The Lord of the Rings Online website features more LOTRO-y goodness. Look for “Hero’s Guide to the Silvertine Lodes.” As usual, Will Hindmarch wrote it, and I edited it.
By the way, if you haven’t checked out the game, I recommend it. The Mines of Moria expansion really rocks.
I’m also getting into Guild Wars these days. The fact that my friends Jeff Grubb (also an Alliterate), Will McDermott, and Ree Soesbee handle a lot of the writing for it helps.
A short while back, Jennifer Contino interviewed me for her Pulse column at Comicon.com. You can now read the results online.
Jennifer clearly didn’t know much about the history of Blood Bowl as a game, and I suspect many comic-book fans might not either. I enjoyed having the chance to set things straight and give credit where it was due: to the mad mind of my friend Jervis Johnson!
My favorite time of the year–Gen Con–has been in bankruptcy since early this year. While the core business (Gen Con Indy) is sound, the company lost money trying to establish Gen Con So Cal and on a disastrous Star Wars Celebration III. As my pal Peter Adkison explained, the idea was to establish a strong showing at Gen Con Indy this summer and then file a bankruptcy plan this fall that reflected that strength.
And that’s exactly what happened. The show came off well, and Gen Con had its first profitable year since 2005. The company started to come to settlements with its major creditors and looked ready to put the plan into action.
Then someone stepped in and made an offer for the company. This, as it later became clear, was a hostile takeover bid by a mysterious company known only as the Gen Con Acquisition Group. The offer’s intent was to snatch up the company at bankruptcy prices while it was at its most vulnerable. However, Gen Con management has made it clear that they prefer their plan to this oddball, last-minute bid. They’ve even made arrangements to pay off their debt to the Make-a-Wish Foundation immediately rather than wait for the plan to be approved.
Here’s hoping that the unnamed bidders fail in their blatant attempt to hijack the company and the con. I really can’t imagine anyone better than Peter and his crew to run the show. Peter has a gamer’s soul, and he loves the convention as much as I do. If I had my way, he’d run it forever.
Last Friday, Ashley Rhodebeck came over from the Beloit Daily News to interview my family. She’d been assigned to update the local readers about our quadruplets and how they’re doing. The article appears in today’s paper, and you can read all about us online too.
The kids had a ball talking with Ashley. When her car pulled into the driveway, they raced out to greet her and walk her into the house. They barely stopped talking (sometimes all at once) the entire time she was here. I can’t wait to show them the paper tonight.
Ten years ago today, I became a father. My son Marty was born down in Radford, Virginia, while I was helping run Pinnacle Entertainment Group as its president. Even before he was born, we knew we wanted to move back to Wisconsin to be closer to family–something I couldn’t have imagined when I was in high school–and within six months we had.
It’s hard to believe Marty’s already 10. This means he’s already more than halfway through the time we can expect him to live with us before he heads off on his own, to college or wherever. He’s developed into such a wonderful boy, and I cannot wait to see what kind of a young man he becomes. At the same time, I want to make sure to savor every moment we have before then.
Today, we took Marty to the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago and then to the Rainforest Cafe in Schaumburg. He had a ball, and the rest of us did too. Next weekend, we’ll have a laser tag party with his friends and celebrate all over again.
It’s good to be a dad–especially Marty’s dad. He’s a sweet, smart, clever kid with a sharp sense of humor, and I could not be prouder of him.
Happy birthday, Marty! Here’s to many, many more together.
Publishers Weekly just posted an excellent article about what it takes to make money at producing comics. It’s framed in terms of this summer’s notorious debate between Robert Kirkman and Brian Michael Bendis, but feel free to ignore that and just look at the numbers. Making money in comics is far from easy, and this shows you exactly why.
Put this next to John Rogers’s recent comments on the canceling of Blue Beetle from DC Comics, and its clear why even the larger publishers struggle with making money on some of their titles. There are only so many comic-book readers out there, and with prices nearing $4 per book, they can’t buy enough titles to keep every one of them afloat.
I recently signed up for Marvel’s digital comics service. It’s actually pretty snazzy, and it only runs $60 per year. Considering that’s less than the cost of two comics a month, it’s a fantastic deal. Also, since I’m a reader rather than a collector, it’s a great fit for me. I get to read the books but then not bother with all that bagging, boarding, and boxing of them and then trying to figure out where to store them.
And I don’t have to remember to drive down the comic store every week to get my fix. I usually wind up cursing my luck for missing a key issue if I can’t manage it to make it on any given week. You add up too many of those, and I just give up on a title. There are too many holes in the story to make it worthwhile for me to try to follow it.
My only real complaint is that Marvel doesn’t usually post new issues until they’re several months–or even years–old. They hope to preserve their comic-shop sales this way, I know, but I’ve been broken of that habit, and I don’t see myself going back any time soon. In the meantime, make mine digital.
My latest book apparently hit shelves before I knew it. More Forbidden Knowledge: 101 New Things Not Everyone Should Know How to Do is now available at bookstores around the US (at least). Amazon still lists it under the name of Michael Powell, the original book‘s author. However, Urban Outfitters (of all places) not only has it under my name but also features the cover and some interior pages to glance through too.
This is the third book I wrote for a nonfiction book packager, but due to the vagaries of publishing it’s the first one released. I’m told the others–Egyptians: Lost Worlds and Orcs–should come out in 2009.
The book sounds edgy, but it should be filed under “Humor” rather than “Reference.” It covers everything from breathing fire to how to disarm a nuclear bomb, but with only 300 or so words devoted to each topic, each entry just features a tongue-in-cheek overview. The Anarchist’s Cookbook it is not.
If you’re looking for a fun, light read, check it out. As I wrote it, it struck me that someone could easily add a d20/4E set of rules to it to create Jackass: The Roleplaying Game. Think of it as all the fun without any of the stitches.
My fellow Alliterate and good pal Lester Smith just launched WhenShadowsRise.com, a new website dedicated to the development of a new horror roleplaying game. Among many other gaming gems, Les designed the excellent Dark Conspiracy RPG way back in 1991.
Les has been working on this game in his limited spare time for a long time. I’ve heard about it in bits and pieces from him over the years, and I can’t wait to read the actual thing.
Unfortunately, I will not be able to make it to the TAGIE Awards tonight or to ChiTAG tomorrow. My wife has come down with the flu, and while my mother will come over to watch most of the kids tonight, my son Marty needs a parent to join him at the opening night of his play (KFAD‘s production of A Christmas Carol) tonight.
Kids come before work, so I’ll be there instead of in Chicago tonight. If you were planning to see me there, please accept my apologies and my hopes that we get another chance some other time soon.
I’ve posted a lot of gloomy things here lately, so I thought I should give some attention to some of the good ones too. Three new babies have come into the world recently and that’s something to wear a goofy grin about.
First, my cousin Michelle Norville gave birth to her fourth child, Lucy Ann. Michelle and her husband Marcus are wonderful parents already, and Lucy comes into a home filled with a lot of love from arms both big and small.
Second, Judith Heise–the wife of my good friend John Kovalic of Dork Tower fame–gave birth to their first child, Louisa Claudette-Marie. This is especially poignant because John and Judith had tried for so many years and had a foreign adoption fall apart not so long ago. Ann and I struggled with our own infertility issues for many years, too–before we corrected them with a big (baby) boom, so we’re just thrilled for the newly formed Kovalic Trio.
Third, Rachel Butterworth-Tice–the wife of another good friend (and former employee at Pinnacle), Matt Tice–just gave birth to their first child too: Gregory David. I’ve known the proud parents for over a dozen years, and Gregory is one lucky kid.
To top this all off, my cousin Kate Williams and her husband Trevor are just about to have their first baby. They had some scares early in the pregnancy that sent Kate on bed rest, something my wife Ann knows only too much about from her time carrying the quads. We are ecstatic that the baby is now near enough to full term that she would no longer be considered a preemie if born even today, and we cannot wait to hear of her birth soon.
So, congratulations to all those very happy parents, and welcome all you lucky kids! We’re hoping to have you all around for a very long time to come.