A blue-collar crew just trying to scrape by are forced by bad luck, corporate intrigue, and their empty bank accounts to take control of their own destinies in this story of rags to riches, to ruin, to revenge.

Fantastic Worlds Productions is pleased to announce their first Starfinder actual play podcast: Far Beyond the Stars. Join Galactic Mistress Abbie Lammel as she runs the intrepid employees of the EJ Corp freighter ship Calamity through Paizo’s Fly Free or Die Adventure Path! Captain Friday Francisco, played by Dustin Alexander; mechanic Seren Casurus, played by Heidi Owens; crewman Ballad Serenade, played by Jess Negin; and ace pilot Miss Fanny, played by Angel Espinoza, are ready to kick butt, haul cargo, and run from the Golden League—and they sound good doing it.

As always, the quality and polish of Fantastic Worlds Productions is at play with Far Beyond the Stars. In the first episode, listeners are treated to a shoot 'em up as the crew tries to help a poor lashunta merchant who just wants to retire, while the background is laid for just how in over their heads these four do-gooders are about to be. Presented with crisp audio and carefully chosen background music, this show is easy on the ears. This cast is diverse, their characters are unique, and their adventures will be literally out of this world!

Building off of this momentum, Fantastic Worlds Production’s founding podcast, Fantastic Worlds Podcast, is celebrating its 100th episode with a special two-episode release! Game Dad Dustin holds the reins as GM while players Abbie, Angel, Jess, & Logan traverse Paizo’s Reign of Winter Adventure Path for Pathfinder 1E. This moment has been a long time coming—what climactic events will go down as the show nears the end of Book 3?

Along with their Patreon-exclusive Pathfinder 2E podcast The Greatest Show on Earth playing through the Extinction Curse, the members of Fantastic Worlds Productions are here to deliver quality, diverse entertainment through the magic of Paizo’s Pathfinder and Starfinder gaming systems.

If you’d like to keep up with Fantastic Worlds Production and its crew, check out their website fantasticworldspod.com.

Hello to everyone in the Paizoverse, Steve here from Hideous Laughter Productions and today I’m thrilled to help announce that Paizo and our network have signed a licensing deal to help us grow our shows and continue sharing our adventures across the globe!

Who are we?

For those of you who don’t know us, Hideous Laughter Productions is a Columbus, OH based podcast network. Our flagship show is the Hideous Laughter Podcast where four of my best friends and I get to disconnect from the real world every week and tell the story of adventurers unwrapping a mystery and stirring up some scares in Paizo’s gothic horror Pathfinder 1E adventure path Carrion Crown. Our “brand” per se is that we want every listener to feel like they’re at the table with us and invoke the feeling of gaming together with your friends on a Friday night. What does that mean? For us, the atmosphere around the table is just as important as the rules or setting on the table! Over the last few years of turning our adventures into a podcast, we’ve laughed, cheered, and cried together as our characters and story grew beyond what any of us ever expected. We pride ourselves in bringing our all every week and delivering a show with top-notch audio quality and storytelling!

Why Pathfinder?

At any given time, between the Pathfinder Tales novels, the core rulebooks, and lore supplements, there are easily 4+ Paizo publications on my bedside table in some stage of being read through, and I know my enthusiasm for the system is not unique among my fellow players at Hideous Laughter Productions! From the mysterious depths of Golarion, to distant space far beyond the Pact Worlds, and everywhere in between, I (and the rest of my fellow HLP gamers) love exploring the universe Paizo has created and crafting stories in it! Our group has gamed together long before the show and has played through several adventure paths across both the Pathfinder and Starfinder systems. We’re absolute nerds for the game mechanics and lore, so when we decided to start a podcast two years ago the Pathfinder system was a no brainer!

What Else? Beyond Carrion Crown!

Though our podcast network debuted with our flagship Carrion Crown show, quickly we began to realize that we had an appetite for more! Releasing the regular show was great, but what else could we do? What other stories could we tell?

• Zone of Truth - Along with the main show, our main podcast feed also hosts the Zone of Truth, a biweekly podcast where Griffin (our GM for Carrion Crown) and myself host a conversational and interview-style show where we discuss what’s happening behind the screens from a GM and player perspective, review new and upcoming Paizo and Pathfinder related products, deep dive into some of the juiciest Pathfinder lore, and interview exciting content creators in the TTRPG space!
• HLP Evil Interlude – Also on the main feed and a prequel-companion show to Hideous Laughter Productions’ flagship Carrion Crown adventure run, the HLP Evil Interlude stars four evil “heroes” setting the stage for some of the biggest moments in Carrion Crown! Homebrewed and run by GM Griffin, this show is a must-listen for fans of deep Pathfinder lore and folks who enjoy listening to something different from an Adventure Path. And what can I say, sometimes it just feels good to be bad!
• Linked Legacy - This anthology series departs from HLP tradition, putting different members of the HLP into the GM seat to tell new stories set against the backdrop of classic pathfinder modules. Available to all subscribers to the HLP Patreon at the $5 tier or above, the Linked Legacy podcast is sure to surprise and delight new and longtime listeners of the show alike!

So, What Now?

With the partnership between Paizo and Hideous Laughter Productions made official, adventures truly await, and Hideous Laughter Productions is looking forward to doing bigger and better things than ever before! I sincerely hope you check us out and fall in love with our characters and story just as much as we have. Below I’ve hyperlinked our link tree site and from there you can find us on all your favorite social media sites, our website, Patreon, and many of the world’s biggest podcast platforms. To all the horror buffs and more traditional fantasy roleplaying fans out there, to all the number crunchers and RP enthusiasts, we’ve got something for everyone in our show and I look forward to sharing our stories with you and interacting with you all online! See you there!

https://linktr.ee/hideouslaughterpod

Steven Straple
Player in Hideous Laughter Productions, Paizoverse Enthusiast, and All-Around Nerd