Ask Me Anything: Alepous

I sense an affection for Foxes... What's the story behind that?

Also, glad to have you playing in Fabula Ultima with us!

Kalamata, Greece. There's a kind of olives named for that region. Besides that, what is your favorite non-gaming thing about Kalamata?

Thanks for the lovely art you posted in my game. Tell us more about that passion of yours and how it enhances your games! What inspires you? What do you like to draw most? As an architect and 3D designer, has any of that influenced your games?

It's one of the animals that I like since I was little. There is no story, I just like them, they are "cat OS running on dog hardware" as someone put it. I also plan on doing 2 fox tattoos in the near future, well the one is a kitsune inspired lady not a fox per se. The name is a freestyle word for "fox" in greek, Alepou (feminine).

Other animals I like are sharks, dogs, spiders, crows and moths.

I enjoy too Fabula Ultima so far.

Yes, olives are almost the only product my region has. In Kalamata all have at least some land to get their yearly olive oil. Another thing we produce are raisins and oranges. Kalamata, despite being a large city, does not have much for gaming, especially RPG or wargaming. But I love its location, it combines sea and mountain. You can be at the beach in 5-10 mins or at the mountain in 20 mins.

Thanks for the kind words. My dream is to publish a full comic book story but I am still too amateur to do it. At least I feel that my level of drawing is not where I want it to be. I like scifi and I tend to draw such things. I also like high fantasy, as I grew up with classic Conan, Frazetta, etc. Lately I try to invest into grimdark and maybe publish a skirmish game on itch.io. We will see. I also turned to drawing animal like characters, but try to make them feel realistic and not a parody or a furry-style (which I hate).

I try to have a more naturalistic and free approach to my designs but being an architect, I usually end by making them more robust and close to reality. Maybe that's why I like hard scifi more.

Let's have some Peloponnesian cryptids!
Any local legends, ghost stories or creatures you can share?

How many languages do you speak?

Greek Mythology questions:
• Who is your favorite Greek Goddess, and why?
• What is the most awesome Greek Monstress or beast-woman, and why?
• If you were reborn as an Amazon or Nymph (and you somehow had a choice in the matter), which would you choose, and why?

Given how much media comes from the Greek pantheon, along with all these spy films set in Greece, what's the biggest Hollywood mistake they make about Greek culture, and what really happens?

Which movie or TV show best portrays your job? Who is your favorite fictional architect?
What scale is are the things you are 3D designing? toys? buildings? cities?

Oh, I love Greece. Visiting Athens was liking breaking the 4th wall for me. I've long had this sense that ancient Greece, before the Roman Empire was a thing, looms large in education and popular culture, but then the country kind of fades from the public imagination.

What do you wish people knew about Greece that didn't have to do with Antiquity, especially before visiting the country?

We do not have many modern cryptids but we do have stories and traditions that date back to Ancient Greece. We have water nymphs and the equivalent of greek elves (the small ones, like fairies). When I grew up my granny told me stories but, sadly, I do not remember anything.

I speak 5 languages (Italian, Spanish, Engish, German and Bulgarian) and a bit of French and Russian.

I tend to not like gods, if it was possible I would like to be a god-slayer (too much Kratos, haha) but if I were to pick it would be Hephaestus. The god of the forge and creation. For a goddess I would pick Artemis, the goddess of the hunt.

I always liked Medusa, I think. She is such a tragic monster-waifu. And Arachne too, although she did challenged her fate with the goddess Athena (which was petty at the end and transformed her).

I would pick an Amazone. I always liked the warrior-woman or the shield-maiden trope.

I really do not know. Usually there are small random stuff but I really hate it when they mix greek with roman stuff, which are compatible but different at the same time. Modern Greece is, mostly, like any western world country but I hate it when they show us doing the "opa opa" thing and that we are like Zorbas from the film.

Hmm, there are not many films about (fictional) architects. However there was (the orginal) John Stewart from Green Lantern that was an architect and the infamous Inception film.

I make both small and large scale stuff. I do toys, mostly Warhammer 40K and I am trying to make some full fledged miniatures the last months, but I also do buildings (mostly houses and small villas). To build a city is a major task that no architect can achieve alone. Even a single story house is multi-disciplined if you want to make it right.

Modern Greeks have more things based in the Byzantine era than Ancient Greece (and Byzantines were not called themselves like this but Hellenes or East Romans). And we have three names for a Greek person, Greek and Hellene (both names are in Homer's Iliad) and Romioi (from the East Roman Empire).

I really have never thought about the last question. Most of the tourists come for the "Ancient Greece" experience and having fun at night but we have a history that spans almost 3000 years. It's difficult to pick. Even me, I just recently started studying about Byzantium and I am overwhelmed with the information that exists.

I would like to see re-emergence of our history like the North did with their Viking culture and they are (rightfulyl so) proud of it. Re-enactment is also a thing I would like to see. I even did a study for a reenactment historical village in Cyprus while in University where you could visit and live like in ancient times with respective technology, jobs etc, like they do in Scandinavia or England.