Yo, just a quick update for any regular readers who may recall my ‘Plans For 2016’ post. Obviously that went out the window as I haven’t brought anything new to the table since July. Life got busy, sorry mate. I’ve not forgotten about you though, so here’s what’s shaking. Things are moving forward slowly. Chris Mcgreevy is still working behind the scenes on the site rebuild. Hopefully we’ll be able to shift over to the new format by early Summer.And whilst I have not been active with the blog over the past six months, we have been busy on some affiliated projects

Despite it’s ‘rugged’ audio qualities our podcast Dungeonpunx has been racking up a ton of listens. Thanks for all the support, we all really appreciate that. We try to keep it light and a fun listening experience. I know sometimes it can get kinda rowdy with six five clowns bawling at each other trying to get the next rip in. I try to keep them boys under control but it’s like herding cats man, trust.

We upgraded our recording set up after Episode 1 and that’s definitely improved the sound quality. I know those early episodes are unlistenable in places but hey man,the Raw Deal demo was a bit rough in places too so suck it up buttercup. However, the condenser mic we had been using made it virtually impossible to boost individual levels. In an effort to improve that situation (and turn Boardy the fuck down) we just forked out a bunch of cash for some XLR individual microphones. I am hoping this will mean that solid material no longer gets lost in the general racket and the whole thing becomes easier on the ears of our listeners. We really have a lot of fun doing the show and moving forward I want future episodes to sound a touch more professional. I can accept that not everyone in the podcasting world appreciates low fi black metal production values or the audio mix on the first Hatebreed demo so this is us trying to compromise.

We love feedback and if you like what we are doing or can think of suggestions of how we can improve the show please leave us a review on Itunes Believe it or not that stuff actually encourages people to check out the pod and word of mouth helps boost our reach. Likewise if you wanna get involved we’ve been building up a decent little community over on Facebook, check it out HERE

To absorb some of the cost of the microphones we’ll be releasing a new T-shirt Dungeonpunx design shortly. You should know by now that we don’t churn out that lame shit brah, our gear is quality and I really hope you get a kick out of this one. Once again Rich Nerdgore did the business. It’ll be available for pre-order soon but here’s a preview of the design. Get at me if you are feeling that Fat Willy’s Surf Shack vibe.

Now that boring old guff is out of the way, let’s take a look back at something that always makes me feel warm and slightly nauseous inside…when gaming tried to mainstream! For younger readers, try to imagine what life was like in the stone age before the internet, when I was a boy. See back when I was a young turk, D&D and Warhammer and all that cool stuff always had the same kinda underground appeal that drew me towards punk rock and bezzing around on a BMX and listening to metal or whatever. It was something kinda esoteric that you had to scratch around to find.That all went out the window when Gee Dubya and MB Games teamed up and grozzed Heroquest and Space Crusade into the ad break between Wide Awake Club and Motormouth.

I guess they were trying to push things forward and reach out to the more vanilla of my snot nosed schoolmates. For me it was a double edged sword. Sure this exposure had it’s benefits. I mean you could get expansion packs in Argos and when my Mam burst in on me tanning through the ladies underwear section of the Littlewoods catalogue I made sure to have my free hand wedged in the page that featured Heroquest and Space Crusade and Key To The Kingdom. It didn’t occur to me that my mother might be more disturbed to see her estranged son nursing a lil chubber whilst intently studying the weekly repayment options on roleplaying games, but I digress. The downside however was now more people were aware of it, some of the shine came off of it for me. I know that sounds precious as fuck but to analogise it was a bit like when Hatebreed put out Perseverance and suddenly all the wooly hats and smellies from Jillys Rockworld start showing up at hardcore gigs. No mate. Anyhow lets take a look at that Heroquest advert…….

Terrifying stuff I’m sure you’ll agree. So terrifying in fact that no one wanted to play it with me and ( I can’t believe I’m telling you this) that in order to play the game I was reduced to setting it all up on my bedroom floor and then playing as every character AND THE DUNGEONMASTER TOO HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. I would literally move round the table taking each characters turn whilst trying to outwit myself as the adversary.I cannot confirm or deny that I affected a special voice for each character……..

Shortly after Heroquest blew up the spot we got Space Crusade. I received it for Christmas the very year it came out and tried to convince my younger sister to actually play the game once with me. She wasn’t arsed at all, so I did what everyone else did and despondently absorbed the snap-fit figures into my collection to bolster the ranks of my Space Hulk Terminators and have a right war. In this instance ‘a right war’ much like my games of Heroquest was a terribly sad and haunting experience. How about that Genestealer though? *sob*

At least MB/GW threw some cash into making their product look a little bit exciting right? There’s monsters and dramatic lighting and some threatening music and a desirable peer group with good hair cuts. None of those qualities are evident in this little ripper from TSR for the greatest game of all time Dungeons & Dragons. Honestly Gary, what were you thinking?

To conclude my glorious return to Corehammer I’d like you to take a few moments to drink in this advert for the classic cyberpunk RPG Shadowrun. I’d not seen this before so shout out to Boardy for sticking it under my nose. Surely this is the gold standard for RPG advertising? More Cinema Verite than commerical!!! If any of you freaks have got this beat be sure to link up some vids for me to peep in the comments. It’s good to be back.I love you all.x