blogging
YO! South Korea!
I’m going to be going to South Korea next week and looking at our traffic reports we got some South Korean visitors this week after we joined RPG Bloggers. So if anyone wants to say anything in the comments about the RPG scene in Seoul that would be awesome. I’m there less than 48 horus so very much doubt I’ll have time to do anything at all but would be fascinated to hear about it…
Oh yeah! Another Aussie Rules game on the cards.
And this time it’ll be on my console of choice – the Xbox 360!
There’s an article here in The Age about the development of a new Australian Football League game.
One of the problem about being interested in relatively obscure things is that you’re not well catered for. AFL football isn’t obscure in Melbourne, but it certainly is in a global sense and now that video games are big business, the chances of anyone taking the punt (ho ho) on a relatively minor sport reduces.
A similar situation exists for the new music games – Rock Band and Guitar Hero. Rock Band has made serious money: US$1 billion in downloadable track sales. And exactly how many of those are from my favourite genre of music? None – absolutely none. There’s some that come close (Bad Religion, Against Me!, SpongeBob SquarePants) but no Converge, Terror, Kill Your Idols or Ceremony. Not even any Dropkick Murphys and they’re pretty big! I can’t fault the business decision here, but I’d love to play some of those bands.
I like the stuff I’m into – nerdy games, hardcore and AFL all included – and wouldn’t change it. But it’s nice every once in a while when something catering to my interests gets out.
Sorry
Things have been a bit quiet around here lately – I’ve had house guests, lots of work/real world stress and no gaming (last Mythic Senguko Japan session had to be cancelled after a friend got knocked off his bike by a car) and Sophie has been entering the real estate market and running races (go Soph!).
I’m sure we’ll have something to blog about again in the next few days.
“These days I can see half a million Orcs coming over a hill and I am bored”
In Wired here.
I can remember Willis O’Brien’s King Kong. I can remember being awed at the artistry that had made those things possible. Yes, I knew how it was done. But it looked so wonderful. These days I can see half a million Orcs coming over a hill and I am bored. I am not impressed at all. Because, frankly, I could have gotten someone, a passerby on the street, who could have gotten the same effect if you’d given them half a million dollars to do it.
In his own writing on these subjects, and any other chance he gets, Moore can be a bit ranty. But Adam Rogers keeps him nicely on track, while allowing him to speak his own mind – maybe he just got him on a good day? Anyway, Moore speaks about Watchmen, movies in general, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, cultural criticism through differnet mediums and a few other things besides.
Boardgames and RPGs
I don’t go to cons or spend much time with gamers I’m not already friends with so I can’t say I’ve noticed this but according to two seperate industry figures boardgames are making major roads into RPG circles.
One’s a throw away comment by designer Ken Hite in a con review:
boardgaming boomed this weekend as it seems to be doing all over.
And the other is a longer, more considered piece by Steve Darlington, known for his work on the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay line, amongst other things:
In short, for what people want out of an RPG – to move through something like a plot, to have a character of their own design, to make meaningful choices about goals and combat, to roll dice and produce random events, to make choices IN character even if they work against what might be best for winning the game…all of these are being met, more and more, in board games.
(as a side note, Steve’s a fan of this blog)
I’m not sure about this myself, but my experience of boardgames is that they are too directed in their story – one of my signle favourite RPG-things is that the GM can’t predict what the hell the players will do. I don’t miss the box set games of the past – big maps annoy me and I don’t need more crap in my life, just good ideas.
Do any of you feel that there’s an increasing convergence between RPGs and board games?
Defending George
It’s a bit odd but, in the last week, three extensive defences of why George R. R. Martin hasn’t finished A Dance of Dragons yet: one (in two parts) from The Wertzone, one from Suvudu and one from A Dribble of Ink (although this is more a commentary on the Suvudu one).
This is one of these odd things that never would have happened before the internet. Before the net, we never would have known anything about why he hadn’t finished it. But now we know about his football watching, travel plans, work on other books and we have forums dedicated to people moaning.
As for me? I don’t care. Yes, it’s kind of stupid that he is taking so long and yes, it does put off some people. But I still enjoyed the first books in the series and have no regrets that I read them. And Martin doesn’t ‘owe’ me the end of the series anymore than Fox owed me the end of Firefly. I’d prefer to have a conclusion but there is no implicit contract between author and reader that someone will finish a series to my satisfaction. But I’m certainly not going to spend my time defending Martin from critics either – he made his bed.
Some nice links
Chris Pramas announces that the A Song of Ice & Fire RPG has finally been given approval by George R. R. Martin.
According to Kotaku, the Chicago Tribune has asked if GTAIV contains the century’s best writing. Clearly the answer is no – I can think of 30 or so things that are better written from the last 8 years, including some other video games. But interesting the question is being asked.
It’s either fun culture jamming or annoying viral marketing, but they have some funny road signs in Austin.
And continuing on from the other day’s theme, the Guardian has some commentary on the unrepresentativeness of a lot of SFF. This was sparked by a post by Elizabeth Bear on how to produce more representative genre writing. All good stuff and thanks to Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist for the heads up.
Book on female gamers
The Stupid Ranger blog have posted about a new book they are writing on female gamers. They need both male and female gamers to respond to their surveys. Go here to check it out!
Take a bow Nick
Just wanted to introduce the new contributor to Mostly Geek, my brother Nick!
I’ve got no idea what he’s going to write, but no doubt it’ll be interesting! I’m guessing it’ll be more to do with geeky things outside of roleplaying games than I write, but we’ll see.
Let’s start
I’ve recently been reading a lot about all things geek so I thought I’d finally get round to making a place where I could get all my thought’s down. Mostly Geek pretty much sums it up. I’ll use this space to write about the anything I consider to be geeky. From RPGs to books to movies to music. It’s a blog and so who knows where it might lead.