The Greatest Warriors of the Westeros- #10 Daemon Targaryen, the Rogue Prince

 

Matt Smith as Daemon Targaryen in House of the Dragon (HBO)

 

Daemon Targaryen is one of the most compelling warriors in the history of the Seven Kingdoms. Charismatic, daring, and exceptionally skilled in battle, he was also reckless, ambitious, and often impossible to control. That combination makes him both fascinating and difficult to place cleanly on a list like this but yet he ranks at #10 by my estimation.

Background

The younger brother of King Viserys I, Daemon spent much of his life chafing against the limits placed on him. He was a knight of proven skill, a former commander of the City Watch, a veteran of the Stepstones, and eventually a key figure in the Dance of the Dragons. He rode the dragon Caraxes, carried the Valyrian steel sword Dark Sister for a time, and cultivated a reputation as a man who would rather fight than talk.

Where Aemon the Dragonknight represented the ideal of knighthood, Daemon represented something closer to the opposite: a warrior who lived for the fight itself and rarely let honor get in the way of what he wanted.

The Warrior

Daemon’s skill at arms is not seriously in question. He was a dangerous man in single combat and even more dangerous when mounted on Caraxes. His campaigns in the Stepstones showed a commander who could be both bold and effective, carving out a temporary kingdom through sheer force of will and personal courage. During the Dance he continued to prove himself in the field, most notably in the fighting around Harrenhal and in the final confrontation at the God’s Eye against Aemond Targaryen.

What sets Daemon apart is the combination of personal combat ability and the willingness to take enormous risks. He did not fight cautiously. He fought to win, and he was usually willing to put himself in the thick of it to make that happen and consequences be damned.

The Darker Side

Daemon’s reputation is complicated by his character. He was charming when it suited him and ruthless when it did not. His treatment of his first wife, his ambition for the throne, and his general disregard for consequences make him a hard man to admire even when his skill is obvious. He is not a pure knight in the mold of Aemon or Arthur Dayne. He is something more dangerous: a highly capable warrior who answered primarily to himself.

He fits that middle ground in the Song of Ice and Fire, not good, not evil but something in-between. Martin calls him his favorite character and morally gray are likewise a hit with Martin so it stands the reason he is featured prominently.

Why He Belongs

Daemon earns a high place on this list because the record of his ability is strong and relatively close in time compared to older legends. So much so a plausible argument can be made that he could be anywhere from #5 to #10 on the Greatest Warriors of the Westros list.

He was a proven fighter, a dragonrider of note, and a man who repeatedly put himself in situations where lesser warriors would have failed. The fact that he was also ambitious and often destructive does not erase the skill.

Addtionally, Daemon leads forces for the Blacks in the Dance of Dragon and is capable in addition to having served as the Commander of the Gold Cloaks in Kings Landing. 

He is not the purest knight on the list. He may not even be the most likeable. But as a warrior, pure and simple, Daemon Targaryen stands among the best the Targaryen dynasty ever produced.

In the end #10 suits him in my opion; that is no slight either. It's simply a reflection of how good those are at #1-9 on the list. 

How about you, thoughts on Daemon Targaryen? 

Escape from New York as an RPG Setting

Be honest, this movie kicked ass and you've watched multiple times. 

I know I did. 

"Call me Snake..."

Escape from New York is one of those movies that just feels like a role-playing game waiting to happen. I mean it oozes it!

You’ve got a sealed-off island turned maximum-security prison. No guards on the inside, just the worst of the worst left to sort it out among themselves. Gangs with their own turf, their own rules, and their own hierarchies. A President who crashes into the middle of it. And one man: Snake Plissken, dropped in with a ticking clock and almost no support. The whole thing is already structured like a mission brief.

What makes it sing for an RPG is the pressure. Everything is against the clock. Resources are scarce. Trust is a liability. The map itself is hostile. You can run it as a pure extraction job, a longer campaign of surviving and carving out power inside the prison city, or something in between. The tone stays grim, cynical, and a little absurd in that early-80s way — which is perfect.

It also scratches the same itch a lot of us got from older Warhammer and dystopian games: a world that’s already gone to hell, and the only question left is how you move through it without becoming just another body on the street.

System recommendations (in my order of preference):

1.  Twilight 2000 (especially the Free League edition) The strongest pure fit. Collapsed society, scarce resources, armed factions, and small groups of competent but very mortal people trying to finish a job and stay alive. You barely need to hack it, just turn Manhattan into the wasteland and keep the ticking clock.
2. Mothership (or a light hack of it) Fast, brutal, and excellent at making every decision feel dangerous. The stress and panic mechanics would map cleanly onto the constant threat of the island.
3. Shadowrun (older editions, stripped down) Good if you want more gear, street politics, and faction play. Tone down the magic and cyberware and lean into the scavenged, jury-rigged tech of the film.
4. Old-school D&D / OSR with heavy house rules Sometimes the simplest systems get out of the way and let the setting do the work. Treat the gangs like rival warbands and the city like a massive, hostile dungeon.
1. A sub thought of sorts here, perhaps Top Secret. I'm not entirely sold on that but it has merit. 
5. Year Zero Engine (Mutant: Year Zero or a Forbidden Lands-style hack) Strong at resource management, faction play, and the slow grind of survival in a ruined environment.  

Any of those could work. The key is keeping the session tight, the clock visible, and the city itself as much of an enemy as the people in it.

Snake Plissken never asked to be a hero. That’s exactly why the setting works. Expand it out, if NYC is turned into a massive prison and an a Alliance between the USSR and China in a war against the USA is going on? To say nothing of crime being up 400%? Twilight 2000 might just win as a system by default in a walk off...

As a one off, or maybe a mini campaign if the PCs escape the island? Escape from New York provides a great starting point. Sounds all kinds of awesome.

NOTE: from time to time I pose these as questions about settings, like with Late Rome or Middle Earth after the Fall of Sauron to name a few here on the blog.

Not Enough Hours in the Day, Gold and Glory- the Ezine of Dogs of War

Ahhh… the Dogs of War. Everyone’s favorite mercenary scum in Warhammer.

If the Chaos Dwarfs were the lost children of Warhammer Fantasy Battle for years, then the Dogs of War were… well, I’m not entirely sure. They lingered. After the Chaos Dwarfs were removed from the game, Dogs of War at least got a PDF army list that served as something official. So rather than being cut abruptly like the Chaos Dwarfs, they just sort of hung around on the edges.

Wind the clock back to the early years of Chaos Dwarfs Online (2007–2009). I was an admin there. The forums back then were hopping, as were the forums for every other faction. Skaven had The Underempire, Chaos Warriors had Chamber of the Everchosen; you get the point. If there was a faction in the game, someone had spun up a forum for it.

All of that except Dogs of War.

There was a site I stumbled across and quickly became a mod on called The Tavern. That mod, Baumann, and I set out and created Dogs of War Online. That was 2009. Dogs of War Online in turn led to the creation of the ezine Gold and Glory, despite the fact that I wasn’t even a Dogs of War player. From the start the site was a sister site to Chaos Dwarfs Online, and Xander helped me with a few areas of web design I wasn’t familiar with.

Creating an ezine would have been a solid achievement on its own. Doing it while also producing the Chaos Dwarf ezine The Word of Hashut was borderline madness.

And I think that’s really where the crux of the issue with Gold and Glory lay. It wasn’t that the ezine was bad. It was simply a case of me being stretched too thin. Young family, dog, two jobs, admin of two sites — it didn’t leave a lot of time for much else. People would ask how I managed it. The honest answer is that I didn’t sleep much. I also didn’t paint nearly as much during at times, especially when one of the two ezines was in production.

Looking back, Gold and Glory wasn’t bad. It just suffered from not enough hours in the day. Unlike Chaos Dwarfs Online and The Word of Hashut, there also wasn’t the same desperate energy behind it. Chaos Dwarf players had to create everything because there was no official support. Dogs of War at least had that quasi-official PDF list to lean on.

Looking ahead, I’ve spun up a new Dogs of War site. But much like life repeating itself, I haven’t had as much time as I’d like (dealing with elderly parents will do that). History repeating?

If you’ve never read Gold and Glory, all of the issues can be found here and are free.

Let me know what you think! 

To Big to Fail? How TSR and Kodak Mirrored Each Other

Two companies more alike than at first glance...

Growing up outside of Rochester, NY, I heard some variation of this from Kodak and in the media over and over:

• "We have fifty years of film."
• "We have decades of film left."
• "We have 50 years of paper."
• "The world will always need photographic paper."

Whether it came from high-level Kodak executives or somewhere else in the local conversation, it did not matter. They did not have fifty years. They barely had five.

Kodak kept talking about how their bread and butter would continue to power them into the future despite the rise of digital cameras and then ultimately smartphones. This was the same company that had created the first digital camera in 1975. My dad worked at Kodak in 1975 and actually saw that camera back then. They invented the future and then spent the next couple of decades trying to protect the past instead of owning what they had built.

In 1980 one also has to wonder if TSR was thinking along the same lines. There were competitors, sure, but nothing that looked strong enough to knock them off their perch. D&D was the eight-hundred-pound gorilla of the RPG world. From the outside it looked permanent.

But in each case they were going to fail. Some of it was their own making. Some of it was not. A good portion was just plain hubris. It is eerie how both companies sat at the absolute pinnacle of their respective markets and then felt like Icarus flying too close to the sun.

So what does this have to do with gaming? A lot, really. I am mainly talking about TSR here, but first a quick overview of Kodak.

Kodak was founded in 1880 in Rochester, New York by George Eastman. In time they came to define photography itself. By their zenith around 1980 they were a world-renowned brand that seemed untouchable. Then came the early 1990s and a series of missteps, ill-advised moves to diversify, and the decision to spin off the parts that would actually prove more valuable later (namely Eastman Chemical). Their fall and shortsightedness were staggering. The company that had once owned the image of everyday life slowly lost the plot.

Then there is TSR. From starting up at Gary’s house and in his basement to produce the first 1,000 wood-grain Basic sets to later revised editions to eventually 1st Edition Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. By the early 1980s TSR and more specfically D&D was a juggernaut with two distinct lines and grossing something like 26 million in 1983 and had risen to the pinnacle of the RPG landscape by the early 1990s. For a while it felt like the hobby revolved around Lake Geneva.

In both cases the 1990s would not be kind. TSR would not make it out alive. They were purchased by Wizards of the Coast and effectively gone thereafter. Check out this "article" from the "ancient years" on the internet!

It is said that hindsight is 20/20, but I am going to pull in another famous quote from none other than Steve Jobs: "If we do not cannibalize our products, someone else will." That certainly describes Kodak. The question is how well it describes TSR.

Even in the 1980s TSR was already attempting to diversify into other hobby areas (needlepoint, anyone?). Meanwhile Kodak spun off the parts that would turn out to be successful later. The situations were not identical, but the type of decision-making feels uncomfortably close. Both companies made choices that protected the old model a little too hard and failed to fully embrace what was coming next (moreseo in Kodak's case). In the end those choices helped doom them.

It is eerie how closely these two stories run parallel to each other. Both companies stood at the absolute peak of their industries in the 1980s. Both failed to fully adapt when the ground started shifting under them. And both saw the 1990s become the decade of their long decline and eventual demise. One was bought out and absorbed. The other never really recovered its former place. Different industries, same basic arc of hubris, missed chances, and a future that arrived faster than either was ready for.

Am I off on this? Lets here from those especially in my neck of the woods, does this sound familiar to you? 

Dungeon Magazine #10- Threshold of Evil – Old School AD&D Thoughts and a Review

Dungeon Magazine #10- Threshold of Evil
by Scott Bennie
An adventure for 5-8 PCs, levels 14-18

The adventure that is the subject of this review is right there on the cover of the issue itself—and it’s a cool cover at that. With Dungeon #10 you might very well have one of the best issues of the magazine in terms of 1st Edition (or even 2nd Edition) adventures. All of the scenarios are excellent, with the possible exception of Monsterquest, but I digress.

Threshold of Evil is one of the best, if not the best, 1st Edition modules presented in the hallowed halls of Dungeon. In my mind it ranks right up there with Into the Fire, Wards of Witching Ways, and Trouble at Grog’s as some of the finest 1st Edition Dungeon adventures. Did I mention just how good it is?

On a personal note, Issue #10 was one of the first “back issues” of Dungeon I ever procured, and one of the first 1st Edition ones I got. I was fortunate to pick this one up when I did; it helped propel me along the path toward the full #1–81 Dungeon collection.

Overview Threshold of Evil is no cakewalk, as the suggested levels indicate. It can be played a number of different ways, and it would be interesting as a one-off just to see how different groups of characters handle the challenge. Levels 14+ is no joke, this thing can be lethal.

At 22 pages it is sufficient for many sessions of play. The maps are clear and concise, and the artwork by Daniel Horne fits the mood perfectly. The only piece of art I don’t care for is the one on page 43 that starts the adventure; from there it’s excellent. The art always struck me as evocative of Games Workshop’s Warhammer Fantasy Role-play 1st Edition style.

The Setup The heart of the module is the standard “there is a problem and we need the PCs to solve it.” The twist is that the signs are confusing and no one has any real idea why strange things are happening. The villagers (the village can be any one of your own devising) point toward Mt. Thalask and the Arch-Mage Azurax Silverhawk, who has not been seen in some 200 years. That’s a bit strange, but Magic-Users are a peculiar lot, are they not?

A bit railroady? Sure. But you take Arch-Mages where you find them and hope they’re in a good mood. Plus, don’t Arch-Mages always get blamed when something goes wrong in their neighborhood?

The module begins as a reconnaissance mission. With the judicious use of spells that characters of this level will almost certainly have access to, the party can gain solid insight into what they might encounter. There is also a scholar by the unfortunate name of Hheltus who can shed some light on Azurax’s character (or lack thereof). Through spells or the scholar, the PCs are likely to form a picture that Azurax is not a particularly nice guy...and they are right, up to a point. Rather than being rabid, frothing evil, Azurax is far more nuanced. His research into extending his life is what has been causing the problems in the countryside, specifically his Portrait of Longevity.

The Approach Once the mission is defined, it’s time to supply up and head for Mt. Thalask. There is one major problem: his lair sits atop a 12,000-foot mountain. To make matters worse, Azurax has shut off the "easy" methods of travel: no fly, no teleport, no shadow walk, etc. The only way is up the mountain the hard way: climbing. So time to bust out that copy of the Wilderness Survival Guide!

At the summit the PCs encounter a tower, but it’s only a façade containing the first Simulacrum. This fight is relatively easy and serves mainly to make the party a bit cocky.

Inside the Complex Once the complex is breached, the real adventure begins. The living spaces on the upper levels are strangely devoid of monsters and traps. This is also where the party first meets Florimel (or rather, a Simulacrum of her) and can gain a bit of knowledge.

Descending deeper, things heat up. Level 2 contains more living areas packed with interesting details and yet another Simulacrum (this time of Lord Fell). Level 3 is where the first major battle can take place, or not, depending on the actions of the PCs. Slaadi and the most powerful simulacrums of Azurax and Lord Fell await here, along with the portals.

Level 4 brings more living spaces and a chance to meet the real Florimel and learn of her plight. From there the throne room becomes accessible, offering the possibility of parley with the real Azurax and a host of his (and Lord Fell’s) simulacrums.

From this point the module can go in any number of directions. I’ll leave the possible outcomes out of this review to preserve some suspense.

Strengths This could easily become a slug-fest, but it doesn’t have to. Everything depends on how the players approach the situation. Remember: Azurax is not (yet) truly evil. He is more of an “ends justify the means” type. The PCs could have real problems if they simply waltz in and start slaughtering the occupants, after all, what hard proof do they really have beyond the misgivings of a crusty old sage?

The portals are excellent. Who doesn’t love a good series of one-way magical portals? If one player goes through (and it usually happens sooner or later), the rest eventually follow. These portals make fantastic hooks for alternate campaign worlds—or dramatic ways to end a campaign.

The use of Florimel is another strong point. An enterprising DM could build an entire campaign around the events on Azurax’s mountain and her eventual return to the Faerie Realm. (For those unfamiliar, pick up Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene, as noted in the adventure itself.)

The creative use of the simulacrum spell is brilliant. Before this module I had never really considered using it multiple times. After reading Threshold of Evil, I never looked at the spell the same way again. It lets the designer put some of the toughest possible foes (classed NPCs) in front of the party without the risk of the PCs walking away with a mountain of magic items. The same technique is applied not only to Azurax but to Lord Fell and Florimel as well.

Azurax looks to be a tad grumpy here...

Azurax himself is loaded with potential. If thwarted, he makes an excellent recurring villain. Best of all, he is not the tired “rabid world-conquering mad mage” trope. He has little interest in ruling the world and is far more focused on himself.

The Portrait of Longevity is a great hook with a slightly Renaissance flavor that may feel a bit disjointed in a strictly High Medieval setting, but it works well here. I especially like how Azurax disguises the true portrait among many others of himself.

The inclusion of Slaadi is another plus. Some people bag on the Fiend Folio, but not me. These guys are cool, and because they are not evil, some of the party’s usual defenses may not be at full strength.

Finally, the use of Wish and Phase Door to seal off easy access shows real thought. The party will burn through resources with no convenient place to rest and recuperate.

Weaknesses There are a few areas where a total party kill is dangerously easy, most notably the confrontation in the throne room. Even a savvy, experienced group of high-level characters can get caught flat-footed here. DMs should be prepared.

If the party defeats Azurax through pure force, the magical loot can become excessive. In practice this is unlikely if Azurax is played intelligently; he is far too smart to let that happen easily.

One minor nitpick that has always nagged me: the living spaces feel a bit small for a complex perched 12,000 feet up a mountain. Boredom alone might have done in some of the human occupants long before the PCs arrived. It’s a small point, but it’s there.

Closing Thoughts I really had to stretch to find even those few weaknesses. This magazine is well worth seeking out for this adventure alone. It can serve as a springboard for multiple alternate campaigns, further high-level adventures, deadly consequences, and a memorable high-level antagonist. You can’t really ask for much more than that.

Is there anything I missed? Have you or your group ever played Threshold of Evil? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

The original review can be found here on Dragonsfoot.

On Her Majesty's Secret Service - We Have All the Time in the World

Out of the twenty-six Bond films (yes, I include Never Say Never Again in that), I think the very best is On Her Majesty's Secret Service. And if it isn't number one, it's certainly in the Top Five.

That opinion may surprise some people because it isn't the first film that usually comes to mind. I know... sacrilege, right? How can a Sean Connery Bond movie not be the best?

Interestingly, this opinion has become far less unusual over the last couple of decades. For many years, On Her Majesty's Secret Service was treated as something of an oddity in the Bond canon, a movie remembered mostly for being the one without Connery. However, as audiences and critics have revisited the film, its reputation has grown significantly. Today, many longtime Bond fans rank it alongside classics such as From Russia with Love, Goldfinger, Casino Royale, and License to Kill as one of the strongest entries in the entire series.

So while it may not be the first Bond film many people name, it is no longer a fringe opinion to argue that On Her Majesty's Secret Service belongs among the very best.

While I think Connery was excellent in the role, I'm not convinced he was the best Bond. That honor might actually belong to Timothy Dalton, but that's a discussion for another day.

At the time, George Lazenby had the impossible task of replacing Connery as 007. A near-complete unknown, it would be his only outing as the British super-spy, but what an outing it was.

I won't go too deeply into the story in case anyone reading this hasn't seen the film, but I will say this: On Her Majesty's Secret Service presents perhaps the most human depiction of James Bond in the entire series.

The action has also aged remarkably well. Nearly all of the skiing, car chases, and fight scenes rely on practical effects and real stunt work, giving the film an authenticity that many modern action movies struggle to match.

And then there's the villain.

Blofeld is played by none other than Telly Savalas. "Who loves ya, baby?" Oops... wrong role! But seriously, you can't go wrong with Savalas. His Blofeld is physically imposing, intelligent, and genuinely threatening.

Unlike Connery's effortlessly cool Bond or Roger Moore's more lighthearted and gadget-driven interpretation, Lazenby's Bond feels personal. He gets hurt. He doubts. He falls in love. He feels like a real person instead of an indestructible icon.

Some critics have focused on Lazenby's inexperience as an actor, and there's certainly some truth to that. Unfortunately, every performance was inevitably compared to Connery's, making the transition even more difficult. Looking back today, however, I think Lazenby deserves far more credit than he usually receives. When compared to Ian Fleming's novels, his interpretation is actually one of the closest to the Bond Fleming wrote.

Then there's Diana Rigg.

Contessa Teresa di Vicenzo, aka Tracy Bond

Wow.

Most younger viewers know her as Olenna Tyrell from HBO's Game of Thrones. Fewer realize that during the 1960s she was widely regarded as one of Britain's great screen beauties and style icons.

More importantly, Tracy isn't just another "Bond girl."

She's intelligent, independent, capable in a fight, and never feels like she's simply there to admire Bond. She challenges him emotionally in ways very few characters ever do.

And then... there's the ending.

As Bond says:

"We have all the time in the world."

It's one of the most emotional moments in the franchise and one of the reasons this film has only grown in stature over the decades.

In many ways, Diana Rigg's performance feels effortless because she brought so much of her own wit, confidence, and personality to the role. Anyone familiar with her career: from The Avengers to Game of Thrones, knows she possessed that commanding screen presence throughout her life.

Some readers may be wondering, "Tracy Bond? Who's that?"

If you've never heard of her in connection with the other Bond films, there's a reason. Watch On Her Majesty's Secret Service and you'll find out. The character is referenced in several later Bond movies, but they're subtle enough that many viewers miss them. Because On Her Majesty's Secret Service spent so many years being overlooked within the Bond canon, those references are easy to overlook as well.

So there you have it.

I think On Her Majesty's Secret Service has the strongest claim to being the greatest Bond film ever made; or, at the very least, it belongs comfortably in the Top Five.

Now of course the natural question what does this have to do with anything? Well, once again a gamer of the right age range? Top Secret of course, but even better? Victory games James Bond 007!

In a future article I'll attempt the impossible task of ranking every Bond film to determine which one truly deserves the top spot. Stay tuned.

Are you a Bond fan? If so, which Bond film do you think is the best? Let me know in the comments.

The Place Where It All Happened: My Hometown, the ’80s Hobby Scene, and the Luck of Location

I wrote about THE CAMPAIGN back in 2014: that first long, magical AD&D run that still feels like the zenith of my gaming life. About how things changed afterwards as mirrored by Stranger Things and Growing Up in the 80s.

But there’s another piece of that story I’ve been turning over lately. It’s not just when it happened. It’s where.

Rochester, New York in the 1980s wasn’t New York City. It wasn’t the Twin Cities or Chicago. It was a mid-sized industrial city with big companies (Kodak, Xerox) that hadn’t yet collapsed, a couple of strong universities (U of R and RIT); and, for a brief, perfect window, a surprisingly deep hobby scene.

That location mattered more than I appreciated at the time.

The Narrow Window

I got my Moldvay Basic Set for Christmas 1982. I wasn’t in the absolute first wave of players, but I was close enough to catch the rising tide. By the time Warhammer Fantasy Battle 3rd edition arrived in my area in early 1988, my friends and I were right in the middle of high school, the perfect age for that kind of deep, obsessive hobby dive.

The window for pre-4th edition Warhammer in the US was tiny. Maybe three and a half years. GW’s management buyout in late 1991 was already pushing things toward 4th edition. We hit the sweet spot dead center.

Change any of those variables and the whole experience changes. Born a couple years earlier and it might have been too soon, the scene wasn’t there yet. Born later and we would have only known 4th edition and beyond. But my position in my generational cohort put me exactly where I needed to be.

Why Rochester Mattered

Not every town had this. Places like say Kansas or smaller rural areas often had one (maybe) game store, if they were lucky. Rochester had 3–5 active stores at points in the late ’80s. The industrial base that hadn’t yet hollowed out, plus the colleges, created enough of a critical mass of nerds, engineers, and creative types to sustain a real hobby infrastructure.

It wasn’t a huge leap from Lake Geneva for TSR stuff, and the Games Workshop distribution pipeline reached us reasonably well in those early days. That combination: decent distribution + local density, was rarer than it felt at the time. We just didn't know it.

By the mid-’90s the scene had contracted. Crazy Egor’s (I actually know Egor/Paul; he lived my home town) became Millennium Games. A couple of other stores hung on for a time, but for a stretch it was spotty. The golden window had closed.

The Ghost of Place

Rereading my earlier posts about THE CAMPAIGN and the Citadel Giant saga, I keep coming back to how much location shaped what we got to experience. The same way the show Stranger Things uses Hawkins as more than just a backdrop, it’s part of the feeling; Rochester was part of ours.

We didn’t have the monster-of-the-week drama. We had basement tables, multiple stores to browse on weekends, friends who were all hitting that same perfect age at the same time, and a brief era when Warhammer 3rd edition felt like the center of the universe.

It wasn’t perfect. It was rough around the edges, like most real memories. But it was ours.

And like the friendships that formed around those tables, some of it faded as people moved on with life. But the place where it happened? That still feels special. I ended up back in my hometown, the same place where so much of it started. The man cave is here. The dogs are here. The memories are here.

Sometimes the luck isn’t just in the timing. It’s in the coordinates.

The Ghost of the ’80s didn’t just haunt the games we played. It haunted the town where we played them.

How about you? If you are around my age (smack dab in the middle of Gen X) does this sound familiar?