The blog for news, events, releases and commentary from Castle Perilous Games & Books. located in downtown Carbondale IL. New posts every Monday and Wednesday.
Wednesday, December 31, 2025
Tuesday, December 30, 2025
Fight 4 Ever
Friday, December 26, 2025
New Year's Eve
We will remain open regular hours New Years Eve and New Years Day. In fact, on New Years Eve, as is our tradition, we will remain open until Midnight or whenever people leave, whichever comes first.
We will have an assortment of snacks and hot dogs in the game room as well.
Wednesday, December 24, 2025
Tuesday, December 23, 2025
Christmas Hours
Saturday, December 20, 2025
Christmas Party
D20 Day
Come in today, buy one of our Warhammer tote bags or bring in a CP or Warhammer bag, fill it up, roll and d20 and take that percentage off your total. Your Preferred Customer and Castle Cards do stack with the die roll
Thursday, December 18, 2025
Contest
tomorrow is the last day to stop by the store and fill out an entry form for a chance to win some of $500 worth of gift cards. Not sure when the contest ends so best to get here early.
Wednesday, December 17, 2025
D20 Day
come in this Saturday, December 20th (D20 get it?) with a Castle Perilous or Warhammer tote bag (you can buy a bag here for $4.99), fill it with whatever you want, as long as it is not an item you have on hold, then roll a 220 and take that percentage off your total. You may use Castle Cards on your purchase and your Preferred Customer discounts do stack so you could get up to 35% off your purchase
Tuesday, December 16, 2025
Cryer from the Castle 12/16
Disco Queen/Dazzler
Dazzler was originally conceived as a multi-media concept with Casablanca Records. Originally named Disco Queen, she was conceived as a black disco singer with a character design based on Grace Jones. Originally her power was to force others to tell the truth, similar to Wonder Woman's lasso. However, the proposed writer argued that would not make for interesting visuals, egro a change to light based powers. Marvel would release a comic featuring the character while Casablanca would release a record. The two companies would co-operate on half hour animated special. Unfortunately, Casablanca ran into financial difficulties and pulled out of the project.
About that time, filmmaker John Derek got interested in the character as a movie project featuring his wife Bo. The character was retooled as a white singer with facial features based on Bo Derek's and the project started moving forward, this time as a movie/comic project. Unfortunately, the Derek's previous project Tarzan the Ape Man flopped at the box office and they pulled out, leaving Dazzler as a comic only character, appearing first in Uncanny X-men #130
Sunday, December 14, 2025
Games Workshop Releases for Jan 17
Here are the releases for Jan 17th. Let us know by noon Tuesday if you want any:
Following the success of Warhammer Quest: Darkwater, rot and decay arrive in the Mortal Realms as the Maggotkin of Nurgle return with a major update and a host of new miniatures. This release includes Festus the Leechlord, Rotswords, Pestigors, Sloven Knights, and Putrid Blightkings, expanding one of Age of Sigmar’s most popular antagonist factions.
Friday, December 12, 2025
Wolverine
Thursday, December 11, 2025
Pokemon
Pokemon is still moving hotly here. We did receive a tiny shipment of gift sets and a restock of Prismatic Evolution boosters, with more Phantasmal Flames on the way so get some while we have them. I keep waiting for this current boom to end but not so far.
Tuesday, December 9, 2025
Sunday, December 7, 2025
New Games Workshop
Here is the Games Workshop releasing on January 10th. If you want any , please let us know by noon Tuesday
The battlefields of the 31st Millenium are reinforced this week with the Legiones Astartes Siege Assault Battlegroup.
This is the first time people can get the new MK III Breacher squad alongside the new Cataphractii Terminators in an added value launch set.
Thursday, December 4, 2025
Eberron: Forge of the Artificer
If you purchased a copy of the #Dnd2024 Forge of the Artificer handbook from us, stop by and pick up a free copy of Fated Flight of the Recluse. WotC send these out as an apology for the delay in the release of the handbook.
If you remember, Artificer was scheduled for release late last summer but the entire print run had warped covers, so the company scrapped the print run and ordered another one.
Wednesday, December 3, 2025
Tuesday, December 2, 2025
New Games workshop
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Saturday, November 29, 2025
Small Business Saturday
for Small Business Saturday, buy one of our tote bags for $5 , or bring in one of ours if you already have one, fill it, roll a d20 and take that percentage off your purchase.
Also, all of our action figures are buy one, get one free.
Tuesday, November 25, 2025
Sunday, November 23, 2025
Saturday, November 22, 2025
Pokemon
We currently are not selling booster boxes of Pokemon, though we will be glad to sell you 36 individual pack, just not at a box discount. Given how fast Pokemon sells, we want to maximize our supply for as long as we can and one way we have found to do so is to not offer a box discount.
Thursday, November 20, 2025
Trampier Mural Ribbon Cutting
Wednesday, November 19, 2025
Batman Deadpool
A lot of people have been waiting for Batman Deadpool #1 which arrived today, so stop by and grab a copy (or two) before they all sell out. We also have copies of the second printing of Deadpool Batman so pick up a matched set.
Tuesday, November 18, 2025
Cryer From the Castle 11/18
Saturday, November 15, 2025
Castle Catch Up for 11/15
https://youtube.com/shorts/0_y9tiuto4s?feature=share
Brandon looks at 1 comic from this week's books and previews 3 from next week's.
Friday, November 14, 2025
Avatar Pre-release
Has a good turnout for the first Avatar pre-release tonight with 16 players. We are out of red and green decks for the other two tournaments, save for those pre-ordered by players that pre-registered. If you come to tomorrow's event, you will get to select from white, blue or black.
Note that we are not "selling" any kits to take home until after 1 p.m. on Sunday so we can make sure all of our tournament players have one.
Tuesday, November 11, 2025
Monday, November 10, 2025
Holiday Battle Forces
GW has announced their holiday battle forces for 2025 . Here are the Warhammer 40K forces and here are the Age of Sigmar If you want one, let us know by noon tomorrow
Saturday, November 8, 2025
Castle Catch Up
Thursday, November 6, 2025
Magic Final Fantasy
Well we finally got in a restock today of the Magic Final Fantasy play boosters. Only took about 3 months. Now to see if the demand is still here or if everyone has moved on from the set to anticipating the new Avatar set.
So far, we have received reprints of Takir Dragonstorm and Final Fantasy. Now all we need is for a reprint of Edge of Eternities to show up for the holiday selling season.
Tuesday, November 4, 2025
Sunday, November 2, 2025
GW New Releases
Please let us know if you want these by noon on Nov. 4th
Kill Team: Dead Silence is the latest expansion for the Kill Team game. This exciting box continues the recent campaigns into the depths of ancient Tomb Worlds and is the first place to get the eagerly awaited, new XV26 T’au Stealth Battlesuits and Space Wolf Scouts. All collectors will no doubt enjoy adding these to their Warhammer 40,000 collections too.
All games of Warhammer 40,000 and Kill Team need an exciting battlefield on which to play. The Killzone: Tomb World set provides this, with both a gaming board and 25 pieces of terrain to create the perfect backdrop. This terrain was previously available in the highly popular Kill Team: Tomb World box and was well received by fans.
Friday, October 31, 2025
Halloween
Stop by the store after 3 today for Trick or treating. We will have candy, Pokemon Packs and comic books for trick or treaters, as well as hot dogs and cider.
Players in the D&D Game get an extra re-roll if in costume and players in Friday Night Magic get an extra promo card if in costume.
Tuesday, October 28, 2025
Saturday, October 25, 2025
Alice is Missing
One of the most unique RPGs to have come out in the past few years is Alice is Missing. For those not familiar with the game, released by Renegade Press, it is a gamemasterless RPG, played silently by the participants, who only communicate through text messages. The Facilitator sets everything up and plays the role of Charlie Barnes, who returns to the town of Silent Falls inquiring about the whereabouts of their friend Alice Briarwood, from whom they have not heard in three days. Charlie reaches out to the other players, who take the roles of Alice’s other friends, who then work together to figure out what has happened to Alice. As all the communication in the game takes play via group and individual texts, every player must have a phone. The game itself only comes with a copy of the rules and the clue cards, which help determine what happened to Alice. A lot of the material, such as the timer, character sheets, soundtrack and props are provided online, meaning that players must have access to at least one computer during the game session. The game takes about 90 minutes to play, with the counter indicating when clue cards get flipped over to provide more information about what happened to Alice.
Given the topic, a missing teen age girl, Alice Is
Missing spends a lot of time on player safety, telling players to determine
Lines (subjects which should not be discussed in the game) and Veils (subjects
which can be mentioned but not described in detail). There is also an X-card,
which a player can play, or type X into the chat, to remove a topic from the
game. Players are then given their characters and time to look them over and
the timer is then started. Over the
course of the next 90 minutes, every 5 or 10 minutes the timer prompts the
reveal of a clue card. At 30 minutes, the suspect cards are gathered, and one
is revealed as the person responsible for Alice’s disappearance, at 20 minutes,
a location card reveals where she is and at 10 minutes, another card reveals
Alice’s condition. During the game, players are never at the same location at
the same time, giving a game reason for texting. Likewise, players are
encouraged to “Make Stuff Up” if it stays within the narrative of the game and
moves it along consistently with the cards revealed. The game requires players
to adopt the motives and relationships of their characters, meaning the more
role playing each incorporates into the game, the more enjoyable it becomes.
Thursday, October 23, 2025
Halloween Concert
South Illinois from College to Elm will close tomorrow about 3 p.m. until 10 p.m. for Trick or Treating on Main Street from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. followed by the Homecoming Concert starting about 6 p.m.
We are one of the 40 stops for downtown trick or treating and will be giving away both candy and a comic book so stop by
Tuesday, October 21, 2025
Sunday, October 19, 2025
MegaTraveller
Thursday, October 16, 2025
Graded Magic Cards
We just received about 10 CGC graded Magic cards. All of them are in our display case or you can see them listed in our ebay store. Grading cards is not something we normally do but these Revised dual lands and a couple of Legacy artifacts have been in the display case for quite awhile so decided to get them graded and list them in our eBay store.
Tuesday, October 14, 2025
Saturday, October 11, 2025
Pauper
Since pauper locally has grown in popularity, we will add a session of Magic pauper play to Saturday afternoon at 1 p.m. Cost is $6. We did try running Pauper on Monday nights earlier this year but after the first couple of weeks, players stopped showing. Hoping that those really wanting to play Pauper will cover here at 1 p.m. and then head over to G&G Games for their evening Pauper session for a day's worth of Pauper play
Tuesday, October 7, 2025
Saturday, October 4, 2025
Pokemon
We received a restock of the Mega Evolution Elite Trainer Kits as well as the Halloween promotional packs. Come in and play Pokemon on Saturdays between 1 and three and you will receive 1 Halloween promo pack as well as 1 promotional card for each match you play.
We would like to get the in store Pokemon play back to a level that it is worthwhile for us to get pre-releases sanctioned again and host tournaments. We currently can apply for pre-releases but do not want to until we get more instore play. If you want pre-releases in Carbondale, come play on Saturdays.
Wednesday, October 1, 2025
Haunted Carbondale
Haunted Carbondale walking tours will start up on the 10th , leaving the store at 6 p.m on the evenings of the 10th, 17, 22 and 29th . We decided to move the third and fourth ones from Friday to Wednesday so as not to conflict with the Homecoming music festival and Halloween.
Tuesday, September 30, 2025
Sunday, September 28, 2025
Tuesday, September 23, 2025
Friday, September 19, 2025
Universes Beyond Spider Man
Magic Spider Man released today and, according to one of our suppliers, WotC printed 3 times as much of this set as the company did Tarkir Dragonstorm. While I do not expect to see Final Fantasy numbers, because that was just nuts, we do expect to sell out of Collector Boosters within a couple of weeks and Play Boosters within a month. Gift Bundles are almost pre-sold out, to the point we are not preselling any more as we want to make sure our allocation covers our orders. Surprisingly, at least to us, we did not presell a single regular bundle but expect those to sell out within a week.
Tuesday, September 16, 2025
Sunday, September 14, 2025
Pre-registration
Today is
Just a reminder that today is the last day to prepay for the Spider Man pre-release or any of the Spider Man product and save money. Pre-release entry goes to $55 tomorrow.
Tuesday, September 9, 2025
Friday, September 5, 2025
Used RPG Materials
Thursday, September 4, 2025
Retailer Handbooks
Wednesday, September 3, 2025
Comic Shop Handbooks
Tuesday, September 2, 2025
Sunday, August 31, 2025
Dave Wallace Memorial
Dave Wallace, long time owner of St. Louis' Fantasy Shop, passed away last week after a long illness. There will be a celebration of his life this Saturday at 3 p.m. at the St. Charles Fantasy Shop location. Scott will leave the store about noon and has room for 3 people if anyone wants to ride along.
Thursday, August 28, 2025
Monday, August 25, 2025
New GW Pre-orders
We are taking pre-orders for the Kill Team Tomb World set as well as the Raverners, BattleClade, Orks Kommandos ADEPTA SORORITAS: SISTERS NOVITIATE , and Battlecards for the Raverners and BattleClade. Let us know by 3 p.m August 26th if you want any.
Sunday, August 24, 2025
GenCon Comments
GenCon 2025 continued the trend of recent GenCons by selling
out attendance (See “GenCon
2025 Sets New Attendance Record”). I can remember the days when 50,000
attendees was considered an amazing number. Now it’s “oh 70,000+ people
attending” even though it is the largest
annual convention in Indianapolis and the second largest regular event in Indy,
only eclipsed by the Indianapolis 500.
I judge how well a game or other product is going to do
based on, not on how much buzz it gets at GenCon or Origins but rather what
items my customers ask for after the event ends. This is what happened with Magic
The Gathering, Dungeons and Dragons 2nd, 3rd, 4th
and 5th editions, Pathfinder, Shadowrun, Vampire the
Masquerade, Pokemon and Yu Gi Oh.
Using this metric, things I expect to do well are:
Starfinder 2E—as is their wont, Paizo released
the new edition to the channel at the same time the company launched it at
Gencon. We have taken pre-orders on this for months and had customers come pick
up their copies as soon as we notified them they had arrived.
Gundam—Both the Gundam TCG and the Gundam
Assemble miniatures game have had significant interest. The Gundam TCG
has proved hard enough to stock in that I expect it to go the way of the
original Final Fantasy TCG which, available while it was in demand only
through one distributor, saw a drastic drop in interest when supplies became
more widely available. Much as with their One Piece TCG, Bandai seems
unable to print enough product to satisfy the demand, increasing speculation on
the game and making it harder to hold tournament or other sanctioned play,
which has become the lifeblood of most TCGs. Since Gundam Assemble is not a collectible
product, at least I hope not, and I have had a number of customers ask about it,
both before and after GenCon. Unfortunately, I am not seeing an official
release date posted yet and it looks as if initial orders will be
allocated. If they are, I hope Bandai
has more product in the pipeline to arrive soon.
Riftbound—Despite the excitement about the
game at GenCon, we have not had any customers asking about it. The buzz around
it reminds of that around another TCG based on a MOBA, the World of Warcraft
TCG which launched with great fanfare and filled tables at GenCon and
Origins in 2005, released in 2006, slowed down enough to get sold off in 2010
and petered out in 2013 (See”WOW
TCG Calls It Quits”). The store did
make a decent amount of money off WOW but primarily from people wanted
to buy the packs in the hope of getting codes to unlock special in-game
items. Actual card play petered out
within a year or two. From what I can tell, Riftbound packs do not
include Riot Codes, so that will exclude that segment of the market. Will it
sell? Certainly. Will it displace Magic,
Pokemon or Yu Gi Oh? Yes,
temporarily but over the long term I doubt it.
Saturday, August 23, 2025
More Diamond Shenanigans
The Diamond Comic Distribution bankruptcy saga just took
another interesting turn, at least based on the daily emails the company is
sending (See “Diamond
Bankruptcy Continues to Rack Up Fees”).
Emails like their “New to Order” come from Diamond Comic Distributors
and have the following address at the bottom:
Diamond Comic Distributors, Inc. 10150 York Road, Suite 300
Hunt Valley, MD 21030
However, the Diamond Daily email is coming from Diamond
Comic Distributors II, using the same email address but has the following
mailing address:
Diamond Comic Distributors II, LLC.
10150 York Road, Suite 300
Hunt Valley, MD 21030
Same mailing address but it appears Diamond has quietly
created a second LLC through which to send some of its correspondence. I figure
some legal reason for it. Just one more small, strange twist in the continuing
story.
Tuesday, August 19, 2025
Sunday, August 17, 2025
Shashibo
Friday, August 15, 2025
Pokemon
Tuesday, August 12, 2025
Monday, August 11, 2025
Saturday, August 9, 2025
Birthday
It is Scott's birthday on August 10th so stop in, have a cupcake and take one of each of the items on the table (while quantities last) as your present.
Friday, August 8, 2025
Mike Herron
Those of you who were in the SIUC SGS during the 1980s and 1990s should remember Mike Herron or "Wheelchair Mike" as he was also known. He played many different war , board and RPGs but I remember him as an avid Car Wars player.
According to his Facebook page, he had suffered from lung disease for several years and recently developed congestive heart failure, to the point that his weary body just gave out. Rest in peace Mike
Tuesday, August 5, 2025
Young Guns Magic
If you are a Magic Player between the ages of 10 and 16 (younger ones are welcome as long as they understand the rules), come join us for Young Guns magic on Saturday afternoon from 3 to 5. All Participants receive a free Magic booster as well as promo cards for each set of games they play.
Sunday, August 3, 2025
Pokémon League
Friday, August 1, 2025
Final Fantasy Restock
Given how hard Final Fantasy products have been to restock, we were happy to get in a restock of the Final Fantasy 2-Player Starter Set as well as the Final Fantasy Standard Commander Decks. Given the popularity of the commander decks, we do not expect to have them past the weekend.
Thursday, July 31, 2025
Eisner Awards
Tuesday, July 29, 2025
Friday, July 25, 2025
Edge of Eternities Errata
Diplomatic Relations has the following errata
We are aware of an issue in which the card Diplomatic Relations from Edge of Eternities was printed with missing rules text that affects its functionality. The printed version reads:
Target creature gets +1/+0 and gains vigilance until end of turn. It deals damage equal to its power to target creature an opponent controls.
The corrected rules text reads:
Target creature you control gets +1/+0 and gains vigilance until end of turn. It deals damage equal to its power to target creature an opponent controls.
This is an official update to rules text that should be reflected in play. Corrected text will appear on MTG Arena, Gatherer, and Magic Online.
Sunday, July 20, 2025
Artificer
Due to problems with cover warping, the Eberron Artificer book has been delayed until late November.
We want to share an important update about Eberron: Forge of the Artificer.
A few weeks ago, we received the first printed copies of the book. At first, everything looked great and met our production standards. But over time, a serious issue emerged: the covers began to warp. This was a defect that developed after production and wasn’t visible during initial inspection.
After reviewing the full scope of the issue, we made the tough decision to recall and reprint the entire physical run. No copies with this defect will be shipped to customers. This is a complete reprint, not a patch job, and we believe it’s the right call.
We know many players expected digital access earlier, but to preserve the integrity of the experience and ensure a unified release, we’ve aligned both physical and digital editions to a single timeline. Both versions will now officially launch on December 9, 2025.
Key Dates for WPN Release
November 25, 2025 – Early Access Begins [North America Only]
Customers purchasing through participating WPN stores will be eligible to pick up their corrected physical copies starting this date two weeks ahead of global release.
December 9, 2025 – Global Release
All remaining physical copies and digital editions go live.
Saturday, July 19, 2025
DCC Day
Today is DCC Day. While quantities last, come in and take one each of the Adventure Packs free. Each features a low level adventure for Dungeon Crawl Classics and Either X-Crawl or Mutant Crawl Classics. We also have a number of limited edition DCC items available for purchase but quantities on those are extremely short.
Wednesday, July 16, 2025
Final Fantasy
We expect a small restock of Final Fantasy boosters to arrive later this week, both play and collector as well as 1, that is one, bundle. Based on the amount of interest, we do not expect these to last the weekend.
Tuesday, July 15, 2025
Friday, July 11, 2025
Fantastic Four #1
We sold out of the relaunch of Fantastic Four on Wednesday but got in more copies on Thursday so we have them in stock if you want to snag a copy. Remember, to get one of the spiffy FF cloisonné pins, bring in a ticket from the movie, buy $10 worth of Fantastic Four books and pick a pin.
Thursday, July 10, 2025
superman Movie
So far I am hearing very good reviews of the new Superman movie, despite those complaining because Kal-El is shown as an immigrant to the planet, which he is. "Strange visitor from another world" and all that as the original original had it. If you see the movie, bring in your ticket and purchase $10 worth of Superman books, we will give you a reproduction of Adventure Comics #210, featuring the first appearance of Krypto.
































