I mentioned this project in a different thread and Hithero asked me what I was talking about. Rather than hijack that thread I thought I'd start a new one.

Atomic Sunset is a project (still in the planning stages) for a 'pre-apocalyptic' skirmish game set in the 1950s.

You know of course that the earth was visited by aliens during the 50s, from those documentaries that were made back then - 'It Came from Outer Space', 'Earth vs the Flying Saucers', and 'The Day the Earth Stood Still' amongst others. Plus of course, the giant insects that went on the rampage after the atomic tests in the desert of New Mexico were captured by some amazing amateur footage and compiled into newsreels like 'Them!' and 'Tarantula'.

The game seeks to recapture some of the feel for that period - the 'can do' attitude of rebuilding after World War II, the hero-worhip of the returned soldiers, and the optimistic promise of a future space-era - at the same time being tainted by a growing mistrust of the 'boffins' and their meddling with forces they don't understand, a gnawing fear of the threat of communism and the dawning realisation that our own government may not be the shining paragon of virtue we were led to believe.

It's a bit like Fallout 3 I suppose (a computer game), but before the bombs went off. So the American Dream is still alive, Rock and Roll is just getting started, the jets of the USAF are sleek and shiny, and every amateur scientist knows how to fly a helicopter.

The models will include giant ants and other bugs (spiders, wasps, mantises and scorpions), aliens (some friendly, some not) and their servitors (i.e. robots), plus a variety of humans (US National Guard, townsfolk, cops, scientists, g-men, and some villains.

Vehicles will include a variety of civilian and military vehicles from the 40s and 50s as well as some flying saucers.

If you get a chance to, check out some of the movies I mentioned above - they are wonderful windows into the mindset of the era.

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Dagster

Where can I throw my money at this?

All sounds very interesting, will it be 28mm skirmish? Mantic are soon to KS Mars Attacks, seems a similar thing.

I do still admire the pre post modernist world view of the time!

@Dave, yes 28mm. The Mars Attacks idea sounds very cool - a fun film and I even remember the original trading cards from when I was a kid.

Atomic Sunset won't be making much progress this year (it takes a lot to ramp up a project with a rulebook and around 100 minis from scratch), so Mantic have a clear shot at the genre with their Kickstarter. I'll be watching it closely to see how it develops and how much of an overlap there will be with my concept. They are both ultimately based on the same source material (B Grade sci fi of the 50s - films, tv, and pulp magazines), but the flavour of the two concepts are very different.

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Dagster

When I first saw the thread title I imagined this was some Heavy Metal group... do any of the other oldies remember films like 'Them' or even the 1970's 'Damnation Alley'?

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Published ebooks:
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Phantom Ships, Ghost Flotilla
More to come!

"Them the beginning of the end"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f8xSo2MEPzQ
One of my favorites.

Chris Kringle(Edmund Gwenn),teams up with Matt Dillon( James Arness), Daniel Boone(Fess Parker),and Spock( Leonard Nemoy) to battle RadioActive Mutants - Film at 11. Don't forget Clint Eastwood's(fighter Pilot) first movie Tarantula.
Most of the kids nowadays won't watch a B&W movie.

"It's later than you think"

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"the same as a duck you must be made of wood"

Them is a brilliant film and is the one that started me thinking about this game concept. The whole thing is about protecting the "American Family" from the horrors of the Cold War - the film starts with a lost child wandering in the desert and ends with a cop rescuing two kids from giant ants in the stormwater drains of Los Angeles.

I remember watching Tarantula when I was a kid and seeing at the end of the film a close up of the face of the fighter pilot, obscured by his oxygen mask - I recognised his eyes and jumped up and said "Clint Eastwood!"

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Dagster

Atomic sunset sounds excellent, I think your on to a winner.

B&W movies, just watched "the longest day" again, one of the best ww2 movies ever made

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Harfoots-The first of the Hobbit people to cross over the Misty Mountains and enter Eriador.

Look for Hell is for Heroes

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"the same as a duck you must be made of wood"

My favourite B&W war movie is The Train with Burt Lancaster, followed closely by Dunkirk with John Mills and Richard Attenborough. Excellent acting and scriptwriting, very tense plots and highly realistic action.

After watching Dunkirk I've started collecting some BEF squads and British vehicles suitable for the early war period. I am planning a narrative campaign based around the exploits of the 51st Highland Division. Many of them were forced to surrender to Major General Rommel's forces after being abandoned by the Navy, but some elements broke through the German lines and made it to le Havre on the coast for evacuation.

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Dagster

I have not seen the Train in years. A very good movie.

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"the same as a duck you must be made of wood"

Speaking of Dunkirk, my grandad was there, involved in the liberation of Belsen and detained in New York for running whiskey for Al Capone !!!
I wish he'd write his life story.

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