THROWBACK THURSDAY: Faking Family History

The brave solider poses with his gorgeous wife before heading off to war

Short of the amazing props made by people like the HP Lovecraft Historical Society and the contributors to the fabulous Propnomicon blog, old photographs are among the best tools to add an air of verisimilitude to role-playing games set sometime during the last century or so.

However, not everyone has a family history full of explorers, gunfighters and soldiers and this is where those rare photographic studios that offer 'olde time' pictures come in handy.

With a range of period props and costumes, you can create a slice of history - in sepia - that your family never knew it had... and then use the pictures as the basis for role-playing characters!

Timmy The Flea

Whenever I come across one of these studios, I like to take the opportunity to get dressed up and pose for an old time picture. Not only do these make for interesting 'conversation' pieces when displayed around the home (I'm beginning to sound like an advert!), but they are unique role-playing props.

It's not cheap (the last one Rachel and I had done cost £32 at the National History Museum of Wales around 20 years ago), but then again you don't find these specialist studios in every High Street or on street corners.

We're not talking about those online apps where your head gets badly Photoshopped into a fake film poster; this is the full works, as you can see from my examples above, and each one conjures up a string of stories and possible scenarios.

And I know these days you can do this via AI, but that can be very hit and miss - as well as being ethically dubious.

There used to be a photographic studio in the Trocadero Centre in London, which was stocked with Wild West and gangster costumes (Pete has a picture of him and some friends as 1920's Chicago gangsters in his stairwell), but that closed many years ago.

If you happen to stumble upon one of these places, and are looking for that special prop for your role-playing game, an 'old time' picture is a worthy investment of cash (obviously it doubles as an actual souvenir as well!)... and who doesn't like dressing up every now and again?

Timmy The Flea's Hole-In-The-Head gang portrait

Dragon Crusaders (2011)

You have to admire the unrepentant chutzpah of The Asylum for its continued use of unattributed quotes making grandiose claims on their DVD boxes.

For Dragon Crusaders, an "anonymous critic" has declared it: "an epic action adventure in the tradition of Clash Of The Titans and Reign Of Fire!"

The Reign Of Fire angle being that it features dragons and the only Clash Of The Titans (presumably the remake) connection is the use of dodgy CGI - and, to be honest, it's actually a bit better here.

Dragon Crusaders is typical, low-budget Asylum mockbuster fare, but I've always contended that their fantasy, sword-and-sorcery titles are among their best - 2006's Dragon was the first Asylum flick I saw and remains my favourite.

A group of outlawed Knights Templar are fleeing across faux-Medieval England to find a sanctuary from the pursuing soldiers of the king (who we never see and are quickly forgotten about) when they are distracted by sounds of battle in a nearby town, which is being raided by pirates.

The Templars - of course - ride in and save the day, slaying the pirates, and then heading out to the pirate ship (which looks oddly anachronistic) to finish the job.

Unfortunately, as they arrive, a captive witch - Neem (Shinead Byrne) - on the ship has just finished invoking a curse that any who set foot on the boat and have shed blood will be transformed into demonic gargoyles.

The curse has a couple of twists - first anyone affected by it, but slain before the transformation takes place, will rise as a revenant and secondly the purer the soul of the cursed the longer the transformation will take.

Dispatching the pirate-revenants with the aid of wandering warrior woman Aerona (Cecily Fay), Neem reveals that she found the curse in a grimoire she stole from the "Black Dragon" sorcerer who has her people in thrall.

And the only way to break the curse is to travel to the Black Dragon's fortress and slay him. Oh, and Faolon (Steve McTigue) is called the Black Dragon because he can transform into one and has another seven, smaller dragons under his control.

There's witchcraft, bickering, internal disputes, chaste romance and some pretty decent fight scenes (even if one of the largest, against an entire 'village' of the sorcerer's slaves, just seems to suddenly stop without any resolution) along the way and if you can ignore the plot holes, dreadful acting, cheesy dialogue and laughable attempts at banter, Dragon Crusaders is an okay film.

Welsh-location filming certainly adds to the verisimilitude, and the woodlands and sweeping, rolling landscape makes for a dramatic backdrop to the action.

A 'silent' knight turns up at one point, peppering our heroes with arrows, seemingly commanding Faolon's dragons and then challenging the lead Templar, John (Dylan Jones), to single combat... but then disappears from the story as suddenly as he appeared.

Throw in some exploding salt peter for good measure, some slick fight moves from Aerona and the Templar's resident archer (Feth Greenwood) and there's quite a bit to keep you entertained for an hour-and-a-half as long as you aren't expecting a replay of Peter Jackson's Lord Of The Rings or either iteration of Conan The Barbarian.

A New Excalibur Is Being Forged

Before Tolkien.

Before Narnia.

Before fantasy became English.

From the mist-shrouded mountains of Wales comes a forgotten origin — a myth born in the land itself.

Excalibur returns to the earliest roots of the Arthurian legend — mysterious, magical, ancient, and forged in Welsh myth.

Featuring Sylvester McCoy (Doctor Who, The Hobbit) in the official teaser. Bringing Fantasy Home to Wales. Follow the journey at www.excaliburfilm.com

Multi award-winning writer, director and producer, Dan Freeman's Excalibur, a £13 million fantasy feature drawing directly from Welsh mythological sources, has officially entered pre-production.

Written and directed by Dan Freeman (The Minister of Chance, Death Comes to Time), Excalibur tells the story behind the Arthurian legend as it appears in early Welsh tradition, including material associated with The Mabinogion, rather than later Anglo-French medieval romance.

The film aims to reclaim Arthur as a Welsh hero and place Wales at the centre of the fantasy tradition it helped inspire.

Dan said:

"We're not remaking the English version of Arthur. John Boorman did that in 1981 and it was perfect. We're going back to the source – the Welsh myths that inspired Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, and every fantasy epic that followed. This time though we’re making it in Wales, about Wales, for Wales."

You can learn more about Dan's plans, the movie, and the creators involved at the website, and even get involved and support it through a monthly subscription.