What I've been up to lately

[drcpunk]

I finished reading The Woman in White, one of the many books recommended by Ron Edwards that I've enjoyed. Classic gothic, well written, and full of stuff that I think became cliches in later works, though I'm not an expert in this field.

I've learned how to download podcasts and put them on my mp3 player in such a way that it likes the files. I don't have an I-pod, but I'm not feeling this as a huge lack.

Thus far, I have listened to the first four broadcasts of Sons of Kryos, a podcast about rpgs. I listened to the first one on a bus trip up to Columbia, which was exactly the right length to hear the whole thing. Good stuff.

I have finally read Peter Beagle's A Fine and Private Place, which I would probably not have enjoyed nearly so much if I had read it years earlier. I have reread "Lila the Werewolf", and I am rereading The Last Unicorn, which is as good as I had remembered, and a bit startling after the other two. They're all good, but the style of The Last Unicorn is different, high fantasy, as opposed to urban fantasy. Note that Beagle's urban fantasy is nothing like, say, Charles de Lint's or Emma Bull's. Then again, if you look at Urban Fantasy as authors claiming their own cities for the genre, this is hardly surprising. Beagle's city is New York City, my New York City, albeit a generation earlier.

I have finished all but three characters in first draft for the larp Dark of the Moon. At this rate, the game may be runnable in a year or so. We have also decided that, instead of creating a smaller game out of it, we should create a teaser game, set before the events of Dark of the Moon. And, we have a list of other larps we want to work on. We have convinced zrealm to look over what we have with fresh eyes.

I have run three sessions of Beyond the Mountains of Madness and have a wiki for keeping write ups and such on. I have started a pbem game set in the CthulhuPunk world I created over 15 years ago. In keeping with each game having younger protagonists than the one before, this one has high school students. This game, too, has a wiki.

I have been playing in jlighton's feng shui game, which also has a wiki.

I have seen the movie Casion Royale, which is as good as everyone said. The thing that annoyed agrumer also annoyed me -- gratuitous exposition in a movie that generally recognized that we could figure stuff out.

A bit of house cleaning. Could stand a bit more.

Spending time with mnemex. Could always stand a bit more of that.

Comments

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

Is _The Last Unicorn_ entirely high fantasy? IIRC, it mostly is, but there are occasional bits like Cully wanting to be listed in Childe or the butterfly doing bits of commercials.

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

True also of T. H. White's The Once and Future King. Yes, I'd say it is high fantasy. "Entirely" is a different question, one I'm not as interested in. Say, "essentially", perhaps.

More odd in the high fantasy flavor are the references to tacos and magazines. But, it's still high fantasy.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

I think I'd file _The Last Unicorn_ as "pretty much high fantasy" and _The Once and Future King_ as "not exactly high fantasy, probably in its own category". I'm not sure exactly why I place them differently, but the modern elements in _Once and Future_ are more important to both the theme and the plot, and take me out of the high fantasy trance.

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

I agree on Once and Future King, and am also not entirely sure why. Part may well be the modern elements and deliberate look at modern issues in the modern world. Part may be the -- not condescending -- but explicit "This is what you need to know to understand this part of the tale". I don't mind that, but it may be part of what breaks the high fantasy trance.

[ladymondegreen.livejournal.com]

I have finished all but three characters in first draft for the larp Dark of the Moon. At this rate, the game may be runnable in a year or so. We have also decided that, instead of creating a smaller game out of it, we should create a teaser game, set before the events of Dark of the Moon. And, we have a list of other larps we want to work on. We have convinced zrealm to look over what we have with fresh eyes.

We're doing a teaser game? I remember the teaser ad, but I think I missed a memo somewhere.

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

The teaser ad is for the main game.

The teaser game is something else. You know how we'd originally discussed doing a 4 hour and a weekend long version of DotM? mnemex thinks that a better thing to do is a prequel game. This is fine with me, as I don't have to get involved if it keeps me from working on the big game. You guys can get involved as much or as little as you like -- it'll be on the wiki.

Working name is Light of the Sun, and it'll have about 7 characters from DotM, and 10-15 other characters. Can talk details if you'll be at batyatoon and sdelmonte's party.

[drcpunk.livejournal.com]

Have now put all first drafts on the wiki -- take a look at your leisure, and comment in the talk pages.