Tuesday, December 22, 2009

This just in...

I've deleted more spam comments from my last post than I have from the entirety of the rest of my blog ever. This is amusing to me.

James

Labels: I need a tag for this sort of thing

Friday, December 04, 2009

Death's Door being discontinued.

I'm discontinuing Death's Door. It's had a good long run, and I've gotten what I wanted out of it as a designer and a publisher. Rather than carry the stock as a cost into another fiscal year, I'm selling off what's left, and if it's not gone by Dec 31, it's getting destroyed.

Which is to say: If you want it, get it now, because you'll not otherwise find it.

It's been marked down to $8.00 USD everywhere I sell it. IPR has about a dozen left, and I have a few at Blank Shield Press as well. I'd appreciate it if you go through IPR by preference; Ideally that stock will just sell out, and they won't need to ship anything back to me.

James

Labels: pimping my stuff, publishing

Friday, November 06, 2009

Yes, I want you to give me your candy.

Had a fun game of Where are your keys? last night.

There were 6 of us in total, and we played through "What is that" to fluency, and then poked and stumbled through "Who/Whose is that?" and "Want, have, give, take." It was a lot of fun, and by the end of the evening, we had people using the game to trade around the bag of caramels.
"I want my candy."
"That is not your candy, that is my candy."
"That is my rock. I will give you my rock."
"Yes. You give me your rock, I will give you my candy."
"Perfect!"

We talked about the game a bit, both before and after, and discussed some of the techniques, and the viral, open source nature of the game. One aspect of that which came up in particular, is that I talked about the roadmap using Technique: Language Ladder instead of Technique: Travels with Charlie, and after the game was done, I talked a little about the why's of that, and how the game allowed and encouraged that kind of thing. I also talked about some of the Techniques we didn't use, because we didn't need them (Everybody Plays, Lunatic Fringe) with so few people.

The game will spread from here; two of the participants were already talking about bringing it to other people this weekend, and I'm going to show it to my brothers at a family dinner this Sunday as well; they're both teachers, and I think they'll quickly see the potential of it.

I'm going to try and get something going on a monthly basis, probably using a facebook group for organizing things. This would just be for teaching and spreading the game, and the hope is that people will spin off of this, and hunt down native speakers in their target language, and spread the game even further.

I really need to figure out how the built in camera works in my laptop.

James

Labels: WAYK

Friday, October 16, 2009

Thou shalt...

I've had a list for a while now, that I've occaisionally talked about, but not written about, which is odd, in retrospect.

So. Here are the four games that I think should be mandatory to play, before anyone is allowed to write, design, organize, or run a game.

- a freeform RPG. No formal rules beyond "I have final say over what happens to my character"
- the social/party game Werewolf. In it's most basic structure; 10ish villagers, 2 werewolves.
- Diplomacy. I'm not responsible for any fallout among the people you play it with.
- a oldskool competative boardgame, like Risk. Caveat: play it hard-nosed, and strictly by the book, without table chatter or distraction.

So, having done all of these things, what's the point? And why these particular things? Because each of those games, or styles of play is fun, in it's own particular way. Those games are also two faced monsters that will deceive you if you haven't played them.
Because from the outside, freeform blends into werewolf blends into Diplomacy blends into Risk. But viewed from within, those styles of play are very different, and further, actively damaging to each other.

Worth saying again. Those styles of play are actively damaging to each other, and I'm absolutely certain that anyone who has played games for any length of time, has seen this, a thousand times over.

But for some incredibly baffling reason, we keep thinking that if we only design "well enough", that we can make all of those people happy.

You can't. Stop trying. Focus on one style of play, design for that style of play, and make it clear up front. Some people will, indeed, try your game, expecting it to be something it isn't, and declare that it sucks.

But the people who like what your game will like it very much indeed.

James

Labels: geekery, I think too much

Friday, October 09, 2009

The update of updateyness, now with updates

Lots of things going on. Like SNOW.

Stupid snow, reminding me that Winter is Coming. We need to winterize the trailer, and clean out the garage so we can park under shelter ASAP. We're also giving the inside of the house the hairy eyeball, and looking at some major reorganization.

In less prosaic affairs, I've got lots of cool ideas for Reality Cops, but they mostly pertain to layout and presentation; the game itself is floating untended at the moment. I desperately need some perspectives that aren't mine, and they aren't coming. :/ I hate chasing after people.

I'm reopening Death's Door as a project; not so much with an eye to republish it, as to use it as a testing ground for rewriting and layout now that I've got that many more years of writing/designing under my belt. It may end up getting republished as a result though, who knows.

And last but not least, Where Are Your Keys is continuing to hold my fascination, such that I've invited a bunch of local people to a workshop to introduce the game, and we'll see what happens from there. I already have some thoughts about techniques and things that I may (will) do differently.

James

Labels: I need a tag for this sort of thing, publishing, Reality Cops, WAYK

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

WAYK, the Language Fluency Game

Where Are Your Keys?

Wow. Just . . . Wow.

The sound quality is politely described as "poor" in this video, but you can really see the potential. I was able to pick up some of the basics of ASL just watching, let alone actually participating.

Seriously. Check it out.

Labels: geekery, I need a tag for this sort of thing, WAYK

Saturday, September 19, 2009

I like InDesign CS4

It's remarkable the features that just come out of nowhere when you upgrade from version 2.1 to version 6.0 . . .

I've created the first rough draft editions of play aids for Reality Cops. You can find them here:

Character Sheet
Real World
Operation worksheet

Enjoy.

James

Labels: publishing, Reality Cops