Starting point

My younger brothers, me, and my cousin all rode our bikes up to the shopping center. My step-mom gave us each five dollars. It was summer, and the black bike seats were hot. The shopping center was a mile up the road, but on a bike you could get there pretty quick. We'd take short cuts and then only have to be on the busy main road for about the last 6oo yards.

My dad bought and built a model rocket and the weekend before we launched it. I couldn't believe how high up it went. It made me think about missiles, and nuclear war, and the Russians. Nuclear war was bad because everyone said so, but the missiles seemed pretty cool to me. At the shopping center was a hobby shop where dad bought his model rocket. It was next to the arcade.

We went into the arcade first and parked our bikes out front. Dad loved Centipede and always played it, his machine was right up front in the arcade. I liked Star Castle and Battlezone. I liked the graphics how they were line drawn. I liked trying to dodge the big cannon from the Star Castle. It was like beating the Death Star every time I could destroy the castle. Then I'd make my little ship do figure eights in celebration.

My brothers, my cousin, and I played in the arcade for awhile. We had to wait for my cousin to finish his game. We were told to stick together, so we waited. He finished, then we walked over to the hobby store to look at the rockets.

We walked in and a bell rang on the door. This old lady behind the counter looked up and said. "hello boys."

We all said "hi" and then we split up like marbles let loose into the store. I looked to my left and saw these books and boxes. "ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK" was on the top shelf and that looked cool. This mean guy with a gun and one eye was dragging this other guy behind him. I knew it was from a movie, but I could not see the movie. Man that game looked better than Bonkers. It was on the top shelf and I could not reach it. There was a pinkish box though right in front of me. It had this wizard lady and a guy with a spear on it. This huge dragon was attacking them. It kind of looked like the guy on the side of the Centipede video game cabinet. He was shooting arrows at the giant bug. That's why the Centipede game sucked. You didn't have a guy with a bow shooting, you had a snake head spitting stuff at the centipede. They lied about it with the art on the cabinet, and that sucked.

I picked up the dragon box. It was $10 dollars, and I only had $3 left after the arcade. I flipped the box over. What kind of game is this? No board, no pieces, just some books, a crayon, and some weird dice? I read the back of the box. You slay a dragon, find piles of treasure and then a black knight comes out and challenges you, what do you do? Oh man, I kill him! This looks cool, and there are over 100 monsters to fight? I thought of dracula, the wolfman, godzilla, dragons, maybe centipedes like the video game, unicorns, mutants, giants, the fish guy from the lagoon, heck I couldn't even come up with 100 monsters.

I had to play this. I took the box over to my brothers and my cousin. They looked at it and my cousin said that it sounded cool, but he did not want to read the book. I said I would read it. I'd learn how to play it, and then I'd teach it to everyone. We could all play together. With Atari you could only have two people play, and that meant two of us had to watch. Monopoly was dumb, Risk took too long, Bonkers was boring, the Slime monster game didn't have any slime left in it, and Boggle was dad's game. This was a new game we could play together.

Everyone walked back over to the game shelf. There was another book called "Sword of Hope" and these thin books called modules with giants on the cover and knights fighting them. These were cheaper than the box set. The old lady said you have to buy the box first before you can use the other books.

I put my three dollars in and my cousin put in seven. The lady put the box in a plastic bag. I slipped the bag handle through my handle bars. It was so hot out we were sweating when we left the shopping center, and the box banged against my knee while I peddled home. I hadn't slain a dragon yet, and I did not get stopped by the black knight riding my bike home either. I did discover a treasure though, a wealth that would last me all that summer and continues to reward me now.

Unintended Consequences

Hello my friends and mysterious acquaintances, and a tip of the hat to lurkers everywhere. Sorry I've not had the time I have hoped recently to write. I am still here, still nerdy, and still working away, just not on my own projects as I had hoped.

As I've made mention before, I happen to work for a game company. Technically I have a specific title and role. My own out pouring of new ideas and past experiences in retail often tap me to do not only my job, but additional projects. Recently a new project was launched and the time line for completion is...well to put it mildly "nuttier than squirrel shit."

The project is the sort of thing most companies would spend about a year putting together, we've had a little under 3 months. My own part in this is as "rented mule." Here is how it works: Super important #2 guy in the company has crazy idea and creates a time line not tethered to reality. Yours truly gets the unenviable task of trying to give shape to said wild ass vision, with my time line being, "this should have been done yesterday. Oh, and don't quit your day job, as your titular function is critical to our continued success." So myself, another hard charger in the same department, and 2 outside consultants (who are paid double the company wage) are putting this little dream together. For the visionary it is a dream, for the cat building it, its a nightmare.

I can hear you now gentle reader, "Waaaaaah, boo-hoo, you have a job so why are you complaining? it is called work for a reason, man up and shut up about it, who cares? Will you ever finish just ONE rpg you are working on? Damn what a cry baby!" All true to a certain extent.

Who cares? Well my wife and I do, and I am sure that is the extent of it. In the end having worked absurd hours daily and weekends to meet a deadline while still having to fulfill my normal work responsibilities has left me bereft of time to write or to attend to my blogs. My part in this project should be over soon, and after a vacation I hope to have the COLLAPSE rule book up.

Thanks for your patience and I hope not to have a lapse like this again. As Winston Churchill said, "If you are going through hell, keep going." That is precisely what I intend to do.

Feel Free?

I am pretty much done with the core rule section of COLLAPSE: character creation, resolving uncertainty, combat, and damage. I want to add a section on explosives, fire, and damaging terrain (doors, window, etc.) and then its complete.  I'd probably add a few potential setting overviews and follow each with a short list of media resources (novels, movies, comics) for further reference.

I am considering releasing these core rules for free, maybe I'll offer them printed as well just to see if anyone wants to buy them.  Plus I can practice my bootleg book making skills.

Then I'd charge for the follow on "blue book" reports dealing with specific "administrator eyes only" details around specific scenarios. These would include scenario hooks, details around events like zombies, alien invasion, post nuclear, etc. 

Thoughts?

COLLAPSE RPG blog is up

So other than working and traveling way too much, and devoting a LOT of time to fantasy baseball and the real game (GO SOX!)I am always tinkering away on my Roguish RPG and now I have another one under way which I have discussed before: COLLAPSE.  I knocked out the basic rules, character creation and combat.  It's a simple system, but I think that's a good thing and fits the flavor of the game.  The rules should come in around 48 pages and I am going to hand make copies.  I don't think I'll end up having to make more than 20 so I am going to include the dice as well. 

I am trying to write it in the fashion of a government field manual and a sample of that is on the COLLAPSE site.  Check it out, it's a bit spartan right now, but the oak starts from the acorn right?

Happy Easter!

GAMA Radiation

I walked the show floor in between meetings with distributors yesterday, and it took about 20 minutes.  So I walked it a few times and here's the trends:

1) Board games are back: Most booths were offering various board games.  This is the strongest growing market segment for hobby stores currently, and the manufacturers are putting out a lot of stuff this year!  Most dominant game form at the show.

2) Card games: Living Card games (Fantasy Flight) or self contained deck building card games (Dominion, Race for the Galaxy) are the new card trend. AEG's Thunderstone was a surprise hit and more are on the way.

3) A Winnowing of CCG's-there are 3 AAA players in the industry really and then there are a few fighting for some placement and recognition, but nothing stood out and most retailers limit the CCG's they carry now.

4) Minis-yup still there, nothing innovative or new

5) RPG's-well there was D&D...uhm...and FFG's Warhammer/ 40k stuff...and then Green Ronin stuff...nope that was it really.

There were even fewer manufacturers showing, and what appeared to be even fewer retailers attending.

So in my meetings I asked distributors about the RPG market. To a man (and woman) they said it was a non factor in their business, simply an offering for completeness, but a limited offering at this point.  $th edition D&D is steady but slow, then the FFG 40k RPG is okay, their new warhammer RPG game was not very strong, Green Ronin, Pathfinder, C&C, are all low and slow.  So I asked why?

1) Most often the distributors said the release of rules in PDF or worse, free, means they (distributors) not only don't need to carry RPG's-but SHOULD NOT carry them any longer.

2) MMORPG's and console games are more accessible and easier to get into with less hassle. One guy and a computer in his home versus gathering 4 or more people and hosting them at your house for 4-5 hours.

3) Board/ card games are a quicker game fix and easier to get people to try.

Answer #1 for RPG's is probably the reason why the RPG will continue to decline.  When items become "on demand" then it changes the way we as consumers expect to consume them.  So RPG's at retail are on a slow steady decline.

So are videos (hello Netflix, goodbye Blockbuster) and Video games are the next to go.  Anyone remember Suncoast video stores? Memo to Gamestop, the bell tolls for thee!

Already most Gamestops carry (if any) a tiny amount of PC games, because you can just download them.  Probably with the next generation of home consoles, the same could happen for their games.  Then there are no reasons to buy new games at retail...and no more used games to trade in...so goodbye Gamestop.

How about iPod and the Music Retail store industry...they collapsed ages ago.

The Kindle is the canary in the coal mine for books and comics.  Once a full color version comes out at $299 with a 10 hour battery life...goodbye book stores and comic stores as I can download what I want, anywhere I am, any time I want!  Color is the key-especially for comics, children's books, and art books.

There is a fundemental shift occuring as technology makes access, portability, and our expectations as consumers change.  It does not mean the complete disapearance of Books, CD's, Video game discs, or RPG books, it just means they could well become antique, specialized curiosities like Record Players.  In fact the OSR movement may well be the first wave of this antiquism. My wife and I collected all of Billie Holiday's LP's which we still love to listen to in the summer with a tall cool drink while I BBQ...is that any differnet then my collecting early D&D stuff then playing on a Saturday night with a group of late 30 and 40 somethings?

GAMA World

So I am in Las Vegas this week for the GAMA trade show.  I'm interested to see how many manufacturers are here this year, and to see if more or fewer retailers are attending.  About 3 years ago the show took up 2 big show room floors.  Then it went to 1.5, and last year it was just one floor.  So fewer manufacturers are probably in the market or at least willing to spend on attending.

Clearly the sinking economy is one issue, but that's tough when numbers came out saying hobby game sales were actually up as reported in an article on ICV2:

Game sales in hobby stores were up from 5 to 10% in 2009 despite hte worst economy in generations, according to a report in the new issue of Internal Correspondence (#70).  The growth was driven by a huge resurgence in Magic:  The Gathering Sales and by board game sales up by double digit percentages.  Yu-Gi-Oh! and the return of HeroClix also helped support improved sales.  Non-collectible miniature sales were down a little, and RPG sales were down around 10% in 2009.  

That's not a huge surprise as people tend to look for more value in a difficult economy.  Thus a $30 board game can be played multiple times with the family versus a video game at twice the cost and in general is a one or 2 player experience.  Speaking of that RPG's then should be the ultimate value as they should be relatively inexpensive ($20) and other than adding dice all you need is paper, pencil and imagination. Yet RPG sales are one of the few declining categories.  I have my own theories on this but suffice to say the hardback college biology sized rules texts don't exactly say "fun" nor "easy to learn"  I often wonder if RPG's would have exploded had they been delivered in their current format 200+ page hardback tomes for $20+

Anyway, looking at a map of the trade show floor, it looks pretty sparse this year with companies like Konami, Bandai, Wizards and Upper Deck taking huge positions on the show room floor (about a 4 booth space each) Fantasy Flight also has a large presence and I always look forward to seeing what they will do next!


I wonder if an OSR booth isn't a missed opportunity.  I mean you would have to be a crass capitalist trying to sell a few hundred retailers, but once you get over that issue, it seems like a few of these efforts could come together and split a booth or two and really try to get their product out there at retail.  Retailers are here, distributors are here...and the games are??  Maybe when I finish my Collapse game and my Roguish RPG I'll buy a booth, have my lovely wife run it and then offer to sell space to other OSR guys who want their product shown/ sold?


More from the show floor later...

War Against the Chtorr: A Matter for Men

I stumbled upon this GURPS setting book ages ago, and picked it up on a "75% off" whim.  It was an interesting read but not anything I'd run.  A couple weeks a go I found someone on ebay selling all 4 (of the planed 6 or 7 books series) online and bought them ($10 total).  I am halfway through the first book and its a really good read!  You have strange alien (purple worm!) invaders, post apocalypse setting (both nuclear AND alien invasion) so its a pretty lively read akin to Starship Troopers in terms of action and tone.

David Gerrold is the author.  The first book was written in 1983...and here in 2010 we are still awaiting the rest of the series to finish.  Much like my thoughts that George RR Martin will not finish the Song of Ice and Fire Series, I doubt Gerrold will finish his.  Even so if you like a good sci-fi action story, you could do a lot worse than this.

(Odd historical footnote for today, March 23rd: The U.S. Health Care bill is being signed into law today by our President, and it is also the anniversary of Patrick Henry's "Give me Liberty or Give Me Death" speech.)

Epic Fail

Liberty 

1 : the quality or state of being free:

a : the power to do as one pleases  

b : freedom from physical restraint  

c : freedom from arbitrary or despotic control  

d : the positive enjoyment of various social, political, or economic rights and privileges  

e : the power of choice


"He would be only too happy to let you make your decisions for yourselves. But sometimes you might make the wrong decisions, comrades, and then where should we be?"

--George Orwell, Animal Farm

 

Winter is coming...

Well, in a manner of speaking it is as the picture is from the opening shot of the HBO adaptation of GRR Martin's Game of Thrones. (No worries fellow hardball fanatics, spring has definitely sprung...PLAY BALL!).

I have a love hate relationship with these books. In fact I started the first book multiple times and finally at some point I stuck it out and became hooked. There is much in GRRM's writing style I loathe (over much detail on clothing and food, the entire Daneyrs plot) and much that I really enjoy (political plots in Westeros, handling of the super natural elements, character building)that keeps me coming back.

I doubt very much he will ever finish the series. Much like Stephen King's random writing schedule on the gunslinger/ dark tower series, it may take a near fatal event to motivate him to focus and finish the damn series. GRRM is seemingly easily distracted into strange side roads or editing collections and what not, rather than finishing the Westeros tale he started. He has a lot of talent and is clearly a motivated writer, but for whatever reason the success of A Song of Ice and Fire series has become something of an unpleasant burden. For a fellow who writes so much, the books have to be split up into various releases, it would seem he could crank out 400 page books yearly instead of delivering 1000+ page tomes every 5 years. Regardless, I think much like Alice down the rabbit hole, he has discovered something quite strange and quite intimidating in size, and now isn't quite sure what to do with it or how to handle it.. Not sure the HBO series will help that or harm the series ever seeing a textual end, but its a gritty dark fantasy world and I look forward to it being brought to life on screen.

In the not that matters to anyone but me PS to this post:  One of my favorite actors (Sean Bean) plays Eddard Stark in the HBO adaptation of his GRRM series.  For whatever cosmic coincidence, Bean's played nearly every one of my all time favorite literary characters: Richard Sharpe, Boromir, Odysseus, and now Eddard Stark.  Outside of the possibility of his playing Beowulf, or a movie adaptation of the Odyssey where he can show more of his take on Odysseus than he did in TROY, he has pretty, much defined on film some of my all time favorite characters...what are the odds of that happening??  PSS Sean Bean, or Hollywood if you are reading-A real adaptation (true to the story) of the Odyssey would be huge especially following The Clash of the Titans relaunch this summer....OH and while you are finishing that, adapt "Eagle in the Snow" by Wallace Breem and put Sean in as General Maximus.  I only want 5 % of the gross door revenue for giving away such genius easy money ideas, you can thank me later.

Erol Otus wasn't here...

In discussing D&D, most OSR fans often comment on the art and the artists. In fact the art really seems to have had a massive impact on how one viewed the game and to some extent even played it. There are iconic images: the cover the Moldvay Red Box, The cover of module B2, The Cover of the AD&D Players Handbook or DM's Guide, all have become iconic.

Not so GDW'S Traveller. In fact its almost illustrative of the exact opposite philosophy of design. No cover art, and nearly no interior art. A few rough sketches, silhouettes, and ship diagrams. Really not much of anything and one could argue outside the stark design ethic of the book covers, there isn't a single iconic "art" image for Traveller. The cover is iconic simply for what it lacks-art-thereby the simple design alone IS the art.

Yet no one seems to mind or feel cheated in the least. I have never read or heard anyone say 'Traveller sucks because there are no pictures!' Yet I have heard and read people lamenting what they consider to be terrible art or that an artists decline (in their opinion) takes away from their enjoyment.

Is one better off then designing their game material with limited artistic interpretations? Is less more?

First wave...

I have always liked heroes that were mortal, from heroes like Odysseus, Beowulf, and Boromir to Flash Gordon, Batman, and Captain America. To me they are just (extra?) ordinary guys who have all of our ordinary faults and yet still try their best to overcome the failings of being mortal. It’s how I run my games and colors a lot of what I like in movies books and TV.

Well, if this sounds like your kind of thing, then I need to point you to a new comic line launching from DC comics, It’s called First Wave and it centers on a noir like world where the heroes are ordinary guys trying to do the right thing in a world gone wrong: Doc Savage, Batman, the Spirit, Black Canary and more.
I have high hopes, and hope it becomes a long running popular line of books.

Hand-crafted gaming goodness

I am hoping you might be able to help me. I have decided that when I finish the revisions to Roguish I am going to print and assemble them myself into digest sized booklets. Not out of some sense of trying to be throwback, more in the sense of I want to finish doling it my self. I'll probably only sell 50 or so game sets so I'd rather they go out handmade, for better or worse. :)

My question is can you guide me to a blog or site that discusses the trials and travails of doing this?

thanks in advance for your guidance!

Shouldn't Toy Fair be fun?

So I am back from a LOOOOOONG week in NYC working the ToyFair booth for the company I work for. Holy Cow 9 hours a day on your feet selling sure was easier in retail when I was 24 then it is now @ 40. Anyway, while it is BIG BUSINESS (so busy-so important dontcha know) it always amazes me how grim, dour, and down right crabby a lot of folks are at the show. It could be buyers or another companies booth crew stopping to talk, but damn they make Eeyore look like Chuckles the Clown.

Look I am no Mary Poppins, but damn if you come to my booth I am going to smile shake your hand and talk with you friendly and casual. I may be a "sales guy" but I am not going to "sell you." To often as I visited booths or had other folks come to ours, I was amazed by how little they knew about their own games and toys, and by how little they cared.

Stopping at one booth I saw a couple of new kids games I thought my nieces might enjoy. So I asked a sales rep in the booth "can you tell me about these games? Are they out yet?" Her reply, "It's a game for little kids, can't you just read the box?" Then she quickly looked away and studied the remainder of what smelled like a tuna fish sandwich. I smiled, set the box down, wished her luck, and left.

Maybe it was the fact my lanyard and name badge identified the company I worked for and she had issues...or maybe she just had a bad meeting or a bad day. Either way-she lost a sale as I would have probably tried to find them online, instead I'll go out of my way to avoid the whole company now.

In fact MANY booths had vaguely interesting things, but the staff in the booth either ignored you, or at times were hostile. In fact the only genuinely friendly booths were the limited "hobby game" booths at the event. By limited I mean less than a dozen. There is a difference between having a passion for what you are doing, instead of having to (to lift a phrase from Nike) "Just do it."

If you can't be happy in the game and toy industry might I suggest a different career path? The absolute best parts of the show (for me, outside of successful business) were when fans or kids came to our booth and overflowed with stories or excitement at seeing some of their favorite stuff RIGHT THERE! No matter how tough the job gets sometimes, seeing how happy the end result makes kids feel makes it worth it.

If you are frowning more than smiling at the end of your work days (especially in a game and toy business) then get out! Life's way to short to be miserable, and at the show I saw a whole lot of misery.