Still in class today so this will be a quic lunch-time post.  Our last release has been swiftly driven from the front page.  Time to get a new one up.

I just realized Battlestar Galactica premiers tonight.  It snuck up on me.  I know where I’ll be at 10:00pm tonight!

Talks with the Werecabbages are going well and I expect them to pick up the heavy lifting for the Omens of Armageddon line of D20 Modern Adventures.

I have decided its time to take my publishing up to the “Next Level”, and having the Werecabbages do some work for me is part of that strategy.

Still waiting on GSL news from Wizards.  Like everyone else.

We play our Star Wars RPG campaign again next week.  Looking forward to it.  Because i took some pictures of one of the models our GM converted I already know about one of the challenges we’ll face, but I am sworn to secrecy and have to “act surprised” when the model in un-veiled.

More info soon.

I got the D7ACU: Skele-Teen out last night. That PDF is another Otherverse/Chris Field creation he did based on some horror-movie elements that inspired him. I really enjoyed the idea behind an undead teenager coming back to protect other troubled teens.

I also read on the Otherverse Games Blog about some changes Chris is doing to his otherverse America setting. It dove-tails almost exactly with what I have been thinking for the Omens of Armageddon line I am working on. Instead of a “setting book” that reads like a travel-book or encyclopedia I am doing a series of adventures where the players are introduced into the world pretty much as it exists “today”. As the adventure arcs progress the world changes, and the players play a large part in what happens. But the end result is that they feel more like they are “part of” the setting rather than just “setting up shop” for the duration of a campaign.

I am in talks with the Werecabbages about developing the series, which looks to begin hitting the streets come summer.

I also got an email back from [UNIDENTIFIED PERSON] regarding [SECRET PROJECT] which is moving forward. With luck I’ll be able to unveil it by the end of the month! This project has been in the works and on the drawing board since long before I started publishing PDF’s. Stay tuned for details.

Played a little Rock Band last night. I am OK on the guitar but SUCK on the drums. I kind of thought it would be the other way around. Guess I need to practice.

I picked up a few comic books the other day and this cover jumped out at me:

It kind of reminded me of these:

I am in a class for work all week.  I enjoy taking the classes cuz I am not at work, and I get to learn some new, nifty things that make my resume look good.  This week I am taking an IIS7 on Windows Server 2008 course.  Interesting stuff.  I especially like the new Event Viewer on Server 2008 as I do a lot of Security Auditing in my day-to-day job.  Lots of new tools and filters.  Many of them are also in the new Vista OS as well.

I picked up my wife from the airport last night.  She was all excited about this “new” video game she played called Rock Band.  So we came home from the mall with it last night.  We plan on playing after work tonight; should be fun.

Still saving my pennies for a new copy of the Adobe Creative Suite.  I am also toying with the idea of doing a special sale to earn money for it.  Stay tuned for details as they become avaliable!

I really want to get into Flash and can use the new Dreamweaver for [SECRET PROJECT].  Plus the audio applications may let me take my Publisher Audio Commentaries to the “next level”.

Still no word on the GSL.  Would love to hear something.  Anything.  Please?

Sorry for the lack of posts! My wife has been out of town since last Tuesday so I have been busy playing the single-guy. Plus I had to re-load all the fonts and other applications on my new desktop so I could get PDF work done. I am halfway through a new D7ACU and will get it out very soon. I have two or three other projects right on its heels as well.

There is a lot of buzz going on over at ENWorld and on the OBS publisher forums about the GSL and weather 4th edition will be open or closed. I am in the “wait and see” camp. I hope 4th edition is open and suspect the GSL will allow 3rd party publisher support. My feeling is that with 3.5 WoTC wanted 3rd parties to create content that required the use of the core rulebooks that WoTC sells. Well, with True20 and other complete games emerging, they have had to tighten down the license to dis-allow that. I am OK with that. It is also understandable if the “suits” at Hasbro are having second thoughts about “giving away” their IP for all of these fly-by-night, one-man-show operations. (Of which Skortched Urf’ Studios is a proud member!) If they squash the GSL and close the sytem I will not lose any sleep since 3.5 and the OGL are already “out there” and will have plenty of support. Plus, the only reason I am not spending my time creating a custom rule-set is that the D20 system is accessible and free for development. This will not change. But nothing has ever prevented me from compiling my own rules and releasing them. If 4th edition is closed I may look into creating my own “system” if it suits my needs.

I saw the move Death Sentence last night. On the whole I enjoyed it, but several scenes were just stupid. [Spoilers ahead, ye have been warned!] So our main character has his son killed by some gang-bangers as an “initiation killing” to get into the gang. The case is gonna plead out for like five years so our “hero” recants his testimony so the perp walks. He’s gonna kill the guy himself! Cut to the scene of him the the garage going through his rusty tools looking for a appropriate weapon to use against this gang-banger. (Who he followed from the courthouse and found out where he lives. His buddies picked him up in the same cars they used for the robbery/killing.) He decides on a rusty bowie knife. He tracks down the kid and jumps him when he’s taking the trash out to the dumpster. A fight ensues where the 22 year old kid is whopped by the 40+ year old KevinBacon. OK, maybe it was the element of surprise; I’ll play along. But then Kevin is all freaked out about, you know, there being blood all over the place when you stab someone with a knife. He flees.

The bad guys figure out it was him because he was seen “staking out” the neighborhhod by a passer-by. (Guy in a late-model car in a tie hanging in the hood.) They attempt to exact revenge and hit him as he’s leaving work. Cool chase scene. He kills one of them and gets away, but they get his wallet and briefcase. They return it and let him know they are gonna kill his family. Cool, I like where this is going. So Kevin Bacon calls the cops and gets them to park a car outside his house for protection. He wants it to “just stop”. They are doing the whole eye-for-an-eye thing. Cue Kevin in his houe with a freakin baseball bat standing watch. Cut! Hold it right there. Gang-bangers know who you are and threaten to kill you? Get the f*&% out of town, or at least send your family to the Motel 8. But no, Kevin feels all safe cuz there is a squad car parked out front. (If this were me, my wife and kid would be three states away and I’d be packing waaay more firepower than a Louisville Slugger.)

So naturally these hard-core gang-bangers show up, kill the cops and storm into the house with shotguns. Kevin is dodging buckshot like there is no tomorrow! But they get him and drag him down to the den where they bust caps into his wife and son, before shooting him. The whole family is left for dead. Kevin wakes up in the ICU, learns hiswife is dead and his son is in a coma, possibly never to re-awaken. He sneaks out of the hospital and cleans out his savings account and goes looking for revenge. He scores some guns; a 1911 .45, a .357 revolver and a double-barrel 12 guage. It is clear to us that he has never handled a gun before in his life. He reads the manual, he loads and un-loads them, fumbling with the shells etc. I swear, like fifteen minutes later he is “Mr. Badass”! He has never actually fired a live gun, but his anger and thirst for revenge made him competent with his newly acquired guns! (That he, of course purchased from the black market.) I found this to be the single worst part of the movie. They don’t show him practicing with them, he never fires a shot until he is “in the Sh!*”. Look, I have spent YEARS of my life practicing with guns. I am (with all due modesty) fairly competent with them. I am NOT ready to go toe-to-toe with six or eight gang-bangers and am always trying to improve. That’s just stupid.

However, I get what they were doing and I liked the overall effect. The revolver and the double-barrel were perfect choices for a gun “newb” to use. He catches one of the bad guys and gets him to tell where the gangs “hideout” is. He kills the guy and lets the gang-leader know he’s coming to get him via cell phone. He then goes storming into the gangs HQ and a cool firefight ensues. It was bloody, and aside from a lot of shotgun blast dodging (which this movie seemed to have a lot of) I loved the very end when he is side-by side with the main bad guy. They are both shot several times, wounded and sitting on the same pew/bench. Kevin draws his revolver, which the bad guy didn’t know he had. (The lesson here is two guns are better than one.) He simply says “Are you ready?” and the look on the bad guys face was perfect. Cut to a scene of Kevin walking out of the gang HQ. Perfect! Loved that ending.