Sad Day in Wisconsin

While I was at my step-uncle Richard Lacy’s funeral on Wednesday, I learned of a horrible tragedy that had happened in Madison the day before. Ryan Dutter, formerly of Beloit, shot his disabled 12-year-old son and then killed himself.

I didn’t know Ryan personally. I went to school for many years with his older brother Pat, and Ryan was in my step-brother Dan Schooff’s grade. I often saw their mother Rosemary running around town, especially last year when we were looking for a bigger house.

It’s hard to imagine what could drive Ryan to such an act. I always respected his family and enjoyed their company, and it’s awful to contemplate what a horror this must be for them all.

D&D on BBC

The BBC has an excellent piece on the new eTools for use with Dungeons & Dragons Fourth Edition. The video features short appearances by my friend (and former editor) Rich Baker, and the article has quotes from my pal Charles Ryan.

I’m excited to see that the beta for the online character builder is finally up. While 4E is a fine game, its real promise for being something truly innovative comes with the electronic tools Wizards has promised for it. They’ve been in limbo for months now since the game’s release in the spring, and I’m looking forward to being able to use them all sometime (hopefully) soon.

TAGIE and ChiTAG and Dickens This Weekend

As a reminder, tomorrow night I’ll be at the TAGIE Awards dinner. On Saturday, I’ll be at ChiTAG, helping out with the Ask an Expert sessions. If you’ll be there, be sure to stop by and say hi.

The rest of the weekend, I’ll be watching my son Marty perform in A Christmas Carol. This is the Kids Fun and Drama production of the musical based on the classic holiday story by Charles Dickens. If you happen to be in the Beloit area, you are more than welcome to join us at the play.

More Gaming Industry Upheaval

As ICv2.com and OgreCave.com report, we’ve had more shake-ups in the tabletop industry. Last week, Upper Deck laid off another 40 people on top of the others they let go earlier in the year.

On the bright side, a couple of companies have already stepped forward with plans to rescue the games of WizKids. The guys behind SaveHeroClix.com formed Piñata Games to spearhead their effort, while my friends at Catalyst Game Labs put in a bid of their own.

While there may be other suitors, both Piñata and Catalyst have excellent claims as heirs to WizKids’ games. (Piñata’s founders helped run WizKids until it folded, and Catalyst has licensed a number of WizKids games for RPGs.) I suspect both efforts may find that the current credit crunch hampers their efforts, but I wish them both the best of luck. Honestly, if Piñata wound up with HeroClix and Catalyst got the rest, I’d be thrilled–and hopefully they would be too.

Rest in Peace, Richard

My step-uncle Richard Lacy passed away on Sunday morning. Richard met and married my stepmother Nancy’s sister Sally later in life, but not too late for them to have their son Bill, whom I’ve known as a younger cousin for most of his life. Richard had three kids from a previous marriage, and while I’ve never met them, I’ve always heard good things about them too.

While the family is understandably sad at losing Richard, we know that he had a good, full life. It might not have been as long a life as we would have liked (is it ever?), but he was 79 when he passed. Despite the illnesses he’d suffered from in his final years, he went as gently as anyone could hope for. We should all be so fortunate.

The morning Richard died–before we knew he was gone–Ann and I brought the kids over to my father’s house for a huge family brunch. My whole step-family was there, along with my sister Kim and her family. That’s 22 people in all.

It was just the kind of gathering at which we often saw Richard, Sally, and Bill, and it felt very different knowing that we’d never have them all there again.

Good-bye, Richard. We’ll miss you, but we’ll remember you for the rest of our lives.

The Gamer Economy

It looks like games aren’t as recession-proof as they’ve seemed to be in the past–at least if you’re a mass-market tabletop games company. According to various reports, Mattel is laying off 1,000 people, 4Kids is still losing millions of dollars, and Topps is closing its WizKids division.

First, my condolences to those employees caught up in all of this. It’s never fun to lose a job, especially when the economy is so rough.

Second, this shows just how big gaming has become. The companies in these reports aren’t five guys working out of a basement. They’re mass-market, publicly traded, multinational giants. Because of that, they expand and contract along with the global economy rather than being able to relay on a small but dedicated base of fans to help them chart their own courses.

Times like this make me glad to be working for myself. Many people fear to make the jump to freelancing because they prefer the security of working for large companies. However, while my income may be varied and sporadic–that’s an inbuilt hazard for any freelancer–at least I never have to worry about being let go.