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The whole idea behind Strange Vistas, a project originally envisioned and started by the indefatigable Ricardo J. Méndez, is to put together a large Web site making available lots and lots of hypertext documents which may be of use to 1920s CoC Keepers. These documents, sorted by geographical region (countries, especially), should deal with all aspects of life in the 1920s, enriching even the most well-researched campaign.
From our discussions so far, we'll concentrate on writing about those aspects which don't usually appear in factsheets or atlases: social concerns, fashion and dress, political unrest, the favorite pastimes of the upper crust, the shady dealings more commonly practiced in the underworld, seasonal subleties of local weather, and so on - all related to each of the countries we hope to cover. That's where our future collaborators come in.
We've already got people from Australia, Costa Rica, Italy, Brazil (that's me), Portugal... and with the help of the worldwide network of Keepers we can reach through Strange Aeons, we may acumulate a sizable amount of information which is both historically and locally accurate, for many countries (especially outside the US, although we hope to cover it, too). We seek to minimize and dismiss the usual myths and misinformation which usually come from secondhand sources about several countries, which get published and work against the Keeper, in that his picture (as presented to players) is less than reliable.
But that's not all. We seek as well to mine and discover hidden legends, local stories and spread more adventure seeds than a bunch of writers could possibly apply to their scenarios in a lifetime. Learn secrets from the history of Portugal. Approach archaeological sites on the arid plains of northeastern Brazil. Discover the hidden nightlife of Melbourne, Australia. All that we can think of, we plan to write about. These are our countries, after all, and we should know a bit about them.... In a sense, you'll have a World Guidebook unlike any other currently available. Specifically designed with Call of Cthulhu in mind, but useful for other games (and even fiction writing) nonetheless.
But for our dream to harden and shine, we need your help. Everyone is invited to write a piece, even a small one, about his/her nation (or region of a nation). The Strange Vistas website, server space constraints permitting, will gather all. This is the future, of course - we're on the stages of website planning right now - but a more complete invitation, with guidelines for writing and such, is sure to come at the right time.
The "Strange Vistas" e-mail
list, hosted by
Onelist.com, was recently created as
a medium for discussions on project development. Subscribers are mostly
interested in collaborating with the project directly, as editors, web designers,
artists and so on. We do not use it to trade info on our home countries;
thus, it is not a "forum" in the sense Strange Aeons is. Everyone willing
to learn more about the project and help bring it to light is invited to
subscribe to the e-mail list, of course -- you can do so through the WWW.
Point your Web browser to
http://www.onelist.com/subscribe.cgi/strangevistas
All information regarding subscription can be found there.
Yours,
- -- Ricardo Christe
one of the Editors at the mouth of the volcano.
