I am so rarely tagged to do any sort of blogging game/meme I feel kind of obligated to respond to Rik “Canned Goods” Hunter’s invitation to post the title of each blog post for the month. So here it goes:
Kinda interesting to go back through the old posts– if I have time, I’ll try to do another post about blog entries that tell more the story of 2008 around here.
Anyway, trying to tag others here, I’ll start with a couple locals:
The original plan for this weekend was camping at the Pinery Park in Ontario, a really beautiful and very tent-friendly campground and park about three or so hours northwest of here. We (meaning us and Jim and Rachel and fam) arranged this trip months ago, and– of course– the weather is not cooperating. We’ve had stunning weather this week and next week looks acceptable, but of course it has to rain this weekend.
Anyway, I am thinking I might interact with a whole different kind of “nature” this weekend, Spore. I’ve seen various commercials and such, but I have to say that Will Richardson’s post about playing the game has kind of sold me. Here’s a quote:
It arrived yesterday, and I’ve spend a total of about 90 minutes playing so far, and I’m pretty much blown away. I have little or no idea what I’m doing, I’m sure, but my herbivore (you didn’t really think my spore would eat meat, did you?) paramecium has now evolved into a two-legged, funky-eyed, green, fruit-eating creature who’s growing a family and trying to figure out how to survive in a world with equally funky looking creatures who might be friend or foe. And while getting past the cell stage was pretty easy, this creature stage is already proving to be much more challenging. Just a few minutes ago, I was killed by some purple dudes who ganged up on me and seemed to chew my head off. Luckily, rebirth is almost instantaneous.
Interestingly enough, Will posted this a couple days ago, and he hasn’t posted since. Perhaps a bit too much Sporing?
Via boing-boing; I already knew that fortune cookies were actually an American invention and not a Chinese one, but this video kind of confirms that people on the street in China are not likely to know what to do with those little pieces of paper:
A couple months ago, I went with my friend Chris to a gaming conference for a day in Columbus. One of the many games I saw that I almost bought was War on Terror. I didn’t get it because it looked a little too expensive for me. Well, I learned via boing-boing this morning, that had I bought it, I might have had it confiscated.
Perhaps the criminal could hit someone with a snow globe. Dirty bastards.
By the way, the photo featured here comes from the WOT web site and is part of contest they’ve had for creative pictures featuring gamers wearing the evil balaclava.
Dungeons & Dragons co-creator Gary Gygax rolled a natural one on his fortitude save today, dying at level 69 at his home in Lake Geneva.
Best known for developing D&D with Dave Arneson in 1974, Gygax helped formulate a pen-and-pencil role playing ruleset that would become a touchstone for modern gaming across its genres.
My own AD&D phase was in junior high/early high school, with a few gaming sessions all the way into early college years. Truth be told though the people I hung out with were more likely to play Traveller or Runequest. Will is getting the itch to play these games already, playing a kind of watered-down version and also making up a version with some friends at his school. I suspect Gary would be proud.
This is the blog, homepage, and/or portal for one Steven D. Krause, aka Professor Steven D. Krause, aka Steve, aka sitedad, aka a host of names not repeatable here. It used to be two different blogs, but now it is one.
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Not really. But at least one version the game was seized by police in the UK because the balaclava, which is the little hat thing that says “evil” on it and which is one of the satirical props of the game, could be used in a criminal act.