I guess i’ll be blunt. I’ve just, as of last week, been given the honour and responsibility of creating the book design and layout for Call of Cthulhu 7th edition.

*ulp*

Not only will i be doing the core rulebook, but i’ll also be designing the Investigator’s Handbook, as well as the Keeper’s Screen.

This, obviously, is a huge deal. And not something i take lightly. As someone who actively plays CoC, and knows about the….various opinions on how CoC 6th edition looks, and how i’m doing the book design for RPG i love the most, it’s a little daunting. Well, okay. A lot daunting. Kinda terrifying, but in a good way.

Anyway. I’ll be discussing my progress right here, at ol’ Squamous. Right now i’m in pre-production, going over the manuscript and getting ideas for the design. At this point, i’m pouring over fonts, how page elements might look, navigation, splash pages, and so on. One thing i’m keeping mind that, as pretty as this could be, it is still a /rule/ book, and needs to be easily referenced by people (one thing that people complained about with 6th ed. (me included) that it’s a bitch to find information in it sometimes). But i still want it to reflect a period look and feel, evocative of the Classic era. We’ll see how it goes.

Meanwhile, other stuff has been slithering around in the Squamous camp-

I’ve been pounding out a fiction anthology for Miskatonic River Press, called The Grimscribe’s Puppets:

The first pass is already done; now i’m going back and making corrections and the usual lot. I still hate italics text.

Work continues on the card art for FtS!. I’ve kinda lost track of how many i’ve finished, but i’ve gotta be close to the 30 mark. I need to post more examples about that here. I’ll get on that.

In non-Lovecraftian news, i’ve been hired as book designer for Montag Press! I’ve already received my first assignment from them; more news on that as it happens.

Whew!

And now, i can finally announce that the scenario is now live on The Unspeakable Oath’s website! Please feel free to check it out here. Hope you enjoy it!

Whelp, Oscar Rios, famed writer of Call of Cthulhu adventures, has decided to take advantage of Chaosium’s licensing agreement, and has formed his own little publishing house, Golden Goblin Press. The first publication is going to be The Island of Ignorance: The Third Cthulhu Companion. The Kickstarter for it just launched last night, and yours truly will be doing the book design for it. So get our your credit cards, and pitch in for what looks to be an incredible book. I mean, just look at the list of participating authors! Aniolowski, Rios, Sammons, Harms…

Meanwhile, yes, i’m still plugging away at my card game (how many times have i said that here recently?). I’ve also been silently gathering some things together for the Kickstarter- i’ve hired a sculpture artist who will be making…stuff. And things. AWESOME things.

Lastly…well, i can’t say much yet, but if things go the way they have been, i’ll be taking on, by far, my biggest and bestest book design project to date. Holy crap.

1) The first is a collection of science fiction short stories based around the Cthulhu Mythos, called Eldritch Chrome. It’s edited by Brian M. Sammons and David Conyers, who, if you don’t recognize the names, well…you can be rest assured that they know what they’re doing. It’s good stuff, from what i read.

2) The Cthulhu by Gaslight 3rd edition pdf Supplement! There were some articles that had to be trimmed or cut entirely, due to space constraints or whatnot, and i had these pretty, full colour versions of the handouts that Dean Engelhardt had made…not to mention an easy way to print out the spiffing character sheet that Dean had lovingly hand-crafted. I didn’t want all this to go to waste, so heck, why not put together a small pdf for people to enjoy? I don’t know if Chaosium plans to charge for it, or offer it up as a free download. Once i do know, i’ll post about it here, along with links and cat toys and jam and such.

Meanwhile, i continue to chug slowly but assuredly on the artwork for Feed the Shoggoth!…

(speaking of, it’s a helluva thing to be able to have an impromptu game demo session with Charlie and some of the other folks in the office…)

Now, you may be asking yourself, what the hell’s going on with this card game you keep babbling about from time to time? Well, i’m still neck deep in the art. After the clean up was done, i’ve had to go back and redo all the colouring, as well as do further clean up of the line work i originally did. It’s a long process, and one that i can get to in between other (i.e., paying) design work. To give you an example of what needs to be done, i essentially need to take scans of the original work i did, like this:

And turn it into something more like this:

It’s not terribly difficult, mind. It just takes a long time to do, and get right. And there’s a *lot* of art to get done. I think i’ve mentioned it before, but there’s about…80 pieces that need to be done in total. Some of which i need to go back and start over from scratch, as the original art is just too crappy for my tastes.

So…that’s where i’m at with Feed the Shoggoth!. Got a ways to go, but i’ll continue to post progress here as it happens.

Heroism comes in many shapes, many forms. In the RPG world, heroes are sometimes defined as killing the giant dragon, or driving that extra-dimensional horror back to whence it game. In real life, however, heroism is much more. It means doing something selflessly for another human being. Heroism means you care. Heroism means /giving a fuck/.

And, more than anything, heroism means TAKING ACTION.

My friend Damion is taking action. He’s taking on the challenge of doing the AIDS Lifecycle, riding from San Francisco to LA- more than 540 miles, to raise awareness and money for the fight against AIDS.

He’s doing his part. Do yours. Please donate.

By far the biggest book we shepherded through last year was Cthulhu by Gaslight 3rd Edition. Sorry, i should rephrase that: AWARD WINNING Cthulhu by Gaslight 3rd Edition. *ahem* Yes, i’m a bit proud about this one. I had started work on Gaslight in 2011, and was essentially made leader of the project. There were a lot of moving parts, and i ended up wearing more hats for this book than i originally estimated, but damn if it wasn’t fun and challenging. This is easily the book i’m the most proud of. Kevin Ross, along with Cthulhu by Gaslight’s original author William Barton, did an incredible job, and the artists that i got together were amazing.

The other big thing that i worked on, which *hasn’t* been released yet, is the card game i’m developing, Feed the Shoggoth! It’s been something i worked on throughout the year, as time permits (things i’ve signed contracts for obviously take priority). The germ of the idea for the game hit me in January, card and rules development took place from Jan-April, with play testing during April and May. More tinkering with rules, art wrangling, and some more play testing…and it’s still not done! There’s so much left to do…but it *is* getting done. I’ve got all the production art stuff back, so now the process of completing the final card art can commence. I’m confident that 2013 will be the year of FtS!.

Medieval Tales was one project that’s…kind of in limbo. I don’t know what’s going on with the company, so i have no idea if this book will ever see the light of day.

Back on the topic of Gaslight, i’ve been quietly been working on a couple of supplements that i’ve not talked much about. One of which is a .pdf-only addition for 3rd edition, whilst the other…well, you’ll have to just wait and see.

Returning to the topic of stuff i did get out the door, A Season in Carcosa, the fiction anthology containing stories based on the Hastur Mythos, was released. Oh, and Bumps in the Night finally hit the shelves (though i wish i had my contributors copies of it…*sigh).

While it doesn’t seem like we here at Squamous Studios haven’t seen many releases to print this last year, we’ve been working a lot behind the scenes, and in fact, two books are about to go to the printers- Tales of the Sleepless City, a collection of scenarios set in 1920s New York City (by Miskatonic River Press), and Undead and Unbound, a fiction anthology of zombie tales (by Chaosium). And there’s new stuff on the horizon that i can’t talk about quite just yet…

Thus sums up 2012. Thanks to everyone for their support. We can’t wait to see what happens in 2013!

Lastly, i ran another small demo of Feed the Shoggoth over the weekend, and reaction was again very positive. I got a couple of suggestions for some alternate rules, which i’ll try to incorporate. But first, i need to get the card art done, and really tackle the design of the cards themselves. Again, it’s going to be a question of attractiveness of the cards versus readability, and having the necessary information presented to the players with as little fuss as possible.

So that’s where things stand right now. I’m hoping that 2013 will be the Year of the Shoggoth! Stay tuned…

I’ve been working furiously lately to get Tales of the Sleepless City out the door; last night, i made a big push to get the page decoration done, and i think i’m there with it. Again, trying to be pretty without ruining the functionality, and working within an Art Deco style/framework. I think i pulled it off, but i need to see what Tom thinks. After that, i’ve got a round of corrections to comb through, which i’m hoping won’t be too long…

Happy to say that i’ve been given a new book to work on, a fiction anthology called “Undead and Unbound”. Given that it’s been shepherded by Brian Sammons and David Conyers, i’m sure it’s gonna rawk.

Feed the Shoggoth is, alas, something i haven’t been able to look at much, mostly because of time constraints, plus i’m still waiting for the art clean up to be done. But it’s still present in my mind.

Lastly, there are a couple of Gaslight-related projects that are in the works, but i can’t say more on that just yet. But don’t fear, that era is going to see some support.

Aaaand it means i’m back on Tales of the Sleepless City. Right now i’ve got the first two scenarios done, and am chugging through the third. My process has been a bit reversed on this particular book; normally, i like to have all the page decoration done prior to laying out the contents, but due to how things worked out, i’m doing the opposite. I have done the scenario splash pages, however, and feedback on them has been positive. I’ve got a vague idea of how i want the page designs to look, but nothing concrete…so i’m essentially letting things percolate until inspiration or (more likely) desperation hits me.