Learning to Make Games: Putting in the Time

Posted by Rampant Coyote on January 21, 2014

My dad used to joke about how he’d bought all this exercise equipment but it hadn’t helped him one bit. Then he’d say something like, “I’m going to try using some of it now, and see if that makes a difference.” Yeah, it was a lame joke. But I sometimes get into that mentality, too. […]

Filed Under: Game Development, Geek Life, Music, Production - Comments: Read the First Comment

Sixty Days of Rocksmith 2014

Posted by Rampant Coyote on January 10, 2014

I didn’t exactly sign up for the Rocksmith 60-day challenge or anything like that. But it’s been a little over 60 days since I first started playing with Rocksmith 2014. If I was truly disciplined, and learning to really play the guitar was of greater importance to me, I’d have been playing 4+ hours per […]

Filed Under: Geek Life, Guitar Games - Comments: 13 Comments to Read

Thinking in Code

Posted by Rampant Coyote on January 7, 2014

While I eventually received a formal education in computer science in college, for the first six years or so of my programming experience I was self-taught. I learned lessons from typing in other people’s code from the pages of books and magazines, and seeing all the different ways people approached similar problems. And of course, […]

Filed Under: Geek Life - Comments: 15 Comments to Read

Happy New Year

Posted by Rampant Coyote on January 1, 2014

So now we’re all in 2014. Hope it is a great one. It’s a good time to reflect and plan. Where do you want to be one year from now, and how can you make that happen? It’s that latter part that trips folks up – including me. A definite plan of action is required, […]

Filed Under: Geek Life - Comments: 7 Comments to Read

Popping the Question, Gamer-Style

Posted by Rampant Coyote on December 24, 2013

With the help of a musician and programmer friend, gamer geek Robert Fink proposes to his gamer girlfriend, Angel White. Awesome. Mr. Fink, yer doin’ it right, IMO. Congrats to the couple!

Filed Under: Geek Life - Comments: Read the First Comment

Dreams Surpassed

Posted by Rampant Coyote on September 26, 2013

When I was a kid, I used to dream about video games. I guess I still sometimes do, but not as often or as vividly. But back when I was a kid, and arcades were king, and Ultima III was in the process of blowing my mind… yeah. I’d play games in my sleep. There […]

Filed Under: Geek Life - Comments: Read the First Comment

Salt Lake Comic Con Post-Battle Report

Posted by Rampant Coyote on September 9, 2013

As I mentioned last week, I went to my first Comic Con this weekend – the very first Salt Lake Comic Con. It ended up breaking a few records. It managed to be the most heavily-attended first-year Comic Con in history (by almost 2x). It also turned into the single largest convention ever held in […]

Filed Under: Geek Life - Comments: 2 Comments to Read

Comic Con!

Posted by Rampant Coyote on September 6, 2013

Salt Lake City’s inaugural Comic Con is this weekend, and I’m joining the 40,000 other people who are descending upon the Salt Palace to get their geek on. I’ve never been much of a con-goer, to be honest. Visiting the Game Developer’s Conference back in the day, and my attendance at Brigham Young University’s Fantasy […]

Filed Under: Geek Life - Comments: 3 Comments to Read

Will Movie Theaters Go the Way of the Video Game Arcade?

Posted by Rampant Coyote on August 26, 2013

Once upon a time, arcades were a fixture in my life. This was so deeply ingrained that even to this day, on those (relatively rare) occasions I find myself inside a shopping mall, I still find myself looking for one. It was something of a surprise in the late 80s when I’d go to a […]

Filed Under: Geek Life, Movies - Comments: 14 Comments to Read

It’s About Communication

Posted by Rampant Coyote on August 20, 2013

We drive my daughter to college today. This makes no sense to me. I’m barely out of college myself, right? Right? I don’t know if I can even begin to comment on all the weird thoughts going through my head at this time.  But I guess I captured a lot of them a few months […]

Filed Under: Geek Life, Indie Evangelism - Comments: 3 Comments to Read

The Improv Rule for Role-Playing Games

Posted by Rampant Coyote on August 14, 2013

This one may be a bit focused on dice & paper gaming today. But hey, for me, it’s all connected. One of the few “rules” adopted for improvisational acting (and for round-robin story writing exercises) is the “do not negate” rule. That means you can only build on what those before you have said, not […]

Filed Under: Dice & Paper, Geek Life - Comments: 7 Comments to Read

Old-School vs. New-School – The Literary vs. the Cinematic

Posted by Rampant Coyote on August 9, 2013

Weird thought for the day… Dungeons & Dragons came into existence before the era of the “Hollywood Blockbuster.” Which generally means pre-Star Wars. Reading the old Dragon magazines (yes, I do that) of that era, and the references mentioned in the 1st edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons manuals, it struck me that the vast majority […]

Filed Under: Geek Life - Comments: 2 Comments to Read

(Kickstarter) – Steampunk Dice

Posted by Rampant Coyote on August 8, 2013

Okay, as many of you know, I’m a little reluctant to advertise Kickstarter campaigns too often around here. I’ve got enough friends, acquaintances, friends-of-friends, and community members running Kickstarter campaigns these days that I could probably fill half my posts with announcements. And I’ll still feel guilty if and when these projects fail to deliver. […]

Filed Under: Geek Life - Comments: 4 Comments to Read

What Tower Defense and RPGs Have In Common

Posted by Rampant Coyote on August 6, 2013

What? Another tower defense game? Seriously? That genre isn’t dead yet? Yes, of course, I bought it.  Stupid bundles. Seriously, I need another tower defense (TD) game like I need another hole in my head.  And yet… Gah. Maybe I should admit that I have a problem. I suspect there’s some kind of emotional correlation […]

Filed Under: Design, Geek Life - Comments: 8 Comments to Read

Steampunked!

Posted by Rampant Coyote on August 1, 2013

So this is what I did last weekend… though the photo is more steam than punk. Salt City Steamfest Photos Gotta admit… I had a blast. Last year I only went to a single evening of it, and was overwhelmed by an over-full convention and underpowered air conditioning at the convention hall. This year, sadly, […]

Filed Under: Geek Life - Comments: 10 Comments to Read

The Trolls Devour Fish

Posted by Rampant Coyote on July 29, 2013

Crab mentality. It’s a thing. Individually, crabs could escape an open-top bucket. But if you add other crabs, and they’ll keep pulling each other down as soon as one rises, so that none can escape. Now, it drives me crazy when people brush off criticism by saying, “Oh, they’re just jealous.” Nine times out of […]

Filed Under: Biz, Geek Life - Comments: 12 Comments to Read



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