Mike Martens | Clear Keep

17 Oct 2024

O HEY. I'm a UX writer and ttrpg designer, with graphic design in my side holster. If you want a feed about any of those things or their intersections, add me! 👾👾👾 I'm also bad at marketing myself, so this is your chance to follow someone before they're cool.

omnes.exeunt.pressWhat is zonecore?Creating Exclusion Zone Botanist led me to search for the origins and critical works of the genre. Here are five common elements of zonecore and a list of zonecore tabletop games for inspiration.

New proposal for the genre name: Zoney Deschanel. Because it's a panic pixie dream world.

Ben // foresight studio@foresightstudio.bsky.social

Also PS for a nice breakdown of games with Annihilation vibes check out omnes.exeunt.press/p/what-is-zo...

Mike Martens | Clear Keep reposted

Haunt-Along 2026 An annual tradition collecting a thread about a horror movie each day through the month of October. Find 'em all here. 🐈‍⬛

Such a key piece of how Conditions work in CfB – Ruin in Trophy too! How characters manage being at the brink is where the fun is.

Michael Van Vleet (he/him)@signalstation.bsky.social

when a moment has an impact on a character— physically, emotionally, whatever— it can be memorialized with a Condition because that moment has changed who they are. Yes, mechanically, it could lead to a penalty on a roll, but what it'll really do is signpost who the character /is/.

gamefound.comKraldum: Solo Fantasy Mudlarking RPG by tooth & shore - GamefoundGo down to the shore below the city. Collect what you can. Survive what lurks there and beat the rising waters to make it home.

Looks v cool

tor, mud skeleton@toothandshore.bsky.social

friends we're in the final 48 hours! the river is still hungry for tribute gamefound.com/en/projects/...

Plus One Exp @ 🔜 Metatopia

Wild. Mouly and Spiegelman co-founded RAW … one of the most important publications in the alternative/underground comix movement. Like … umm …

Rodrigo Baeza@rodrigobaeza.bsky.social

Oh, shit. www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/...

Mike Martens | Clear Keep reposted

Aquarium Drunkard

@aquariumdrunkard.com

Trick Or Treat: Vintage Halloween Mixtapes (Vol. 5-9) aquariumdrunkard.com/2023/10/26/t... Re-upped. Choice vintage Halloween spookers from the Grey Haas

Mike Martens | Clear Keep reposted

@plusoneexp.bsky.social

Getting to do some campaign play of @signalstation.bsky.social's dustbowl era carnival mystery game and having a blast. It's a wonderful build on the Brindlewood Bay mystery system by @jasoncordova.bsky.social. I saw one of the best flirting scenes I've ever seen in play today also.

Like all reasonable people, I just want a job so I can buy some cool synths and then quit my job because I immediately become the world-famous best at synths.

Working on getting an actual deck of cards together for Tourist Hole …

Excited to crack open @joelhines.bsky.social’s Interloper as I dive back into work on Planet Raygun.

Please do not be distracted by the title of the magazine behind it.

Developed the “Giant Soft” edition of Dread last week, and let me tell you … this thing’s got twists.

My first five TTRPGs: 1. Hero Quest 2. Amber 3. Dungeon World 4. The Veil 5. ( a few dozen in a very short time )

Sean Tibbitts Is Submitting to Sprigs & Kindling!@pizzoc.bsky.social

My first five TTRPGs: 1. D&D 5e 2. Trophy Dark 3. Brindlewood Bay 4. The Between 3. Masks: A New Generation

ttrpg.linkKingdoms Carved: The 7th Order & Ritual DeckKingdoms Will Rise & Fall in this pair of mystery games! In The 7th Order, stop the apocalypse as rent-a-cops with the Four Horsemen drawing near. In Ritual Deck it's time to duel! Take on the ancient...

2ish hours left on this unique pair of Carved from Brindlewood games. Ritual Deck centers around JRPG drama and a super clever dueling mechanic, while 7th Order feels like a cult-classic TV show that you recommend to all your friends. Check em out & help these creators get full editions in print.

Plus One Exp @ 🔜 Metatopia@plusoneexp.bsky.social

THE END IS NIGH!!! The final hours of The 7th Order & Ritual Deck funding are here! We are a few backers away from our next stretch goal! Join us for the end! ttrpg.link/kcc 29/X

youtube.comHost - Official Trailer [HD] | A Shudder OriginalYouTube video by Shudder

Tonight we’re transporting ourselves to the strange and frightening time of pandemic lockdown with that era's definitive found-footage horror … Light a candle, turn off the lights, dig up a creepy music box. It’s time for Host.

There's stuff of the time, that grapples with the time, that I still have trouble with. Host has been one I can swallow, though. Maybe that's because it's under an hour. Maybe that's because it's mostly happy to be a spooky found-footage film. But it seems to strike more deeply each passing year.

Give this cursed Zoom call a viewing if you've never seen it. Give it a fresh viewing if it's been awhile. Just know there's the spirit of something we've tried to forget inside of it. (It's currently streaming on Shudder.) Then swing by the rest of the #hauntalong for more spooky season picks.

Mike Martens | Clear Keep@clearkeep.bsky.social

Haunt-Along 2026 An annual tradition collecting a thread about a horror movie each day through the month of October. Find 'em all here. 🐈‍⬛

youtube.comHost - Official Trailer [HD] | A Shudder OriginalYouTube video by Shudder

The interactions, the gags, the blocking across camera views, even the jump scares: It's crafted so precisely and hits so perfectly on that time. Novelly executed but not a novelty.

At the pandemic’s peak escalation, we didn’t know what was killing us. We isolated to hold it in check, but we also craved connection … Some couldn’t hold the line, keep the circle intact, take the nightmare seriously. And that let the horror out of containment. That’s the undercurrent of Host.

youtube.comHost - Official Trailer [HD] | A Shudder OriginalYouTube video by Shudder

And yes. Things get bad.

Host is immensely real, and watching it today, it’s deep nostalgia. You will be reminded of things you forgot. It’s something of a seance for us in this era, pulling us back into that one.

youtube.comHost - Official Trailer [HD] | A Shudder OriginalYouTube video by Shudder

The premise: A group of 20-somethings gather on Zoom for an online seance. How does a seance work when the circle is formed from video captures crunched up into binary code and transported through cables, routers, and data centers? Does it?

Our Zoomers (mostly) don’t believe it does. They snicker and drift. Some play along. Some embrace the mood. Some reject it. Their host courteously, earnestly guides them into the circle, into the conversation with the spirits.

youtube.comHost - Official Trailer [HD] | A Shudder OriginalYouTube video by Shudder

youtube.comIN THE EARTH - Official TrailerYouTube video by NEON

Filmmakers were faced with a practical impossibility for their craft at the time. We had some, like Ben Wheatley with previous #hauntalong pick In the Earth, embrace the era as narrative conceit while constructing a film that looked like it could have been constructed in any era.

And then we had the Zoom-meeting movie. What if a movie was a Zoom call? Movies like Host. Most in this genre are … fine. Clever, constrained, awkward necessities. Host is special.

youtube.comHost - Official Trailer [HD] | A Shudder OriginalYouTube video by Shudder

A lot broke in the outbreak that shut down the world six years ago: Time, memory, health, and life. A lot is still broken. A lot of what was broken has broken things further. The film industry, of course, is one of those things.

It’s weird and a little bit hard to say, but I’ve been developing nostalgia for bits of it. Don’t get me wrong: I’d never go back. Not that kind of wishful nostalgia. But parking lots turned into nightlife spaces? Traffic reduced to zero? Streaming parties with distant friends? Miss it.

One thing that's going to stick out on these is that once you run one, you're going to be fully prepared to run any. Wildly distinct settings and tones and experiences, but indexed on a book format where the operations are familiar.

Mike Martens | Clear Keep@clearkeep.bsky.social

And just wait til you open them up …

itch.ioThe Lazulite Fountain by Amanda/iamatrex for Appx. N Jam 2026A Trophy Dark incursion where reality flows backward toward its own unmaking.

Officially heading to Metatopia … My first! Tips, tricks, darkest secrets?

Mike Martens | Clear Keep reposted

Amanda/iamatrex

@iamatrex.com

My little Trophy Dark incursion for Appendix N got 11th place in the Writing category, so that's a nice little self-esteem boost :) Download it for free, if you want! Art by @oxsago.bsky.social :D itch.io/jam/appx-n-j...

And just wait til you open them up …

The Gauntlet Writer’s Retreat is a really special thing and a highlight of any year it happens: A dozen-ish writers and designers of varying perspectives all gathered up to pitch and craft and dialogue about games. Such a constructive space, with so much respect, and dare I say community.

It feels like the cornerstone of a *scene* to me … Just so many big ideas building each other up. So much is cooking …

(Also, this The Lands Remaining thing has got legs.)