January « 2015 « Ken and Robin Talk About Stuff

Archive for January, 2015

Episode 125: Just Get Two Corpses, People

January 30th, 2015 | Robin

Ken and Robin remember a 90% scale replica of the façade of the Alamo in this episode themed around their recent sojourn in Austin, TX.

In the Gaming Hut we recapitulate a Chupacabracon panel with talk of villains and how to portray them.

The Food Hut has us munching on barbecue, Tex Mex and the wonder that is In and Out Burger.

The Eliptony Hut has a classic bit of carny cryptozoology in it—the Minnesota Iceman, now resident in Austin’s Museum of the Weird.

And finally Ken’s Time Machine has him ensuring continuing independence for the Republic of Texas.

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Choose your own sponsor, so long as it is Destiny Quest Infinite, an interactive fantasy game book like no other. Armed with nothing but your sword and a backpack, you enter a land of monsters, powerful forces, and shadowy secrets. Or check out the licensed computer version from Adventure Cow.

What’s better than ravening ghouls prowling a blasted land for dead flesh to feast upon? Free ravening ghouls prowling a blasted land for dead flesh to feast upon! For a limited time only, grab Ken’s Ghouls installment of Ken Writes About Stuff for the grave-dirt price of $0.00.

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Tags: Eliptony Hut, Food Hut, Gaming hut, Ken's Time Machine

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Episode 124: Live from Chupacabracon in Austin, TX

January 23rd, 2015 | Robin

Join Ken and Robin for this live episode recorded at Chupacabracon in beautiful Austin, TX. The best audience ever, per capita, punch above their weight to keep us supplied with incisive questions. We discover that the Nerdtrope game is exceptions-based as Ken draws a historic quintuple Trope. Or is that Nerd? I forget. Vicissitudes of the road had their way with our audio quality this time out, but hey, quintuple. We couldn’t not release that.

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Tags: Live

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Episode 123: Freemium Democratic Regime

January 16th, 2015 | Robin

Verily and anon, adopt the cloak of darkness as Ken ducks into the Elizabethan tavern that is the Gaming Hut to discuss his School of Night GUMSHOE setting.

Violence and mayhem disrupt the tranquil comfort of the Food Hut as we examine America’s Whiskey Wars and riff some dystopian futuristic equivalents.

Should that scene end with a jump or a slide? How to Write Good mulls the art of transitions.

The Conspiracy Corner situates itself in a hotel room—the so-called Illuminati hotel room at Houston’s Hotel Zaza. We spitball the sinister plotlines that might spin from this weird location.

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Tags: Conspiracy Corner, Food Hut, Gaming hut, How To Write Good

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Episode 122: Accelerated Gameable Force

January 9th, 2015 | Robin

The Magicians’ Guild turns out to be rife with factions and competing interests as the Gaming Hut looks at ways to add realistic messiness to your game’s imaginary institutions.

In Ken and/or Robin Talk to Someone Else, Robin asks up-and-coming illustrator Rachel A. Kahn how an artist breaks into the roleplaying game market these days, and what her must-have tools and resources are.

The Cartography Hut unfurls this map of global criminal trading activity, and we wring gaming ideas from it.

Finally Ken’s Time Machine shakes off some mothballs, but not a sense of historical inevitability, as Lisa J. Steele asks Ken to keep Japan allied with the West in the run-up to WWII.

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Tags: Cartography Hut, Gaming hut, Ken and/or Robin Talk to Someone Else, Ken's Time Machine

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Episode 121: Handy Scrying Mirror Carrying Case

January 2nd, 2015 | Robin

Our voices are as froggy as London used to be foggy in our first episode back after our UK sojourn. Inspired by the Museum of London’s current Sherlock Holmes exhibit, we usher a certain consulting detective into the Gaming Hut.

As listeners know, every trip to the UK occasions a raid by Ken on London’s book purveyors. So we peer deep into the unsorted pile of Ken’s Bookshelf for an epic vicarious cataloguing of his latest plunder.

Finally we wrap up our Dreamhounds of London inspired Culture Hut series with a look at the life, art and madness of Antonin Artaud and his Theater of Cruelty.