Ken Rolston speaks with a freedom earned from more than three decades designing games. He began his career working on tabletop role-playing games from Dungeons & Dragons and Warhammer, and later moved into videogame design, his career capped with The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind and The Elder Scroll
The well-known drinking game Beer Pong originated at Dartmouth College. It was purportedly created by students who wanted to combine a love for table tennis with an equal love for fermented beverages. The sport is still popular on campuses, and players compete annually in the World Series of Beer Po
With all the HD remakes coming out recently, this is one direction I wouldn’t mind seeing more games head in. – Adnan Agha [Deviant Art via Reddit]
Arthur Rackham was a talented artist who probably illustrated that beautiful Fairytale book your grandparents keep on their top shelf. His art might also be the reason people get night terrors. If Ruth Miller has her way, you’ll be able to play UNO or Poker with Goldilocks and Rumplestiltskin. Her K
Last week, we looked at the difficulties of programming languages, and the Atlantic this month comes to us with news on the “hacker education” front with programs like Dev Bootcamp and Hacker School. The idea is simple – short project-based programs aimed at generating real world skills. Writer Joe
As an antidote to its pollution problems, Milan’s Stefano Boeri is constructing this vertical garden. Called Bosco Verticale (Vertical Forest), the buildings when constructed will be home to more than 900 trees and 10,000 sq. meters of forest. Kinda reminds me of something…. -Jamin Warren [via Creat
Back from the weekend! Here’s the first shot of this week’s mainstream gaming news! – Microsoft says there will not be a new Xbox in 2012. – The Giants win the Super Bowl (according to Madden). – Nintendo Network is going to allow microtransactions, the cornerstone of business models like free-to-pl
Built by Theo Watson in just three hours for Art Hack Day this weekend, this is tongue-in-cheek prototype surely to misinterpreted by the MSM. -Jamin Warren
How often do any of us decide to make life-altering decisions that go completely opposite to our skills and talents? The NY Times has the story of y what cognitive psychologist Gary Marcus did in trying to learn the guitar. His new book “Guitar Zero: The New Musician and the Science of Learning show
Sarah Kay’s Ted Talk “How Many Lives Can You Live?” starts with a childhood question of potential identity. “When I was little I could not understand the concept that you could only live one life. And I don’t mean this metaphorically, I mean I literally thought that I was going to do everything ther
There’s a music app called Circle of Fun available for the iPad right now. Creator Troy Peterson wants to jazz it up (pun not intended) and is currently raising money on Kickstarter for the next sizeable update. Grammatika looks to have a lot of potential to teach students about music and let them s
Wired has compiled a bunch of conceptual drawings and prototypes of spacecrafts that, for one reason or another, sadly never became reality. My favorite is this beaut from Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. which “was based on ideas from the rocket pioneer Werner Von Braun.” Sigh. I miss the S
Ever wonder how you harness all that stress behind the controller? There might be an answer in the near future. Scientists have uncovered a new mechanism that enables greater study into the little-known world of stress and the brain. Using “mouse and zebrafish model systems,” researchers are now abo
The past year has seen the rise of a new breed of leading lady: the foul-mouthed, dirty, yet smart and confident female worthy of the spotlight. In Hollywood, this new character is drawing in audiences, particularly with the Judd Apatow-produced hit Bridesmaids of last summer. Sundance has also embr
My new favorite blog is Playscapes which is all about playground design. These were designed by Danish playground design firm Kompan. –Jamin Warren [img]
It is understood that not everything in art and entertainment falls into the same mold- that’s what makes every piece of work unique. But with a recent NY Times article talks about a Hollywood producer’s application of positive psychology to film, could such notions be applied to games as well? Thro
What has bloggers abuzz about the internet phenomena Lana Del Rey nowadays isn’t so much her downbeat pop songs such as Video Games, but her real life storyor lack thereof. The internet has been up in arms at how she once took a far less successful stab at fame as Lizzy Grant, an entirely differen
Years ago when Facebook launched its apps, many of the first popular titles were board games. Scrabulous, of course, being the notable example and of course being a total knock-off of Scrabble. Anyway, I always thought that would be the direction that Facebook games would move in as the core problem
Eric Eisenberg of Cinemablend interviewed Liam Neeson about his role in upcoming film The Grey. Between preparing, shooting and acting, Neeson is charged with becoming a “man’s man” but as the interview reveals, he’s actually quite the opposite. The characters in these action movies you appear in ar
Or, Dwight Schrute’s favorite map. – Lyndsey Edelman
James Franco is understandably upset that his co-star’s work is not being recognized. In Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Andy Serkis plays Ceasar, the leader of the Ape rebellion and central character of the film. Franco argues that Serkis’s performance is aided but not defined by the technology tha
Get excited! It’s time for more mainstream gaming news! – Steam has a mobile app on both iOS and Android. Get rid of your phone or your credit card if you want to keep eating. – Nintendo is taking another stab at this “online gaming” thing the kids are talking about with Nintendo Network. President
Amy Lombard is a Brooklyn-based photographer who’s started a new Kickstarter project to document the life of people who shop at Ikea. The above boy and his Xbox are recent captures: To elaborate a little more on the project – As a photographer, I am not necessarily interested in staging reality so t
This is just insane. Makers of MLB 2K12 and MLB: The Big Show take note: The team will host a party for 500 people on an infield that features a bar, a full-service grill, an oyster bar and a dessert stand. A 12-foot screen will protect the party attendees from errant line drives and any advances
Last night and last night only, the American Museum of Natural History and the Hayden Planetarium here in New York hosted independent gaming collective Babycastles for an evening of gaming and science. The sold out event, entitled Cosmic Cocktails and Space Arcade, included access to the exhibit, Be
