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This anthology, described on the cover as "Thirteen NEW Single Night Adventures," is a collection of short adventures based on horror films. At the time of this book's release (1990), there were actually few RPGs or supplements that played with the stock situations and clichés of horror films; GURPS Horror touched on them as part of a larger discussion of horror games, and the relatively little-known It Came From the Late, Late, Late Show (1989) (and the even littler-known Attack of the Humans from 1990) was one of the few RPGs which used horror movies as the central basis of its setting.
The introduction starts off with the header "Welcome to Camp Cthulhu!" which is a mixed blessing—while the adventures have some humorous touches, and the movies which inspired them adventures often had their share of comedy (intentional and otherwise), I didn't get the feeling in later reading that every adventure here should be approached as a goofy romp. The optional rules which make up the rest of the introduction seem to share this indecisiveness. While offering an alternative Sanity reaction table for more cinematic Temporary Insanity (Call of Cthulhu's Temporary Insanity results tend to induce instant phobias, which is not really in keeping with most movies) is a good idea, a result of hair turning white rarely showed up in non-comedic horror films. The "3-D" optional rule is pretty much "wave objects back and forth in front of players' faces until it isn't funny anymore," which shows that the writers remembered their Count Floyd but seems like a gag I would've saved for a specifically 1950s B-movie adventure. Similarly, the option to use Bud Abbott and Lou Costello (written up with cinematic stats, so that for example Costello never takes damage no matter how much he's knocked around) would only work well in adventures with a very specific tone (I just can't see them fitting into an adventure like "Horror Planet").
The adventures are presented in roughly chronological order, based on the era the story is taking place in. Note that this doesn't have anything to do with the era in which that type of film was most popular: an adventure like "Nemesis Strikes" may take place in the 1920s but the films it was inspired by are unmistakably 1970s. Each adventure follows a format comprising the Keeper's and/or Investigators' Information (background story), the actual adventure, and optionally an Epilogue, followed by writeups for NPCs and pre-generated PCs, with sample dialogue for each to help set the mood. There is also a sidebar at the beginning noting what subgenre of horror inspired the adventure's plot, as well as a list of recommended viewing.
Each adventure also has an illustration or two (nicely done by Earl Geier, who did lots of nice work for Call of Cthulhu) featuring a scene from the film, usually with a rather cheeky caption (such as werewolves approaching a building with the caption "With a huff, and a puff, and a gouge and a chew"), maps (as needed), and sidebars that are to be used as player handouts. There are a few pages in the back of the book that reproduce the handouts, but I was somewhat disappointed with those since they are exactly like the sidebars in the adventures right down to typography and layout, making me wonder why they bothered.
The thirteen adventures are as follows:
1) Uncle Timothy's Will: Presented as an example of "Haunted Ghosty Places," the adventure is a pretty straight-up Old Dark House reading-of-the-will film. The recommended viewing does not include any of the three film versions of The Cat and the Canary, even though the original stage play is the mother of the Old Dark House reading-of-the-will storyline. This is probably because Cat's menace is not supernatural in nature, but since the adventure draws so strongly from this film I would've placed it on the list. By the same reasoning Kwaidan, while one of the great Japanese ghost movies, is a fairly poor fit for the list given the adventure's overall style (if only Blood Brothers had a J-horror adventure!).
Having the house haunted by the very man whose will is being read reminded me pleasantly of The Ghoul (1933), Britain's first sound horror film (starring Boris Karloff fresh off his star turn in Frankenstein). My main problem with this adventure is that the villain (and his demise, should the PCs successfully effect it) is described rather too explicitly for the films made in this era, unless the GM chooses to run it as a period film with the sensibilities of a later era (such as the 1978 version of The Cat and the Canary).
2) Oath of Blood: This is a gangster adventure with a twist in the form of a vampire horning in on the New York Mafia's business with a new—and nasty—gang of his own. While the sidebar is naturally about vampires, the writers might've done well to throw in a few vintage gangster films such as Little Caesar or Public Enemy to help set the mood. (Innocent Blood would've been a perfect candidate for the viewing list had it not come out in 1992.) This is a fun adventure, but as with "Uncle Timothy's Will" some of the descriptions are a bit nastier than even pre-Hays Code films would have ever allowed.
3) Nemesis Strikes! I gotta admit, I like this one in spite of myself, mainly because I'm a big fan of The Abominable Dr. Phibes and Theatre of Blood, both of which are on the recommended viewing list (as a "Theatrical Madmen" adventure, the sidebar also lists the various versions of Phantom of the Opera, but the adventure is based on the Price films alone). It reads wonderfully as an example of its genre, practically feeling like a lost Vincent Price film—which is also its weakness: anyone who's seen Phibes or Theatre knows that the investigators will be helpless to interfere with the murders until it's dramatically appropriate. Even if players are willing to accept this convention of the movies, there are still too many moments where the players simply sit and listen to the GM play out a scene for them. The writers should have structured this adventure so that the players take on the roles of the victims as well as of the people vainly trying to stop Nemesis, which would at least give the players the fun of acting out a terrible death with plenty of screaming and/or thrashing about.
4) The Land That Time Ignored: This one follows the ever-popular "Lost World with Dinosaurs and Forgotten Tribes" genre, but strangely, its recommended film list does not include The Land That Time Forgot! The adventure itself follows the plots of such films in a very straightforward way, with the interesting touch that the dinosaurs are always described as resembling the puppets, stop-motion puppets, or lizards with extra bits glued onto them that the audience will see—which may or may not help with the players' attitude. (Some of the most hilarious B-movie moments come from actors who, having not seen the final shots of the monster effects, play their reactions to them with much more seriousness and intensity than the monsters ever deserved.) This one would actually be a good candidate for the Abbott and Costello (or even the 3-D) optional rules in the intro, as it's the most lighthearted adventure in the book. Expect a player who's also a Simpsons fan to try out his or her best Troy McClure impersonation.
5) The Mummy's Bride: This is a fairly straightforward mystery adventure based on the Universal Studios Mummy films of the 1930s and 1940s (the recommended films list also includes Wrestling Women vs. the Aztec Mummy, but I think that film rightly belongs in its own genre of Mexican Wrestling movies). The adventure, much like the mummy itself in those vintage films, progresses slowly—perhaps too slowly for many gamers' tastes; a few action scenes in the vein of the Stephen Sommers Mummy films would certainly liven things up. On the other hand, players who are particularly familiar with the vintage mummy films might enjoy trying to decide who to trust, as we have both a suspiciously knowledgeable Egyptian (as in the 1932 movie) and a dubious Egyptian priest (as in the 1940s movies).
6) The Dollmaker: This adventure, set in the unusual setting of a 1930s London music hall, attempts to cover the small but broadly defined group of films involving animated dolls, statues, mannequins, or ventriloquist dummies. The problem is, while all those films have the common thread of animated imitations of humans, the approach each takes is quite different. Ventriloquist dummy horror often focuses on the confusion of personalities or balance of power between the ventriloquist and his dummy (as in Magic and the ventriloquist story in Dead of Night, a film which would have fit better in this adventure's recommended film list than it does in the one for "Uncle Timothy's Will"), while mannequin and wax museum horrors usually play on the fear of people around you (or worse, you yourself) being replaced. In contrast, Killer Doll films exploit both our fear of innocence turned vicious and a more general fear of Little Scuttling Things (it should be added that the lack of Trilogy of Terror, a movie which has one of the all-time great Killer Dolls, in the recommended film list is a real mistake!).
Since the PCs for this adventure are all described as fellow performers in the music hall, with only rather tenuous plot devices bringing them in contact with toy dolls, mannequins, or wax museums, I think this adventure would have worked best if the focus was solely on the Evil Ventriloquist Dummy storyline, with the PCs attempting to save the life and sanity of their colleague while the dummy (or is it?) tries to stop them by any means possible.
7) Ancient Midget Nazi Shamans: Well, this one certainly has the best title of all the adventures... It's supposed to be based on Gremlins and related "little beasties running amok" films of the 80s (like Critters), with WWII soldiers rescuing what they think is a child who has been tortured in Nazi experiments but is in fact a member of a foul and ancient dwarfish race (think Tcho-Tchos). One of the soldiers decides to adopt "little Klaus," and bring him back to his nice suburban town in the States, with horrible consequences to come.
This adventure takes place in three parts: the rescue of Klaus, local children discovering that Klaus is not at all what he seems, and the attack by Klaus and his resurrected fellow creatures on the town. In Darren MacLennan's review of Blood Brothers, he notes that the second stage of this adventure, featuring the death of some children, seemed too harsh even for an 80s-era horror film; what's more, the children's disappearance is quickly glossed over in the plot in order to move us quickly to the Thanksgiving battle. I also think this was a mistake, and that the adventure would have benefitted by staging the takeover attempt on Halloween itself and providing the players with more children characters (there's actually only one child character in the list of pre-generated PCs) who end up bringing the fight to the midget fiends when adults are either incapacitated or shown to be ineffectual—there's a lot of potential for fun with kids in costumes fighting the Midget Nazi Shamans with improvised kid tactics, mix-ups when Midget Nazi Shamans disguise themselves in cast-off Halloween costumes, and so on.
8) Honeymoon in Hell: Innocent married couples on a cruise in the Florida Everglades in the 1940s end up running afoul of a mad scientist and his experiments. The viewing list for Mad Scientists ends up covering a broad swath—everything from Frankenstein to Altered States—but manages to leave off the adventure's major influences, Curse of the Swamp Creature and The Alligator People. This wasn't an adventure that particularly impressed me: the two things that stood out in my mind were a fairly grim description of an experimental subject which would've fit better in a more exploitative/sleazy mad science film (something along the lines of 1974's The Mutations) and an epilogue that makes the most out-of-left-field reference in the entire book.
9) Dead On Arrival: This follows the grand tradition of gut-munching zombies kicked off by George Romero in Night of the Living Dead, particularly its more humorous spinoff Return of the Living Dead (the section of the adventure titled "Send More Investigators" rams this point home). This adventure, along with "Nemesis Strikes!", really captures the feel of the movies that inspired it well—and unlike "Nemesis" it doesn't fall into the trap of having scenes unfold that the players cannot participate in. Mind you, if it's like most zombie movies the death rate will be higher than most players like...
Notably, the Keeper's Information section of this adventure is structured much more like a cutscene, and I'd recommend actually running it as a prelude, with players taking on the roles of the various Dead Meat citizens to get into the mood for the adventure to follow.
(On a side note, I'd love to know if Al Bruno, CJ Carella, or any of the other minds responsible for All Flesh Must Be Eaten ever played this particular adventure.)
10) The Swarming: Though the title suggests an adventure based on horror films with insects (giant or otherwise), it's actually about werewolves. It feels most like The Howling, where an investigative reporter (or in this case, friends of the reporter wondering what happened to him) find themselves facing the threat of an organized group of werewolves and their plans for the locals. In the end, it's a basic siege situation that would make for a good evening's gaming. The subplot about the head werewolf wanting to make the townsfolk more vulnerable by lacing the water supply with a large quantity of LSD didn't really go anywhere for me, but a throwaway moment in the story's epilogue—a werewolf offering someone a sandwich with head cheese he made himself—coupled with the name of the place the PCs will stay at through much of the adventure (the Red Fox Inn) suggested that the writers might have considered a subplot based on a completely different subgenre of horror... which could have made for a more interesting (and gruesome) payoff.
11) Spawn of the Deep: This is our Fish People adventure, and while the film list includes Creature From the Black Lagoon and its sequels, the adventure is almost a dead-on RPG retelling of Roger Corman's infamous Humanoids from the Deep—which, being a film less well known for its quality than for its onscreen monster rapes, well... yes. Um. I didn't find this adventure particularly inviting to run or play, but your mileage may vary.
12) Trick or Treat: This is the shortest adventure in the book—a mere four pages—and is a somewhat slasher-film-esque adventure featuring an evil Druid taking his revenge on the teens who disrupted a sinister ritual and caused his death. The viewing list for this adventure is pretty interesting, running the gamut from The Wicker Man (the original, thank goodness!) to the hilarious The Devil's Rain, although the adventure doesn't feel much like any of them (I would be tempted to loosely link it to Pumpkinhead or maybe Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers had the latter film not come out in 1995). It boils down to a face-off between the PCs and the druid (whose soul is bound in a tough old oak tree) and his army of minions (zombies and an animated scarecrow who serves as his eyes and ears). Frankly, as an adventure it did nothing for me, but I rather liked the monstrous druid and would consider revamping him for a different horror adventure, perhaps in a setting like Ravenloft.
13) Horror Planet: Not to be confused with "Planet Terror" from Grindhouse, this is an ambitious adventure that starts out in a gritty near-future city. The PCs, colleagues of a brilliant but eccentric scientist who has dropped out of sight, locate the scientist only to find that his experiments in inter-space teleportation has caused him to fall prey to a parasitic alien intelligence. During the course of the adventure, the teleportation device is activated, teleporting the PCs (and the alien) to the ship the scientist contacted, where they will have to fight for survival and the hope of being able to get the ship back to Earth. This is made extra difficult by the fact that the spaceship's engine was jettisoned by its original inhabitants and is now on the planet the ship is orbiting...
I like this adventure, but somehow I think it would've been better presented as just an outer space horror adventure without attempting to tie it in with movies—sure, the scenes on the spaceship evoke Alien, but so many derelict spaceship adventures have also done so in the years since that movie was made that it just doesn't stand out in that respect. It doesn't help that the recommended film list is heavy on 1950s SF/horror films like The Day the Earth Stood Still, which have little or nothing to do with this adventure's setting (the actual adventure introduction prefers to cite Robocop, Blade Runner, and Hardware).
One particularly intriguing aspect of the adventure is that one of the PCs is not human, but a chimpanzee, Argus, who was part of a project by two of the other PC scientists to improve intelligence in primates (for what reasons, we're not given). Argus can only communicate by sign language (though a kindly GM will probably let his player pass notes) and the challenge of playing a character with limited communication and a rather different psychological outlook than the other characters will excite the imaginations of the right players.
After all this, you may wonder if I in fact liked the book. The answer is yes—with reservations. The concept of movie-based RPG adventures is a fun one, and for the most part I liked the plots of the adventures, but it seems like most of the writers struggled with how to keep the tone suitably movie-like, either leaving in odd little anachronistic touches ("Uncle Timothy's Will") or just having a somewhat unfocused approach ("The Dollmaker"). The other difficulty is that even when an adventure did closely emulate its genre, the demands of movie storytelling and role-playing don't always play well with each other. (Sorry, "Nemesis Strikes!") Also, as a horror film fan I found that the recommended viewing sidebars were often lacking, though a lot of the omissions seem to have been due to the films not being readily available on video at the time of Blood Brothers' publication (the DVD revolution has really spoiled us). That said, if you can get your hands on copy of this book (it's been out of print for years, but copies do turn up on eBay) for a reasonable price, it's not a bad source of ideas and adventures.
And like many horror films, for all its flaws it was successful enough to spawn a sequel...
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