Midweek Miscellany of Geekdom

Following in the footsteps of one of my favorite Medievalist bloggers, I have decided to include a weekly feature which highlights oddities and exciting news I have read about on a given day. Naturally, all such information will be some how related to geekdom in general.

• Though it's a year late for my tastes, last year was Robert Howard's 100th Birthday, Fantasy Flight games will be releasing the Age of Conan boardgame this summer. The game will be designed by Nexus games and will use mechanics similar to those used in their excellent War of the Ring boardgame. They have yet to post pictures of any of the game's components online. Given the track record of Fantasy Flight Games and Nexus, I expect the components will be of very high quality.
  
  
  
  As Thulsa doom might say, "Contemplate this on the tree of woe."



• Gamasutra has an excellent, and long -- 10 pages, article covering the history of the first video game console roleplaying game I ever played. The article, "The History of Dragon Quest," discusses the success of the franchise and also finally explained to me my unnatural enjoyment of Dragonball Z. You see, Dragon Quest had character design art created by Akira Toriyama, the man behind the Dragonball mask. And that jem came on the first page of the article. When it comes to the Dragon Quest series, I have never had so much fun "killing" smiling slimes than the first time I loaded Dragon Warrior into my Nintendo Entertaiment System.
  
  
  
  Isn't he cute? Shh...don't alert him. I need to bash his brains in with my longsword.
  
  Do slimes have brains? What about smiling slimes?



• Media Tie-In Author extraordinaire, Lee Goldberg, informs us that media tie-in authors now include the snooty and artsy fartsy literati. Dave Eggers, of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius fame, is writing the novelization of the upcoming Where the Wild Thing Are film adaptation of Maurice Sendak's classic children's picture book. Thanks Dave. Now I'll have to get into fist fights with people about how the new novelization, of a movie based on a 300 word work, has now elevated the form. Add to this all the fist fights I get into with people explaining that Blankets is a graphic novel, but Watchmen is a "trade paperback collection," I'll be spending so much time brawling, I won't be able to blog anymore.



• Apparently, the basic Risk boardgame is being revamped so as to no longer end marriages and friendships. For years, I have tried to explain to people that the Risk variants, which limit game length and add "objectives" to the victory resolution system aren't as bile causing as the basic Risk game. For years, my friends have continued to play the basic game, only to have long lasting friendships lost in the process. I don't know what it is about Risk that causes this. Games like Diplomacy and Junta are all about betraying your friends, but when the game is over everyone still likes one another. It only takes a couple hours of Risk to create hatreds that last generations.
  
  This image from the article over atGamers with Jobs, shows the "playtest" edition Hasbro is releasing to create buzz.
  
  
  
  You wanna create buzz? How about giving me a copy to promote on Geekerati Radio? I'll even schedule an interview where fans can call in. Sheesh!