A Strondovarian stands on slime farm grounds. Near a building, an Embivel drinks from a dish of water. A Nathaie flies above. Visible in the distance is a slime pool.

Embivel

Embivels are one of the first animals that the Strondos domesticated, at some point in history long forgotten, and they now occupy a place in Strondo culture similar to dogs or mules to humanity. An Aehubar species capable of carrying or pulling a lot of weight, most of the work once done by Embivel on Gurx is now done by machinery, but it’s still generally seen as useful to have some around.

Nathaie

A Glounaph species known for bright crests, Nathaie are very territorial and quite intelligent. Strondo farms will often provide a home for Nathaie, and treat them well, so that they will chase off small animals that try to sneak onto the grounds and raise alarm should larger creatures show up.

Palooath

Unseen in the picture, but ubiquitous on the farm, are the tiny creatures known as Palooath. A distinct worm-like branch of Vootuph, Palooath can live beneath the purple grass-equivalent of Gurx and draw nutrients from the soil. At some point in history, Strondos noticed that when creatures ate Palooath, the resulting biological waste was quite good at helping slime to grow. It’s now standard farm procedure to have a lot of palooath around to be eaten by the other creatures and gather the resulting waste to drop into the slime pools.

If you had to ask me “Which superhero or villain is the closest friend to Rocket Racer?” I’d obviously have to reply the Prowler. They’ve been friends in a bunch of comics. But Bob’s relationship with Prowler is a topic for some other post. Today I’m talking about the best friend Rocket Racer has that we’ve barely been shown: Antoine Delsoin, the Hypno-Hustler!

Bob and Antoine first appeared together in a story that is likely the worst story in Rocket Racer’s limited history of appearances. But I won’t hold that against the relationship between the two characters.

When we first see Bob and Antoine as a pair, they are in prison together, and join a “crew” assembled by the criminal known as Tombstone (also, Big Ben is there, but we don’t need to worry about him now). We’re not told if this is the first time Bob and Antoine have met, but they don’t seem to get along well. I posit maybe they knew each other and even worked together, got caught, and blame each other. That would certainly cause some tension between them.

That story came and went until, suddenly, fourteen years later, another comic depicted the two together. This time, it was just a single panel (but a better comic). Bob and Antoine, both out of prison at this point, were just talking about developments in the superhero/villain community. We have no way to know if this was their first time catching up since prison, or if they’ve stayed in touch all along.

But what I do know is that Bob and Antoine make a good pair of friends. Antoine, like Bob, is a low-level supercrook who is pretty ridiculous on the surface and is routinely mocked for it. The main difference between them is that Antoine is never embarrassed by it. In his way, Antoine has a lot more self-respect than Bob. He’s more socially active, he is comfortable being himself, and unlike Bob, Antoine definitely fucks.

They’re a great contrasting pair. I’d like to see their relationship continue to shine in what few appearances these chumps get. Heck, make ’em roommates, sharing a supervillain lair because neither makes enough to afford one on their own.

I mean, why not?

Time flows so quickly that I was surprised to learn that it has been more than two months since I officially announced I was making a game called Surrounded By Danger. But in those two months, progress has continued and I can say that I think the basic mechanics of the game are nearly complete. There is only a little fine-tuning left to account for balancing issues and the like. Otherwise, this is a completely functional cooperative board game that I have playtested with four other people, not including myself. It genuinely works.

But, unfortunately/extremely fortunately, something has changed since the last time I wrote on the topic. I delved into research on other cooperative board games and learned a lot about what exists in the genre these days. What I learned changed this project entirely: there are board games that now attempt to tell ongoing persistent stories. I got very into the idea, and I very much am now working on a Story Mode for Surrounded by Danger. It’s going well! I’ve even tested it! And while it may not be as developed as the basic mechanic yet, but it’s coming along.

Another bit of progress that has occurred is less good news. I had really, really wanted to release this game with the subtitle “An Urban Beekeeping Simulator” because it would greatly amuse me to do so. But cooler heads have convinced me that this would give potential players an incorrect view of what the game is about. Is it my fault that the populace at large doesn’t know that Beekeepers are all about fighting crime and investigating supernatural threats? No, I’ve done everything in my power to prove this to them. But the more people who come into the game, the more will learn about the greatness of Beekeepers, so I guess I should do this right.