Today marks forty years since Raiders of the Lost Ark was released in theaters. This film is, of course, the inspiration for Treasure Hunter Adventures, as well as the gold standard for adventure movies. Throughout the rest of the month, I will have more posts about how it can inspire RPG scenarios and campaigns.
-Nate
Continuing the lead-up to the fortieth anniversary of Raiders, here are links to three different Youtube options for watching the rather short-live prequel series, The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles. Personally, I hope these episodes eventually find their way onto Disney+.
-Nate
Today marks two notable anniversaries. The first is for Treasure Hunter Adventures, which I released one year ago today on DriveThruRPG.com.
Since then, it has gone on to become a Copper Best Seller.
This post is the first of what I hope to add every three days this month, to celebrate the fortieth anniversary of the movie Raiders of the Lost Ark--which occurs on Saturday, June 12th. It presents two books that inspired my Treasure Hunter Adventures projects.
The first book, by Graham Hancock, is The Sign and the Seal. It describes the author's efforts to fid the lost Ark of the Covenant--something that was intriguing, of course, for me as a fan of Raiders. I don't wish to debate the academic merits of the book. Instead, I'll just say that it made me start thinking about working on modern-day treasure hunting adventures. All I needed was a rules system to use for writing them.
The second book provided an answer to that first conundrum. It was, of course, the D20 Modern RPG, released in November 2002. It took the still new D20 System that premiered with 3rd Edition Dungeons & Dragons, and retooled it for use with modern adventures. It was a perfect fit! I still think this RPG was underrated, even though it now feels a little clunky. Equipped with that, I put together D20 Modern Treasure Hunter, which was published by Emerald Press.
The next scenario for Treasure Hunter Adventures is now available: Out of the Darkness. It sends the heroes to investigate a curious map in search of a missing person, and leads them into a previously undiscovered danger in the middle of a quiet American community.
-Nate
Here is some information related to the forthcoming scenario Out of the Darkness.
-Nate
First, here's an old map drawn with charcoal on some kind of hide. To where might it lead?
Next, here's some information about the Futhark alphabet, the runes of which, some say, can be used for magical inscriptions.
More on Futhark from Wikipedia
Finally, I've added a couple of books to my Appendix N for Treasure Hunter Adventures, ones that deal with the Vikings and their exploration of North America.
During this pandemic, it feels like a lot of movie and television productions have been put on hold. Over the course of the past year there have been updates about many of them--Indiana Jones 5, the Uncharted movie, a sequel to the Tomb Raider reboot, and even a television series for Disney+ based on the National Treasure franchise--but nothing actually hitting the screen. Today, however, we took a step, with the release of a trailer for The Lost Symbol.
This series, for NBC/Peacock, is based on the novel by Dan Brown. That book was initially intended to be adapted into a film, but was passed over instead for Inferno. From what one can see in the trailer, it looks promising, although the "Coming Soon" detail doesn't give us a concrete date.
-Nate
Update: Here's a second trailer; the series will begin streaming on Thursday, 9/16, on Peacock.
