Downing Back Up

Way back in 2006, I wrote about the many losses game designer and filmmaker Todd Downing had suffered in the previous year. I’m glad to say that things are looking up for Todd and his family, and you can read all about it in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. I wouldn’t say the story has a happy ending, because it’s clearly far from over. However, it’s great to see that good people can survive horrible years and have better ones ahead.

Mutant Chronicles in Theaters this Week

It must be Mutant Chronicles Week.

Today, I’m doing an interview about the Mutant Chronicles film (or at least my novelization of it) with Ed Healy for the Atomic Array podcast. Tomorrow, I’m heading out to LA for the US premiere. (I’ve never been to any kind of film opening before, so this should be fun in many different ways.) Then, Thursday, the movie opens a limited engagement in select theaters around the nation.

Of course, if you can’t wait until then, you can always rent and watch it via Amazon video (which works with computers, Rokus, or TiVos) or through the Xbox 360.

To whet your appetite, here’s a five-minute preview of the film, featuring director Simon Hunter and stars Tom Jane, Ron Perlman, and Devon Aoki.

EDIT: The layout of my site cuts off the right half of that. Fortunately, you can see it in full, with other videos about the film, elsewhere.

The Guild Wars Novel

I’ve been officially cleared to announce that the novel I’m currently working on is Guild Wars: Fall of Ascalon, to be published by Pocket Books, a division of Simon & Schuster. It’s a tie-in novel based upon the hit MMORPG Guild Wars. As ArenaNet (the game’s developers) mentioned last year at PAX, the novel focuses on the time period between the original Guild Wars games and the upcoming sequel Guild Wars 2.

I’ve been working closely with the crew at ArenaNet on this book, and they’ve been a real delight. They count a number of excellent novelists among their staff, so they grok how a novel works and how to best braid it into the ongoing development of the computer game.

I can’t say much more about the book at this stage. However, I can report that the information about the book that you can find on some bookstore websites–like the page count, release date, and so on–seems to be placeholder material taken from the ISBN (book code) database. Don’t trust any of it yet.

More news when I can tell it.

No Vegas

Sadly, I had to cancel my trip to the GAMA Trade Show in Las Vegas this week. Too many deadlines have piled up like a 16-car accident on a slick, foggy day in front of me, so I need to clear through those before I can take that much time out of the office with a clear conscience.

I understand that GAMA has found people to cover my seminars for me, so no one should be forced to get through the show without any chance to chat about game design and freelancing. My biggest regret, of course, is not being able to see all my friends out there this week, but I’ll have other chances this summer at Comic-Con and Gen Con instead.

Back to work!

Dave Arneson Dies

As I mentioned earlier this week, Dave Arneson was terminally ill with cancer. He apparently had entered hospice, and his death had been falsely reported a few different times this week. Now, with confirmation from people I trust, we know that Dave died last night.

Dave was one of the two people credited with designing Dungeons & Dragons, the game that changed my life in many ways and gave millions of people countless hours of fun with their families and friends. The other, Gary Gygax, died just over a year ago.

Dave and Gary had a notorious falling out decades ago, which wound up with Dave suing to retain credit and obtain royalties on the game. While they managed to settle it out of court, they never, that I knew, repaired their friendship, which kept Dave out of mainstream gaming industry circles for years.

After Wizards of the Coast bought TSR, which published D&D, though, Dave made a well-heralded return to Gen Con. I had the honor of meeting Dave after that and the chance to express my gratitude to him. Best of all, I sat on a number of different panels with him in the following years, and he was always an absolute delight to spend any amount of time with.

One of the first things I did after Gary died was to write Dave a note too. Lots of times, we don’t express our appreciation of people until they’re gone, and I wanted to make sure Dave knew how I felt. A lot of other people did the same thing then and at Gen Con last year, which now turns out was Dave’s last.

One of my favorite memories of Dave was at the opening of one of the Gen Cons in Indianapolis. Standing next to a giant twenty-sided die–it had to be at least three feet across–Peter Adkison stood in front of throng of people massed outside the doors of the exhibit hall just before it opened for the first time that year. He then brought Dave and his granddaughter forward to make the opening die roll for the convention, the first time I ever remember anyone doing something like that. The grins on all three of their faces lit the gigantic hall, and the crowd let out a huge cheer when the giant die rolled.

I couldn’t think of a better way to start the show–or for me now to remember such a wonderful man.

Charles Responds to BEA

[WARNING: Local Politics Ahead. Fortunately, the election is today, so after that we can return to our regularly scheduled blather.

By the way, if you’re a local, do get out and vote. We’re projected to have a low turnout this year, which makes every vote cast that much more precious.]

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