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Danger Doyle: Adventures in Saturn City
Publisher: Gallant Knight Games
by Anthony [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 07/25/2024 08:53:14

(Please forgive the wall of text, I'm having trouble figuring out how to format this review.) I am a big fan of the work of both Alan Bahr and Nicolas R. Giacondino (NRG); GKG is one of my favorite game companies, and their collabs are always a lot of fun. I've not played "Tunnel Goons", the system that the game towards the end of the book is based on, but it seems simple enough, and several people I respect consider it a good time. That said, none of this review is about the game itself: I am just talking about the product as a whole, and the (what I consider to be a) slight disservice that the description does the product. For those confused, this is, from cover to cover, a work of fiction. Much like the novel-version of, say, "The Princess Bride", where the author William Goldman presents his story of Wesley and Buttercup as though it was a story that already existed, an old tale of his heritage that his elders read to him as a child that he is cleaning up and presenting to an audience that is unfamiliar with it, instead of invented whole-cloth, Bahr and NRG have invented a comic-strip mythology and a creator of that mythology. They present it here as a labor of love, restoring what they can of lost body of work that they both appreciated as children. Taken as that, and if you're into that sort of thing (I am!), this is a fun product. Bahr's writing on the world of Danger Doyle is just like the source books for the Gallantverse/Tiny Supers; this is very similar in format, and just as fun, but it also includes a bit about the life of the fictional "creator" of Danger Doyle, Alberto Sola Lopez. It also has NRG's wonderful artwork depicting the world, at times full of beautiful alien landscapes (see the cover), NRG's classic action in others (page 7 in the sample), and other times haunting in what they DON'T show but seem to be hinting at (a broken helmet and limp hand at the bottom of page 51). The only problem here, and the reason I am giving this 4-stars instead of 5, is that I feel the description isn't doing a great job of describing the actual product. It claims to "presents a limited collection of DANGER DOYLE strips", which this doesn't actually have, unless I missed something or downloaded a corrupted file. I guess it could be correct, if the idea was that they were kind of like the Prince Valiant comics, where there's one big illustration with text beneath it, but there is no ongoing story here, the strips that most people are more familiar with from the Funny Pages or regular comics. The artwork is just (and forgive that word, "just", it's not to disparage or minimize the finished product, but I feel it does apply) a collection of illustrations. Bahr's description of the world is very good, but that isn't what the description is selling. Bahr comes clean on the fictionality of the content at the end, and there is a very touching dedication. I am happy with this product, but it was not what I was expecting when I plunked down my money. I feel that a more accurate description, even if it "ruins" the fun of the fiction right up front (much like my review is doing, I guess) would be a little more... honest, I suppose. Not to say that there was a malicious intent to deceive, but the description is a bit misleading, and thus, 4-stars. I do recommend this product, even as just a fun artifact, and a guide for a game I may never play. The descriptions are fun and the art is beautiful, and it's nice to slip into a world where Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon had a female counterpart who could hold her own, instead of just damsel distressedly.



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
Danger Doyle: Adventures in Saturn City
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