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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 8364301" data-attributes="member: 27780">Polyhedron Issue 65: November 1991part 3/5Ponderously Puzzling: To go with our potion feature, we also have a potion-based logic puzzle. As with last time, you need to figure out which is the one you want, by color, smell, shape & material of the vial it's in, and position relative to the other ones, and then a process of elimination. Fortunately, there's no dragon setting the parameters this time, so you have more time to mull it over IC and take notes. This format definitely seems like it would hit diminishing returns fast if they did it every month. Surely there are other kinds of puzzles they could throw at us. The Living Galaxy: Roger recycles a topic he did several times in Dragon editorials, but in more detail. Taking your real world experiences and using them to generate game scenarios. In a sci-fi scenario, this frequently results in "planet of the hats" style worldbuilding, so you should take care to put a little more nuance in and maybe combine two or three ideas rather than just using one pretty much unchanged. This basic concept is padded out to a full 5 pages with examples this time, which is a new high for this column. As usual for these, they're not objectively bad, but I never come away from them feeling I've learned anything new. Such are the perils of being both generic & formulaic, and having a remit to write to people as if every issue is someone's first. Into The Dark: James goes for another very specific combination this month that I'm mildly surprised he found enough films to fill out. Westerns and Horror. I suppose Deadlands did quite well for itself when released a few years later. And every western is technically a horror story from the indigenous point of view. But what will the weird bits they add on be, and how well will the historical and supernatural elements blend in this selection?Curse of the Undead has some good ideas, and the actors do their best with the material they've been given, but is bogged down by over obvious telegraphing of the plot and sloppy editing. It's still an entertaining enough watch, but definitely no classic for the ages. Jesse James Meets Frankenstein's Daughter is the kind of hammy low budget ridiculousness that could never be called good, but is a fun watch precisely because of it's combination of cheapness and interestingly bad acting. More stuff to watch late at night, preferably with friends.Grim Prairie Tales is the only one this time that's actually outright good. An anthology of four shorter stories, with a fifth one as a framing device where the people involved are telling the other stories and reacting to the tales by the other one, it builds tension nicely and gradually develops the characters in an interesting way. This seems like it could have plenty worth stealing for your own horror RPG's. Ghost Town does decently but not exceptionally. There's a few strings visible on the special effects, but they're used effectively to build atmosphere and keep the viewer in a state of disorientation. The ending is a bit disappointing after all the buildup, but I guess the ride is more important than the destination. Ghost Riders gets thoroughly slated. The kind of low-budget film that barely makes it to theatrical length, yet is still slow and padded out because they didn't write enough story in the first place. The sound mix in particular sounds like they never even heard the acronym ADR. Let's hope it was at least a learning experience for all involved.</blockquote>

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