Dragon*Con 2009

Dragon*Con 2009. Whoo boy. Where to start.

For those who don’t know, Dragon*Con is an annual gathering of tens of thousands people in Atlanta to share their love of science fiction, fantasy, and other geeky endeavors. It is always over Labor Day weekend and it is always a spectacle to behold, as a good many of the attendees dress up as their favorite characters. There are lots of geek celebrities in attendance (like William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy) and tons of events, including concerts, parties, discussion panels, movie marathons, gaming marathons, and vendors selling all kinds of strange and wonderful things. There is so much stuff to see and do that it is distributed across four hotels downtown. It is, in short, a freak show par excellence.

For one thing, I am still somewhat shocked that I took the advice of an extremely enthusiastic (and nerdy) gay couple that I only met a few months prior and attend one of the nation’s largest geek conventions with them. I mean, I don’t generally do things like this. Anyone who knows me knows that I generally don’t go out of my way to go to large gatherings of people… especially when it costs money. But, I think at some point this past spring, I realized that I’m not getting any older, and that it’s always better to regret things you’ve done than to regret things you didn’t do, and nothing ventured nothing gained, and maybe a handful of other cliches too. So, why not? I mean, the worst that could happen would be that someone mugs me and murders me in some back alley of Atlanta… and that’s not terrible in the grand scheme of things. What did I have to lose?

Fortunately for me, I was neither mugged nor murdered. As a matter of fact, I had a surprisingly enjoyable time, in the company of people whom I have come to consider real friends. I felt like I fit in there among the geeks and the weirdos–it was lovely. There is so much that could be said about the trip, but so much that should probably remain unsaid in case certain parties ever stumble across the blog. Let’s just say that most of us spent the weekend in a blissed-out, boozed-out, sex-fueled haze, punctuated with pirates, vampires, steampunks, goths, furries, gamers, zombies, ninjas, elves, faeries, and other things too numerous to list. And while the debauchery might have made me feel like I was in college again, the games and characters that I saw made me feel like I was back in high school. This was the very best kind of nostalgia, coupled with a wondrous assemblage of things and people never even dreamed of previously.

I’m very glad I went and I have now become something of a Dragon*Con evangelist. Knowing the tastes of my other friends, I know that they would have a blast, and I would very much like to show them the wonderful and strange place that is downtown Atlanta over Labor Day weekend.

I’ll leave you with a bit of music by the Crüxshadows, a goth/darkwave band that is a perennial favorite at the ‘Con. I heard this song throughout the weekend as we ventured through the lower reaches of the Atlanta Marriott, so in my mind it became the default theme song for my first ‘Con experience. And yes, I admit it: I think the lead singer Rogue is cute. I’ve always had a thing for the goth boys.

The Last Bastion of Geekdom

I have met an interesting couple (of boys) online who live not too far from me. We have a lot of the same interests, except they are deeply invested in something I’d always viewed with derision: LARPing. For those not in the know, LARP stands for “live action role playing” and basically amounts to a type of game where everyone gets “in character” and behaves as their character would behave, and you have a fictional setting somewhere, and (sometimes) some kind of stated goal or objective for the whole thing.

In its worst form, you end up with lots of old, neck-bearded virgins with horrible BO, battling it out with foam swords in their mothers’ basements.

I have been invited to attend these boys’ LARPing session this Saturday… and I think I’m going to check it out. Mostly out of morbid curiosity… but partly on account of them being the ones who invited me for the threesome. (They are tres cute BTW, so no worries about me shagging a homely sort out of desperation.)

I’ll let you know how it goes… I’m sure it’ll be a memorable occasion.

Page 48 from the Xaositect Songbook

Personal Updates

• I broke my fucking tooth this morning. Goddamnit.
• I am trying very hard to be over my ex and enjoy the time I spend with BF, but after having spent so much time together, it’s proving more difficult than I would like. Plus, having a troublesome dirty dream about said ex from time to time is not helping matters. Nor is the fact that ex remains my best friend helping matters any. *sigh* Sometimes being fucked in the head has its downsides.
• I am totally addicted to tower defense games at the moment. Right now, this one is eating up most of my free time.
• Work is being lame at the moment, because end-users are finding new, experimental ways to suck. Fortunately my supervisor is giving me glowing reviews–always welcome in an economy where job cuts are the order of the day.
• I think Gene “Fairy Bishop” Robinson and Rick “Saddleback Mountain” Warren need to totally duke it out during the inauguration. Rick’s probably a sturdy fuck, but Gene could even the odds with his shepherd’s crook or, barring that, a convenient folding chair.

Monkey-Ninja-Pirate-Robot-Zombie

For a more complex and interesting game of rock-paper-scissors, might I suggest…

Gentlemen.

I have a new hobby… can you guess what it is?

The BF and I have been wasting lots of time together… we tend to go for a dual-pyro approach or the classic heavy/medic smackdown.

Ravenloft Cut-Scene 2

Regarding the settlements of Lamordia, it is rare that a kind word is ever uttered about Leidenheim, the remote port city on the country’s western shore. It is rarer still that anyone voices a desire to travel to Leidenheim during the summer, when the humidity from the nearby swampland makes the clothing stick to the body and forces breathing to become a conscious effort. Breathing is made more difficult by the perpetual rank odor of the fishmongers’ stalls, and the occasional whiff of foul ordure and offal discarded by the city’s poorer residents.

It was remarkable indeed how Leidenheim, once a modest city of learning and one of the most commercially successful settlements in Lamordia, had fallen so far to such a shadow of its former glory. The closing of the University of Leidenheim under mysterious circumstances seemed to be the death knell for the city, as it had driven most of the city’s more educated citizens to Port-a-Lucine, Il-Aluk, and other settlements across the world more known for their academic endeavors. The growing prevalence of piracy on the open waters between Lamordia, Dementlieu, and Darkon led many shipping companies and private traders to change their ports of call and delivery routes, eschewing Leidenheim entirely. And overland travel, which required traversing several miles of dangerous swampland, was hardly an ideal substitute for maritime commerce.

Still, some of the city’s more industrious residents found ways to make a living.

---

The lame beggar boy watched a rather genteel-looking man emerge from the clerk’s office near the Leidenheim shipyard. Of course, having never seen true nobility, the boy could little recognize that the man’s couture was merely a mishmash of various fashions that spanned the continent. His plain Falkovnian boots clacked across the cobblestone street, and the boy watched as the somewhat obese man slowly walked back toward the downtown business district.

“Excuse me,” the boy shouted. “Hey sir, excuse me!”

The man stopped in his tracks and looked in the boy’s direction. “Yes?”

“Sir, can you spare a coin or two?”

The man smirked and turned toward the boy. As he approached, the boy made out more of the man’s details. His clothing was rich and ornate–or at least appeared to be at some point in the past, when it was not so smudged and faded. The man appeared to be wearing several layers of clothing, which struck the boy as odd, given the stifling humidity of the day. Even more odd was the fur-rimmed overcoat that the man wore; it was considerably oversized and dragged behind him on the ground.

“What did you ask?” the man inquired, peeking inside the small rusty cup that sat beside the boy.

“Sir, I was wondering if you had a coin or two you could spare… I’ve not had a meal in days.”

“Well,” the man said matter-of-factly, “I don’t believe in charity. However… if you’d be willing to do a bit of work for me, I would give you a small pittance.”

The boy looked up at him, a bit confused. “But sir,” said the boy, “I’m just a cripple, I can’t work.”

The man smirked. “Sure you can, lad,” he said, reaching into a pocket somewhere within the interior folds of his voluminous overcoat. He produced a stack of papers and bent down closer to the boy, offering the stack to him.

“Pass these out to everyone coming and going here, especially out-of-towners and people you don’t recognize.” The boy looked down at the man’s hand, holding the papers in front of his face. The man wore a tattered woolen glove, and a couple of his fingers were exposed through irregular holes. The boy looked up at him, then reached out and took the papers.

“That’s a good lad,” said the man, and he reached into a different pocket and produced a shiny coin. He dropped the coin into the boy’s cup, and the boy was overjoyed.

“Oh, thank you sir!” the boy said, his face awash with a look of relief and simple happiness.

“Fetch me more customers and there will be more where that came from,” the man said. He then turned and walked away from the boy, continuing on his way toward the business district. The boy watched him walk away, then looked down at the papers he held in his hand.

The man made his way back to his shop, which was only barely in the business district and was just a stone’s throw from the slums and one of the less reputable taverns in Leidenheim. His shop was sandwiched between two buildings, both of which were uninhabited. As a result, both buildings had become makeshift billboards for the Pendergast Emporium, and the street-facing walls of the buildings were plastered with dozens of the same handbills that the man had given to the cripple earlier. As the door opened, a small bell tinkled, and the man cleared his throat.

Slowly walking down one of the aisles in the store, the man seemed deep in thought, but kept his arms close to his sides so that his large sleeves would not accidentally drag anything off the shelves. As he approached the front desk, he noticed the bald, heavily-tattoed man behind the counter holding a stone of some sort up to lamplight, looking intently at it.

“That’s a pretty piece, Phillip,” the man said. “Where’d you get it?”

“A man came in while you were gone, Mr. Pendergast. Quite bizarre, really. I’ll tell you more about it in a bit, but rest assured–we got this for a song.”

Pendergast walked up to the counter and extended his gloved hand to Phillip. “Is that so?” he said. Phillip placed the stone in Pendergast’s hand, and he immediately pocketed it somewhere within the folds of his overcoat. “What passes for a song these days?”

“Trust me, we got it for cheap. I’ll tell you more about it, but you might want to attend to the current customer.”

“Who is it?” Pendergast asked, looking around while leaning on the counter.

“That young errand boy of the von Hauptmanns. Baldridge, I believe.”

Pendergast grinned broadly and stood up straight. “Excellent,” he said, rubbing his hands together. “Always a pleasure working on the von Hauptmann account.”

Phillip motioned with his head toward a door on the far side of the store. “He’s back there, checking out the curiosities. You ought to go sneak up on him and scare him.” As he said this, Phillip grinned, exposing teeth that had been filed down to a point. “He’s such a bleedin’ dandy.”

“All that time spent with the von Hauptmanns, I suppose,” said Pendergast. Both men laughed.

“I’ll go fetch the boy,” said Pendergast. “You, go get their order. Greta should have everything together in the back room.”

“Aye,” Phillip nodded, and he disappeared into a room behind the front desk. Pendergast, meanwhile, strode toward the closed door back in the corner of the store, near the bookshelves. As he approached, the door opened, and a young man stepped out. Seeing Pendergast, the young man smiled.

“Ah, Mr. Pendergast!” said the young man. “Good to see you again!”

“You know lad, I was serious when I said you could call me Henrik.”

“I know, it just seems somewhat… impolite.”

Pendergast laughed. “Oh, don’t worry about politeness here of all places!”

The young man snickered. “Good point.”

“Come now, Simeon, we have much to discuss before we square away this latest order of yours. If you’ll come back to my office, we’ll work out the particulars of your employers’ request.”

Simeon nodded politely and followed Pendergast back to the room behind the front counter of the store.

Chess Boxing

This is pretty incredible.

Chess boxing is a relatively new sport that combines the brutality of boxing with the strategy of chess in alternating rounds. The sport was first described in a French comic book in the early 90’s; by 2003, official matches were being fought throughout Europe under the auspices of the World Chess Boxing Organization (WCBO). I have a great deal of respect for anyone who can excel in both physical and mental pursuits, so this seems like a pretty awesome idea to me.

The Evolution of My Gaming Interests: An Abbreviated Timeline

• 1986: Parents purchase my first video game system, a Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), with the standard issue Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt combination. All the cool kids in kindergarten had the NES, so getting this was exhilarating both on a “I have the latest toy” level and on a “I meet the societal requirements for coolness” level.



• 1987: My best friend Christopher introduces me to the Legend of Zelda series; I am perfectly content to sit for hours and watch him play. We snicker continuously at the enemies called “Darknuts” and speculate that they must have a lot of pubic hair.
• 1989: I attempt to get into RPGs by wasting many hours of my life playing Dragon Warrior, fighting slimes and drakees for shitty EXP and spending all my hard-earned gold on herbs. My later experience with the original Final Fantasy game would confirm my extreme dislike of role-playing games. (The Marsh Cave, anyone?) I also acquired a Game Boy this year, which I tended to use more like an extremely primitive iPod than a gaming system.
• 1990: After seeing every gamer’s favorite movie The Wizard, I acquire Super Mario Bros. 3 and immediately take advantage of the warp whistle trick unveiled in the movie. The game became the first Mario game I ever played to completion thanks to that. Renting video games becomes a great pastime to help deal with my parent’s divorce and other shitty things going on in my life at the time.
• 1991: During an episode of “Family Matters”, I saw my first commercial for the Super NES; my face was locked in a perpetual smile for 15 minutes afterward, like Jack Nicholson’s Joker had gassed me or something. I convince my parents to let me rent an SNES to try it out, and they oblige–or so I thought. On Christmas Day, it is revealed that they’d just opened the SNES that they’d purchased for me and let me play with it for a few days, under the guise that they’d rented the system. Probably remains the best Christmas duping I’ve ever experienced.



• 1992: Since none of the good games were in stock at the local movie store, I rented Final Fantasy II out of desperation, not expecting a lot. I was immediately hooked and decided that role-playing games were the best genre of games ever. I get all my friends hooked on the game and take up the odd hobby of narrating the games to them while they played, going so far as to use different voices for the different characters in the game.
• 1995: I played Final Fantasy III continuously from the moment I got it for Christmas in ‘94 until the date I beat it: February 5th, 1995, a date I’ll always remember. The game was incredible, but it also disturbed me (and my then-conservative sensibilities) deeply and initiated philosophical and religious introspection. I cried when the game was over. I begin to model certain aspects of my personality after Kefka.
• 1997: Disillusioned by the fact that Final Fantasy 7 was released for the Sony Playstation, I turn to computer games. I receive The 7th Guest for my PC; it becomes the first PC game I really get into, even though it creeped the hell out of me. As I played it, I again found my fundamental beliefs challenged. I begin to model certain aspects of my personality after Henry Stauf.



• 1999: Some friends introduce me (quite by accident) to Half-Life, and it became the first 1st-person shooter that really caught my interest. This was a very tumultuous and confusing period in my life, as I was dealing with death and unrequited love, and it was delightful to get to blow the shit out of aliens and beat up things with a crowbar. This year marked the birth of my online persona “Ozzie”, through which I earned a reputation as a hilarious badass with the Bubblemod crew. (For the Square fans reading the article, the nickname does come from the comically inept villain from Chrono Trigger.) At this point I spend more time collecting video game music than I do actually playing video games.
• 2002: I try Warcraft III and suck at it. I also join an online browser-based RPG community; this lasted for a couple of months before I lost interest in it. I remember no details about the community other than the fact that at one point, I voluntarily joined a clan called “Pink Fluffy Bunnies” and was a ranked PFB officer.
• 2003: My interest in console gaming (and life in general) on the wane, I am introduced to traditional pencil-and-paper role-playing games by my good friend and roommate Adam. I remember the dark night we rolled the dice and my very first character, a wild mage named Jacob, was born. His foray into a demonic cathedral in Ravenloft will live in my memory for the rest of my days, and would inspire me to DM my own Ravenloft campaign a couple of years later.
• 2005: Amount of time spent gaming has been reduced almost entirely to zero, outside of the occasional D&D get-together. I kick off my own homebrew Ravenloft campaign, which continues to this day. It is also around this time that Adam begins a Planescape campaign, and my CN tiefling rogue-y bard is born. The avatar I use for this blog is an approximation of what I think Ignus would probably look like.
• 2007: Half-Life 2 and Morrowind initiate a brief return to gaming, but it appears the age of console gaming is more or less over for me. I am perfectly content to simply observe my friends and/or relatives playing, and occasionally partake of their games while visiting, but I have no desire to get any console(s) of my own.
• 2008: Interest has turned solely to a single, live-action game known in some circles as “hide the sausage“.

Sega’s Pervy Past

Some classic ads from the early days of Sega.