Ken Newquist Bill Gates says that ultimately, cellphones will kill the iPod as they invade its music-playing market. It’s possible, but three big things have to happen first: 1) Storage: Cellphones need as much storage capacity as an iPod. Don’t point to a 512 mb cellphone and say that’s going to get me to ditch my iPod; … Read more
The thing that Dungeons & Dragons 3.0/3.5 excels at most is its flexibility: its possible to play the same class for years and never play the same kind of character twice. Unearthed Arcana expands that flexibility by adding hundreds of new options to the game. Unearthed Arcana (Amazon) is not the sort of rulebook that … Read more
Fortune.com has a column up called “We’re a Nation Helpless to Save Ourselves” railing against America’s rampant consumerism, which author Geoffrey Colvin claims is leading us to ever higher levels of personal debt, which in turn will bring about crushing collapse when it all finally catches up with us. I agree with some points — … Read more
While surfing for information about styling tables using CSS, I came across “css vs. tables”, on which one very anti-CSS layout web designer argues in favor of using tables to control page layout. I’m sympathetic to his argument … up to a point. When I re-designed Nuketown last year, I went to a CSS-only layout … Read more
After four years of playing Dungeons & Dragons 3.0 and its kin , poisons are old hat for most players. Depending on the situation, the rules lawyers, power gamers, and even that guy who spends most of the night exploring the nasal possibilities of his dice know what poison a Game Master is talking about … Read more
Being fat (or at least, just overweight) won’t kill you. And it might even let you live longer. Last year, the Centers for Disease Control announced that obesity was the number #2 preventable cause of death among Americans, coming in right behind tobacco-related deaths. Coming after the release of Super Size Me, two lawsuits against … Read more
Nuketown’s 2005 Reader Survey is now over, and I’m pleased to announce the winner of the contest: David Weathers. David will be receiving a $10 gift certificate to Amazon.com. I didn’t get a huge number of responses to the survey (less than a dozen) but the ones I did get were informative. Just as importantly, … Read more
Show #5 starts off with some Windows and Mac tales before settling down into its more traditional science fiction and fantasy fare. This time around I talk about The Greatest Games I Never Finished (Diablo II, A Fool’s Errand, Legend of Zelda: Orcina of Time), the appeal of the Wheel of Time series, and offer … Read more
X-Men 2 surpasses its predecessor by telling a tight, fast moving story while simultaneously giving fans almost everything they wanted. The story picks up shortly after the end of the first film. The X-Men are back at Xavier’s mansion, dabbling with normalcy. Rogue, life-force absorbing, power-stealing teenager, has a boyfriend in the form of the … Read more
Another d20/OGL character generator has hit the Windows platform. It’s called RPG Xplorer, and it’s got a full-page ad in Dragon 331. I’m always happy to see more RPG utilities — heaven knows Game Master’s need all the help they can get — but looking over the site, I couldn’t help but think did we … Read more