Dungeons & Dragons: Daggerdale Looks Like a Good Time

I am eagerly awaiting Atari's Dungeons and Dragons: Daggerdale which will be released for the Xbox 360 and PS3 later this year. If it is as fun as prior D&D console offerings, it should be a nice way to waste a few hours.

Neuroshima Hex -- One of My Favorite Apps of 2010

Michal Oracz's Neuroshima Hex was initially released in 2006 to much deserved critical acclaim. The game combined traditional territorial control wargame interactions with Eurogame game play and card game style interactions. The resulting product is easy to learn, quick to play, and a rewarding repeat experience. I consider my imported copy of the game -- which is now sold in the US by the excellent Z-Man Games -- one of the treasures of my collection.

Shortly after purchasing my iPhone, I discovered that Neuroshima Hex was being offered as an application for the bargain price of $2.99. I quickly purchased the app and it has been one of the four or five apps I turn to when I need a quick bit of entertainment.

Rather than write a full review of the game, I have attached the two videos below. The first is a trailer for the game and the second is a tutorial which goes over gameplay.

I have to say that one of the things I find most endearing about the app revolution, for both smartphones and tablets, is how quickly it has become a platform for distributing excellent versions of quality board games to users who might never encounter the game otherwise. To buy a copy of the Neuroshima Hex board game requires finding a niche hobby game store, but to buy the app one only need visit iTunes. Now if we could just spread the word about this excellent game.

Some Notable Additions to My Blogroll in 2010

2010 saw the creation of a number of blogs that I have found myself enjoying, as well as my discovery of blogs that had been posting for a while that I hadn't seen before. I ended up adding a good number of blogs to my various blogroll categories last year, and I thought I'd point out some of the better additions.

1) Grognardia -- James Maliszewski's "Grognardia" blog is one of the best old school gaming blogs on the internet. James' musings about games of yore, his thoughts on game design, and his commentary about classic SF/F are well worth your attention. James is one of my favorite "indie" game designers, having worked on "Sword, Spell, and Shadow" and "A Thousand Suns." I don't always agree with his opinions, but I always enjoy reading them.

2) Fabled Lands -- This is the official blog of Dave Morris and Jamie Thomson where they share information about their "Fabled Lands" line of Fantasy Game books, as well as examples of their past work. Want to see what a roleplaying game about Feudal Japan using the Warhammer Fantasy RPG rules would look like? Head on over to "Fabled Lands" and find out.

3) Fantasy Game Book -- This is a blog that examines fantasy gamebooks with a bit of academic rigor. I added the blog to my list just the other day based on the strength of recent entries by Andrew Wright. His thoughts on "One True Path" vs. "Multi-Path" gamebooks make for interesting reading.

4) Jordan Mechner's Blog -- Before Jordan Mechner, the terms "narrative" and "video game" would rarely be used in a sentence. That changed with Mechner's "Karateka." Though the narrative of the game was simple, his use of musical cues and dramatic elements hinted that video games could be more than tests of reflexes and memory. They could be interactive narrative experiences, and that experience didn't require the use of a laser disk that linked animated sequences through a decision tree.

You Got Rick Astley in My DOOM!

Steve Jackson Games Offering Early Space Gamer Issues on e23

From many of my prior posts, it's probably pretty clear that I am a great admirer of The Space Gamer magazine that was published by Steve Jackson Games in the early 80s. Over the course of the magazine's lifetime, it changed hands no fewer than four times, but it is the Steve Jackson era that stands out as a particularly high point for the magazine.

During the Steve Jackson era, The Space Gamer was THE magazine where gamers could find reviews covering the breadth of the gaming hobby. They had review and news columns covering rpgs, miniatures, and play-by-mail games. Key among the reviews was the magazine's "Capsule Reviews" section where gamers could find thoughtful reviews of dozens of gaming products in every issue. This magazine is one of my favorite resources when I am looking for archival information about the history of the gaming hobby. Reading The Space Gamer one quickly sees that the "current" animosity that some gamers feel toward Wizards of the Coast -- the current owners of Dungeons and Dragons -- is nothing new. Back in the 80s, during the Gygax era, TSR (the owners of D&D at the time) had huge layoffs on a regular basis and were as sue happy as modern gamers claim Wizards is today.

In addition to rules and news, The Space Gamer issues often featured fully playable board games. Kung Fu 2100, Globbo, Battlesuit, and Necromancer were all games that originally appeared in the pages of TSG. The pages of the magazine also featured regular articles by people who are now giants in the gaming industry. People like Allen Varney started their game designer careers as contributors to the Letters page of TSG. Lord British wrote articles discussing his designer notes for Akalabeth and its origins.

For years, I have been collecting back issues by scouring eBay on a regular basis. Some of the issues are more expensive than others, and I have had to wait through several auctions on a couple of key issues. eBay, garage sales, used games sections, and used book stores used to be the only places one could legally acquire copies of TSG. Now that has changed.

Steve Jackson Games has finally made the first three SJG issues of The Space Gamer available on their e23 electronic publication store. Potential readers can now find issues 27, 28, and 29 at the website where they cost a mere $2.99 each. For these, and for any TSG issues, this is a bargain.

Go. Buy them now. Read them. Enjoy the in depth look at the early days of our hobby.

You can even get a free preview of issue 29 here.

Let's hope they keep adding new issues for us to purchase.

What If 16-bit Fantasy Games Were Designed by Bitter Divorcees?

The good folks over at SF Signal posted this amusing video featuring a more cynical view of what the solution to a side scrolling 16-bit fantasy adventure might be. In the video our intrepid hero rescues the princess, but then gets more than he bargained for as the material demands of the princess continually increase. One can imagine that this is a video game level that Oscar or Felix (of the play/movie/tv series The Odd Couple might design). Though the humor is cynical and staid, the video has its charms because one can actually imagine a game designer going to great lengths to create "meaningful" relationship tasks and goals within a video game experience. Such games may already exist.

I would be lying if I didn't say that the sequence where the video's protagonist goes to work for "the man" doing a task of physical labor, in order to pay for a wedding ring for his princess, didn't remind me of Peter Molyneaux's efforts at verisimilitude in Fable II. Molyneaux's game features complex systems for relationships (including financial support/gifts), real estate, and manual labor. In fact, I often joke that the amount of time I spent playing the "Blacksmithing" mini-game in order to earn money to purchase businesses/houses essentially transformed the game into a game of Blacksmith Hero. It was great fun to watch my labor equate to property ownership, which itself equated to revenue, though it wasn't fun of the combat/conflict variety. These tasks made my Fable II experience feel somehow more real. After all, even heroes have day jobs.

Even pen and paper roleplaying games sometimes offer their equivalents of the Blacksmith Hero experience. D&D 3.5's magic item construction system was a much needed rules set for the game, but the crafting rules could be utilized in a number of ways. One could merely have the players roll the skill checks and do the math, but one could also role play out the forging/crafting experience between the rolls. The 2nd Edition AD&D setting Birthright, one of my favorite settings, had sub-games devoted to govern the kingdoms and large scale battles. These sub-games were the setting's greatest strength and its greatest flaw. Superhero 2044 is essentially a pen and paper simulation of the "patrol" patterns of the superheroes being played by the characters. DC Heroes has gadget construction rules that can be roleplayed, and included recommendations for incorporating character's mundane -- but still meaningful -- sub-plots into the campaign. Marvel Superheroes rewarded characters for keeping up with their mundane lives while combating cosmic calamities.

What are your thoughts on the subject? Do mundane mini-games add realism to a fantasy video game? Do they detract from the experience?

If You Could Play Casual Video Games on Demand Through Your TV, Would You?

According to Interactive TV Today, TAG Networks has been market testing a Video Game on Demand channel in cooperation with Oceanic Time Warner (the Hawaiian arm of Time Warner Cable). They launched the effort in 2008 and are now contemplating expanding the offering to other markets.

Owners of the current generation of console gaming systems can currently purchase games for download through their consoles, a system similar to traditional pay-per-view on demand sales, but it appears that TAG Networks system works more like Netflix on Demand, Stars on Demand, or USA on Demand. Your television remote control is your game system controller. ITVT reports, "TAG, which is ad-supported and available to all Oceanic Time Warner Cable's digital subscribers, allows viewers to use their remotes to play a range of casual games, including branded games such as "Bejeweled 2," "Tetris," "Diner Dash" and "Barney," and classic games such as Texas Hold'Em, Sudoku and Checkers. The channel, which also offers community features, including multiplayer gaming across households and high scores, is powered by a platform for which TAG Networks has filed nine patents to date."

Ad supported on demand gaming through your television sounds pretty interesting, and the offerings are good for the casual gamer )a large segment of the gaming population), but what about the console rpg player or real time strategy gamer?

There are a couple of games that look like they might appeal to the geek in me. In particular "Seven Seas" and "Mummy Maze." Both are casual games, but they share some aesthetic qualities with some games I have enjoyed in the past. "Seven Seas" looks a little like the classic "Sid Meier's Pirates" game and "Mummy Maze" shares some visual qualities with "Gauntlet" -- though it doesn't look like it shares many game play elements with that classic game. I hope that Game Table Online is looking at this channel and looking for ways to get their robust and deep game catalog into an interface like this. I would live to play Axis and Allies or Nuclear War while sitting at my couch.

Looking at the games a little more, and thinking about the possibility of further development in the social/community functionality offerings, a thought suddenly comes to me. While using a TV remote may not be the best way to play a real time strategy game, or an action rpg like Dragon Age, it might be a great way to play a turn based and game mastered role playing game.

When Wizards of the Coast launched the 4th Edition of Dungeons and Dragons, they heavily promoted something they called the "Virtual Game Table" which would allow people to run D&D games through via the internet. The DM would create a scenario using a scenario editing tool, and the players would interface with the dungeon through their individual computers. There are currently a few good remote gaming software packages available, so Wizards' offering would have had to have offered additional functionality and graphics capability that the current software lacks. This was one of the reasons the product failed, that and a fear that D&D 4e was trying to kill the actual table top experience (not a completely irrational fear in the gaming community).

I wonder if TAG Networks technology could be used to create an interactive household to household "television top" role playing game experience. I have friends that live across the country who I'd like to game with and gaming while sitting on the couch holding a TV remote would be more "comfortable" than sitting at my computer desk at the keyboard and mouse -- at least for me. Creating adventures might be a pain, but I think the play experience could be worth while. It also might be a way to introduce new gamers to the marketplace as the "social" interface might allow others to watch an ongoing game (say one that wasn't classified as private by the players).

It wouldn't replace the table top experience, anyone who has played face to face table top rpgs knows that they are a unique experience, but they might help expand the gaming hobby as a whole.

What do you think? Would you play casual games? Would you play rpgs? Other games?

Fist of the Northstar: Mad Max Meets Superpowered Kung Fu (Hulu Recommendation Friday)

Happy New Year!

One of the great traditions of celebrating a new year, is looking back to the past and how it portrayed the future. The mid-80s were filled with post-apocalyptic narratives, but none quite as action packed as the anime series Fist of the North Star. The cartoon is best remembered for the exploding heads and bodies of its antagonists and its protagonist's favorite one-liner, "you're dead and you don't even know it yet." This is usually followed by the villain's body exploding in dramatic fashion.

Hulu has all 152 episodes of the series.

Koei Tecmo will be releasing a video game based on the manga/anime classic some time during 2010.

Super Mario vs. Phoenix Wright -- Which is the better Queen video?

Both videos are pure awesome, but which is "awesomer?" You be the judge.



Super Mario video from GoNintendo.


Phoenix Wright video from Joystiq.

Green Ronin's Dragon Age RPG is Worth a Look

When Green Ronin announced they would be releasing a Dragon Age role playing game based on the BioWare computer and console game of the same name, I was initially skeptical about the endeavor. BioWare and Green Ronin are both held in high esteem by fans due to the consistent high quality of their products, but Dragon Age still seemed like less than a stellar idea by Green Ronin.

If there is one genre where the role playing game market is over saturated, it is in the Fantasy themed role playing game market. There isn't much room within the existing gaming marketplace for another Fantasy themed rpg, and the loyalty of consumers within the existing games' market share is pretty solid. Old school D&D players have games like Castles and Crusades and OSRIC. Mainstream Fantasy Gamers have the new Dungeons and Dragons and Pathfinder role playing games. Gamers who want things fast, furious, and fun have Savage Worlds and the excellent Hellfrost setting. Fantasy Flight Games introduced the Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 3rd Edition game this year to seduce board and card gamers into the rpg hobby.

That brief list only scratches the surface of products available for the Fantasy fan. In fact, it leaves out a game that Green Ronin released this past March. Their Song of Fire and Ice game is a Fantasy RPG based on the popular series of novels by George R.R. Martin. I found it truly surprising that Green Ronin would attempt to release two Fantasy themed RPGs in the same year. It should be noted that these are full role playing games, each with their own mechanics, and not campaign settings for existing gaming properties. If these were setting books, I would be much less surprised than I am by the release of two complete role playing games within the same year. This struck me as potentially counter productive, and that dividing the game design resources at Green Ronin might affect the game quality.

This was all true before I purchased the pdf from RPGNOW and GM'd a session with my gaming group this past weekend. I read through the rule books last week and prepared myself to run my group through the adventure. As I did so, I was struck by how simple -- yet robust -- the Dragon Age RPG system is. The basic mechanics are easy to teach and learn. All actions, for which there is a possibility of failure, are decided by a simple mechanic. The player rolls three six sided die (one of a different color than the others) and adds them together. The player then adds this total to one of their statistics (for example: Communication) which have ratings of -2 to +4, if the statistic has an applicable focus the player adds 2 more to this total. This number is compared to a difficulty rating ranging from 7 (routine) to 21 (nigh impossible). If the total is equal to or greater than the number, the action succeeds. If the action is successful, then the player looks at the different colored die -- called the Dragon Die. The higher the total of that die, the more successful the action.

I was impressed by a couple of things in this system. I am very fond of the fact that the game uses a simple roll of three six sided dice. Most people, even non-gamers, have three of these lying around their house. Second, the mechanic is easy to remember, yet has enough depth that it is useful in structuring narrative results without being completely dependent on the sum of the total. A character needing a total of 11 on a check, who rolls 11 can still be extremely successful if their Dragon Die result is a 6. This means that quality successes come more frequently than they might otherwise come if a normal die distribution were used to determine "level of success."

Let's see an example of an action and include the probability of success.

Torvald the Hunter is tracking a wild boar through the forest. It hasn't rained in a few days, so the ground is neither more or less receptive of tracks than on a normal day. Torvald is about an hour behind the boar, so the Game Master decides that this is a Challenging activity -- so it has a target number of 13. Torvald is no more perceptive than the average person (his Perception is +1), but he is trained in the art of Tracking (and will add +2 to this roll). Taking the Target Number of 13 and subtracting Torvald's bonuses, we see that he will need a 10 or better to succeed on this action. Looking at the chart below, we can see that this gives him a 62.50% chance of success.



Torvald's player rolls his three dice and gets one 2, one 2, and a 6 on his Dragon Die. His roll totals 10. Adding his bonuses for statistic and focus his total is 13, which is enough for a success. Rolling a six on his Dragon Die means that this is a remarkable success and the GM rules that Torvald is able to predict the boar's movements and move ahead of it making the hunt easier. Had one of the two's been the Dragon Die and the six a regular die, Torvald would still be successful in following the beast but that success wouldn't be as great.

Quick, easy, and it feeds a narrative spirit. The entire game is based on this simple mechanic, and in knowing just this much you could jump into a game easily. You would even be able to navigate the slightly more complex combat system.

The combat system works like any other task, except you need to keep track of when you roll doubles. If any two of your dice have the same value, and you succeeded at the action, you are allowed to spend a number of "stunt points" equal to your Dragon Die on creating interesting combat effects. These effects range from making a second attack to tripping your foe. I am in love with this mechanic. One of the difficulties in any system is getting your players to explain their character's attacks in an exciting and narrative style. Some players are naturally resistant to doing anything other than rolling and stating damage, but this isn't the real cause of the difficulty. The difficulty typically stems from a player describing an exciting action (for example: "Torvald trips Estvan with his Boar Spear") only to have that action fail when the result of the action is rolled. Most systems require attempts at tripping etc. -- the narrative effects -- to be described before the attempt, like visualization exercises. If the action fails, this can create narrative disappointments and lead to players giving up on trying to describe combat excitingly. By shifting the declaration of narrative effects (with real bonuses rather than being mere descriptors), the stunt mechanic makes combats more exciting than many other game systems.

The elegant mechanic design is obviously aimed at bringing gamers over from one medium, Console/PC gaming, into the medium of table top role playing, and I think it is an excellent attempt. Dungeons and Dragons and Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay are attempting to appeal to the same market, but they are doing so by using design techniques from Console/PC/Card Game media. D&D and WFRP3 use "exception based" game design hoping that by emulating the style of other games, they will appeal to those gamers. I think that it will work, but I think what Green Ronin is doing will work as well -- and I think it will work for recruiting gamers who would otherwise be intimidated by the massive amount of rules most RPGs require players to learn.

Green Ronin's Dragon Age RPG is a "Red Box" for a new generation of gamers. The old D&D Red Box introduced an entire generation of gamers to a new hobby by simplifying and explaining a difficult game. Something that isn't attempted often enough in the current market. Chris Pramas remembers what it was about the Red Box that enticed the 80s generation of gamers, and he has brought those elements to a new generation of gamers with Dragon Age Set 1. It's a great Basic Set.

Capcom Announces Demo for Latest Entry in Ace Attorney Series

Ever since October of 2005 when Capcom released the first Ace Attorney game in the United States, I have been addicted to this wonderful series of deduction based adventure games. In that first game, players were put into the role of Phoenix Wright a wet behind the ears defense attorney who defended the innocent against an overzealous and often corrupt criminal justice system.


The games were a combination of good storytelling and appropriately challenging logic puzzles. Players are expected to keep track of clues as they listen to their clients and do their own investigations of crime scenes during a trial. Two game elements exist which add tension to the game play. First, the trials themselves only last three days. If you haven't proven your client innocent and found the real culprit within three days, then your client is automatically found guilty. Second, you can only make three mistakes in logic during the examination and cross-examination before your client is found guilty due to your own incompetence. There are no appeals in the criminal justice system of the Ace Attorney series, so the stakes are high.

In addition to being highly entertaining adventure games in the mold of classics like Secret of Monkey Island and Maniac Mansion, these games fall into the noble genre of deduction games. Exceptional non-video game entries that fall into this genre include Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective, 221B Baker Street (one of my wife's all time favorite games), Scotland Yard, Fury of Dracula, and Gumshoe. The board games differ in the amount of narrative content, but they all require players to use deductive skills in order to win the games. These games also vary in the amount that luck can play to aid the players, in the boardgames luck sometimes can give certain players more clues (or more important clues) than the other players possess. This is one of the drawbacks that board games in the deductive genre can fall into.

Thankfully, the Nintendo DS based Ace Attorney series doesn't suffer from this flaw. As a video games, the clues and their location are concealed by the magic of code and must be actively discovered by the person/people playing the game. The Ace Attorney game also requires the player to walk through all the steps of the logical process and the articulation of any logical proof. Even if you know the answer and have figured out the mystery, you must still walk step by step through the logical analysis in order to win the game. I think this is where the Ace Attorney games become more than just games, but valuable learning tools as well. While the information in the individual mysteries will never come into use in daily life, the critical skills developed by investigating the mysteries will. Given that the mysteries carefully balance learning with challenge, players don't tend to get frustrated that they cannot solve the mysteries. The first episode of each game is typically fairly easy to solve, but by the time you get to the final mystery things get quite challenging.

In the newest entry into the Ace Attorney series, which comes available on February 16, 2010, the players leave the court room for the crime scene as they take the role of Phoenix Wright's oft-time rival Miles Edgeworth. Instead of investigating previously examined crime scenes, as in the prior entries in the series, as Miles Edgeworth the players will be asked to start the investigation at the crime scene to find the clues which will be brought out in trial.



A prosecutor friend of mine once told me how Perry Mason influenced his desire to become an attorney and eventually a prosecutor. Perry Mason's ability to find out who the real culprit behind the murders on the TV show gave my friend the impression that attorneys where real life superheroes. They defended the innocent and made sure that the guilty were punished. At some point my friend came to the realization that prosecutors were the real Perry Masons of the world, they were the ones defending victims and prosecuting the perpetrators far more frequently than defense attorneys. Now the Ace Attorney series is walking down a similar path. The players have played defense attorneys fighting against an over zealous and sometimes corrupt Prosecutor's office. Now it is time for the players to take on the role of the most noble member of that office and bring justice to those who thought they could get away with murder.

I'm excited about the prospect and am grateful that Capcom has released a playable demo of the game, which can be played at the Gamespot website. Though all you have to do to play it is click on the image below.



Features :

• Starring Miles Edgeworth, the popular rival of attorney Phoenix Wright
• Gameplay moves out of the courtroom and onto the crime scene
• New investigative style using the Nintendo DS stylus to uncover evidence
• Several unique cases to solve with over 15 hours of gameplay
• New technique, such as “logic” mode assists you in uncovering the crime
• Unique dialog trees and interrogation techniques let you question witnesses to discover the truth

Responding to Things We Think About Games -- Gaming Expectations: Heroic Endings or Doomed to Failure (Case Study One: Robotron 2084)

In 2008, game designers Will Hindmarch and Jeff Tidball released a very useful book entitled Things we Think About Games. The book contains 101 statements by the authors, with a couple of additional statements by guest gamers/designers. Some of the comments are common sense, some are blunt, and all are thought provoking. Things We Think About Games is a book that belongs on every gamer's bookshelf, and Will and Jeff's website belongs on every gamers rss feed.

At the San Diego Comic Con this year, I asked Jeff Tidball if he would allow me to write a series of posts featuring the statements from the book. Each blog post would be a gamer reacting to one of the statements in the book, and eventually I'd like to address all the statements made by the various game designers. I will also continually belabor the fact that Will and Jeff asked Wil Wheaton, and not me, to write the introduction to the book. While this is a common mistake, it is one that I will point out at every opportunity. Yes, Wheaton is more famous (and is in Secret of Nimh which I recommended as last week's Hulu recommendation), but I am less likely to use expletives.

This being a blog, and not a Thesis or Dissertation, I will address the statements in no particular order, but I do hope to address them all. Today's blog topic is inspired by the 101st entry in the book.

STATEMENT 101
Know Why You Play Games.

The statement is simple enough, and is a gamer's version of Oracle of Delphi's famous dictum Gnōthi sauton or "Know Thyself." It is a statement seems to have an underlying claim that some ludophile Socrates might adhere to, "the unexamined gaming experience isn't worth playing." That may, in one way, be the whole point of Hindmarch's and Tidball's book, but this quote provides a nice starting point for any discussion regarding games and spurs one on to think philosophically about the subject.

It was this thought that was lurking around my subconscious when I read an article at Gamasutra about Robotron 2084. The article is an historical article about the game and its legacy with regard to game play. A good amount of time is spent discussing the games innovative use of a two joystick system, an innovation that couldn't be accurately emulated in a "home experience" for many years. It makes for interesting reading, but there was one quote which mixed with STATEMENT 101 to inspire me to think about why I play games. The quote was a simple one, "The player is tasked with the grim, desperate, and ultimately futile task of saving the last family of Humanoids (emphasis added)."



Ultimately futile -- the words echoed in the back of my mind.

Why would I want to play a game that I cannot, no matter how skilled I get at it, "win?"

What particularly bothered me about this statement is that it pointed to a contradiction in my game playing habits. I have been a fan of Robotron 2084 for decades and have played it uncountable times. In that time my skill level has migrated, from poor to excellent to poor to average, depending on how often I have played the game during a given time period. I am not always in the mood for Robotron, but I never find the game -- as it was designed -- to be a bad game. As big a fan as I am of this particular futile effort, I was seriously disappointed by the end of Dawn Of War. After many hours of game play, and total victory over the forces of Chaos, I watched as all my hard work evaporated in a "1970s Satan has eaten your soul Bad ending" as my Space Marine Captain unwittingly released a new demon into the universe.

The futility of all my hard work playing Dawn of War was made clear to me during the final animated narrative sequence. Lucien Soulban's scripted ending undid everything I had struggled for in playing the game -- and it seriously aggravated me. I was all the more aggravated because an author/game designer I respect was the one who dropped the "futility bomb" on my head.

Why was I experiencing such a strong emotion that was, on its face, a contradictory sentiment to my thorough enjoyment of the equally futile Robotron 2084? To answer this, it was helpful to contemplate statement 101.

Why do I play games?

I play different games for a variety of reasons, but one reason that keeps me coming back is "story." I like the way that games, of all kinds, tell stories. It's one of the reasons I am a "good loser." I don't mind losing to someone who is better than me at Chess, all I want is my learning experience to be a good story. Candyland, with its pre-determined gameplay, taught me the importance of story in play and de-emphasized "winning." Both Robotron 2084 and Dawn of War contain story elements. Robotron's appear to be "weak" at first, but they are deeply embedded in gameplay -- if simple narratively. Both games contain narratives where the actions of the player, in the end, result in failure -- so there must be some element of the game and how it interacts with story that allows me to enjoy one in its entirety while feeling dissatisfied with the ending of the other.

Aha! It isn't the futile ending that is disappointing. It is the fact that the futile ending was not a part of game play -- it was a forced narrative tacked on to the end of the game. When the player inevitably loses in Robotron it is because the game has finally become too hard to finish, the game has literally beaten you. When you "lose" at the end of Dawn of War, it occurs after you have achieved "final victory." The contradiction lies in the interaction between the mechanics and the story -- a contradiction made even stronger by the underlying expectations of Real Time Strategy games. The underlying expectation of an RTS is that you can win, any advantage in supply or troops the computer opponent has is usually made up by an imperfect AI -- necessarily imperfect as a perfect AI would likely win all the time and lessen the fun.

Would I have felt differently if I had actually lost the final scenario of Dawn of War rather than have a scripted 70s ending? Not if the game had followed standard RTS genre conventions, the player "must" have a chance to win in the conventional. If the game progressed in a manner similar to other RTS games, each level getting slightly more difficult but winnable, with a final impossible level, the game would have likely been as unsatisfactory. This dissatisfaction would likely have been accentuated by the interstitial narrative clips.

On the other hand, if the game lacked interstitial clips and the narrative left only to game play I would probably have accepted an unwinnable level. At least possibly, especially if I knew going in that the game eventually becomes unwinnable as each level becomes more difficult than the last. But that isn't the central conceit of an RTS campaign, the central conceit of an RTS campaign is that the player is unlocking a heroic narrative. In this case, each victory leads to a new chapter in the hero's tale. A hero can hit a low point, like the one at the end of Dawn of War, but that ought not be the end of the story. In this case, it is. There is no sequel to the narrative, though there are many sequels to the game. My Blood Angels forever stand defeated in their victory, where my mutant defender of humanity just ends up dead after finally facing overwhelming odds.

I think it would be interesting for someone to design an RTS where each level becomes more difficult than the last, with no end in sight. Then the story changes from how my victory was taken from me, to how far I was able to get and who is able to get to the farthest level. I think I might prefer traditional RTS games -- with victorious endings -- to that "futile" RTS, but given my love of Robotron 2084 I'd probably like that killer RTS more than the end of Dawn of War because the ending would be driven by the mechanics of the game.

I don't mind losing when it's a part of the rules, but I hate losing when I won fair and square.

More on How Playing Games Can Increase Your Employment Marketability

I would probably take fewer than two minutes of perusing the archives of this website for even the most dense person to deduce that I am an avid lover of games of all types. I am a ludophile extraordinaire. I'm the type of person who reads that the CEO of Spirit Airlines owns over 1700 board games and asks himself,"hmmm... Do I have that many?" The answer to which will vary depending on whether you get to count Role Playing Games, Board Game Expansions, and Card Games. It varies even more if you count each product within a Role Playing Game line as "one game" or as individual games in the equation. In other words, my answer might be -- depending on the initial criteria for the variables -- "Yes, I own as many games as the CEO of Spirit Airlines." Sadly, without the paycheck of said CEO.

It should be noted that Mr. Baldanza, the CEO I am referring to, has owned over 3000 games -- and currently owns approximately 2000 -- according to his BoardGameGeek Profile. I trust his profile more than the New York Times as he -- unlike me -- appears to have time to actually update his profile. My profile significantly underestimates my game collection and I really ought to get to work making my profile accurate. Though the fact that Mr. Baldanza's profile is actually updated may provide a clue why Spirit Airlines receives so many customer complaints -- just sayin'.

I also own a fair collection of video games ranging from the Atari 2600 era to the modern 360 era with a couple of stops over in PC land.

All of this is to say that if anyone would be excited to read articles regarding how playing games increases your value as a potential hire, it would be me. So when I read articles, like this one from the Washington Post discussing Changing the Game: How Video Games are Transforming the Future of Business, I read them with a pretty open mind (especially when the book can be purchased for my Kindle 2 in seconds while writing a blog entry) -- maybe too open. Add to this that the CEO of Spirit Airlines thinks that certain games provide real world skills that can be applied to running an airline, and one can see how it might be easy to get excited about how all that time I've been playing games hasn't been wasted time. And if 97% of teens spend time playing video games, it might help worried parents to discover that their kids are also developing some useful skills while beating Guitar Hero: Metallica or setting up a World of Warcraft raid.

There are reasons to believe that playing games can be beneficial in developing a variety of skills -- social and otherwise, but one should always keep in mind that not all games are created equal. Candyland is a great gateway game that is one of the best ways to introduce children to the norms of gameplay, and the fact that who wins the game is completely random can be a tool to teach young people how to be gracious when they lose a game. Learning that losing isn't the end of the world by learning that sometimes winning is impossible, can be a wonderful experience for children. Especially, when the outcome of the game is "hidden" and that the only way to find the result is to actually finish the game. Candyland teaches how to lose, how to persevere when things look glum, and that winning doesn't make you a better person. Candyland's approach, with winners and losers, is a far better way to teach self-esteem (and its limits) than the modern "no losers," "no conflict," "no touching," and "no dodgeball" movement that seems to be pedagogically popular.

All that said, Candyland isn't the best game to teach a young person mathematical skills, or how to look at challenges critically and logically, or how to develop deductive skills. Games like Settlers of Catan, Chess, and Clue are much better for these skills. And you can also learn many of Candyland's lessons through physical sports which have the added benefit of being good exercise as well. If you want to maximize the benefit of playing games, then one would imagine you might want to play a "balanced diet" of games.

Recent research has also demonstrated that young people who play video games are less likely to experience depression than those who spend time watching television. This is good news indeed for parents who worry about their Prince of Persia obsessed tyke might become a lonely couch potato. Video games, and games in general, are active experiences. But studies like the one related to the link between TV and depression should also be read skeptically. As much as I only want to read happy things about games, I can't help but have my "is the research normatively biased gnome" whisper into my ear, when I read explanations for the different reactions to the various stimuli like the following:

What is it about TV that makes it more detrimental to an adolescent's health than gaming?

In a word, advertisements. Most hour-long TV programs now have over 15 minutes of commercials. That adds up to a lot of time spent listening to advertisers tell you exactly what's missing from your life - and how their product will improve it. "The bottom line is that when we do sit down and think it is nice and relaxing [to watch TV], the reason we feel that way is because our thinking brain is completely turned off," Dr. Primack explains. "It can almost be related to commercials brainwashing us, and saying 'you want this in your life.'

Really? It's commercials that cause depression? Not the inherent passive nature of the medium? Not the lack of social element in TV watching? (All points brought up by Nachbar -- the journalist who wrote the article for The Escapist -- as things that are benefits of games.) Commercials make us feel inferior? Wow. [sarcasm]How insightful in that Frankfurt school cultural hegemony kind of way.[/sarcasm]

I don't know about you, but when I watch the most recent Suave commercial it isn't telling me "exactly what's missing from [my]life." It seems to me, the commercial is saying that Suave is a good product for those who live busy lives. And when I see a car commercial for a BMW (or a sports car) driving swiftly along some coastal highway, my first thought is usually "that's pretty." I don't spend time thinking to myself, "why don't I have the latest model of Mercedes." I'm just not that obsessed with certain material goods defining my sense of self. Not that my personal experience proves anything -- one cannot generalize from an n of 1 with any degree of accuracy. But social sciences are at their weakest when they try to describe "why," especially if the study didn't have a second test group who was exposed to television shows without commercials, and various groups exposed to specific genres of television entertainment. I'll need to read the full report to see what variables they account for, and how they account for them, but unless they test specifically for a correlation between watching advertising specifically and depression, this sounds like a normative bias to me.

All that said regarding a potential weakness in the study -- one cannot know if it is an actual weakness unless one sees the test design -- that doesn't mean that there is not a correlation between television viewing and an increase in the odds of exhibiting depression. There is. There also is no similar correlation between playing video games, many of which do actually have ads in them. The good Dr. and I will have to discuss what all that "unlocking" of vehicles in various race games is other than advertising.

Anyway...no one ever said watching TV would help you develop job skills.

End of Gaming as We Know It Announced at GDC: Hello Kitty MMORPG to Be Released in the US

Every so often there is a paradigm shifting event that occurs within the media. Sometimes it is something like Poe's invention of the detective mystery or the Lucas/Spielberg invention of the blockbuster. In the 1980s, one huge paradigm shift in afternoon animation was the shift to cartoons that were blatant advertisements for lines of toys. When the toys being advertised through cartoon stories were things like GI JOE and TRANSFORMERS, children had much reason to rejoice. But when the next shift came, the STRAWBERRY SHORTCAKE and MY LITTLE PONY shift, teenage boys throughout America wept as they watched their favorite shows replaced by talking ponies.

This week at the Game Developers Convention in San Francisco, a paradigm shift of monumental proportions was announced. Sanrio, the makers of those cute HELLO KITTY artifacts we find at malls across America, are going to be launching a HELLO KITTY MMORPG in the United States. Just when beautiful women like Felicia Day were giving fathers everywhere hope that their daughters could share the joys of crushing Horde Guilds in PvP Raids, Sanrio dashes all those hopes aside by creating this game. Now the young girls of the world will be able to:



"Just soak up the super-cute atmosphere?!" We're doomed. No instanced dungeons slaying the minions of a diabolical lich. No riding giant tigers and Gryphons. No mining for ore to manufacture our sweet rifles so that we can shoot our Orcish enemies. Nope. We can spend money at malls...interact with Sanrio characters...and cultivate our own farm. This gives new meaning to "farming" in an MMO.

What is the father of twin daughters to do?

Oh well...maybe I can customize my character to be like Pochacco. He's cute as can be after all.

Listen to the Geekerati Inteview with David Gaider

Last night, Eric and I had the pleasure of talking with BioWare's David Gaider about his new book Dragon Age: The Stolen Throne and the upcoming video game Dragon Age: Origins. The discussion provided some great insight regarding what we can expect from the next rpg from BioWare.

Given BioWare's excellent record when it comes to quality PC and console rpgs, David and his crew have a lot to live up to and it sounds like they are likely to exceed expectations. Dragon Age: The Stolen Throne takes place thirty years before the event that transpire in the game and makes a natural jumping in point for those who can't wait until the second half of the year for the video game experience.

In the past, many of BioWare's successful rpgs have been based on licensed products. But with recent games like the action-rpg Jade Empire and the deep play of Mass Effect, BioWare has shown an ability to develop immersive settings with compelling narratives.

David Gaider lives in Edmonton, Alberta, and is a Senior Writer at BioWare's Edmonton studio, where he has worked since 1999. He is currently the Lead Writer on Dragon Age: Origins, responsible for story and setting design, and prior to that worked on such titles as Baldur's Gate™ 2, Baldur's Gate™ 2: Throne of Bhaal, Star Wars®: Knights of the Old Republic™, Neverwinter Nights™ and its expansions.

Eric Nylund Discusses Mortal Coils on Geekerati Tonight

Tonight at 7pm Pacific, SF and media tie-in author Eric Nylund will be discussing his upcoming book Mortal Coils with me and my fellow hosts on Geekerati. Join Bill Cunningham, Shawna Benson, Eric Lytle, and me as we discuss video game writing and this exciting new novel with Eric Nylund.

Eric Nylund is a New York Times bestselling and World Fantasy Award nominated author of several novels (including HALO: GHOSTS OF ONYX and DRY WATER). MORTAL COILS will be his ninth novel.

Nylund is also a writer and story consultant for Microsoft Game Studios where he helps develop and maintain blockbuster billion-dollar game franchises such as GEARS OF WAR and HALO. He has helped shaped the intellectual property for some the world's best videogame developers including BIOWARE, ENSEMBLE STUDIOS, and EPIC GAMES.

In January 2009, Nylund will have his first comic mini-series published, BATTLESTAR GALACTIC: THE CYLON WAR—a prequel to the television show, which chronicles why the machines started a war against humanity...and how the humans survived!

Also out in the Spring of 2009 is Nylund’s graphic novel, HALO: Genesis, which will appear in the Limited Collector’s Edition of HALO WARS.

He has a Bachelor’s degree in chemistry and a Master’s degree in theoretical chemical physics. He graduated from the prestigious Clarion West Writer’s Workshop in 1994.

MORTAL COILS is a modern fantasy novel about two twins who find out that they have an unenviable heritage that just may tilt the balance in the war between the Immortals and the Infernals.

The people at Tor Books have been kind enough to share the first nine chapters for your reading pleasure.

ABOUT MORTAL COILS

Nestled in a small town between San Francisco and the heart of the California wine country, a set of twins—a brother and a sister—live a life of mundane obscurity. Fiona and Eliot Post dream of running away from the oppressive rule of their grandmother, who has raised them since infancy after their parents were killed in an accident at sea. They hate being part of such a strange family—with all of its restrictive rules. Audrey Post insists on home schooling her grandchildren and forces them to work at a local pizzeria where they are bullied by a tyrannical boss. She seems to truly love Fiona and Eliot, but refuses to allow them to explore the beauty of the world that surrounds them.

On the eve of their fifteenth birthday, however, everything changes. It begins with hauntingly familiar violin music played by a homeless man who reeks of sardines and sulfur; a victorious confrontation with their bully of a boss; and a visit from two mysterious strangers, one known only as "a Driver" and the other who claims to be their long-lost uncle.

It turns out that Fiona and Eliot are much more than ordinary teenagers. They are the result of a single mistake: Years ago, an immortal goddess…and the infernal Lucifer, the Prince of Darkness, fell in love. To protect them from their dangerous heritage, Audrey Post valiantly kept the twins hidden and camouflaged from the entities that have sought them over the years, transforming the divine into the dull.

But now they have been found—not only by their maternal relatives, but also by their paternal ancestors. For millennia, the Immortals and the Infernals have abided a strict law that they may not meddle in each others' affairs. The twins represent a new balance of power, however, and can potentially open a door into the unknown. If they tip one way, they can be a great boon for the Immortals. If they tip the other way, they will be a powerful asset to the Infernals.

Each family is determined to gain control of Fiona and Eliot. But in order to establish the twins' proper place and rightful allegiance, they each must devise tests to determine which side the twins favor. The Immortals create three heroic trials inspired by urban legends, taking them into deeper and more dangerous pockets of mythology incarnate in the modern world. The Infernals fashion three diabolical temptations for the twins, each one an attempt to forever isolate brother from sister.

The time has come for Fiona and Eliot to be judged, and it is a matter of life—and death—that they band together and learn to use their fledgling powers. For family allegiances are constantly shifting and the twins' actions could ultimately cause a war of apocalyptic proportions.

Readers will remember Fiona and Eliot long after they've finished the last page of MORTAL COILS, and will eagerly anticipate their next adventure


MORTAL COILS
By Eric Nylund

A Tor Trade Paperback Original
ISBN: 0-7653-1797-4
$14.95/608 pages
Publication date: February 3, 2009
www.tor-forge.com

ABOUT GEEKERATI RADIO – Geekerati Radio is an online radio show hosted by Christian Lindke, Shawna Benson, Bill Cunningham, and Eric Lytle which features discussion of popular culture by geeks for geeks and is a featured show in the BlogTalkRadio network. The Geekerati Radio show airs Wednesday nights at 7pm Pacific and the archives are available 24/7.

DEATH RACE (2008): How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love Watching a Commercial for a Video Game

When I entered the theater on Saturday to watch DEATH RACE (2008), starring Jason Statham, I had a huge chip on my shoulder. I fully expected the film to be as bad, if not worse, than Uwe Boll's IN THE NAME OF THE KING -- which also starred Jason Statham. What I forgot was that DEATH RACE is directed by "geek-media to film" über-director Paul W.S. Anderson (MORTAL COMBAT) -- who should in no way be confused with arthouse über-director Paul T. Anderson -- and in my mind having Anderson as a director is a positive thing.

One might ask why that is a positive thing. To answer, I will say that Anderson has in the past done what I thought was a complete impossibility. He directed an entertaining movie based upon a video game intellectual property, the aforementioned MORTAL COMBAT. He thankfully had nothing to do with the abomination that is MORTAL COMBAT 2. Anderson's ability to translate property from one geek medium to another isn't a one time fluke either. His 2002 screen adaptation of RESIDENT EVIL, starring his fiancé Milla Jovovich, was as entertaining an adaptation of a video game as has yet been made. I also believe that his Kurt Russell vehicle SOLDIER and his Gothic SF film EVENT HORIZON are highly underrated. Anderson's films are by no stretch of the imagination classics to be cherished, but they tend to be fun popcorn fare -- and to be honest that is what I hoped for in my heart of hearts when I went to see the new DEATH RACE.

I should have kept this in mind when I walked into the theater on Saturday afternoon, because I left the theater entertained.

Anderson's DEATH RACE begins with an opening scroll reminiscent of ROAD WARRIOR's description of how the world changes from the modern day -- a description seemingly based almost word for word on the future history described in Steve Jackson Games CAR WARS DELUXE EDITION. Essentially, the US economy collapses in 2012 (Corman's classic had the world's economy collapse), unemployment is ridiculously high, crime soars, corporations take over the prison system, the world watches its first "prison death match," eventually they become bored with fights to the death, and finally the DEATH RACE is born to satisfy their bloodlust.

Whew! That was quite a sentence. Needless to say, the script by Anderson attempts -- though ultimately fails -- to address one of my concerns regarding the remake. He also ties this film to the original by using David Carradine to do the voice over for Frankenstein in the film's opening race. I wanted some social commentary about our society's long history of bloodlust and Anderson hinted he would give that commentary to me. In the end though, he skipped over that part of the narrative to focus on the story of the racer, which brings me to the actual narrative of the film.

Anderson's script views like a bizarre combination of THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION, THE LONGEST YARD (the Burt Reynold's version), and the original DEATH RACE 2000. Jensen Ames (Jason Statham) is a down on his luck blue collar worker who loses his job at the local steel mill when that mill closes down -- as an aside, I knew I was watching fiction when the film depicted a working steel mill within the US. Ames returns home, his family is murdered, he gets framed for the murder and sentenced to life in prison. Shortly after his arrival at the prison, he is made an offer by the warden (Joan Allen). She needs him, you see. The fans love Frankenstein, but Frankenstein died at the end of the last race -- a race that he won according to the pay-per-view telecast. As incentive to participate in the race, Ames is offered his freedom. Frankenstein has already won four races, if he wins a fifth then he gets to go free and return to society. Ames, as the new Frankenstein, would only have to win one race to be reunited with his daughter.

The script is all pretty standard stuff and doesn't offer any of the criticism I had hoped for, but it does serve as a skeleton (even though a weak one) for what turns out to be an entertaining film.

What makes the film entertaining is the fact that it unabashedly acknowledges the fact that there will be a video game based on the film. The best example of this occurs during the first race, and all subsequent races, when the audience is shown how the various offensive and defensive devices on the vehicles are activated. In order to activate their weapons, the drivers must drive over lit up sword icons on the track. Shield icons activate the defensive items on the vehicles, and skulls activate death traps which destroy the vehicle that activated the skull. As the film portrays it, the DEATH RACE is a kind of bloody and fatal version of MARIO CART -- silly laughter and all. One might say the DEATH RACE is live action WARIO CART. I could almost hear Machine Gun Joe (Tyrese Gibson) shouting, "I'ma Machina Guna Joe-a...I'ma Gonna Weeen."

Though the premise might seem cartoony, the action is anything but. Anderson brings his signature style of quick cuts and hyperkinetic action to the screen. The action sequences run the gamut from fast cars with guns blazing to Ames opening up a can of whoop ass on those who annoy him.

One only wishes he had taken things a little bit further. It's one thing to acknowledge as a part of your film that a video game will be made about it. It is another thing to use that as an opportunity to criticize overly violent video games. I'm not one that is overly worried about the influence of violent games on society, but I enjoy a good SF criticism as much as anyone. Anderson drops the ball with regard to the video game criticism by both choosing MARIO CART style games as the basis for his action and by not taking the violence far enough...or at least not showing how much the fans love and obsess about the violence. It isn't enough to hear that the DEATH RACE has 70 million subscribers, I want to hear some obsessed fans talk about the race. Better yet, have those same hard working steel workers at the beginning of the film talk about their favorite racers. Both the original story and the first movie showed us the world outside the race, or at least gave glimpses. Anderson's DEATH RACE seems to take place outside the surrounding world and its fans are only those who order the streaming video on the internet.

It isn't only in the area of social criticism where Anderson drops the ball. Most disappointing to me was the fact that Robin Shou, who plays the character 14K, is never allowed to showcase his significant movie martial arts skills. Shou was one of the highlights of Anderson's MORTAL COMBAT, and it is nice to see him on the screen, but one laments that the film spends so much time focused on Statham that Shou never gets his time in the spotlight.

I could continue with a long list of places where Anderson failed to deliver on the promise of the film's potential, especially aggravating since Anderson has been wanting to do this project for more than a decade, but such a list would undermine my actual feelings regarding the film.

I have written, and said, many times that sometimes the only important thing about a film is whether or not it entertains you. Not all film is meant to be high art and DEATH RACE certainly falls into that category of film.

To play around a little with something I wrote above, "Anderson has done something I never would have never thought possible. He has made an entertaining movie that seems to have as its sole purpose the promotion of an affiliated video game." If the video game can live up to its big screen commercial, it should be a heck of a fun time.

RATING: 2.5/5 STARS

Conan and Jem: Christy Marx on Geekerati

What do CONAN: THE ADVENTURER

and JEM

have in common?

Christy Marx was a Writer and Story Editor on both of these animated series (and a whole host of others. Listen to last week's Geekerati episode as she talks about these shows and her career as a television, animation, comic book, and video game writer. You can also visit her website to find some great advice if you are looking to become a writer in the television, animation, comic book, or video game fields.

Gore Verbinski on Films and Games

Today's Gamasutra has an article covering some comments that Gore Verbinski made during a speech at the DICE Summit about the film and video game industry. There's a good deal of the type of comment one would expect at any conference dealing with entertainment. You know, the "be original," "hire talented people," and "find your own artistic voice" kinds of comments.

Not that these comments are not true, they are, it's just that they are a little cliché.

What isn't cliché is one of the final comments by Verbinski in the Gamasutra article. Verbinski states:

"This is not a debate between active and passive engagement," he added. "A novel requires active participation by imagination... a film used to do that, but now it just reminds people of that other film. Let's not do the same thing with games. You haven't even scratched the surface of what is possible."

I am absolutely in love with this passage. Lately, I have been doing a good deal of reading regarding game design theory and there are those who are dismissive of other media because they believe non-video game media are non-interactive. I usually find myself with a desire to murder these people and remove their faces to make masks I can where during speeches I give (as them of course) recanting "their" previous position. Not really, but I do find the pretense of these people as annoying as those who deny narrative elements in many modern video games. Sorry, but I believe you have to be intentionally obtuse to think that Fable or Mass Effect aren't narratives.

Verbinski gets it. He sees that novels are an interactive an immersive experience that requires "user participation." Interactivity isn't exclusive to the video game world. He is also asserting, and I'm not entirely in agreement with this part of his argument, that films don't do it as much, anymore, as books or video games. I think that whether watching a film is a passive or active experience depends upon the individual film and how that film balances Boorstin's "three viewing eyes," which he writes about in Making Movies Work: Thinking Like a Filmmaker.

Arguably one could use his three eyes theory of viewing and combine it with whether a film is passive or active to create a kind of film review matrix. Such a matrix might look something like this:

Voyeuristic/Active	Voyeuristic/Passive
Vicarious/Active	Vicarious/Passive
Visceral/Active	Visceral/Passive

In fact, I might try and elaborate on this theory later when I have a copy of the Boorstin book in front of me. Like when I'm at home.

A Call for Writers

Despite the fact that I have been pretty lax in my posts the past few weeks, this is not a post soliciting writers for this blog. I have enough co-writers, who don't do enough co-writing, at this time.

What this is is a call for writers who want to write for a new online magazine designed to support the Geekerati webcast radio show my co-hosts and I air each week. Essentially, I am looking for writers who are willing to work for no-pay now, hopefully pay in the future, who will write quality articles about some area of geek culture which will be published in a Monthly online magazine via the Issuu service. Here's what I'm looking for.

1. A reliable illustrator or two: b/w line art is dandy as is someone who can do cover designs.
2. A video game reviewer: we'll need 2 to 3 video games reviewed each month.
3. 2 to 3 book reviewers of various genres: do you want to write about mystery, fantasy, children's lit, comic books?
4. A television reviewer: Shawna...I'm looking at you. We need 2-3 television show reviews a month.
5. Games reviews: We need someone who can write 1 or 2 table top game reviews a month.
6. A film reviewer: (David Chute and LYT, I'm looking at you guys) Are your reviews not published in enough places? Try our magazine
7. A tech writer who knows a thing or two about the gadgets out there.

Any writers/illustrators will be invited to participate in our online radio show on a fairly regular basis.

As I wrote earlier, these positions will be unpaid until we can build an advertiser base, but when/if we do that we will pay a fair rate.