"Have you considered the cost of such a machine?"

Speaking of Cannibalism

[Possibly NSFW and/or damaging to one's soul]

No Words

This may be the single greatest video the internet has ever produced:

Bonus points for the Citizen Kane reference.

Harry Potter VS Star Wars

"Live long and prosper." -Ben Franklin

The Bus

I'm not up on the career of Paul Kirchner. What I know is that he is a heck of an artist, and that he did some things with Heavy Metal magazine, one of which was a monthly feature simply titled "The Bus." You can and should read it here. It is brilliant, bizarre and wonderful.

Sifteo Cubes

Ever since the boardgame Operation debuted in 1965, it's been clear that hybridization potential exists between electronic and non-electronic games. I've been excited for the possibilities ever since Microsoft unveiled the original 30" Surface, but the $10k price tag put that a little outside the mainstream market.

Well a new challenger has appeared. At $30 each, these Sifteo Cubes still aren't quite at the level where you could expect every customer to already own a set (or include a few in the box), but I could imagine quite a few interesting ways you could combine these with boardgames.

The tipping point draws near, folks. Some day all this stuff will be cheap enough that every boardgame can have electronic components up the wazoo and every videogame can have tablet support and action figures, and instead of distinguishing between videogames and boardgames we can just refer to them all as bideord games or something.

Or maybe that's a bad idea and none of that will happen because it's actually more fun to just tackle your friend while holding a PlayStation Move.

Darkwood Pre-Alpha

Procedural generation seems like a natural fit for a genre that depends on the element of... SURPRISE *cough* Anyway this indy-horror Darkwood game looks very promising. (Don't trust the creepy ghost-child. Pianists are sketchy.)

And if you're already in the market for a game with a lot of procedural generation, I heartily recommend FTL. Not really horror, but lots of accidental suffocation. Remember to close your airlocks, people.

Saracen Night

When you go to bed after designing and prototyping for 12 hours straight, you sometimes have weird dreams.

Last night I dreamt of some sort of pen-and-paper roleplaying system in which one of the available classes was “Saracen Knight.” This class had various melee bonuses as well as an interesting drawback: whenever you ran into a British citizen, you were required to pay them money as reparations on behalf of India for the Sepoy rebellion.

Because nothing screams high fantasy and adventure more than ironically depressing references to European colonialism!!

CERN Scientists Discover Comic Sans!

Today, after years of research and experimentation, scientists at CERN made the remarkable discover that people on Twitter really hate Comic Sans.

They also found the Higgs Boson, a particle theorized half a century ago by the standard model as necessary for explaining the existence of mass in the universe blah blah the point is, font choice is important! I bet when Cowan and Reines published their discovery of the neutrino, they used something sensible like Helvetica!

Cosmic Rebirth

Apparently Family Guy creator Seth McFarlane is bringing back Carl Sagan's show Cosmos. I know that sounds like a setup for a Family Guy gag, but it's set to be hosted by Neil deGrasse Tyson, certified badass, so count me in.


It's set to air on Fox, which means it will reach a large audience, but which also means it will have a glorious first season and then get cancelled.

I look forward to that glorious season.

Take it, autotuned Carl Sagan!

Poe in a Bag

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
`'Tis some visitor,' I muttered,- here I opened wide the door;
Darkness there, and nothing more.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, peering,
Looking for my wayward guest, when something gleaming caught my view;
On the porch my eyes were showing that a paper bag was glowing,
Glowing with a dancing fire that with every moment grew.
Donning loafers without prompting, I intently took to stomping,
Stomping on that paper bag, for careless fires I eschew.
Threat extinguished, yet there lingered something sticky on my shoe.
Here I muttered, "Doggy poo."

Kickstopper

It's becoming clear that websites like Kickstarter and Rockethub are going to have a large impact on the way we think about paying for games, as both developers and consumers. Crowdfunding gives developers the freedom to go after a much narrower demographic, and you don't have to prove that people will buy what you're selling once they already have.

A couple months back, Tim Schafer asked for $400,000 to make an adventure game, a genre long considered dead by mainstream publishers. In the end, he did not raise his goal amount. Instead he raised $3,336,371! If this doesn't prove that there's still a market for adventure games, it at least proves that there's a market for Tim Schafer games.

With all the great possibilities of crowdfunding, I'm sad to announce the first Kickstarter scam: a game titled Mythic: The Story Of Gods And Men. People started to get suspicious when they noticed that the concept art and CG animation (and office shots) had been stolen from other websites. Also the fact that they were promising to make a game with graphics "up there with Skyrim" with $80,000 in donations, in a year, might have been a clue.

The creator has since pulled the plug, but you can still watch the trailer and laugh at its ineptitude without feeling bad. Also I'm not sure it was wise for the "creator" to show his face in the video, maybe he's unfamiliar with how the internet works.

The Panality of Evil

If you're in town for the Calgary Comics and Entertainment Expo, I'll be doing a panel (2:00, Sunday, Palomino room C) on boardgame design with the Game Artisans of Canada. Come say hello and tell me why the Mass Effect ending sucked.

A Very Special Message Board

So a group from 4chan, also known as the internet's sphincter, just released a game about dating disabled girls.

As you might expect, the game is... tasteful?
 

I'm not really a visual novel or dating sim guy, but this definitely bolsters my faith in humanity. And, other developers, apparently 4chan has more mature and nuanced views on diversity than you. Just thought you ought to know.

Magic Cards With Googly Eyes

I don't know how this took 18 years to happen.

Great Game Ideas #1

Skinner Boxing

-A standard boxing game except that your punches only occasionally connect, on a random basis.

-You also have to block at least once every 30 seconds or your coach electrocutes you.

The Unspeakable Thinks You Can Think

Many who know me are aware that I am a fairly avid longtime fan of H.P. Lovecraft and all things Cthulhu Mythos related (Eternal Darkness is one of my favorite games of all time). It dawned on me a while back that his stories of eldritch terror scratch a similar itch for me as another author whom I was wildly into many long years ago named Theodore Geisel, better known to the world as Dr. Seuss.

Both authors deal with strange and fantastical worlds, and both authors like to make up lots of silly words to accentuate the strangeness and fantasticalness.

 Both revel in the bizarre and the unnatural. And both were a little racist.

Granted Lovecraft usually goes for more of a horror angle, but Dr. Seuss can get somewhat creepy too.

"What would I do?" Probably soil myself.

In honor of these literary giants, I've compiled a list of words they made up and turned it into a quiz. Can you tell the difference between Lovecraft and Dr. Seuss?

Unspeakable Thinks » funny quizzes

And apparently I'm not the only one who thinks these two greats should go together. (You won't regret clicking that link. Unless of course you value your sanity.)

The Musician as Athlete

Two decades ago, my mom wrote and self-published an extensive book on Musicians' health from the perspective of someone who both plays the Cello and gets injured. If you too are a musician made of delicate human flesh, you're in luck. I recently converted The Musician as Athlete into an ebook which can be purchased through Amazon. If you are instead some sort of inorganic music synthesizer program, you may not find too much of value here, but I personally suggest uploading yourself to the cloud in order to achieve nominal immortality. If you are a non-musical spambot, I would like to discuss a few things with you.

Battleship Trailer

It's really happening. A trailer for the new Battleship move has just surfaced. There doesn't seem to be a way to embed the video, so I'll have to describe it for you:

So Alexander Skarsgård is dating Liam "I Will Find You" Neeson's daughter, and Liam Neeson doesn't like this one bit because Liam Neeson is the Admiral and stuff. But then, during a routine drill, the fleet discovers a big metal thing. And one guy goes to touch the big metal thing but he gets an electric shock because maybe he rubbed his feet on the carpet. Then they all get attacked by Decepticons and Liam Neeson yells "Prepare to fire!" and his naval assistant asks "Sir, which weapons?" and Liam Neeson looks serious and says "All of them."

I don't know, this whole project seems a bit ridiculous from the start. I mean, it has Rihanna in it, and everyone knows women can't play Battleship:

Regardless, if it doesn't have Tim Curry revealing that communism was just a red herring, I'm not interested.

A Gaggle of Group-Names

Ever wondered what to call other people? First terms that come to mind not suitable for polite conversation? Then this handy-dandy list of collective nouns should come in handy ...and dandy.

Subject            Collective Name of People

A
Academics......................... A faculty of academics
Acrobats........................... A troupe of acrobats
Actors/players.....................A cast/company of actors/players
Aldermen...........................A bench of aldermen
Arsonists...........................A conflagration of arsonists
Artistes.............................A troupe of artistes
Athletes.............................A team of athletes

B
Bakers................................A tabernacle of bakers
Barbers...............................A babble of barbers
Barmen...............................A promise of barmen
Barons................................A thought of barons
Beaters...............................A squad of beaters
Beauties..............................A bevy/galaxy of beauties
Bishops...............................A bench/psalter of bishops
Boys...................................A blush of boys
Boy scouts............................A troop of boy scouts
Brewers...............................A feast of brewers
Brownies..............................A pack of brownies
Bureaucrats..........................A shuffle of bureaucrats
Butchers..............................A goring of butchers
Butlers................................A sneer of butlers

C
Candidates............................. A slate of candidates
Canons.................................. A chapter/dignity of canons
Capitalists.............................. A company/syndicate of capitalists
Churchgoers............................ A congregation of churchgoers
Clerks....................................A school of clerks
Cobblers................................ A cutting/drunkship of cobblers
Cooks................................... A hastiness of cooks
Critics................................... A shrivel of critics
Curs..................................... A cowardice of curs

D
Dancers.................................. A troupe of dancers
Deans.................................... A decanter/decorum of deans
Directors................................ A board of directors
Dons..................................... An obstruction of dons

E
Employees.............................. A staff of employees
Experts................................. A panel of experts

F
Foresters................................A stalk of foresters

G
Gamblers................................A talent of gamblers
Girl guides............................. A company of girl guides
Governesses............................A galaxy of governesses
Grammarians.......................... A conjunction of grammarians

H
Harlots...................................A herd of harlots
Harpists..................................A melody of harpists
Hermits..................................An observance of hermits
Hoodlums................................A gang of hoodlums
Horsemen................................A cavalcade of horsemen
Hunters...................................A blast of hunters

I

J
Judges................................... A bench/sentence of judges
Jugglers.................................. A neverthriving of jugglers

K
Knights....................................A banner/rout of knights

L
Ladies......................................A bevy of ladies
Lawyers....................................An eloquence of lawyers
Lepers......................................A colony of lepers
Listeners...................................An audience of listeners

M
Magicians.................................An illusion of magicians
Magistrates...............................A bench of magistrates
Matrons....................................A riches of matrons
Majors.....................................A morbidity of majors
Men........................................A band of men
Merchants.................................A faith of merchants
Messengers...............................A diligence of messengers
Minstrels..................................A troupe of minstrels
Mourners..................................A cortege of mourners
Musicians.................................An orchestra of musicians

N
Natives....................................A tribe of natives
Nuns.......................................A superfluity of nuns

O
Onlookers..................................A crowd of onlookers

P
Painters......................................A curse/illusion/misbelieving of painters
Peddler (US)/pedlars.......................A malapertness of pedlars/peddler (US)
People........................................A crowd/audience/congregation/ mob of people
Performers...................................A troupe/troup of performers
Poverty.......................................A skirl of pipers
Police.........................................A posse of police
Preachers....................................A converting of preachers
Prisoners.....................................A pity/gang of prisoners

Q


R
Robbers.........................................A band of robbers

S
Sailors...........................................A crew of sailors
Seamstresses...................................A scolding of seamstresses
Senators.........................................A house of senators
Sergeants-at-law...............................A subtlety of sergeants-at-law
Servants.........................................An obeisance of servants
Sheriffs..........................................A posse of sheriffs
Shoemakers.....................................A blackening of shoemakers
Singers...........................................A choir of singers
Soldiers..........................................A squad/army/brigade/ company/division/muster/ platoon/troop of soldiers
Students..........................................A class of students
Subalterns........................................A simplicity of subalterns

T
Tailors...............................................A disguising of tailors
Taverners...........................................A glozing of taverners
Thieves..............................................A den/gang of thieves
Trustees.............................................A board of trustees
Tourists..............................................A flock of tourists

U
Undertakers........................................An unction of undertakers

V
Vicars...............................................A prudence of vicars

W
Widows..............................................An ambush of widows
Witches..............................................A coven of witches
Women...............................................A gaggle of women
Workmen............................................A gang of workmen
Worshippers.........................................A congregation of worshippers
Writers...............................................A worship of writers

X

Y
Yeomen.............................................. A fellowship of yeomen

Z