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Big Numbers and Battle Cries – Tenra Bansho Zero Review
In the vast and varied world of Tabletop Roleplaying Games, you’ll find just about any genre has a dedicated system. In the case of anime, nothing better matches the over-the-top action and unparalleled style that you get from Tenra Bansho Zero. The game’s acronym, TBZ, even invokes classic Shonen like Dragon Ball Z (DBZ). TBZ was written and published in the early 2000s by Japanese artist and game designer Junichi Inoue and originally released simply as Tenra Bansho, or alternatively “Everything in Heaven and Earth.” The game proved popular enough to grow a cult following and eventually led to a Kickstarter for an updated and translated version of the game which we’re talking about now.
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Yu-Gi-Oh Top 5 Absurd Anime Archetypes
For more than two decades, Yu-Gi-Oh! has been a staple of TCGs along with the likes of Magic the Gathering, and over the many years we’ve seen all sorts of cards get released. However there’s something that should be said about the cards which aren’t publicly available, this is the case for a lot of cards and monsters that are created in Yu-Gi-Oh!’s own anime but to this day have neither been printed nor digitally preserved in Master Duel. These monsters are interesting to look back on, typically incredibly specific monsters that are designed to match the over-the-top obsession of some one episode antagonist.
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Going beyond D&D: Tabletop Games for Gamers growing bored of 5th Edition
Wizards of the Coast’s famous tabletop RPG has remained the most popular Role-Playing system for nearly a decade, with its streamlined rules and increasing accessibility through resources such as D&D Beyond and Roll20, it’s no wonder that the name “Dungeons and Dragons” is becoming synonymous with Tabletop Role-Playing Games. However, where D&D provides a good pool for new players to kick their feet and learn to swim in, inherently it’s limited in the kind of game that you might want to run. The worlds of Dungeons and Dragons may be myriad but eventually there’s only so much that you can homebrew into a system. So with OneD&D still just a growing light on the horizon, what better time to branch out and explore the rest of the Tabletop Gaming space?
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All Hail the King of Hate – An Essayette
All hail the King of Hate. Darksydephil was a Youtuber from YouTube’s hay day when you could gain fame off of playing video games with crappy cameras pointed at your CRT television, where the glare would cover up 1/3rd of the screen. Phil called himself the King Of Hate, an auspicious title he gained from his years in the fighting game community, a hotbed of toxic salt where he made it his personality to shout insults and profanity. Hatred permeated the man’s every fiber of being, it compelled him to slam his controller into a table whenever it didn’t respond to his commands at once. The King of Hate, tyrant of wicked acts, title more appropriate to the response he received from all those who beheld his self-appointed royal visage.
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A Love Song in Binary
H
What does it mean to be human? A question I’ve always asked myself, because humanity loves its complicated existences. We must look beyond the flesh and organs which we share with many mammals of our world. Every time I look in the mirror I not only see a reflection of myself, but a reminder that there is some quality of existence in me that makes me an individual, that makes me human. Perhaps it’s having that thought that makes someone human.
[The first thought begins with a single line of code, a single letter]
01001000
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The Eye of the Universe
Image created using Craiyon The eye of the universe gazes into forever, it sees the good, the bad, the rises and falls. The eye of the universe stares down on a dying star, watches as it explodes, consuming the system around it and leaving trails of stardust. It turns its gaze to a spaceship, cluelessly buzzing around many different planetoids exasperatedly searching for the correct one to land on because the co-pilot forgot the map. It turns once more and gazes at a pale blue dot, on that dot is a boy desperate to ask the universe a question, “do you see me?” The eye of the universe wishes it could answer, only reality didn’t see fit to give it a mouth. The eye of the universe gazes into forever, it is a thankless job.
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The Winds of the Ecclesiasphere: Chapter One
This is the first chapter of a story that I’m currently working on, titled: The Winds of the Ecclesiasphere.
I thought I must’ve been dead, I was unconscious for so long that I was starting to dream, and I ended up dreaming my entire life up to this point. Gray Guthrie, born 2022 to Francis and Holly Guthrie. I am 26 years old. I was born with gray eyes, the doctor told my parents they would probably change as I got older -they never did- but that didn’t stop them from naming me Gray anyway. I could see my life blur right past me, early childhood where I would sit in the sandbox making castles only for them to collapse from the breeze. I learned a lesson that day, nothing ever lasts forever. In the split second, I was already past my High School years, getting into College and learning engineering so I could be an astronaut. I spent those years working in my room, drawing and reading blueprints. It was after college when I met Zora, the first person who I truly fell in love with. They were amazing, smart and loving, but as I remembered them, I also remembered what came next. I remembered the nights of crying in my mind, the lethargy that kept me from leaving my bed, and the many days where I just couldn’t stand living in such a loud and difficult world. I remember seeing them reach in to drag me out, but I was too afraid that my grip would be too powerful and that I would drag them in with me instead. In that moment I could hear my own voice clear as day, “They’re better off without me, I may as well shoot myself off into space.”
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The Cliffs of Kaffe
Image Prompt Created with Craiyon The disc spun unevenly, its typical hum had a peculiar warble to it due to the ramshackle nature of its current operation. The Castaway had, at best, a rudimentary level understanding of Orbital Disc Flier engineering and operating, and thus his repairs could only possibly hold for as long as it stays in the air. There was something in the atmosphere around Kaffe-7 that just attracted people to it, literally, ships were sucked into the cliffs like moths to a flame. The Castaway was lucky to have survived the crash, very lucky that the atmosphere of Kaffe-7 was habitable, and incredibly lucky that this particular ship was less damaged than the others. The only trouble now was getting it out of the planet’s atmosphere and back to his home planet.
The lights in the ship blinked red in an infrequent pattern as the twice-salvaged power cower struggled to divide its remaining energy evenly, the silver metal floors and walls shook violently as the disc pushed itself through the heavy clouds in the sky. The Castaway looked up at the screens, watching in excitement as the clouds parted to reveal the open sky ahead of them, the edge of the atmosphere swiftly approaching… only for the Castaway to suddenly hear a heavy groaning sound from the walls around them. The Castaway fell to their knees, they could feel the ship falling and could see the clouds rushing past him on the screen. They could see the walls around them coming closer, all creaking to encase them in a small silver prison.
Some day the universe may discover the truth of the cliffs of Kaffe-7, but until then, that natural magnet deposit will remain the death of many space travelers.
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Welcome to The Oubliette!
Hello dear reader!
I am Chester Carlson and I welcome you to The Oubliette, the metaphorical dungeon where I lock myself and let my voice echo beyond the trapdoor at the top and into the ears of any who might be passing by. All of this is fancy talk to mean that I will be posting to this blog for whomever takes an interest in my writing.
I am a writer, an aspiring author with a fascination of strange and fantastical tales. I primarily write science fiction or fantasy but I don’t consider myself one for strict genre labels. This blog will serve as a repository for my writing, updates on projects or whatever ramblings that I can form together into a coherent idea.
For now I only bid you welcome, and hope that you enjoy the content that I produce.
The Oubliette 