Observations of the Fox

The first time I wrote this, it didn't take. The computer crashed during post upload. Between finishing work on the Eighth Sea, deciding on follow up projects and real work, I've being doing some layout work for Nick and Elizabeth Licata on their new game "Candycreeps". It looks like a fun setting with a simple and fast game mechanic. I don;t know how much more I can write about this without getting their permission first, but I'd recommend people have a look at it if their into the cute gothic aesthetic of "Emily the Strange" and the tokyo Gothic Lolita look.

I've been trawling the web for information about generating a random hand of five cards. The aim here is the create an automated random character generator for the Eighth Sea (first generate a random occupation template, then fill the remainder of the character's attributes and skills with randomised values using the random character generation method described in the rulebook). This quest led me to a fascinating game called Five Card Nancy which demands further exploration (there's a random online version also). It also led me to the Livejournal of Scott McCloud , and suddenly feel less guilty about not updating this blog as often as I could. Not that I put myself in the same realm as Scott, but it did make me feel a bit better.

Over the past couple of months I've been to Supanova and I've been to GenCon Oz . I had intended to go to both of these conventions with some kind of product that I could use sell. Or at least attend the conventions with a product that would showcase my thoughts and ideas. In this regard, GenCon Oz was far more successful. But on the other hand, I did meet someone at Supanova who thought my artwork showed talent. So I'm going to start working on a few new ideas that could be used in a comic. In this regard I've had a few ideas that might have a bit of potential. The problem I'm having now is that some of the ideas are much better suited to a roleplaying game where the players can interactively explore the ideas within their own group of friends. Other ideas seem better suited to a more linear storytelling format, and hence would work better as a comic. Most of the ideas fit between these two options, and quite a few ideas seem to vary between the options depending ...

As I've just posted my last entry, I decided to look at the forum I've set up for Vulpinoid Game Design. It's gone...probably due to a lack of activity. Let's hope that can be amended sometime soon. Maybe I'll have to ask for a subforum on the Forge... ...anyway, back to work.

Two months have passed since I last posted and I'm feeling really slack. Maybe not, but now that I look back at this blog page I realise that I've had so much stuff that I could have been posting about. In that time I've been putting the final touches on the Eighth Sea, finished off a semester of study, had a haircut, travelled to GenCon and participated in some panel discussions, come back home to revise the Eighth Sea based on what I learnt at the con, I've done layout work for a game called Candycreeps, got my hair coloured and a few other things. Life just gets the better of us sometimes, and instead of sitting back to reflect on the issues at hand, it's sometimes better to just take things as they come and live life in the moment. I'll see what I can do over the next few days to put some of these things into perspective. No guarantees, but I'll see what I can do.