Up late talking games & writing? You're...

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Games: Have you ever found yourself playing something that you weren't really crazy about, but you played it anyway? There are lots of reasons for doing so… maybe you spent the last of your budget on a title that the reviews were far too kind to, or maybe there's nothing really hot or exciting on shelves and you’ve got nothing better to do. Whatever the case, I imagine that anyone who plays games finds themselves in that same position occasionally. That was the situation this afternoon.
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A while back, I had picked up a copy of the Incredible Hulk (360) for something like ten bucks. I've been a Hulk fan for a long time (since Mignola was drawing the comic in his pre-Hellboy days) and I've never felt like any of the games have ever done the big green guy justice. This one didn't either, but there was some amount of mindless fun to be had by leaping around the open-world city and smashing things at random. Not a lot of mindless fun, but some. I think I got through about half the title before getting bored with it and putting it aside for a rainy day.
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It just so happened to be raining this morning.
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Time spent away from it had replenished my patience for the repetitive gameplay and simplistic design, and I had every intention of pushing through and finishing it, just to say that I did. I would have, too, until I hit one of the most poorly-designed, completely aggravating bosses I've seen in quite a while. (the Stark Industries Hulkbuster, for those of you who’ve suffered through the game.)
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When stuff like this happens, I really don't get it. I mean, the game is pushing no boundaries whatsoever in terms of what it's trying to accomplish, and the vast majority of missions were complete pushovers. Pick up item here, carry it there. Go to this location, destroy everything. That kind of stuff. It's not really challenging intellectually, and it's not even very interesting, but on a day like today, I was okay with that. Then, out of nowhere the developers get some wild hair up their ass and decide to come up with a boss that completely breaks all the rules that the game has established up until that point. I'm not going to go into the details of what made this battle so infuriating, just take my word for it when I say that it was needlessly stupid.
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I tried a couple more times after failing miserably, and when I finally figured out what needed to be done, I decided that it wasn't worth the effort and plucked the disc out of the console. I'm not a quitter. I have no problem putting out effort when it's warranted. Any level of challenge is fine as long as I feel like the game is meeting me halfway, but on a two-bit clunker like Incredible Hulk, pulling out a boss like that is just flat-out insulting… if you're going to make a cheap, crappy game, then at least make it so that I can play the entire thing with a minimum of effort.
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I probably would've hung in there and kept going back in my younger days, but I'm older now and my free time is worth a lot more to me. My game priorities have changed. I don't need to prove anything to anyone (including myself) and if a game doesn't bring something to the table, I don't need to sit there and eat it.
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Honestly, some games just aren't worth it.
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Music: Freezepop, a synth-pop group most commonly known for their fan-favorite contributions to several music-genre games such as Rock Band, Guitar Hero, FreQuency, Dance Dance Revolution (and others) were kind enough to take a few minutes out of their day to talk with me in support of their most recent full-length CD release, Future Future Future Perfect. A review of this disc immediately follows the interview.
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For those not familiar with the band, Freezepop consists of Jussi Gamache (aka Liz Enthusiasm, vocals), Kasson Crooker (aka the Duke of Pannekoeken, vocals, synths) and Sean Drinkwater (aka The Other Sean T. Drinkwater, vocals, synths)
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… So what's up with the band?
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To start off the interview I'd like to ask a question that usually comes at the end… is there any one thing you'd like people to know about Freezepop right now?
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J: We are awesome.
S: We are so awesome.
J: Yeah, that pretty much sums it up.
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Well I'm a big fan of your music, so no argument on my end.
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S: We are only being somewhat facetious.
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How did you originally get together? How and when? Did you all just to bump into each other at the mall? What's the story there?
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K: That's exactly what happened; we were all at Spencer gifts.
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S: I was helping some of the girls at Rave, and we all sort of looked at each other and definitely decided we should form a band. (laughter) No, actually I think Kasson was looking for a singer and he had asked one of our friends about it. I answered the phone when he was making the call, and that's how I got into the band. Well I mean, Jussi and I were roommates at the time and Kasson and I had known each other from being the keyboard nerds in our respective bands before that, so we struck up the conversation and I was like, “it sounds like a really fun idea”, so Kasson had the idea to form a band around the little QY70 (a Yamaha keyboard) with a female singer, and I sort of tagged along.
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So what were you all doing at that point? Was it '98 or '99? Did you all have part time jobs or wha?
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J: It was '99 so this is our 10 year anniversary, kind of crazy.
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S: We were all in other bands.
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J: Well I wasn't really, but we had a little record label though.
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S: Kasson and I were both on bands that were ostensibly on the same label based in Boston, so we were all a little bit connected anyway
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Where did you get the name ‘Freezepop’? Where did that come from?
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S: Depends on who you ask. My version of the story is that Kasson wanted to call it Rocketpop and then I suggested Freezepop, but there is some disparity on that.
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K: I do remember liking that name, but definitely Freezepop is a much better name.
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Jussi, did you have your own version of that story?
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J: Well the whole Freezepop thing came around because my house had a fourth of July party and we were like “Oh, we got freeze pops.” We had like 500 of them, we put them in the freezer overnight and we thought that would be enough time for them all to freeze. Only like 10% of them froze, so basically the rest of the summer we were stuck with a freezer overflowing with freeze pops. So anyway, that was the freeze pop summer and Sean basically lived on them.

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Kasson, I know you call yourself the Duke of Pannekoeken, so are you from Minnesota or of Dutch descent somehow?
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K: I actually don't really know. I tried to figure out the derivative of my name, and I’m descended from the pilgrims somehow. Some of the pilgrims were either Dutch or English, but I think it’s more that I have an affinity for their pancakes, so I changed my name to that at some point.
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What was it before?
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K: It started off as the Duke of Candied Apples, and then when we were in Belgium I switched it to the duke of Belgian Waffles. A year or so later we were in Amsterdam, and clearly I found my breakfast food of choice, so I settled on that and it has been that ever since.
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Are you eventually going to make your way through other breakfast foods? Perhaps blintzes or crepes, or something like that?
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K: I’ll never say never, but I’ve stuck with this one for awhile.
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S: The Duke of Turkey Bacon? Perhaps veggie sausages.
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I usually do a lot of game reviews (and that's how the person from your label found me originally) so forgive my ignorance but I was going to ask: what programs or instruments are you using these days? How much is PC work in front of your keyboard to get your songs together, and how much is in a more traditional studio setting?
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S: Kasson and I both have studios that are somewhat similar. We’re using a lot of the same software. Some of the same hardware we have, like analog synthesizers. We both like a lot of hardware, and we’re kind of a getting into a neat process of working now… But we’re never in a traditional studio as such, at least I don't think.
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So when you guys are recording your tracks, are you together or apart?
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S: It’s been totally all over the map. The normal process is Jussi will send some lyrics over to Kasson, and he’ll lay down some tracks and match up the lyrics to the melodies. Then she'll go over to his place and do the vocals.
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Do you always come up with the lyrics first, or do you start with a melody in mind?
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J: I come up with most of the lyrics and hand them off to the boys, and then they do their thing with it and kind of match it up to the song they already have going or write a song around it. There’s a lot of back and forth, too. We don't have one typical way of writing.
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K: For me, I am usually most inspired programming some drum sounds on synthesizers, and then I end up with a pattern or two that I really like that has a chord progression and some interesting sounds. For me that's the starting point. That’s what I feel I do most naturally, but we’ve done other things where we have a full set of lyrics and have written a bed for it.
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How much do you guys tour, and how much time do you spend doing other things? I mean, are you full-time musicians now? Kasson, I know you work for Harmonix (the developers behind several music games such as Rock Band) but do you other two have game industry jobs?
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J: Sean and I work freelance so we have a schedule that's flexible. I’m a graphic designer and Sean does all sorts of audio composition stuff. Generally when we tour, Kasson can't usually come with us so we have another sort-of member (a stand-in member for him) and the three of us tour. We’ve been touring kind of a lot the last couple of years. We try and go out for two weeks at a time and then come back for a couple of weeks, so that we can continue on with our actual day jobs.
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S: That’s so we can recharge our batteries. Going on tour for two months at a time is very draining, so we'll go out for three weeks, come back for a month, go out for twenty days, then come back for thirty days. By the end of the year we've been on tour for a couple of months, but not all in a row-- we don't want to hate each other and not want to be in a band together again.
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(laughter)
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How much is domestic versus international? Do you find you have a bigger fan base outside of the U.S., or do you know what the breakdown is?
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J: It used to be true [that more fans were international] but since the whole video game thing happened, it’s definitely evened things out a bit more.
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So you feel that most of our domestic fans are from your exposure in games?
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J: Oh yeah, definitely.
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In relation to that, do you find you sell most of your music through electronic channels, or how are CDs doing for you? What's the breakdown?
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K: It's actually been surprising. Our back catalog sells a lot more digitally than I think we do in CDs, but for our most recent CD with Cordless (their label) we actually sold more physical copies. The hard thing to gauge, though, is that a lot of people who buy the music online don't buy the full album-- they just buy individual songs. It is a little bit harder to gauge traditional album sales versus individual tracks. From a revenue point of view, we make more money from selling music online than CDs, but I think at this point it’s pretty much split, I think. A few years ago I thought we would be doing tons and tons of digital sales and less CD sales.
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While we’re on the topic, what do you guys think of copy protection for MP3s? Now that restrictions seem to be easing a bit, do you have feelings either way?
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S: Not really
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(…long silence…)
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K: I used to struggle with the whole DRM issue and I’m actually happy that most of the industry is going non-DRM. The downside that there are still a fair amount of problems. Artists are writing songs and getting exploited, so it's hard to sell music. Fortunately for us, it's not like we’re living off the music and stuff. If I was trying to live off my music, my feelings might be a little bit different on IP protection and DRM. At this point I really don't care. The thing about tour fans is that when they buy our music, they know they’re supporting us and that the money isn't being fed into a giant corporation. We actually have a really good deal with our record label, where it is very beneficial to us in terms of the master recordings and stuff. I’ve met many people over the years who have said they've found our music online, and now they’re buying our CDs. In the past sometimes, they would just PayPal us money for the MP3s they had gotten over the years, so it's pretty cool having fans like that.
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So you guys feel like you have a pretty tight connection with your fans?
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K: Yeah totally, we use our website and MySpace, and now FaceBook and LiveJournal to be able to connect with the fans. One thing we’re dabbling with is a premium service where people can sign up and get access to exclusive content that they wouldn't normally get, so we’re kind of seeing how that goes and if people are interested and that kind of thing.
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J: Yeah our fans are pretty hardcore and it's awesome, it's really great. I think we are just underground enough, when they find out about us it's exciting.
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You mean you're not in the ‘oversold, not cool anymore phase’?
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J: Yeah, exactly.
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Just to lighten it up a little bit, out of your catalog, what do you find is the most popular, or most requested song when you play concerts? Along with that, what are your own personal favorites? Do you each have a favorite song that you do?
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S: There are a few, I would say.
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J: There are a couple that are pretty standard ones.
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S: Kind of the perennial favorites… Stakeout, Less Talk More Rokk from Guitar Hero 2, which is obviously one of our most popular songs.
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J: I would say those.
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S: I really like Harebrained Scheme.
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K: Harebrained Scheme continues to be one of my favorite early songs. I have an affinity for Vangelis, and I really like Outer Space too.
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Are there any songs where you think "Oh my god, I wish I could have done that over" or "we totally screwed this one up"?
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K: I’ve gone back and redone songs when I wasn't happy with the recording, which is not good. We rereleased Freezepop Forever so we had to repress a bunch of CDs and get it remastered, so we took that opportunity to make a few minor tweaks-- like to a few songs on the album where I wasn't happy with the mix. Some of our older songs, we're not super fond of the lyrics and we don't perform them anymore, like Robotron 2000. I think out of all the songs that I dislike and would want to go back and redo, I think the first one would be Shark Attack. We perform that live and it’s lots of fun and has lots of energy, but when I listed to the album version of it, I’m bummed out.
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I also wanted to ask, what’s the story behind the one you did in Japanese, Tenisu no Boifurendo? How did that come about?
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J: Um, I took one semester of Japanese and I basically learned enough to write that song. very very elementary Japanese and unfortunately I’ve forgotten most of everything else I learned, but I remember the lyrics to that song. It would be very hard for me to carry on a very simple conversation in Japanese now.
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S: We are going to be really big in Japan though.
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J: Oh let's hope so, I would love to tour there.
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You covered the theme song to Jem... which one of you is the fan?
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K: I’m a pretty big Jem fan.
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Do you think she's truly outrageous?
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K: Well, I have an MP3 collection of every single song from that series, and there's some cheese in there for sure.
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S: The woman who created those songs wrote to us.
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J: Yeah she really liked it. I thought that was really awesome-- plus she wasn't suing us.
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Along lawsuit lines, I saw you doing a Journey cover online. Do you have any plans to release that, or do a covers album?
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S: No
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(silence, followed by laughter)
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K: We've done a few covers over the years. They tend to be obscure things like the Jem cover and we covered a Raymond Scott song. We’ve recorded two other more traditional covers-- a Dépêche Mode track and a Sparks track. We tend to save the Journey and the Final Countdown stuff for our live shows because they tend to go over really well live.
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Are you guys planning on playing PAX again this year?
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J: If they'll have us back. I would love to, that was such a crazy experience both times. Those are by far the biggest shows we've ever played.
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Changing gears a little bit, since I am going to be covering this on a game website I have to ask some game questions. So, I know you have a lot of fans from your exposure in music games, but do you guys actually play? What is your relationship with games?
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K: I have Lego Star Wars. I play a fair amount of games, and we play all of the music games just to see what other people are doing. I’m particularly fond of Parappa and Rez. I’m fond of other Japanese games like Loco Roco, and Katamari was really fun. I just finished Patapon and now I’ve just been getting the little iPhone games for my phone. I’ve been playing Rolando which is a total rip off of Loco Roco but it's still pretty fun.
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Anyone else?
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J: Colecovision Smurfs. I’m actually really bad at video games but I enjoy watching people play them. Like, I can sit and watch someone play Guitar Hero forever. It's very mesmerizing.
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Speaking of that, there’s been some talk in the games industry about whether the music game genre has run its course. Do you guys have an opinion on that?
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S: As long as there are innovations and products keep becoming more interesting…
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K: I think if all the companies stop putting in resources and stop innovating, then they'll end up being just like the other franchise games like Madden or Tony Hawk. DDR is a really good example; it's a pretty good idea and it's fun, but 25 games later and it still looks kind of bad and still has a lot of cheesy music in it. The last thing we want to see in music games is for that kind of thing to happen. So far it's been pretty good.
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S: If we get to Guitar Hero 9 with the glow-in-the-dark strap, you'll know that they ran out of ideas.
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I just have one more question. It’s kind of off-the-wall but I ask this one and I get some pretty interesting answers… So, let’s say an alien lands and tells you that you have to pick between rice, wheat and corn-- you can only pick one. The other two will vanish off the earth completely. Which one would you pick and why?
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K: I’m going to have to go with rice because I love sushi.
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J: But corn is so versatile.
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S: And it feeds the most people. Is it personal taste, or are we trying to keep the species alive?
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No, just you personally.
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S: I would probably pick corn since I like corn chips so much. I love tortillas and I love nachos. I just think corn does amazing things.
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J: You can do pretty much anything with corn.
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S: There's corn in Coca Cola.
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K: There's corn everywhere, that's for sure.
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S: I would vote for rice if it was to keep the species alive, but my personal vote is for corn.
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So what's the final decision?
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J: I’m going to vote corn, but I would miss rice. I probably wouldn't miss wheat that much.
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S: so it's rice, corn, and corn.
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Well, I guess Freezepop has no love for wheat. Sorry, wheat.
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Infinite thanks to the members of Freezepop for their time, and also to Pavla at Rykodisc/Cordless for helping to arrange it. For more information on the band or to check out some of their sounds, go to:
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their site: http://freezepop.com/
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their MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/freezepop
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their PR page: http://cordless.rykopress.com/freezepop/media/
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And if you like their music, you can check out other bands at their label:
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http://www.cordless.com/
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And now, for that review…
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Future Future Future Perfect (Cordless/RykoDisc, 2007)
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Track 1: Less Talk More Rokk
Unless you've been living under a rock, you've probably heard this song. Odds are, you probably love it. I do.
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Track 2: Pop Music Is Not A Crime
Cute and catchy. Hard not to get into this one.
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Track 3: Frontload
Their latest single, and it's got a nice, epic feel.
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Track 4: Thought Balloon
Probably my favorite song on the entire disc. Winsome, subdued, and really, quite beautiful.
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Track 5: Ninja of Love
It sounds exactly like you'd expect it to: kitschy, yet still awesome.
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Track 6: Brainpower
Loose, jangly and raucous. It jumps in, jumps out, and leaves you wanting more.
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Track 7: Do You Like My Wang?
Best. Title. Ever. This 8-bit plastic love machine has an addictingly sinuous pace.
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Track 8: He Says She Says
I love the driving beats and alternating vocals.
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Track 9: Do You Like Boys?
It's light and airy, but if there’s a weak link on this disc, it's this song’s repetitious lyrics and shallow feel.
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Track 10: Swimming Pool
With sweeping scope and a new-age tone, this song is hypnotic.
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Track 11: Afterparty
Darkly,oppressively ominous, this quasi-humorous tale is an odd way to end the disc.
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In total, these eleven tracks are very well balanced in terms of content and variety of style. It holds together excellently as an album, and none of the songs (except perhaps track nine) would feel weak or out of place on their own. In fact, the disc carved itself a spot on my heavy-rotation stack without even trying. Recommended!

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Rating: 8.5/10
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Misc: Today was my third wedding anniversary, and I must say that I've never had a better three years.
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My wife is the best!
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Games: The new Tomb Raider: Underworld DLC came out today. Titled Beneath the Ashes, this new add-on level starts off with Lara in her father's study, hidden underneath the burned wreckage of Croft manor. For those who haven't played Underworld yet, the story basically veers off towards Norse mythology elements, and Ashes has our heroine going deeper underground into a new secret area that was underneath the first secret area. Allegedly there’s an artifact down there that can create and control the undead thralls that populated the latter stages of Underworld proper, and Lara’s not one to leave vital artifacts unmolested, natch.
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I watched a ‘developer's diary’ video on Ashes a few weeks ago, and one of the folks putting it together spent some time saying that the TR team really worked hard on the puzzles and were able to dig in and give it their best. I appreciate that they probably put a lot of effort into it, but frankly, I don't see it. Although it's shorter and more focused than any of the levels in the retail release, it still suffers from a heavy feeling of blah, not being very visually interesting and lacking any real personality. There were also a few spots where I was stuck-- not because I couldn't figure out what to do, but because the areas still have a vaguely too-open feeling to them which was often complicated by Lara not jumping where I wanted her to. The two things combined led me to believe that I wasn't performing the correct action, resulting in some minor frustration and wasted effort.
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I still call myself a Tomb Raider fan, but out of the three titles that Crystal Dynamics has had a hand in, I would rank Underworld dead last behind Anniversary and the stellar Legend. This DLC does nothing to change that, and continues the mediocrity that was present in its parent title. Additionally, this new level is overpriced at 800 points ($10) since most players will be able to get through it in less than two hours. Unless you’re an absolute Tomb Raider fanatic, I'd say that it's not worth the download.
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Music: I'm in the process of putting the finishing touches on the interview I did with Freezepop, so check back for that soon.
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I love their music and they were a lot of fun to talk to, but doing interviews over the phone is something I usually try to avoid because the transcription afterwards is an absolute bear. It's a slow, painful process and I was seriously tempted to hire a stenographer temporarily. Props to the wife for her valuable assistance in getting through the tedium, and the fruits of our labor will be posted here shortly. Apologies to the band for the delay.
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Games: Atlus announced today that a remake of Revelations: Persona will be released in Fall of this year. Including a new localization, new content, and gameplay enhancements, this update should be the definitive version of the 1996 PlayStation original for those who missed it the first time.

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TV: Tried watching the Academy Awards tonight and just lost interest, even with fast-forwarding courtesy of my DVR.
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I didn't see very many of the films that were nominated, nor did I have much desire. The most interesting thing about it was that Twitter started getting hammered with minute-by-minute updates from everyone who was watching the show… I had to stop checking the feeds after a while. The talk just got too monotonous.
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Film: Watched Blood Diner last night via Comcast’s FearNet. I was tempted several times to turn it off before I got to the end, but I managed to make it through.
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By the time credits were rolling, I couldn't decide whether it was a fantastically bad piece of trash, or totally brilliant satire. If you've got access to FearNet, check it out (all the movies there are free) and let me know what you think.
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Games: Finished Manhunt (PS2) today for the first time. It was an interesting experience. Although it certainly lives up to its reputation as being an extremely graphic and gory game, there was a lot more to it than just that… the story and setting (death-row convict is rescued from the chair only to be thrust into a kill-or-be-killed game of hide and seek) were engaging, and the work with tone and mood were excellent. The stark, brutal feel and incredibly bleak outlook of the game’s entire world were very well-realized. There's also quite a bit of meat to chew on for people who like to delve into meta-commentary, but I'll save that for another post.
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The reason I ended up coming back to this came after so many years was that I feel a certain responsibility to experience games that are notable or important for one reason or another in order to expand my repertoire as a critic. Manhunt was certainly a title that should be examined, and I'm glad I gave it another shot. Once I got over the stupendously bad camera, the cumbersome, frustrating controls, and just accepted that the game was twice as long as it should be, there was a lot to like if for no other reason than very few games have attempted to explore the pitch-black subject matter.
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I think the first Condemned game on the 360 is in the neighborhood, but Manhunt still outdoes it in terms of sheer nihilism and apathy towards humanity -- It's not a place I'd like to live, but it's good to visit once in a while.
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Games: This has been an eventful week for downloads on the PlayStation 3. Flower and Noby Noby Boy are now both available through the Store, and although I think it's correct to put them both in the same general category, my reactions to both couldn't be more different.
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Flower is fantastic. I don't necessarily think it's the second coming as some seem to report it, but it is most definitely the kind of thing that makes a player step back and re-examine their entire conception of video games.
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Taking control of a single petal from a flower, players guide this petal towards other flowers located in expansive, grassy fields and other natural environments. Upon contact, another petal is removed from the new flower to join the first, the number of petals growing to eventually become a giant, swirling spiral of color as more and more are collected. Although this is a fairly accurate description of the mechanics, Flower is much more than that. After playing through its entirety and thinking through it for a while, I think it's clear to see that Flower is almost a poem; or at least, the developer’s attempt to sidestep the notion of traditional gameplay in order to communicate feeling, or ideas.
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Best played in one continuous session, there is a very definite emotional arc communicated solely through the environment. Starting in a very idyllic, peaceful setting, the game eventually takes players to darker and less hospitable areas before coming full circle with nothing less than a redemption of sorts as the flowers and the wind that carries them cleanses the land. It's difficult to fully describe in words what this new sort of language is trying to say, but it's not hard at all to experience it. I think this title is very worthy of praise, and is a beginning step towards the maturation of video games as a medium.
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The other title, Noby Noby Boy… well, let's just say it's not nearly as inspirational.
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In this title, players are put in control of something best described as a squat worm with four legs. Its head is controlled with the left stick and its tail with the right. Players can make it jump, freeze position, and eat (among other things) with the central concept being nothing more than to provide players with the character and an environment to exist in.
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The brainchild of Keita Takahashi, creator of the breakout hit Katamari Damacy, this project is much more difficult to embrace. After starting the game and being let loose in the first “world”, small events happen as the player begins to test the rules of this virtual creature. Random people and animals will hop on for a ride as the worm grows, or some things can be knocked down if the worm wraps itself around them. It's interesting to see what kind of effects can be made to happen, but after further experimentation, I experienced a growing wave of boredom and apathy.
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There is no real point to the game. There are no goals, no challenges to overcome, and thus far, I haven't felt as though there's any real message trying to be communicated. I have to admit, I fail to see inside Takahashi’s mind, and I cannot fathom his reasoning for creating this project. Simply creating a virtual space and having a few things to interact with does not strike me as being very sophisticated, intriguing, or even entertaining.
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Although Flower and Noby Noby Boy both remove the majority of conceits that people would consider to be ‘gameplay’, in Flower’s case I feel as though it was done with a very specific intent, and with much consideration for the experience of the player. Noby Noby Boy seems almost the opposite; the developers have stripped away convention, but don't seem to have replaced it with anything at all. Although I certainly don't challenge its right to exist, it strikes me as a novelty for novelty's sake, and I ended my session feeling completely unmoved and uninterested.
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Although I personally would say that only one of these unique projects was successful, I can certainly appreciate that they both were made available to players. Continued exposure to things that push the boundaries of what is expected of video games can only be positive, and I certainly applaud Sony for helping each of these creations find their way into the hands of those curious enough to stray from the usual First-Person Shooters and Madden updates. Regardless of the result, I'm thrilled that this kind of experimentation is happening.
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Writing: Just got back from the PNWA monthly meet (Pacific Northwest Writers Association) over in Bellevue, so sort of a late night this week. Late in comparison to the previous three days, anyway.
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As soon as I arrived, one of the board members waved me over since they knew I do SF, and wanted to introduce me to a newcomer. This person was nice enough, but one of the first things they asked was whether I could recommend an editor or agent to handle their book. Look, I realize that's what every writer wants and that it's what we're all looking for, but when you just meet someone, it's sort of inappropriate to ask for an "in" when you don't know the first thing about them. I smiled and mentioned that probably everybody else in the room was after the exact same thing before we went our separate ways, but I mean, seriously. Come on, people.
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Tonight's speaker was Joni Sensel, and she gave a good, basic talk about writing queries. Although I have to be completely honest and say that I didn't learn anything new, she did hand out some good resources. Besides that, it's always a comfort to hear someone who knows what they're talking about completely reinforce what you're doing.
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I'm still sort of debating whether or not to go to the summer conference this year, but I think I'm leaning more towards going. If for nothing else, the cost of admission would be worth it just for the chance to actually bump into some editors and agents in person. Any readers planning on going as well?
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Games: After receiving notice that I would be receiving my #17 pick despite several of the games ranked higher being listed as “medium availability”, I decided to modify my GameFly queue to do a little experiment.
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Although GameFly lets you have up to 50 games in your wants list, I deleted the bottom 40 and left only ten titles that I am absolutely ready to start playing right now.
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I'm hoping that this will force them to start sending things that are higher up on my list, although I don't know what will happen if none of my selections are available. Maybe I will start getting the things I actually want sooner, or maybe they'll just delay sending me something if nothing's on hand. We shall see...
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