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 …
More Forbidden Knowledge Out Now!
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 …
No ChiTAG for Me
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 …
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 …
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 …
More LOTRO
“Hero’s Guide to the Waterworks,” the latest article on The Lord of the Rings Online: Mines of Moria is up. Will Hindmarch did his regular wonderful job on this piece, which I had the honor of editing.
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 …
Hollow Wee ’Un–Now with Art
Since I posted my note yesterday about the monster I wrote up for FlamesRising.com‘s month-long Halloween celebration, the fine folks there have added a creepy illustration to the article too. My pal Aaron Acevedo breathes some terrifying (un)life into the little critter with his spooky work. (Thanks, Aaron!)
Games, Politics, and Religion
In comments on a recent post about the Citizens of Virtue ARG, my friend Teeuwynn Woodruff points out that the game is meant to support Jesus Wants to Save Christians, a new book by Rob Bell and Don Golden. She also directed me to a fresh blog post that explains it all. Ironically, on the same day, the über-political-polling site …
More LOTRO
Will Hindmarch‘s second article for The Lord of the Rings Online, which I edited, is now up. Check out the details about “Warden Mastery,” a new snazzy class for the upcoming Mines of Moria expansion.