There was a conversation going around the independent game developers' community a couple of months back concerning the reasons for game publication. The idea was that, with the accessibility of desktop publishing opensource programs and the ease in which one could post these creations online for free, then there was a dwindling need to actually publish and charge people money for said games.

I mulled it over for a long while. Was there a reason to create my game and publish it within the tried and true standard model in which people needed to pay me money to read my book? I came up with some answers as to why I wanted to publish but none of them seemed to hit it on the nose.

Finally, I discovered two. One was the proceeds-forwarding aspect of the book's sales to the Star C. Foster Writer's Prize. That one, well... that's pretty obvious.

Then there's the other, and that's the creation and propagation of a community. There exists right now a community of independent creators that develop their own games, publish them, and then use those publications to further redefine, re-examine, and grow the gaming community as a whole. Publication is another avenue of availability. In the current model on which the internet works, finding e-publications that are outside of specific search parameters is nearly impossible at best. Having an existing hard copy that can be stumbled over, found as part of a collective publishing model, or passed around from member to member of a community is another avenue in which the information can be examined and imparted.

Simply, I believe that I have something important that can be added to the discussion and, through that, the community. I think that I'm doing something. That's the second reason I want to publish.

This message has been inspired by this little video right here of a man named Clay Shirky being impossibly intelligent. View and enjoy.





(thanks to Mr. Warren Ellis for the edification)

God, where have I been?

It's been near on a month since my last post (speaking of, thanks for all of the encouragement on the dating front, guys!  More on that in a minute.) and I feel remiss for this.  There's been a bunch of stuff going on, so I think I'll handle all of it in lovely, lovely bullet-points!

• I'm still dating the woman.  Her name is Kristi.  Things are going fairly well there, taking into consideration the sort of baggage I tend to travel with.  I'm getting better at not freaking out completely and pulling away and screaming when someone tries to get emotionally close to me.  That's mostly because she's a great girl and I'd like to not do such things to her.  So there's that. 
  
• Oh, man, Criminal Element.  I got in some really fucking good writing over the past day or two.  Edited some sections, rewrote a section.  Now I just have two chapters that I need to expand from notes into actual, "i'm a real writer" text and the Shotgun Bible should be ready to go. 
  
• Speaking of Criminal Element, I had the great honor of doing a podcast interview about my game on Rob Bohl's Independent Insurgency.  The podcast isn't up yet, but should be soonish, so I'll post a link as soon as it does.  You can check out previous podcasts over here.  It was the first time I'd ever been interviewed about the game and, if I'm going to be honest with myself, I'm not sure if I did my best work on "selling the game", but it was a great conversation that Rob and I had, and I think it might be an interesting thing for the people out there that are interested in any kind of game and design, or who just want to see what the hell I've been working on for the past five (!) years.  A huge thank you to Rob for having me over his place and giving me a chance to talk about my game.  (Sorry I couldn't meet up with you at PoliCon man.  You're still doing DexCon, right?)
• I should mention that I was sorry to miss PoliCon to Don as well.  eruditus , sorry man.  Work's been a bear, but that should be clearing up sharpish.  Still up for some DexCon, yeah?
  
• I'm being transfered from my current location at the Major Video Game Retailer I work for to one that is further from home, in a mall, and is open considerably later than my current store.  I'm not terribly happy about this...
• ...though I might have another job prospect lined up that will amend that situation quite nicely.  I'm not wanting to say too much, in fear of jinxing it, but hopefully I'll be able to be more lose with the tongue in the next couple of weeks. 
  
• Thanks to the kindly intervention of feanor1138  and feanorsgrrl , I was able to see the current "it" noir movie at the Philadelphia Film Festival.  "Blast of Silence" was a fantastic, bizarre, lurid crime novel committed to film, with a slick, seedy monologue laying over top of the whole thing that sounded like "Donald Westlake's Choose Your Own Hitman Adventure".  I found it completely different from what I expected and absolutely enjoyable.  Criterion Collection has secured my twenty-odd dollars for their upcoming release. 
  
• A lovely flub committed by my bank has left me with a negative balance in my checking account, when I should have something that is very much in the positive.  I've been afflicted by this for near on a week now.  I'm not happy, to say the least.  I should have enough gas in my car to at least travel to and from work tomorrow, so at least I have that on my side. 
  
• I bought Rock Band for my 360.  My band is called "Parker Black and the Magnificent Bastards".  This automatically makes my fake band more Rock n' Roll than Fall Out Boy.  I've also four-starred Run to the Hills on Vocals at Medium.  This makes my fake band more Rock n' Roll than Daughtry.  Info on a Rock Band based party action soonishesque. 

That should take things up to the present, so let's have enough of this "Previously on... Mike's So-called Life."  What have all of you magnificent bastards been up to?

A couple of months back I ran a couple of sessions of a superhero role-playing game that I've had sitting in my head for a while.  Called Superior, the game system combines bits from the Shadow of Yesterday (Keys), Spirit of the Century (Fudge dice, skill ranges), and Ray Winninger's Underground (World creation mechanics, psychological impact of super power use).  Sadly, the system didn't come together as well as I'd have liked, but damn if the game didn't fucking kick multiple different kinds of ass. 

The core of the game conceptually is that it treats super powers as a science fictional concern, not as four-colour superheroics.  The world is political and driven by real-world, human concerns.  Superhumans, or Enhanciles as they're called in the game, are treated as weapons on par with Sarin gas and hydrogen bombs.  The Enhanciles themselves are regular people given power that a human should never have.  The tagline that I use for the game is "Great power.  Great temptation."  When first setting up the game I referenced a lot of Warren Ellis' writing, as well as stuff from Mark Millar, Grant Morrison, Alan Moore's Marvel/ Miracleman, and other post-superhero works. 

After going on a good fifteen minute tear about these comics when we sat down for the first session, I realized that the players at my table were not so versed in the comic book world as I had thought.  They didn't know what the hell I was talking about.  There was confusion.  "So, we're meant to be playing superheroes, but we're not?  We have superpowers, go on adventures, and fight other people with superpowers, but we're not superheroes."  I could practically hear everyone's eyebrows arch in confusion. 

I did two things to help resolve this issue.  I drew a picture of a character that was an example of the kinds of characters players could have in the game.  Sadly, my scanner is far too small to scan the picture in properly.  I might be able to get it on here sometime, and I'd really like to as it's a drawing I'm really proud of, but not quite yet. 

I also wrote a small bit of fiction that was meant to act as an example of play.  This is what part of a session of Superior should feel like when playing.  It's not superheroes, it's science fiction.  It's Batman by William Gibson, the Fantastic Four by Neal Stephenson, Captain America by Geogre Effinger.