Sunday, July 10, 2011

Appendix "G": Inspirational Sources

Literature, movies, and TV have long served as inspirational sources for games (duh!). Fantasy games in particular have a well known list, created by Gary Gygax and co. that has been amended through time, but it's name has remained: Appendix N. Star Frontiers was among one TSR's early efforts at science fiction and they published a comparable list of sci-fi for that game as well.

It got me thinking that it would be nice to have an "Appendix N" for the Post Apocalyptic genre. And while there's no codified criteria, I think there are some easy ones to list, not to mention a few that I personally enjoy. So I've begun compiling a list, which also includes some of my own choices that may or may not be directly related to P.A. per se. For instance, I'm not sure Buckaroo Banzai counts as post apocalyptic, but it's certainly weird and wahoo enough that I find it inspiring. :)

I'm calling the list Appendix Gamma or Appendix G for short. I've had this on the blog for a while, but I've added several new links recently so it seemed appropriate to call it out. It's not a "complete" list (and that's also kind of on purpose since it's mainly stuff I'm looking to inspire this blog) but at least the "easy" ones are on there. Feel free to drop any other suggestions in the comments.

5 comments:

  1. The Deathlands series definitely needs to be added:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deathlands

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  2. Good suggestion. I've sort of hewed to the rule that "franchise" = 3 or more types of media. So I'll throw it under fiction in books for now.

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  3. I think Sterling Lanier's Hiero's Journey and Unforsaken Hiero are the definitive GW novels.

    Killraven and Deathlok might offer some inspiration. In films, Damnation Alley.

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  4. Great suggestions Trey. Also, how I missed Damnation Alley I'll never know--esp. since I've been reading up on it lately. I put in under movies for now since that van is so darn memorable!

    P.S. I can't find a link for the Hiero books that has a good overview. James' pulp fantasy post on Grognardia and an Amazon link will do the trick for now. Feel free to let me know if you find something better.

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  5. This is an invaluable list. Thank you.

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