Monday News Roundup – 07/19

Posted by Matt at 10:12 am Geek Speak

Jul 192010

This week, of course, marks the run up to San Diego Comic Con. Somewhere on the order of 125,000 people are expected to attend the con which has been sold out since March. We mentioned in the podcast last week, and on our Event Calendar, that Dark Horse is hosting #NotAtComicCon events at 55 stores around the country on July 24 for those who can’t make it to the con itself. Comics Dungeon in Seattle is one of the participating stores and we are planning on being there!

In more Comic Con related news, it has been known for some time that Comic Con International’s contract with the San Diego Convention Center expires in 2012 and that the cities of Anaheim and Los Angeles have been vigorously trying to lure the con away from San Diego. A decision by the CCI board of directors regarding possible relocation has been expected since April and they were hoping to be able to make an announcement at the convention. Now it looks like the decision has been delayed yet again and will not be made until sometime after this weekend.

Finally, this video came through our in-box and I think it does a fine job of captruing the spirit of the con. Enjoy!

Your Monday News is under the fold

Boardgames

Steve Jackson Games has announced the latest expansion for thier Illuminati card game, Illuminati: Mutual Assured Distraction. The expansion will introduce the New World Order mechanic from the collectible card game version of Illuminati to the stand alone version with cards like Supermajority, Health Reform, Bank Collapse, Superpatriot Act and Economic Stimulus. NWO cards add effects that influence all players, not just the one who laid the card down. Mutual Assured Distraction will contain 18 NWO cards and 5 “special cards to trigger, add, or remove NWO effects”. The suggested retail price is $6.99 and it will be in stores soon.

Quicksand by Erik Oosterwal has received the first ever ICE Award for best fan-designed Icehouse pyramid game. The original Icehouse was a turnless abstract strategy game conceived by Andrew Looney and designed by John Cooper that used nested pyramidal pieces. The pieces are still sold by Looney Labs in their Treehouse game and fans continue to design new games using Icehouse pieces. Currently there are more than 300 variants listed on the Icehouse wiki. The ICE award will be given annually for the best variant designed in the previous year.

Books

The nominees for the 2010 Endeavour Award have been announced. The Endeavour is given out “for a distinguished SCIENCE FICTION or FANTASY BOOK written by a Pacific Northwest author or authors and published in the previous year”. The nominees are:
- City Without End by Kay Kenyon
- Eyes Like Sky and Coal and Moonlight by Cat Rambo
- Hunting Ground by Patricia Briggs
- Mind Over Ship by David Marusek
- Push of the Sky by Camille Alexa
The winner will be announced at this year’s OryCon in November.

Comics

PvP Online creator Scott Kurtz is ending his publishing relationship with Image Comics and will be self-publishing the latest PvP collection. Kurtz explained his decision in an interview with Comic Book Resources

Over the last three years our business has shifted. Sales through brick-and-mortar stores are declining and online sales are increasing. Readers who discovered PvP in comic shops have shifted from monthly readers to online readers, and their buying habits have changed. The monthly floppy is selling less and the trade paperbacks are selling more.

The previous PvP collections will still be available through Image.

TV

The second season of the BBC series Being Human premiers on BBC America this week. the first season of the show, which follows the lives of a ghost, a werewolf and a vampire living as roommates, was something of a surprise hit for th BBC and the show has already been renewed for a third season. The U.S. premiere of season 2 is this Saturday at 10pm on BBC America, right after the season finale of Dr. Who.

Video Games

Plants Vs. Zombies is finally making it over to XBox Live Arcade and the list of achievements you can earn has been leaked. From the list it looks like the XBLA version will have co-op Wall Nut bowling, straight co-op and a versus mode. No official release date or price has been announced.

The long awaited Starcraft II comes out next Tuesday but the system requirements have been released now, just in case you need to upgrade the apparatus before then.
Starcraft II will also require the use of Blizzard’s Battle.net service, the “Real ID” portion of which was the center of controversy when Blizzard announced that it would be requiring Real ID (that is, a user’s real first and last name) to post on official forums, a decision which they have since reversed. Real ID will still display your real name to people on your Battle.net friends list but Blizzard has said that they are working on an “opt out” for those who want to prevent thier names from being displayed to friends-of-friends as well. According to the Real ID FAQ, the friends-of-friends opt out should be available “shortly after release”. The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Blizzard spent around $100 million just on development of Star Craft II which sounds like a lot until you hear that they are expecting to make at least $500 million and possibly as much as $1 billion from the game.