Mark Walker of Lock ‘N Load publishing has announced a new serialized novel set in the World at War universe. The novel, Everyone Dies in the End, will be posted in pieces on the blog, Over da edge,  3 times a week.  He’s even suggesting plot suggestions as the story unfolds, and will even consider guest writers.

I’m a huge fan of serialized fiction, being a huge fan of such sites as podiobooks.com. It’s always nice to see free new fiction, and even more exciting seeing it come from the gaming business.

The first entry is already up, and can be read here.

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New York Game Factory LLC, publishers of So Sue Me (sue your friends, take their stuff), In Other Words, Controversy, and Gazootch has filed for chapter 7.

Source also lists a game called “Powered By Fun”, but I can’t find any information about it.

(source)

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Paper Chess

(source)

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Xtreme Takeover by Curtis Paul, from his company Curtlin Toys and Games, is an abstract game. The copy calls it a combination of Chess, Checkers, Backgammon, Stratego, Risk, War, “and a few others”, but really it’s basically football. Your job is to reach your opponent’s end zone, and if you contact an opponent on the way, you roll to see who is eliminated. You also roll to see how far your piece(s) move each turn.

Paul’s site indicates several other games under development, as well as two games – Pachinko Soccer and Pachinko Hockey – which are not marked as such, implying that their development is complete. I can’t find any information about them anywhere on the net, and Paul hasn’t yet answered my email. [1]

Source also contains pimping about the game industry by Dominic of Northstar Games.

(source, info)

[1] Update – Paul tells me that Pachinko Soccer and Pachinko Hockey are done, but he is working on the trademark and also trying to integrate both games into one to make it more appealing. He hopes to have something more by year’s end.

As to my “football” comparison for XT, he says: “In some respects yes and your very observant to note that. I agree with you and I also think it goes further than that and has more depth especially after you have played it as many times as I have.”

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Syracuse, NY: Man gets punched in the head and robbed of his winnings at a dice game. (source)

Edmonton, CA: A man who held people hostage at the Worker’s Compensation Board has a history of drugs and violence, including throwing a deck of cards and pieces of a board game at his ex-common law wife. (source)

Cleveland, OH: $11,000 stolen at gunpoint from a local poker game. $75,000 was stolen at gunpoint from another poker game in Cleveland last April. One guy was at both of these games. (source)

Port Elizabeth, South Africa: A woman returning from a card game is stabbed to death by her boyfriend. (source)

Denver, CO: Poker game with high interest loans responsible for at least two suicides. (source) Source lists a few other poker crime stories, including a prevented robbery in Cornelius, NC.

Spring Independent School District, TX: $400,000 earmarked to teach Chess was spent on Chess cruises, with some, but little, Chess playing. (source)

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Above is the Boyets-21 warrior suit, developed by the Third Research Institute of the Russian Defense Ministry.  Long winded, eh? Anyway, an article about this puppy was written on RIA Novosti about the armor and it’s possible uses.  The best part of the article, though, was this line:

Many people laugh at the idea, saying that such suits are science fiction as in the Warhammer 40k tabletop miniature wargame, in which futuristic soldiers, creatures and vehicles of war fight according to a variety of scenarios ranging from simple skirmishes to complex battles.

That’s right. It’s only a matter of time before the Empire’s supersoldiers are trekking it across the starts, fighting everything in sight in the name of a picked emperor.

(Source)

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The Nevada Trivia Game by Marty Smith is “a cross between Monopoly and Trivial Pursuit”, a description that always sets my heart aflutter.

The game contents are taken from Marty’s site, NevadaTrivia.com.

(source)

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Do You Know Where You Are? (World Edition) is a geography and trivia game from sggc Cokesbury Acorns.

The game includes 3,000 questions that describe a location and give its coordinates, whereupon have to guess what the place is.

The game board looks like Risk’s, but I don’t suppose they allow any troop movement.

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The study of Educational Technology is the study of how to integrate “things’ into the classroom, whether computers and blogs, videos, props, or games.

One place you can concentrate in Educational Technology is EdTec at San Diego State University. And one interesting course at EdTec is EdTech 670: Exploratory Learning Through Education Simulation & Games.

EdTech 670 is complete immersion in the art of game design: analyzing game patterns, using games as teaching tools, psychological elements, role play, simulation, motivation, fun, and so on.

Students have to design original games that meet market demands and education objectives, upload stories to Youtube, and maintain a blog about board games. The blog has over a thousand entries going back to 2000, and all the entries are written during September through December, which is when the course occurs. Each entry is an exploration of a board or card game.

Information about the game projects, and how they meet the course goals, is also online.

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Drawn Together is a perverse cartoon series from Comedy Central. On Nov 17 you can get the entire series on DVD in a package complete with Drawn Together – The Board Game, a trivia game about the series. As well as a drinking game and Truth or Dare game.

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