Thursday, 2 February 2012

Blog Events: Vampire's Day Soiree


What do you think of when you hear the date "February 14th"? Valentine's Day? Slushy cards? Candy hearts? Flowers? Blood-sucking vampires? What? You don't think of blood-sucking vampires? (I'm ignoring Erinia's answers here ;D) Well, you should, because as well as being Valentine's Day, February 14th is also Vampire's Day! At least...thanks to Holly at Holly's Horrorland it is! 

The Vampire's Day Soiree is a virtual event, in which those of us who would rather watch a horror than a romantic comedy, can immerse ourselves in everything dedicated to the scary sanguines and have fun viewing the offerings of the other participants too! All you need to do in order to take part is visit the sign up post at Holly's Horrorland (click the picture above), comment with your Name, blog name, and URL, and place a link from your blog back to the event page. Oh, and remember to make a vampire-themed post on February 14th of course!

Wednesday, 1 February 2012

Winners: The Soapy Shop of Horrors Giveaway!


Well dear devils, the time has come to announce the winners of The Soapy Shop of Horrors giveaway!  The winners were drawn at random, as you can see from the photo above, by our very own alien horror, Madame Luciel. Since we're feeling extra generous, we've decided to let all three of you have the 1st prize. So instead of the runners up getting one soap each, you will all receive your 5 chosen soaps!

The Winners Get 5 Soaps/Sets Each: 


Lady Bethezda
Soaps: Pentagram Set, Heart ~ Ankh, Bat, Heart ~ Skulls, Goth Bar Set
Scents: Surprise me!
Colours: Please let us know


Jennifer
Soaps: Clyde (zombie 1), JohnnyR (zombie 3), Goth Bar Set, Skull Set, Bat
Scents: Coconut & almond
Colours: Purple & Green


Sam
Soap: Edgar, Spider Soap, Goth Bar Set, Brain Set, Bat
Scents: Please let us know
Colours: Please let us know

Sam, we need your email addresses so that we can contact you for your postal details. 

Congrats! :)

Tuesday, 31 January 2012

Fashion: DraculaClothing

'Delicacy Underbust Corset' by DraculaClothing


'Gassmask Brooch' by DraculaClothing

Started in 2007 and currently based in the Czech Republic, DraculaClothing is an independent alternative clothing company run by Truls Stokka and Ida W. Thorsen. After a fruitless shopping expedition to Camden, the pair became tired of the many "alternative" clothes produced by companies that charged exorbitant amounts of money for poor quality items and very little choice. So rather than just complaining about it, Truls created DraculaClothing, aiming to provide excellent quality at reasonable prices, with Ida joining the company soon after. It's always a bonus to find that a business has been born from the ideas of people that honestly have a passion for the things that they create or the services that they provide. 


'Spider Web Earrings' by DraculaClothing
Originally, DraculaClothing mainly designed items for themselves and people they knew, but over the years they have grown in popularity immensely and now have customers from all over the globe! When buying online, there is, as always, the dreaded postage costs and goods taxes to consider, which often makes it more expensive to buy internationally, via the internet. However, with free worldwide shipping and the already affordable prices, paying the cost of import duties (outside the EU) is still cheaper than buying overpriced items from other companies. And let's be honest here, how many of us are even able to find a local shop, with this much choice and such beautiful items anyway, regardless of the costs?

'Steampunk Kitty T Shirt' by DraculaClothing
The other appealing thing about DraculaClothing is that, although they do seem to specialise in Steampunk, EGA/EGL and corsetry, they provide a lot of other choices too. The number of items they sell is huge and they are constantly expanding their range. 

Whatever your delightfully dark style may be - from elegant vampire to eccentric Steampunk, from Gothic Lolita to tightlacer - there's almost certainly something to suit your taste. There's even enough bats, skulls, spiders, gas masks, bloody shirts, and coffins to keep you horrific darlings happy! 


Many thanks to DraculaClothing for permission to use the images.


For more information, or to browse the DraculaClothing online store, visit the links below:


More photos after the cut below:

Monday, 23 January 2012

Contests: Win Your Favourite Items from The Soapy Shop of Horrors!


We know what you're thinking. You're thinking: "I'd really like to win some free stuff!", and so, dear devils and deviant dolls, we've teamed up with The Soapy Shop of Horrors so that you can! The colour / scent of each soap can be customised to suit your taste. So whether you want jasmine-scented pink skulls, chocolate-scented green gargoyles, or just want a surprise, you're sure to find something you love among Suze Laing's horror-themed soaps! 

"We'd really like to win some free stuff!"
We're giving 1 lucky monster the chance to win their favourite 5 soaps, and 2 runners up will receive one each! All you have to do is send us an e-mail in the 'Contact' section or comment on this post telling us which 5 soaps you want to win, and you'll automatically be entered! (Make sure you tell us which colour and scent you want too, unless you want a surprise).

You can find the full selection on The Soapy Shop of Horrors' website.


Closing date: February 1st, 2012


Good luck!


Saturday, 21 January 2012

Games: Monstermind

Monstermind on Facebook
'Monstermind' is a Facebook game, in which you try to build a prosperous town while making monsters to attack your friends enemies with, set in 1940's-1960's sci-fi horror movies. Even the music is a gloriously cheesy monster movie score!



Your town, which will automatically be called '*your first name*-wood', is pretty empty when you first acquire it, but it doesn't take long to change that! Build houses for population, commerce buildings for money, defence to protect your lovely monsters...or people, and decorations to slow down enemy attacks. You can also change the name of your town, by clicking on it and typing/deleting. Naturally, I chose to call my town 'Horrorwood', since I'm just that original. Heh.


Now, whilst creating a thriving little town, in which you balance the population number with the amount of commerce, is all very fascinating, the best part of 'Monstermind' comes when you get to unleash your mutated creations onto another player's town! Kyahahahaha! You unlock new creature types with each level, from giant apes to giant women, and destructive robots to zombies! The first time you use them, a little information box Every kind of monster has its own strengths and weaknesses, so it's a good idea to experiment to see which ones work well together in the town you're attacking.

For example, zombies might be fashionable horrors right now and you might want to use them, but they cannot take on tanks! Just leave those to the bigger, tougher monsters and let the zombies run shamble in when there's not much defence left. This is important, because you get to keep all of the surviving monsters after each attack. The more creatures you have left, the more you will have to use next time. The key to all the attacks is to take out the Town Hall as quickly as possible, because nothing can function without it!

Initially, you can only attack / be attacked by your friends' towns and Doomsday, but if you hire Eva for 100, you can spread terror and destruction to random player cities too. This makes it much easier to gain experience, collection items, and extra money. Of course, they can then send their monster minions to demolish your town too, so you need to defend it!


There are also quests that appear on the left-hand side of the screen from time to time. When you click them, an old fashioned TV appears and plays a little animated movie telling you what you need to do. Not all of the movies are finished (it simply says "coming soon"), and sometimes it can be difficult to tell what you should be doing, but there is a text summary at the end of the films. Also, the animations remind me of the cartoon 'Dexter's Lab', but I'm not entirely convinced that wasn't intentional.


For all its fun, 'Monstermind' is still a Facebook game, and they can be pretty tedious, and highly frustrating when you get to the point where you suddenly need to spend a stupid amount of real money in order to progress. That's usually the point when I stop playing. However, 'Monstermind' is different, because even though you can buy addons, you don't need to. You can trade in the collections to acquire specific things, such as monsters, buildings, and decorations for free, including some which can only be bought with real money ordinarily. Hopefully they'll keep this feature, as it's something that makes 'Monstermind' much more enjoyable than other games of a similar type.

Overall, 'Monstermind' is an amusing and enjoyable sci-fi horror-themed game that provides procrastinators everywhere with more distractions than usual. It has a cute charm for those who just want to cuddle the monsters, mixed with just enough destruction to keep budding world dominators entertained for hours!


Friday, 20 January 2012

Shopping: The Soapy Shop of Horrors


It's a dark and stormy night; a thick fog rolls in, distorting everything in sight, including your own reflection in the steam-covered mirror in front of you. Everything is silent and still, except for the low gush of flowing water. Suddenly, through the eerie mist, you see zombies, bats, spiders, skulls, brains, and all sorts of horrors in front of you! A shiver of terror creeps down your spine, but, being the knowledgeable spook slayer you are, you know just what to do...dissolve them in your bathwater! For these are no ordinary ghouls, dear devils - oh no! These are the fantastically frightening soaps from The Soapy Shop of Horrors, where "horror isn't just for Halloween...it's for bathtime too!" 


Each of these creepy cleaners are designed and handmade in the UK, by Soapy Shop of Horrors founder Suze Laing. She started the shop after "buying some “Halloween” soap for friends in the U.S.A" and, after finding that the UK selection was somewhat limited, she began to make her own. Following this creative soap crafting, Suze had a breakthrough moment, and realised that "maybe, just maybe, others would want some oddly shaped soaps too, and not just at Halloween!". She was right!

'Bat' by Soapy Shop of Horrors
As well as the products being gory and gorgeous, they're amazingly detailed, and most look like little sculptures rather than soap! This level of detail, together with with the ability of the buyer to choose the colour and scent combination desired, for most of the items on sale, and really affordable prices, make The Soapy Shop of Horrors a very unique and delightfully strange find. Moreover, the little facts about the featured soap horror character, at the bottom of each page, are a great bonus, and make the website interesting and endearing too!

'Skull' by Soapy Shop of Horrors
Many thanks to Suze Laing for permission to use the images and video! 

To find out more, or to buy a Soapy Horror, take a look at the sites below: