The End of the World As We Know It

Hey, hey and whattaya say!

How ya doing?  Great to see ya!  So glad ya stopped by!  How's the family?  How's work?  Sorry to hear that.  What's that?  What have I been working on?  Well, since ya asked...

Right now I'm working on a series of stories to post up on the Kindle Store at Amazon.  It's a science fantasy adventure series that takes place is a weird post-apocalyptic world.  What's weird about it?  Well, nowadays post-apoc is full of zombies, mine isn't.  Why not?  Well, I'm a child of the 70's and 80's, and when I was a kid, the post-apocalyptic world had more than just zombies.  Let me explain...

I think the first time I was exposed to the idea of a post-apocalyptic world was in the Saturday morning cartoon show Thundarr the Barbarian.  

Thundarr was a Conan-style barbarian in a ruined world full of mutants, magic, and super-science.  Thundarr was armed with his trusty Sun-Sword, a lightsaber knock-off.  He had two stalwart travelling companions:  Princess Ariel, an enchantress and daughter of a wizard; and Ookla the Mok, a burly cat-man mutant.  

Thundarr and his companions travel around the ruined country fighting against evil Wizards and their legions of Robots and Mutants as they try to enslave tribes of un-mutated human survivors.  

Each episode had weird mutant animals, ruins of identifiable landmarks, and machinery powered by magic.  The humans always lived in ruined buildings or primitive huts, while the evil Wizards always had a hi-tech stronghold.  There were very few guns (if any) but there were some magic wands that shot laser bolts, uh, I mean bolts of magic I guess.


The next time I encountered the concept of the post-apocalypse was in a catalog of other products by TSR Hobbies.  It was a small catalog booklet that came in my sister's D&D boxed set.  It was in this catalog that I first learned of the existence of the Gamma World Role Playing Game.  

Sadly, I never got play Gamma World.  I never even got to own any of the books,  But I learned what I could about it, it was full of mutant people, mutant animal-men, mutant animals, mutant plants, and robots galore!  Mutants; whether they were human, animal, or plant; were capable of having terrible deformities and/or weird powers.  Apparently characters start off with primitive medieval-style weapons, but through their adventures can find and use more advanced weapons, armor, vehicles, and random little appliances that you don't know how to use.  

It sounded VERY Thundarr.  I was entranced.  

Of course, today all these old supplements are available as digital downloads.  Also, there are new games, like Mutant Future, which are based and heavily inspired by the old Gamma World game.  I'm proud to say that I own an actual physical copy of Mutant Future, and that I have collected several digital files of past versions of Gamma World...and it's all I thought it was and more!  But you know what?  I still haven't played it!

But that's not all!  Like I said, I was a child of the 70's and 80's, and that means "post-apocalyptic" was an actual genre in the movies!  Thanks to this slew of cinematic treats, we all knew that a post-apocalyptic world would be Terrible And Silly!  But we'll wait and talk about that next time!  Until then I wish you...

Good Adventuring!
Timothy A. Sayell