Further compounding the madness of Gabriel playing - and running - Dungeons & Dragons, I am now being told that he is reading Dragonlance. Yes, that's right. The books you read in Junior High, the ones you might read in the library, forgoing lunch altogether because the threat of physical violence was very real. I can't really be angry at this process anymore, and besides - if he's at Dragonlance, his archaeological trek through my formative age must nearly be complete. I read Neuromancer and Fahrenheit 451 before I ever got into Weis and Hickman, so he may be in for a shock near the end.

Andrew Lloyd Webber (or his clever handlers) are looking to position his ouvre in an interactive context, and they're approaching publishers in that regard. It's almost certainly going to culminate in some SingStar-type bullshit when it could be so very much more.

When we received the initial exploratory mail from Pork, asking if Gabe had room in his campaign, it was like being plunged into an icy stream. Once blood began to flow again, it seemed to us that his mental alacrity - which severely complicates normal conversations - may have a natural home at the table. If properly mitigated.

It's like when you rub a puppy's nose in the shit he left in your living room. Just think, in a few years when the comics from 2009 become a book. It will go to print like that. 

Gabe won't change it.  He's punishing me for letting it slip in there.  

Crayon Physics Deluxe - the adult stage of the cool but larval tech demo - is now available for purchase on the PC or the iPhone. Like its wriggling forebear, this is a beautiful, life-affirming experience that suggests anything is possible. One must work very hard to transform it into some kind of battle stadium.

I am trying not to be too strident on the matter, afraid that we're dealing with an old man/lawn scenario, but I'm bad at being polite. If you must both a) post constantly and are b) paid in direct relation to how divisive, petty, or vicious you are, I imagine it's very difficult to write in a useful or interesting way.

I've had a lot of people ask me how my first D&D game as Dungeon Master went. Here's a pic I snapped with my phone towards the end of the night. Actually since we went until 2:30 am, I guess I should say the morning.

We grabbed the demo for Lord of the Rings: Conquest over the weekend, with no expectations because we haven't been following it. I more or less could not endure the tutorial, choosing instead to learn my trade "On The Job," which is dangerous for an archer but one gets used to it. Unfortunately, there was a bug in the demo that would not allow me to play their online game online - it suggested that my displayName was in use, something I didn't find especially surprising, because it was my name. I decided that the hours of a Sunday afternoon would be better employed in the construction of a couch cushion fortress, and took my refuge there.

Massively (and others) dropped articles earlier this week re: one of these tech lawsuits that bloom perennially in the game industry. This time it's Worlds.com versus NCSoft, and if you think the patent in the strip is ridiculous, know that it was modeled on the real one - one which purports to define a "System and method for enabling users to interact in a virtual space." Ha!  

The solution for the bricked Zunes is, they claim, to "wait until tomorrow."

I'm sure it was meant to be grim, but for some reason that story about videogame characters giving men self-esteem issues as well had us in stitches. Part of it may be that we delight in terrible realities, our receptors for joy and despair being reversed - like those creatures who thrive in boiling sea vents or devour toxins, we manifest an alien physiology.

So I spent a huge chunk of the weekend working on my D&D adventure. Playing with Scott, Will and Tycho for the Podcasts really got me hooked on the game. Speaking of those podcasts I'm not exactly sure when they'll be available online. I'll let you know here though as soon as I find out. I will say that there is a point at which Jim is hanging upside down from a rope ladder, 20 ft off the ground casting spells in all directions. He was as usual, magnificent. 

Between the treacherous drifts of the Everwinter and my trip eastward, we haven't really been in the office. With both of us in, the power rings have joined and the morning has largely been spent talking about crucial matters, like the effective range of javelins and the frequency with which an elder red dragon may issue gouts of crackling flame. It's glee of such a concentrated sort that I must store it up, keep it, as (statistically speaking) human lives seem to trend away from glee.