Dragonmeet report and Winding Down...

It's been over a week already, and I haven't written up what happened at Dragonmeet. That's pretty shoddy...

Dragonmeet was good - though I do feel that I'm not really cut out for the social side of things. I met so many people I know there, mostly fellow game designers, publishers, bloggers, reviewers and generally cool people that I've come to know over the years, and as always struggled to find anything cool to say. I'm really not a social animal as they say.

Was interviewed for the second time by the Wibbly-Wobbly Dicey-Wicey podcast - a podcast dedicated to the Doctor Who RPG, though I'm yet to hear any of their podcasts (or find them online except for a facebook page). I just wish I had some news about the Dr Who RPG. I did the rules for the new edition, and the rest is in Cubicle 7's hands...

Wore that cool t-shirt I had printed for WILD, and had a few people ask "Where can I buy it?" and even had a comment of "You talk about it all the time, I thought it had come out?" This made me wonder if I have been talking about it too much..?

Last year's pitch document didn't result in any pick-up, so it looks like I'm taking another approach - teaming up with Stoo at WeEvolve publishing, who made the cool Aegean RPG we've been playing. Plans are afoot for a smaller intro-book to see if we can get interest building for a larger, full scale WILD release further down the line. It's early days yet, but looking promising. I just need to write a cut-down version of the game, with a solo/co-op adventure that ties into the bigger world.

That's another thing that made me think. I had a nice chat with the awesome Jason Durall, line manager for Runequest and Conan, and all 'round excellent chap. Talking about WILD he asked, "So what do you do?" and I was stumped. It was that problem with creating a huge and playable world. What do you actually do?

It's fine saying "You can play oneironauts using dreamshare technology to investigate night terrors," or "You can play agents hacking into other people's dreams to steal secrets," or "Investigating paranormal events that occur when dream archetypes escape the dreamrealms and force their way into our reality," but it doesn't really pin it down.

I was feeling a bit despondent about it really - just the whole lack of being able to describe it - when I went back to watching the playthrough videos for Death Stranding.

Death Stranding on the PS4

Okay, so I don't own a PS4, and I've been intrigued by the visuals of Death Stranding enough to actually watch playthrough videos. The game is like a massive movie with chunks of walking between cities thrown in between scenes, but it's been playing happily in the background while I've been writing. When the true plot was finally revealed - what the BTs were, the concept of Beaches, and one of the plans to connect them - I suddenly had a realisation. If WILD was a video game, it would be compared to Death Stranding.

But how did Hideo Kojima pitch Death Stranding? I guess he didn't have to, with the game being developed by Kojima Productions, and Kojima having such a reputation with a string of amazing games behind him. But can you imagine him going to Sony and saying - "I want to make a game where you are a courier connecting the cities in a post-apocalypse world." It sounds even simpler than "You're a therapist going into the dreams of those haunted by nightmares."

I just wish, sometimes I had the financial backing (and just a fraction of the imagination) of Hideo Kojima. Mindblowing stuff, man.

Just thinking about that, and the freedom Hideo Kojima has to do whatever is in his mind, gave me the motivation to get back to it. To go back to writing that darn game, and try to get it out there.

Thank you.

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Anyway, going back to the title image, it's getting close to the festive season. I work in retail, and it is already madness in the streets. I'm exhausted all the time, and just can't wait for Christmas to be over so I can recover and get back to some semblance of normalcy. I say it every year, and I'll say it again - LAST CHRISTMAS IN RETAIL. I just hope this time it'll be true.

Until the new year, have a good festive season, whatever you celebrate. Be excellent to each other, and don't just dream it... be it.