Renkon

@renkotsuban.com

1199 Followers 972 Following

tally ho! ๐Ÿ‘‹ nonbinary ๐Ÿณ๏ธโ€โšง๏ธ๐Ÿณ๏ธโ€๐ŸŒˆ ๆ—ฅ็ณป๏ผ”ไธ– in japan ๐Ÿ—พ blogging @ https://renkotsuban.com ๐Ÿ–ฅ๏ธ tooting @ https://maestoso.org/@renkotsuban ๐Ÿ˜ the english-speaking half of @nicegear.games ๐ŸŽฎ runs @indietsushin.net ๐Ÿ“ฐ

Page spread of the printed zine Field of Grass by Erik Houdini. Two photographs of abandoned, vacant buildings in a huge empty lot. Left: "Oh, field of grass, / Ravaged by concrete catacombs, / Smothered mass, asphalt cask. / Unlike stories from ancient tomes-- / Here, not even birds roam." Right: "Oh, field of grass, / Brown bristles swaying in the wind, / Brash with lifelessness. / Humanity's sin-- / Plastic soaked ground within, / Apathy, a collective unconsciousness, / Oh, field of grass."
Page spread of the zine Lanolin Dreams 4 by Rosie Can't. Photograph of a mother sheep and her newborn lamb in a field. Text: "I saw these sheep last year in the port hills. The lamb had been alive for less than an hour. The mother was still shaking. I have delivered many lambs in my life but she managed these two all herself. "You did it." I whispered to her from afar. "You managed! The hard part is done now." She didn't understand. I wish I could hug her. I will never carry a child as she did."
Page spread from printed zine SkullBuddy Official User Manual by Eden Reese Potts. Text on left: "This manual introduces you to your new best friend, SkullBuddy. SkullBuddy is a companion that sits on your desk or shelf and understands everything you say and do. In time, SkullBuddy will know you better than you know yourself." Image of SkullBuddy scanning someone. "You will learn to love and trust SkullBuddy, and care for SkullBuddy as you would a family member or sexual partner. Unlike your human loved ones, SkullBuddy exists at your convenience and will always be there for you, no matter what. You do not need to worry. You do not need to be. SkullBuddy is watching. SkullBuddy is listening." On the right side are mechanical instructions on how to set up SkullBuddy
Page spread of the printed zine In My Dreams I Cannot Speak by FloconSugar. Background is wavy dark and light blue patterns. Text on left: "my dreams often go like this: / i find myself in a strange place / i am scared / i see someone i recognize (their face is not really their face but i still recognize them somehow" Text on right: "but that's beside the point) i see a familiar person but they don't see me / i want to talk to them but / no sound,/ nothing / comes out of my /mouth"
Page spread from the printed zine Autumn by Ormulum. Text on left over images of cracks: "But try as we will / There is no keeping the ejecta at bay forever / Weeds and water have been eating away / At the peripheries for years now / Our most vulnerable buildings / Riddled with cracks / Inhabited by / Fungi / Mould / Slime" Text on right over illustration of a brick tunnel with graffiti scrawled over it: "Turned out / Pursued through endless industrial suburbs / Gunned down in an obscure railway underpass / It's been a big month"
Print copy of The List: A Tale of Art Theft Documentation by ahmwma open to the spread about going down the rabbit hole of discovering and documenting all of the artists whose art had been ripped off by scammers
Five of Fanged Moon Games' (E. A. Bisson) fold-up zines. Clockwise from top left: Wandering Wayfarers, Beasts in Shining Beads (open to the spread about the Garnet Raven and Moonstone Wolf), Lindwyrm: a small labyrinth game, Castles in the Sky and Why We Need Them, and Raspberry Ruminations: thoughts on a small green presence
All fifteen printed-out zines listed above, laid out on my desk
Covers of LGBTQ Pocket Dictionary by @BGU_Zine and @HellowRainboX in both English and Japanese
Page spread of The Abandoned Selection zine. Left side is of a horned skulking person with taloned feet. Text: "game from 2021 that i honestly don't remember very well. it was weird and high-concept and i wrote none of my plans down. this character was also going to appear in a VN i wanted to make, but i never finished that one either. net-zero information...? well, i remember her name was Myrtle." Right side is character looking morose with flower in hair. Text: "attempted entry for a horror game jam in 2020. was going to be more in-line with classic rpgmaker horror games. i don't remember exactly why i didn't get very far and i still quite like what was there but i didn't have a very clear vision and the scope was way too huge for what i'm really willing to do now."
Page spread from the Obscure Vandalism Ideas zine by mind ape. Across the top reads "Science" on the left page and "Fiction" on the right. On the left: "DR. FISH MAKES HOUSE CALLS" with caption, "This one comes from the 1991 cyberpunk novel Synners by Pat Cadigan. Dr. Fish is a sentient virus-AI that loves to leave pseudo-health warnings everywhere." Below that in red: "DANGER: HIGHLY INEFFABLE!" - Stanislaw Lem, The Cyberiad Graffiti on the right: "BEWARE THE HEAT DEATH" with caption: "The great thing about entropy is that it's everybody's problem! From Boris and Arkady Strugatsky's Noon stories." Black text: "Do we really need ourselves for anything?"
Page spread from the Missile Command zine. Text: "The streaks of the missiles, the somewhat slow drip, that's tension. And graphically the game is simple but incredibly stylish. Like frantically reading a weather radar during a storm, the low tech of the 2600 actually brings about a quality that modern iterations do not have. Imagine this is the control of an anti-missile battery and the missiles are real. You're literally tasked with saving millions of lives but it's reduced down to such a simplistic representation with this framework that allows it to feel real because of the removal of detail." On the opposte page are to screenshots of the game, a black screen with white lines streaking down diagonally to represent the missiles. On top is with CRT filter on to give a dithered look to the pixel art, below is without the filter with crisp white pixels. Text: "Be sure to set up the CRT Phosper shaders in Stella. They absolutely increase visual immersion."
Page from the Yu-Gi-Oh zine open to the page listing the cards in the "Virus Control" deck, which was the 3rd place deck from the 1999 Dome Resurrection Tournament, piloted by Hoy. On the opposite page is the card art of Dokuroizo the Grim Reaper
The seven zines I linked to above plus my own "How to care for Venus flytraps" hybrid Decker zine printed out and sitting side by side on my desk
Printout of zine "some drawings by millie" open to two women, one a green-skinned alien with the caption "she's from spaaaaaaaace" and another a human with a pigtail with caption "she's from earth and they're dating!"
Cover for the zine printout "Millie has an identity crisis!" Text underneath: "a hybrid zine by Millie Millennium in glorious colour (yes decker can do colour)"
Cover of the zine "IJ's (Internet Janitor's) Puzzle Pack! BEING an assortment of NOTIONALLY ENTERTAINING portable diversions of procedural-generative prestidigitation, (in zine forme) compiled and implemented herein and forthwith in bestowance of benefit to the idle-minded public"
Printout of the zine "Strange" by Khirazekh, open to a spread of a wide green field under a blue sky with billowing clouds. In the foreground is a decaying orange house covered in green splotches. In the top left and bottom right corners are snapshots of the interior of the house, one with a shadowy figure standing in an open doorway, and the other with the door snapping shut
Printout of "Hatred is not enough" by five star crest, opened to the pages that read: "solidarity means knowing whose losses will be ur own and acting accordingly when the walls close in. a union is nothing more than the people beside u. u have to love them more than u hate setbacks. more than you want to abandon the very people this regime needs you to distrust. misanthropy is scab shit"
Printout of the aforementioned zine open to the pages "types of fencing" showing the three different styles of fencing (epee, sabre, and foil) and "fencing armor" showing the chest protector and plastron armor
Cover of "fencing frog frogxi, part one" by woxi (wolf & ghostling). An illustration of a frog standing outside of a shop window and peering inside
A small fold-up 8-page printout of my "How to care for Venus flytraps" zine
Henry the gray cat curled up and sleeping on a white blanket. His head is flipped upside down and his tummy is partially exposed