Moving Pictures
Summers in Toronto can be apocalyptic. If it isn’t the plague of aphids infesting our air supply, it’s the flood of crap at the multiplex.
Scott Adams is a Hydra
This interview with Scott Adams, the text adventure pioneer, has him talking about how he uses several keyboards to set up a Hydra in the multiplayer online world of Everquest II. It’s refreshing to hear oldschool game makers talk about their current game obsessions rather than moan about […]
Cheerfully Lecherous and Unabashedly Lazy
If you had unlimited power – magical power as a wizard, or even unlimited built-in power like Superman – what would you do with it? Would you act responsibly and protect us regular folks? Or would you become greedy and try to take over the world, like a […]
His Dark Ending
I call it a bait and switch. The first book in Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy, The Golden Compass, was an adventure fantasy that was fast-paced and written in an incredibly smooth style. Intrigue, danger, children in peril, armoured polar bears, witch clans at war with each […]
The Bandwagon
Ursula K. Le Guin is one of the most respected names in fantasy and science fiction. She doesn’t need to boost her career by cheap gimmicks or by following current trends. So I was a bit shocked to read about how Le Guin’s editor had suggested she write […]
Not So Happy Ending
Talk about a long journey. Stephen King wrote the first line of a short story called “The Gunslinger” in 1970, at the beginning of his career, and the first volume of the Dark Tower series was published in 1982. Nearly 35 years after its humble beginnings, the series […]
The Cultural Gutter 