Jim Stormdancer @mogwai_poet@mastodon.social

Also discussed: Skyrim modding as a more convincing representation of magic than the spell system in the game itself, dressing up as the Murder She Wrote theme song for Meme Day, and the culinary dimensional space of meat product folded into bread product.

Niche pro-tip: if you want to add Dvorak support to your WASD control scheme, just add the synonyms "," for "W", "O" for "S" and "E" for "D". "A" is already in the right place. (That's how I can that I'm supposed to be able to move but the game doesn't support Dvorak -- I can only move left.)

I was on this episode of The MADEcast talking about making indie games, running ARGs, and doing co-working events at The MADE.

https://art19.com/shows/the-madecast/episodes/bf7ee1c9-6e56-4b35-9f32-c732ad7df393

Monster Island was a play-by-mail MMO written in QuickBasic that ran from 1989 to 2017.

https://if50.substack.com/p/1989-monster-island

This is part of a weekly series called "50 Years of Text Games," covering a game from each year starting with Oregon Trail in 1971. It's up to 1989 and every entry so far has been fascinating.

From Topic Lords #81, the topic is: "first encountering a work through parody."

We get into the phenomenon of how a lot of Monty Python was satire, but Americans didn't have any of the context to recognize it, so for an entire generation of American nerds, wacky shit happening for no apparent reason is the height of comedy.

Listen to the whole episode here: https://topiclords.com/the-pianist-oboist-war

From Topic Lords #81, the topic is: "first encountering a work through parody," or how the one guy at bible camp who knew how to rewrite song lyrics died so kids are stuck singing "Rock Around the Clock" well into the 2000s.

Listen to the whole episode here: https://topiclords.com/the-pianist-oboist-war

Where is the machine learning startup promising to fix the concert videos where the audience claps on 1 and 3

These are really fun to make! Polishing a casual conversation down to the most entertaining possible two minute jewel.

I am a little sad about cutting the part where Avery is in the waiting room looking at the wall of sheriff photos going from modern bureaucrat sheriffs back to the 1850s when you had to enforce the law by being a big scary man, and one of them looked like a buff Edgar Allan Poe, with the weird forehead and spindly mustache.

From the Topic Lords archives, here's Avery telling the story of nearly going to prison for jaywalking.

Listen to the full episode here: https://topiclords.com/dont-freak-out-but-im-arresting-you

Available for patrons, #82: Breadless French Toast a la Dig Dug, ft. Hallie and Chris. We discuss the Sylveon, savory french toast, what briefcases are for and whether they still exist, Detective Pikachu, and the ethics of making a robot daughter.

https://www.patreon.com/topiclords

Topic Lords #81: The Pianist-Oboist War, ft. Alexander and Amanda. We discuss sci-fi stories that are just reskins of real life, ancient bitcoin, that time Wienerschnitzel actually served schnitzel, first encountering a song through parody, &c.

https://topiclords.com/the-pianist-oboist-war

Can someone help this poor Wikipedia editor who needs verification that mirrored sunglasses aren't mirrored on the inside too

An excerpt from Topic Lords #80, wherein we address JP's topic: "the most unexpected CD to be launched from the face of the Cenobite from Hellraiser 3 that launches CDs out of his face."

Listen to the full episode here: https://topiclords.com/xenogears-disc-3-for-smash

For most of my life I've had the naked impulse to create without a driving spark of imagination. I.e. I want to make *something*, but I don't know what.

I had to deliberately invent processes in my life to invent and retain creative ideas.

Long term projects are actually great for me in this respect -- Frog Fractions makes me seem like an overflowing fountain of creativity because when you play it you race through a bunch of ideas in half an hour. But that shit took me a *year* to make.

He would've already been in daycare if it weren't for COVID. We're only doing this because our proximate family is now fully vaccinated.

We managed to get April almost a year of maternity leave but most American parents have no choice but to put their kid in daycare at like six weeks.

I've taken care of Winston full time since August. It's by far the hardest thing I've ever done. Since he started preschool on Monday, the flurries of heart palpitations have stopped, if I see a mess I *just clean it*, and I just went downstairs and realized I had to go back upstairs and I didn't despair at all!

Fantasy Interactive Scenarios by Telephone (or F.I.S.T.) was a Steve Jackson RPG you called on the phone in 1988. Featuring radio drama combat scenarios, saving your game and calling again later, and a "tavern" where you can chat with other players.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fantasy_Interactive_Scenarios_by_Telephone