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Show Notes – Episode #77 “PAX 2010 part 2”

Shannon and Matt — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 23:15:24 +0000

We fight off illness and server power outages to bring you a slightly delayed episode! This week we Continue our PAX coverage with interviews and events from Saturday at the expo. We talked with Fugazo, makers of the WiiWare game Frobot, Square Enix, The Behemoth, Turbine and more, plus our interviews with Bill Slavicsek and Mike Mearls from Wizards of the Coast.

Our Geek Week

Watched Resident Evil: Afterlife (2010) in 3D in the theater
Watched Machete (2010) in the theater
Played the regular D&D game
Went to Marian Call‘s Very Very Big Seattle concert at the Fremont Abbey
Had the Geek Garage Sale! We cleared out a lot of stuff and now have ~~room for more stuff!!~~ less stuff to deal with when we move.

PAX 2010 – Saturday

Saturday was our Seattle Geekly Meetup. Thanks to all the people who showed up and thanks to Jason from the Steve Jackson MIBs , Passionfruit Games, Runic Games, TypeFrag and WotC for all the donated prizes. Photo by Heath.

Final Fantasy XIV from Square Enix

Frobot from Fugazo

Wizards of the Coast
- The Mark of Nerath by Bill Slavicsek
- The Red Box
- Castle Ravenloft boardgame

Symbiote Studios

BattleBlock Theater from The Behemoth

Kung Fu Live from Virtual Air Guitar Company

Dungeons and Dragons Online and Lord of the Rings Online from Turbine

Contest!

Our 2010 Pax Swag Bag Giveaway!

The bag has as much swag from PAX as we could scoop up and includes (but is not limited to) 9 t-shirts from various games, signed copies of The Mark of Nerath by Bill Slavisek and Swordmage by Richard Baker, a full version of Killing Floor for the PC from Tripwire, an inflatable Dragon Age 2 sword, a King Raskull bobblehead, a couple beta codes, various pins, stickers and other swag all contained in a Torchlight II tote bag!

Check the Contests Page for your chance to win!

Music

Music this week was ‘I Pity the Fool’ and ‘My Hope’ by Molly Lewis off her new EP I made you a CD, but I eated it. Buy it on Band Camp. DO IT NOW!

Next show: Episode #78 – PAX Sunday wrapup – Including interviews with Telltale Games about the Back to the Future game, the makers behind an awesome game called Fruit Ninja, we find out about Portal 2 from Valve, and check in with Tripwire Interactive.

Seattle Geekly by http://www.seattl-geekly.com is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

Monday News Roundup – 03/08

Matt — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:02:31 +0000

People who don’t follow video game news may not have heard about the controversy surrounding the DRM for Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed II. The short version is that Ubi requires an always-on connection to their authentication servers in order to play the game on the PC. If the player disconnects from the internet for any reason the game freezes and becomes unplayable until a connection can be re-established and any progress made since the last save point is lost.

Well yesterday the event that everyone knew would happen sooner or later happened and Ubi’s authentication servers went down preventing anyone trying to play Assassin’s Creed II from starting the game. Initially Ubi officials posted on their official forums (which also appear to be down at the moment) and said that the outage was the result of “higher than expected demand”. As the situation progressed updates on Ubi’s Twitter feed stated that their servers had been “attacked” and that the outage was limited to a period of about seven hours between 2:30 pm and 9 pm Paris time (Ubisoft is based in France). They have also claimed that “95% of players were unaffected“.

The merits of DRM in general can be debated but I think it is clear that this particular scheme has some very serious issues and one hopes that this incident may prompt Ubi to re-think their strategy. There is no guarantee that their servers will not experience similar problems in the future even, or perhaps especially, if this outage was the result of a denial-of-service attack and the only people that will be inconvenienced are the people who actually bought a legitimate copy of the game. As one commenter on the Slashdot thread discussing the problem said, “let’s not lose sight of two simple facts: The only people who can play the game right now are pirates. The only people who are blocked from playing the game right now are those who legally purchased the game. Which group would you rather be in?”

More news under the fold

Comics

From the “news that made Shannon make a frowny face” department comes word from DC Comics that longtime Wonder Woman writer Gail Simone will be leaving the title. Simone, quoted by Comic Book Resources had this to say about her departure;

I’m sad to leave but very, very proud of the work we did together and delighted to have been a small part of Diana’s ongoing epic saga. It’s really been a joy. And I have to say in complete honestly, I am genuinely thrilled by who is taking over the book. It’s someone who is going to rock this book like there’s no tomorrow, and I could not be happier with this choice. They got this one 100% right. I think it’s going to be a new era of greatness for our princess. People are going to freak and that makes me smile a lot.

The writer taking over the book was announced this morning as J. Michael Straczynski who is currently writing The Brave and the Bold for DC and has also written for Marvel on Thor and Amazing Spiderman. Gail Simone will be finishing the current story arc for Wonder Woman and Straczynski will be taking over in July.

Movies

The Academy Awards were given out last night. You don’t need me to tell you who the big winners were. They’re all over the tv, radio and internet. Just in case, here is a link to the official Oscars site.
A new trailer for Iron Man 2 was released over the weekend. Enjoy!

Video Games

Unsurprisingly, Nintendo has announced that developer 5th Cell is working on a sequel to the hugely popular Scribblenauts for the DS. Details (including the official title) are still mostly absent but website Go Nintendo has a cover shot of the yet-to-be-released issue of Nintendo Power Magazine which will have a bit more information.
As we mentioned in last week’s podcast, Valve was clearly gearing up for a big Portal-related announcement and they have finally come clean. The official announcement of Portal 2 came through Game Informer who is also reporting that the sequel will have a multiplayer section! We also got word from our source at Valve that interested parties should keep an eye on the mysterious BBS that fans were able to access using clues added to the original Portal in a patch earlier this month. Apparently there will still be new material being posted there occasionally.

Monday News Roundup 8/17

Matt — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 18:29:29 +0000

Video Games

I wanted to lead off with this story from our “correlation does not equal causation” department. Prepare yourselves for a potential uptick in the online video games turn kids into anti-social monsters hysteria. Since 97% of teens ages 12-17 now report that they play some form of video games, whether computer, web, portable or console, researchers have shifted from studying the differences between kids who game and kids who don’t to studying the differences between various types of gamers. Enter the new study from the Pew Research Center. It seems that they found a correlation between playing online multi-player games (versus playing with someone in the same room) and a decrease in “civic activities” (going online to get information about politics, raising money for charity, trying to persuade others how to vote in an election, etc.). I’m just waiting for some talking head to latch on to this one as yet another example of how online games are destroying society. On the up side maybe someone will use it as a club to beat Blizzard into including LAN support for Diablo 3 and Starcraft 2. WHY WON’T BLIZ THINK OF THE CHILDREN!!1!!1!one!!

More news under the fold

Boardgames

Nominees for the 2009 International Gamers Awards have been announced

General Strategy Games, Multi-Player Category

Automobile (designed by Martin Wallace; published by Treefrog / Mayfair Games)
Battlestar Galactica: The Board Game (Corey Konieczka; Fantasy Flight Games)
Diamonds Club (Rüdiger Dorn; Ravensburger)
Dominion (Donald X. Vaccarino; Rio Grande Games)
Le Havre (Uwe Rosenberg; Lookout Games / Ystari Games)
Roll Through the Ages (Matt Leacock; Gryphon Games)
Small World (Phillipe Keyaerts; Days of Wonder)
Snow Tails (Fraser & Gordon Lamont; Asmodee Editions)
Space Alert (Vlaada Chvatil; Czech Games Edition / Rio Grande Games)
Steam (Martin Wallace; Mayfair Games)

General Strategy Games, Two-Player Category

2 de Mayo (Daniel Val; Gen X Games )
Conflict of Heroes: Awakening the Bear! (Uwe Eickert; Phalanx Games)
Day & Night (Valentijn Eekels; Mystics.nl)
Die Saulon der Erde: Duell der Baumeister (Stefan Feld; Kosmos)
Kamisado (Peter Burley; Burley Games)

Historical Simulations

Barbarossa: Kiev to Rostov (Tony Curtis & Vance von Borries; GMT Games)
Conflict of Heroes: Awakening the Bear! (Uwe Eikert; Academy Games / Elfinwerks / Phalanx Games)
Devil’s Cauldron (Adam Starkweather; Multi-Man Publishing)
Espana 1936 (Antonio Catalan; Devir)
Fields of Fire (Ben Hull; GMT Games)
Red Dragon Rising: The Coming War With China (Bruce Costello; Decision Games)
Spanish Eagles (Brien J. Miller & Stephen C. Jackson; Compass Games)
Storm Over Stalingrad (Tetsuya Nakamura; Multi-Man Publishing)
Unhappy King Charles: The English Civil War (Charles Vasey; GMT Games)
Warriors of God (Adam Starkweather & Makota Nakajima; Multi-Man Publishing)

MMO

New superhero MMORPG Champions Online has gone gold and is essentially ready for release. The closed beta has ended and the game is available for download now but if you don’t already have one of the 50,000 keys for the open beta that started today chances are you’re out of luck. The open beta ends August 24 and the game is scheduled to launch September 1.

In other “games that have gone gold” news, the free-to-play version of Dungeons & Dragons Online Dungeons & Dragons Online: Eberron Unlimited won’t be delayed a second time. Massively is reporting that it has gone gold and is on schedule for its revised release date of September 9.

Movies

Variety is reporting that Bryan Singer is set to direct a Battlestar Galactica movie for Universal. Before you get excited, the project is supposedly “a complete reimagination” of the Galactica universe and will not be connected to either the 1970s original or the reboot series that ran on the Sci-Fi channel. Original series creator Glen Larson is set to help produce the new movie.

Rumors about this have been swirling around teh intarwebs, but Bloody Disgusting is reporting it as confirmed that Robert Downy jr. is looking to replace Tom Cruise as Lestat in the latest attempt to bring Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles series to the big screen. You know, because its gone so well in the past…

TV

Entertainment Weekly’s Hollywood Insider is reporting that Adewale “Mr. Eko” Akinnuoye-Agbaje is looking to return to Lost in its final season.

“I’m here for them. Adewale is open for business. We have had talks about some things they might do for the final season and there are other dead folks coming back allegedly but at the moment it is still a maybe. A strong maybe but I have not shot anything yet or signed any contracts. But I’m hoping.”

Mr. Eko was always one of my favorite characters so I’d love it if he showed up again!

RPG

Wizards of the Coast has announced that the next campaign setting to be released for 4th edition is going to be Dark Sun! Dark Sun was a favorite setting for those who favored a darker and grittier feel to their campaigns in previous editions. James Wyatt of WoTC’s R&D department describes it this way on Wizard’s web site;

Dark Sun is a sort of post-apocalyptic fantasy, a world that’s been blasted and ravaged by out-of-control magic. The arcane magic of the world draws its power from the life force of things around it, and if it’s not wielded carefully, it can transform nearby plant life into ash and drain other living creatures of their vitality. That’s why the world is a desert, its civilizations concentrated in a handful of city-states ruled by evil sorcerer-kings and its wilderness haunted by marauding nomadic bands.

The gods of the setting are absent or dead, replaced by elemental spirits tied to the ancient primordials. Shamans and other primal characters draw on the forces of sun, sand, wind, and precious rain. Wizards practice their magic in secret or openly serve the sorcerer-kings. And psionic power is more common than on other worlds — which is handy, since this setting will come out a few months after Player’s Handbook 3, which introduces the psionic power source.

Retrospective on Roleplaying

Shannon and Matt — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 21:07:09 +0000

This last year saw the loss of Gary Gygax, Dave Arneson and Erick Wujcik, three of the founding fathers of the RPG hobby. What were their contributions and how did roleplaying become what it is today?

In this panel, recorded Saturday August 8 at Dragonflight 2009, gaming luminaries Peter Adkison, the founder and first CEO of Wizards of the Coast, Tim Beach, who contributed material to virtually all of TSR’s campaign settings in the 1990s, Skaff Elias the original VP of R&D for Magic: The Gathering and Jonathan Tweet one of the lead designers for the 3.0 edition of Dungeons & Dragons discuss the past and future of the hobby.

The audio is far from perfect as we had only our mobile recorder with us to tape at the panel, and no sound deck to plug into. We did what we could to share it with listeners, rather than have it not taped at all. –Shannon

Monday News Roundup

Matt — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 18:03:10 +0000

We went to the Northwest Pinball and Gameroom Show on Sunday and spent the day wallowing in retro game nostalgia. We’ll be talking about it on the podcast this week, but if you can’t wait to check out some of what we saw you can see some of our pictures on our Flickr page including a short video of Steve “King of Kong” Wiebe playing his game of choice.

To continue with the retro computing theme, you can now get a Twitter client for the Commodore 64. This really makes me wish I still had mine.

more news under the fold

Anime

Seattle’s own Grand Illusion is lucky enough to be one of the 70 screens in North America that will be getting the Evangelion movie Evangelion: 1.0 You Are (Not) Alone. It will be showing for one week only, July 3-10

Studio Ghibli’s Ocean Waves which originally aired as a TV special in Japan is coming to DVD in the UK August 17. No word on an American release date.

Comics

Comic fans may be familiar with Ed Brubaker’s amazing run writing Captain America that culminated with the death of Steve Rogers. Oddly, even with Cap dead the series has marched on with issue #600 hitting the shelves this month. Speculation has been rampant that Steve Rogers will be returning in issue #600 and Marvel has made a spoilerific announcement on that subject. WARNING – DO NOT click on the link if you don’t want to know anything about issue 600 or the five issue Captain America limited series that is starting this month. Link is TinyURL’d to avoid any accidental mouse over problems with the title of the article.

Books

The Horror Writers Association has announced the winners of the 2009 Bram Stoker Awards.

Superior Achievement in a Novel

Duma Key by Stephen King

Superior Achievement in a First Novel

The Gentling Box by Lisa Mannetti

Superior Achievement in Long Fiction

Miranda by John R. Little

Superior Achievement in Short Fiction

“The Lost” by Sarah Langan

Superior Achievement in an Anthology

Unspeakable Horror edited by Vince A. Liaguno and Chad Helder

Superior Achievement in a Collection

Just After Sunset by Stephen King

Superior Achievement in Nonfiction

A Hallowe’en Anthology by Lisa Morton

Superior Achievement in Poetry

The Nightmare Collection by Bruce Boston

The Specialty Press Award was given to Larry and Debra Roberts for their Bloodletting Press and Lifetime Acheivement Awards were given to F. Paul Wilson and Chelsea Quinn Yarbro.

MMORPGs

Neo Steam:The Shattered Continent a free-to-play part-magic, part-steampunk MMO adventure launched just last week. If I had time to add another game to my busy schedule I would check out. I’d be very interested to hear from anyone who has tried it because it looks really cool.

Movies

The change in release dates for Harry Potter is going to complicate things for those wanting to see it in IMAX. Hollywood Reporter is reporting that the studio’s decision to move from a November release to a July release will mean that it won’t be hitting IMAX for two weeks after it opens in regular theaters.

In “dear god WHY?!?!?!” news, Bloody Disgusting has gotten word that 20th Century Fox is planning Donnie Darko 3. For those of you saying “wait… Donnie Darko 3? I didn’t even know there was a Donnie Darko 2!”, yes there was a straight to DVD sequel called S. Darko about Donnie’s sister.

In “mixed feelings” news, the live action Akira movie being produced by Leonardo DiCaprio appears to be dead in the water. The only thing that made me even vaguely hopeful about this movie was that it had been planned as a two-part movie which might have been enough time to almost do justice to the story in the Akira manga. Maybe. On the other hand I really couldn’t persuade myself that it was going to be anything close to good.

RPG

Wizards of the Coast is releasing the Eberron Player’s Guide tomorrow! I was always a fan of Eberron even though I never actually played a campaign set there. Maybe someday…

TV

Matt Smith may be starting his run as the eleventh Doctor by facing some familiar foes. Reportedly the TARDIS is also getting a makeover for the new series. Article may be a little spoiler-y but its really not that surprising.

Video Games

Magic: The Gathering hits XBox Live Arcade this Wednesday! Magic the Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers will go on sale on the Xbox Live Arcade for 800 Microsoft points (about $10). In addition to 2-player duels the game will have a single player campaign mode, a multi-player co-op mode and “unique puzzles” to solve. There won’t be a collectible aspect to the game, but there will be unlockable cards available through single player campaigns and 2-player duels.

D&D Worldwide Game Day and other news!

Shannon and Matt — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 20:25:51 +0000

If you have listened to Episode #6 of our podcast and are now eager to try 4th Edition D&D for yourself, hoo boy are you in luck. Tomorrow is the Dungeons and Dragons Worldwide Game Day for the Player’s Handbook 2. You can try out the new classes and races featured in the PHB 2 in a 2-3 hour adventure with pre-made characters. Everything you need to play will be provided and no knowledge of the rules is necessary. Follow this link to a list of Seattle area locations for Worldwide Game Day or go to WotC’s store and events locator to search for a location near you.

More news under the fold

Movies

♦ Time Magazine has an article about the new push to make more 3D movies that includes some information about James Cameron’s new movie Avatar, a science fiction spectacle that is being shot in 3D.

Comics

♦ Indy Comics News has a weekly roundup of comics recommended to them by their followers on Twitter. Their list for this week includes our recommendation of Seattle-based webcomic Night Zero.

♦ Comic Book Resources has an interview with Grant Morrison about his follow-up to the Seaguy mini-series. If you haven’t read the original Seaguy you should try and track it down.

Books

♦ The Hugo Awards final ballot was released just in time for us to not be able to talk about it on yesterday’s podcast. We are hugely excited to see that locally produced comic Girl Genius is up for Best Graphic Story. Big congratulations to Phil and Kaja Foglio and Cheyenne Wright for this fantastic achievement! The other nominees are:
Best Novel

Anathem by Neal Stephenson (Morrow; Atlantic UK)
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman (HarperCollins; Bloomsbury UK)
Little Brother by Cory Doctorow (Tor Teen; HarperVoyager UK)
Saturn’s Children by Charles Stross (Ace; Orbit UK)
Zoe’s Tale by John Scalzi (Tor)

Best Novella

“The Erdmann Nexus” by Nancy Kress (Asimov’s Oct/Nov 2008)
“The Political Prisoner” by Charles Coleman Finlay (F&SF Aug 2008)
“The Tear” by Ian McDonald (Galactic Empires)
“True Names” by Benjamin Rosenbaum & Cory Doctorow (Fast Forward 2)
“Truth” by Robert Reed (Asimov’s Oct/Nov 2008)

Best Novelette

“Alastair Baffle’s Emporium of Wonders” by Mike Resnick (Asimov’s Jan 2008)
“The Gambler” by Paolo Bacigalupi (Fast Forward 2)
“Pride and Prometheus” by John Kessel (F&SF Jan 2008)
“The Ray-Gun: A Love Story” by James Alan Gardner (Asimov’s Feb 2008)
“Shoggoths in Bloom” by Elizabeth Bear (Asimov’s Mar 2008)

Best Short Story

“26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss” by Kij Johnson (Asimov’s Jul 2008)
“Article of Faith” by Mike Resnick (Baen’s Universe Oct 2008)
“Evil Robot Monkey” by Mary Robinette Kowal (The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction, Volume Two)
“Exhalation” by Ted Chiang (Eclipse Two)
“From Babel’s Fall’n Glory We Fled” by Michael Swanwick (Asimov’s Feb 2008)

Best Related Book

Rhetorics of Fantasy by Farah Mendlesohn (Wesleyan University Press)
Spectrum 15: The Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art by Cathy & Arnie Fenner, eds. (Underwood Books)
The Vorkosigan Companion: The Universe of Lois McMaster Bujold by Lillian Stewart Carl & John Helfers, eds. (Baen)
What It Is We Do When We Read Science Fiction by Paul Kincaid (Beccon Publications)
Your Hate Mail Will be Graded: A Decade of Whatever, 1998-2008 by John Scalzi (Subterranean Press)

Best Graphic Story

The Dresden Files: Welcome to the Jungle Written by Jim Butcher, art by Ardian Syaf (Del Rey/Dabel Brothers Publishing)
Girl Genius, Volume 8: Agatha Heterodyne and the Chapel of Bones Written by Kaja & Phil Foglio, art by Phil Foglio, colors by Cheyenne Wright (Airship Entertainment)
Fables: War and Pieces Written by Bill Willingham, pencilled by Mark Buckingham, art by Steve Leialoha and Andrew Pepoy, color by Lee Loughridge, letters by Todd Klein (DC/Vertigo Comics)
Schlock Mercenary: The Body Politic Story and art by Howard Tayler (The Tayler Corporation)
Serenity: Better Days Written by Joss Whedon & Brett Matthews, art by Will Conrad, color by Michelle Madsen, cover by Jo Chen (Dark Horse Comics)
Y: The Last Man, Volume 10: Whys and Wherefores Written/created by Brian K. Vaughan, penciled/created by Pia Guerra, inked by Jose Marzan, Jr. (DC/Vertigo Comics)

Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form

The Dark Knight Christopher Nolan & David S. Goyer, story; Jonathan Nolan and Christopher Nolan, screenplay; based on characters created by Bob Kane; Christopher Nolan, director (Warner Brothers)
Hellboy II: The Golden Army Guillermo del Toro & Mike Mignola, story; Guillermo del Toro, screenplay; based on the comic by Mike Mignola; Guillermo del Toro, director (Dark Horse, Universal)
Iron Man Mark Fergus & Hawk Ostby and Art Marcum & Matt Holloway, screenplay; based on characters created by Stan Lee & Don Heck & Larry Lieber & Jack Kirby; Jon Favreau, director (Paramount, Marvel Studios)
METAtropolis by John Scalzi, ed. Written by: Elizabeth Bear, Jay Lake, Tobias Buckell and Karl Schroeder (Audible Inc)
WALL-E Andrew Stanton & Pete Docter, story; Andrew Stanton & Jim Reardon, screenplay; Andrew Stanton, director (Pixar/Walt Disney)

Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form

“The Constant” (Lost) Carlton Cuse & Damon Lindelof, writers; Jack Bender, director (Bad Robot, ABC studios)
Doctor Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog Joss Whedon, & Zack Whedon, & Jed Whedon & Maurissa Tancharoen , writers; Joss Whedon, director (Mutant Enemy)
“Revelations” (Battlestar Galactica) Bradley Thompson & David Weddle, writers; Michael Rymer, director (NBC Universal)
“Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead” (Doctor Who) Steven Moffat, writer; Euros Lyn, director (BBC Wales)
“Turn Left” (Doctor Who) Russell T. Davies, writer; Graeme Harper, director (BBC Wales)

Best Editor, Short Form

Ellen Datlow
Stanley Schmidt
Jonathan Strahan
Gordon Van Gelder
Sheila Williams

Best Editor, Long Form

Lou Anders
Ginjer Buchanan
David G. Hartwell
Beth Meacham
Patrick Nielsen Hayden

Best Professional Artist

Daniel Dos Santos
Bob Eggleton
Donato Giancola
John Picacio
Shaun Tan

Best Semiprozine

Clarkesworld Magazine edited by Neil Clarke, Nick Mamatas & Sean Wallace
Interzone edited by Andy Cox
Locus edited by Charles N. Brown, Kirsten Gong-Wong, & Liza Groen Trombi
The New York Review of Science Fiction edited by Kathryn Cramer, Kris Dikeman, David G. Hartwell, & Kevin J. Maroney
Weird Tales edited by Ann VanderMeer & Stephen H. Segal

Best Fanzine

Argentus edited by Steven H Silver
Banana Wings edited by Claire Brialey and Mark Plummer
Challenger edited by Guy H. Lillian III
The Drink Tank edited by Chris Garcia
Electric Velocipede edited by John Klima
File 770 edited by Mike Glyer

Best Fan Writer

Chris Garcia
John Hertz
Dave Langford
Cheryl Morgan
Steven H Silver

Best Fan Artist

Alan F. Beck
Brad W. Foster
Sue Mason
Taral Wayne
Frank Wu

The John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer

Aliette de Bodard*
David Anthony Durham*
Felix Gilman
Tony Pi*
Gord Sellar*

*(Second year of eligibility)

Show Notes – Episode #6 “4E Dungeons and Dragons”

Shannon and Matt — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 06:43:27 +0000

Wizards of the Coast has created quite a stir with the 4th edition of the Dungeons and Dragons rules. Detractors complain that the rules are “dumbed down” and borrow too heavily from the worlds of miniature and online gaming while defenders praise its ease of play and dramatic style. In episode #6 we discuss our experience playing the introductory 4E adventure and our thoughts on the differences between the 3.5 and 4 rules.

Also a review of our geek week, news and geek events in the northwest!

Our Geek Week

♦ Rumors of a massively multiplayer on-line version of Fallout 3

♦ Episodic podcast novel FETIDUS (also available through iTunes). We are working on scheduling an interview with FETIDUS author James Durham for our Zombie Culture episode coming in late April. Stay tuned!

♦ Alien Trespass will be showing at one of the Landmark Theaters in Seattle starting April 3.

4th Edition Madness

Also really wanted to thank our friend Laura who played with us during our 4th Edition session. She played the Half-Elf Cleric and we totally forgot to mention her in the podcast. Thanks Laura!

Wizards of the Coast main Dungeons and Dragons site and D&D faq

Download the sample characters from The Keep on the Shadowfell

4E Character Builder

D&D Podcast featuring Will Wheaton, Gabe and Tycho from Penny Arcade and Scott Kurtz from PvP
Episode 1
Episode 2
Episode 3
Episode 4
Episode 5

Geek News

♦ Big Bang Theory was picked up through 2010-2011 season

♦ Jericho movie in development and Devil’s Due Publishing just announced a “season three” Jericho comic.

♦ Masamune Shirow Working with Lucent on Squad Project.

♦ The Behemoth (creators of Alien Hominid and Castle Crashers) have a new game trailer.

♦ Arthur C. Clarke Award Short List

♦ Weird news: Hippo Sweat is being made into sunscreen.

♦ BSG finale! March 20th. If you are having a finale party, or are one of the lucky 200 people who will be attending the event at EMP|SFM, send us any pictures or stories you want to share! You can e-mail them or we’ll be creating a post for people to comment on later this weekend.

Seattle Geek Events

♦ March 20, 2009 8pm Neptune Coffee Seattle – Star Wars trivia contest. We are also planning a Seattle Geekly meet up at either the 3/27 trivia Star Trek TNG or 4/17 Buffy / Angel trivia. We may just end up showing up for both.

♦ March 20 – 21, 2009 The Egyptian Theater Seattle – Midnight movie: Fight Club

♦ March 20 – 26, 2009 Grand Illusion Seattle – H.P. Lovecraft Film Festival. Opening Night Gala on Saturday. Director David Prior (AM 1200) will be on hand for a Q&A. Doors at 6pm, films at 7pm.

Showing at 7pm – Casting Call of Cthulhu, Late Bloomer, The Book Dealers, Eel Girl, Legend of the Seven Bloody Torturers, The Canal, Maxwell’s Mind, Experiment 18, Between the Stars, Call of Cthulhu

Showing at 9pm – The Outsider, Cool Air, AM 1200

♦ Saturday March 21 – NWSFS Phillip K. Dick Awards social

♦ March 21, 2009 Magic The Gathering Pro Tour Qualifier Registration: 9:00 AM – 9: 45 AM, Entry Fee: $25.00

♦ March 21st, Saturday 10 am – 5 pm Experience Music Project/Science Fiction Museum Seattle – Family Day at the EMPSFM

♦ March 21, 2009 Seattle Mystery Bookshop 117 Cherry St Seattle – Caitlin Kittredge reads from her book Second Skin. In her 3rd book, Nocturn City’s homicide Det. Luna Wilder tracks a killer who is targeting werewolves.

♦ March 22, 2009 9am – 7pm Sunset Hill Community Center 3003 NW 66th Street, Seattle – Steampunk University a one day workshop focusing on helping people understand steampunk and beginning to “gear up” for Steamcon, the Seattle steampunk convention happening later this year. $15 pre-reg tickets or $20 at door. Separate vendor’s room for $2 donation

♦ March 22, 2009 1 pm – Games Workshop at Carkeek 10031B Holman Rd NW, Seattle – A huge re-enactment of The Battle For Finuval Plains, an “historical” battle in the world of Warhammer Fantasy between the Dark Elves and the High Elves. There will be over 20,000 points of elves on our tables for people to play, including a giant super-hydra and a whole phalanx of Dragon Knights actually riding dragons. No knowledge of Warhammer Fantasy or models of your own required! Plenty of side events for those who might be late or unable to stay for the full duration of the main battle.

♦ GameStorm 11 in Vancouver, Washington (not Portland Oregon as previously reported). Seattle Geekly may be attending either Friday or Saturday!

Special thanks to the Warcraft Outsiders co-host Kyle who mentioned us on their most recent episode! If you like WoW, check out their podcast!

Music today was Drown Radio’s Gygax. You can find them on iTunes!

Next Week’s Show: Nerdcore or geek music including a special interview with a local band and our very first first listener giveaway!