Fanmade Sourcebook Draft Complete: 200+PAGE, NEEDS FEEDBACK!

[BonsaiTreehouse]

Ever since April (and even further back for planning and preparation) I've been hard at work writing my biggest undertaking for the Atmosfear fandom: the unofficial sourcebook (now 226 pages of fan fiction and documentation)!

I require feedback and input to get this over the line: included is the history of the game series itself along with rules and house rule modifications for all the games, backstories for the gatekeeper and the harbingers as well as biographies for the soul rangers, descriptions for all the provinces and a bestiary for each! I've tried to remain reverent to the many established details of Atmosfear while connecting the more vague elements together with my own wild ideas"

You can leave notes and annotations on the google drive doc below:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1vJx ... 7q_44/edit

My goal now is to format the whole thing into a "magazine" style pdf with images, text boxes, lavish font and a more professional quality. ENJOY!

[DarkWolff]

This is amazing! I'll try to find some time to give this a good read and comment. I skimmed through it and was really impressed with how much detail you've added.

How are you planning on doing the layout for this? I used to have a copy of InDesign and have done layouts of published reports and some other things so I might be able to lend a hand.

Oh, and the Gatekeeper has two numbers; the other is five (from the original Nightmare).

[BonsaiTreehouse]

This is amazing! I'll try to find some time to give this a good read and comment. I skimmed through it and was really impressed with how much detail you've added.

How are you planning on doing the layout for this? I used to have a copy of InDesign and have done layouts of published reports and some other things so I might be able to lend a hand.

Oh, and the Gatekeeper has two numbers; the other is five (from the original Nightmare).

Thanks! I didn't know the Gatekeeper had a SECOND number in the original game. I don't recall ever noticing that myself, but if you could point me to where I can see it for myself too, it would be greatly appreciated.

In terms of style, I'm thinking of aiming for something close to the Harbingers style with smaller hints of the other games aesthetics to tie it together (page numbers will have bats with ornate swirls just like the classic Atmosfear instruction leaflet and text boxes will have shining gold outlines with black backgrounds etc). In the spirit of the Prima "Secret of the Games" series of books, I'll also be looking to them for more specific layouts. I'm also fairly well versed with graphic design and Adobe suite creative so I think I'll be fine. I will let you know if I need help, so thanks for offering!

[DarkWolff]

Thanks! I didn't know the Gatekeeper had a SECOND number in the original game. I don't recall ever noticing that myself, but if you could point me to where I can see it for myself too, it would be greatly appreciated.

You can see it for yourself right here:
https://youtu.be/xZDQ17bHE5A?t=1846

In terms of style, I'm thinking of aiming for something close to the Harbingers style with smaller hints of the other games aesthetics to tie it together (page numbers will have bats with ornate swirls just like the classic Atmosfear instruction leaflet and text boxes will have shining gold outlines with black backgrounds etc). In the spirit of the Prima "Secret of the Games" series of books, I'll also be looking to them for more specific layouts. I'm also fairly well versed with graphic design and Adobe suite creative so I think I'll be fine. I will let you know if I need help, so thanks for offering!

That sounds good pretty awesome; I look forward to the final product! And I did check and I do still have a working copy of InDesign CS5. I bought an old cheap Adobe Creative package when Adobe switched to a subscription-based model (I don't use it enough to justify the crazy high cost). It's served me well because I've done a lot of things with it that I otherwise might not have.

[BonsaiTreehouse]

You can see it for yourself right here:
https://youtu.be/xZDQ17bHE5A?t=1846

Aha. tbf I'm basing the Gatekeeper's number more around the DVD/App game since it was mentioned consistently throughout multiple clips as his "Lucky" number as opposed to just a regular old number in the classic 1991 tape. The other playable characters have their own "lucky numbers" in the DVD/App clips too which I interpreted as the numbers "marked" onto their numbskull heads like in the Harbingers (it wasn't until I looked at them all together and looked up in the interviews page that I realised they were all multiples of 7 on purpose lol).

In addition, since all the games give the players numbers from 1-6, I thought it would be fitting for the Gatekeeper's own number to not be one that a player might receive themselves.

[Skulldoon]

Looking forward to giving this a read. I posted on the Facebook group but will post here as well if you want to use this image once I get a good scan of it. I would also suggest reaching out to the community as a whole to get pictures or scans of artifacts related to the game to add some fun images to it.


validate javascript syntax online

[BonsaiTreehouse]

I got scans of my own too from my own collection of Atmosfear games but of course, every little helps. I saw your scan on Facebook too and I definitely look forward to seeing if there’s other materials that fans can gather!

[Skulldoon]

Also not sure if you wanted to mention the unfinished Super Nintendo game. There is a rom floating around I believe to try it out.

[ThatWidescreenGuy]

This thing is blowing my mind. Currently on page 57 and ready to finish it as soon as I can!

I've been leaving a couple of nitpicks in there, mostly acting as a lore lawyer; if I misinterpreted something I'd love to be proved wrong, so I'm eager to read that final product.

One question about the bestiaries, many of the creatures seem to be added lore instead of speculation. I'm not saying they're poorly constructed, but is this the case? If everything comes from references or throwaway lines I seem to have missed quite a few.

All in all, excellent work as far as I've read. The writing style could be more consistent, but at its strongest it feels just like the text in the games themselves. I'll give you more feedback as I get further, the soul rangers bit is surely gonna be amazing. Also please tell me if I'm being too harsh, I want to be thorough but I understand constant nitpicks can get annoying.

[BonsaiTreehouse]

This thing is blowing my mind. Currently on page 57 and ready to finish it as soon as I can!

I've been leaving a couple of nitpicks in there, mostly acting as a lore lawyer; if I misinterpreted something I'd love to be proved wrong, so I'm eager to read that final product.

One question about the bestiaries, many of the creatures seem to be added lore instead of speculation. I'm not saying they're poorly constructed, but is this the case? If everything comes from references or throwaway lines I seem to have missed quite a few.

All in all, excellent work as far as I've read. The writing style could be more consistent, but at its strongest it feels just like the text in the games themselves. I'll give you more feedback as I get further, the soul rangers bit is surely gonna be amazing. Also please tell me if I'm being too harsh, I want to be thorough but I understand constant nitpicks can get annoying.

I saw a few of your comments and the nitpicks are exactly why I let people comment on it in the first place, as this is still a draft. I had a feeling there would be inconsistencies and I wanted fresh perspectives to help stamp them out while I work on the final PDF formatting, so be as nitpicky as you like!

The bestiaries are half speculation and half added lore, in that I gathered all I could infer from the cards, artwork, implications from real life backstories, comments from the Gatekeeper (that’s where the “sloth demon“ comes from) and yes, the SNES game too. One of my favourites examples is taking the picture of the weirdly out of place crab from one of the Vampires Harbinger duel cards and finding a way to fit it coherently into her realm.