Bye-Bye Battle Dice

As posted at MarvelBattleDice.com, Playmates has decided to cancel its Battle Dice game line. I’ve known about this for some time but been unable to say anything publicly until Playmates made its official announcement. It’s always sad when a game line goes away, but just because we won’t see any more Battle Dice supplements doesn’t mean we can’t keep playing with the figures and dice we have.

For those of us who prefer to keep playing, there are other, nonofficial sites out there. The best I know of is PopDice.com, run by the mighty Malakai. If you hear of others, be sure to let me know.

Marvel: Ultimate Alliance

My friends at Raven Software (now a division of Activision) are hard at work on the new Marvel: Ultimate Alliance videogame. I saw a preview of this at Comic-Con, and it’s stunning stuff, up to Raven’s usual high standards. I somehow ended up with a fistful of invitations to the game’s VIP site. If anyone out there is interested in joining up for free, drop me a line.

New Alliterates Site

The Alliterates site has a fresh, new look, courtesy of our webmaestro Lester Smith. Stop by and check it out. It looks great, although most of us haven’t had much of a chance to tinker with our sections yet. Look for more content there soon.

ACD Games Day Report

Last night, I drive up to Madison to catch the after-hours action for the ACD Games Day, a small trade show run by the #2 distributor in the adventure gaming industry. I would have gone up during the day, but with the kids in school my schedule wouldn’t permit it–not without a lot of juggling. So, it’s a quick evening for me instead.

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Write for the Black Library

For those aspiring authors out there, the Black Library is holding a new short-story competition. Winning entries will be purchased for a new Warhammer anthology based around the theme of invasion. The deadline is October 11, 2006.

Unlike many other competitions, you don’t need to submit a full story from the get-go. You only have to come up with a synopsis and a short writing sample to start. Either way, this could be a great way to get your foot in the door at the Black Library. Best of luck to anyone who decides to submit.

Titanic Games on the Horizon

The fine folks at ICv2.com report today on the activities of Titanic Games. This includes a deluxe version of James Ernest‘s Kill Doctor Lucky, the first game he published through his own Cheapass Games. It’s a mirror-universe version of Clue, in which the player compete to be the first one to murder the good doctor and get away with it.

Next up, according to the article, comes Stonehenge, an anthology board game. It features one set of components with five different games, each with their own rules. The all-star line-up of designers includes Richard Garfield, Bruno Faidutti, James Ernest, Mike Selinker, and Richard Borg. Mike showed me the game at Gen Con, and with all those great designers working on it, it’s hard to see how it could miss. Expect many good things from Titanic.