First Musings After Origins
Hello All.
I also seem to run tired after Origins through GenCon, but I’m really striving not to. I took plenty of vitamin c and other good natural stuff at the convention to stave off any errant germs in my vicinity and so far it’s worked. I fear turning into Howard Hughes sometimes, so I honestly try not to be too obsessive about it, but one can’t be too careful can they? I’m certain a degree of paranoia and sleep deprivation put me in the proper frame of mind for working on Agents of Oblivion and if I’m not there yet, the breakneck pace we’ve got laid out for getting RunePunk into print will certainly guarantee it.
I’m happy about announcing the scheduled release date so let’s keep our fingers crossed that I can pull it off. So far, everything is falling into place and the first time is usually the hardest. I’m just glad I got my ears wet a bit with PDFs first, but this is definitely leaping into the deep end of the pool.
Speaking of the deep end, I’m glad to see my convention attendance and the awareness of Reality Blurs continues to grow. Despite not having a booth or hucking anything, I got to run a lot of demos, eight in all, and had great reception to both Agents of Oblivion and RunePunk.
I expected people to really dig AoO and they did and they were the first “people in the wild” to get to try out the Sanity system outside of a localized group I gamed with. They found it favorably comparable in assessing the effects of fear and terror as that found in a certain major horror game that’s been around for a long time. ;)
RunePunk, on the other hand, was my unknown commodity and I’m pleased to see that I emerged triumphant from my encounters. Everyone unequivocally enjoyed the gaming experience and not from a novelty approach, but really got the setting and showered me with compliments on its design and ingenuity. This is stuff they said, not me. Still, it was nice to hear it. :D
Finally, I got to speak on a panel with Travis Anderson, Sean Patrick Fannon, and Phil Brucato. I was called a creative genius at one point on the panel when discussing Iron Dynasty and the idea about ninja and bamboo mechas seemed to stick in everyone’s head. I also shotgunned ideas about Agents of Oblivion and RunePunk and let slip about a secret project that is several years away. A half-dozen people came up asking me about various stuff and where really into my setting ideas. I even talked with a couple of gamers on the street who really dug the seetting concepts and went by and checked out the Savage Worlds room at my suggestion. (I saw them there later.)
Later on at a private party, several guys talked with me about True20, since I was the only setting winner in the room I suppose, and one guy who had attended the panel I was on tried to pry a date out of me about Iron Dynasty. I talked about it a good bit, but not in excruciating detail. It wasn’t my party, but did assure them it was in playtesting and I’ve completed the maps. I look forward to working on it more as the schedule permits.
All in all, an exciting time and I got to pick up scads of games that I may not get to read and review before GenCon. My intent, however, is to talk about them hear but it’s hectic at present. Work first! Right? Sure. Why not?
Take care. Get your gaming….
Speaking of which, I got to game with Evil Mike and Chaos Steve of Harrowed Halls. Check out their website. Attend their games. They are uber-prepared and all around great guys. They will be at GenCon and Con on the Cob. Just like me.
Later,
Sean
