Harry Potter and the Nation of Dweebs (By Hank Stuever, Washington Post): Where are the kids who are supposed to be beating up the kids who like Harry Potter? Where is the bully who is going to tell them what kinda dorkface fairies they’re being?
They Fight Crime!
He’s a superhumanly strong neurotic stage actor searching for his wife’s true killer. She’s a mistrustful African-American stripper looking for love in all the wrong places. They fight crime!
He’s a notorious Jewish romance novelist moving from town to town, helping folk in trouble. She’s a bloodthirsty green-skinned archaeologist from a different time and place. They fight crime!
etc.
This is the nonsense blogs were made for.
The Tech of Star Trek: Part 2. Star Trek is set three centuries in the future but scientists today are already working on technologies more advanced than the science portrayed on the show. The second of a two-part look at the science of Star Trek. By Erik Baard. [Wired News]
Tastes Like Phoenix finally has another new review up. This is a cool site with some good gaming articles which went into a coma shortly after I discovered it. The nice thing about their reviews is that they aren’t really aimed at people who ask themselves “should I buy this book?”: They’re aimed at people who ask “well, I bought this book, what on Earth do I do with it?”.
The new review is of Harlequin, an 8 adventure campaign set for Shadowrun. It’s fascinating to read even if you don’t play Shadowrun or ever intend to. It’s aimed squarely at a GM and explains how to run those 8 adventures, what parts are weak, what can go wrong and how to fix any problems before they occur. Along the way, it’s a lesson on adventure plotting and the handling of encounters and NPCs.