

Hey,

    A few years ago, I wrote a couple of books with Frank Martin called the Predestiny series. It was an attempt to do a Young Adult science series that would hopefully break into new markets. It was also a cyberpunk series and something that was inspired by events in recent decades about corporate overreach, activism, and other events which had informed my burgeoning political consciousness. It was also inspired by Terminator, Dune, Continuum, and a bunch of other time travel stories.

    Th...

The Last of Us 1x09 "Look for the Light" review

    THE LAST OF US 1×09 “LOOK FOR THE LIGHT” is the end of season one of THE LAST OF US and probably the high point of the series for fans of the game. Sadly, I feel like the season overall ended up being more of an eight rather than a nine or a ten. There’s some great moments throughout the show and I believe it’s probably the best adaptation of a video game property (Castlevania is close, though). Unfortunately, it didn’t quite soar as high as it could have despite a few high points.

    ...

The Last of Us 1x08 "When We Are In Need" review

    THE LAST OF US 1×08 “WHEN WE ARE IN NEED” is the penultimate episode of the series. Though when there’s only nine episodes, I start to wonder where the divide between a full blown season and a miniseries begin. I’m not saying this to be salty but I think they could have easily been a full thirteen episodes. GAME OF THRONES has a lot to answer for and I really think they should be working to give us more content rather than less.

    To be honest, I wasn’t looking forward to this one as...

The Last Ritual by SA Sidor review

    THE LAST RITUAL is the second novel of the Arkham Horror standalone novel series. I was a huge fan of Josh Reynold’s WRATH OF N’KAI novel and was interested in seeing what more the series might do with the boardgame’s version of Arkham, Massachusetts. Chaosium’s CALL OF CTHULHU has a history of fiction but most of it is typical Lovecraftian horror, which is to say, “Everyone dies or goes insane at the end.” Which has somewhat limited its mass appeal. Arkham Horror seems more keenly awa...

Andrew Doran and the Scroll of Nightmares by Matthew Davenport review

    ANDREW DORAN AND THE SCROLL OF NIGHTMARES is yet another installment in the Indiana Jones expy series by Matthew Davenport. Andrew Doran is a scholar at Miskatonic University but where most of his kind are content to study the Mythos, he goes out and fights it. Unfortunately, this has caused him serious issues as he discovers that doing so on the university's dime hasn't increased his reputation. Indeed, he hasn't brought a single book of eldritch lore or unspeakable sculpture of horrors bac...

Andrew Doran and the Mountains of Madness by Matthew Davenport review

    I'm a big fan of Matthew Davenport's Cthulhu Mythos novels. I really enjoyed THE TRIAL OF OBED MARSH and thought THE STATEMENT OF ANDREW DORAN was a lot of fun. However, I was interested in where the story could go after the events of the first novel. It's not often an author combines Indiana Jones, the Cthulhu Mythos, and Titus Crow. Where do you go from there? Well, nicely, the answer is Antarctica to prevent the Nazis and some nasty cultists from raising an army of shoggoths to destroy ev...

The Last of Us 1x07 "Left Behind" review

    THE LAST OF US 1x07 "LEFT BEHIND" is the seventh episode of the arguable best video game adaptation to a separate media. We've already got some great ones with CYBERPUNK: EDGERUNNERS and CASTLEVANIA but this has topped them all. Mind you, I say this with the knowledge that it's limited by how much you're a fan of zombie apocalypse television. I am but I do think that it's never exceeded anything better than THE WALKING DEAD in its better seasons. Until now.

    Left Behind is, in my mind, the...