OMGN: Blogs

How to Become a Delegate to the 2012 Libertarian National Convention

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 08:00:00 GMT

Dear Friends of Liberty,

As you know, on December 28, 2011 Governor Johnson announced his decision to run for President as a Libertarian. The first critical step in that process is to earn the Libertarian Party’s nomination – and we are asking for your help to accomplish that. Go to GaryJohnson2012 and become a delegate for Gary at the nominating convention.

Between now and the Libertarian Party’s national nominating convention in Las Vegas in May, each of the fifty states will hold a STATE convention. While the specific procedure may vary from state to state, each of these state conventions will either select delegates to the national convention or, at a minimum, play a major role in determining who will represent the state.

Obviously, it is essential that as many of the delegates as possible to the national convention be supporters of Governor Johnson. To insure that happens, we need to attend and participate in the state conventions – many of which will take place in the next few weeks. Whether it be running to be a delegate to the national convention yourself, or helping to ensure that those selected are Gary Johnson supporters, your participation in your state’s Libertarian convention could very well be the most important contribution you can make to the campaign.

To find out when and where your state convention is being held, please go toGaryJohnson2012.com, or contact our campaign headquarters directly. We will provide you with the information you need in order to attend, encourage your friends to attend, and to participate or seek election as a national delegate yourself.

Governor Johnson will be attending as many state Libertarian Party conventions as he possibly can. However, given that several will be occurring at the same times, he may not be able to attend each and every one. If he can’t attend personally, it is even more important that his supporters DO attend and represent him.

We are committed to EARNING the Libertarian nomination in May. You have a critical role to play in doing so, and the process begins at your state’s convention. Please help us make certain that Gary Johnson is well represented!

As always, your support and friendship are deeply appreciated. We have come a very long way – thanks to you and thousands of other supporters across the country. For the Libertarian nomination, crunch time is approaching, and we are counting on your help. Please go toGaryJohnson2012.com and become a delegate for Gary.

Thank you,

       Ron Nielson
       Senior Advisor
       Gary Johnson 2012

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

The Space Review January 30, 2012

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 08:00:00 GMT

Welcome to this week's issue of The Space Review:

The need for real "rocket science" to solve Russian spaceflight setbacks
---
The failure of Russia's Phobos-Grunt spacecraft remains a mystery even as some Russian officials suggest a foreign power like America may have had a hand in the spacecraft's demise. James Oberg argues that some rational engineering analysis -- aka "rocket science" -- can shed light on the spacecraft's loss and dispel conspiracies.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/2016/1

Campaign lunacy
---
Space, typically an issue that gets very little attention in presidential campaigns, burst into public prominence last week thanks to a series of debate questions and speeches. Jeff Foust reports on how Newt Gingrich, Mitt Romney, and other Republican candidates outlined their views on space, and what they also left out.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/2015/1

Not evolution -- revolution
---
The press and public do not seem to be accepting Newt Gingrich's position on space policy. Sam Dinkin discusses the implication for the transition to low-cost space access.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/2014/1

The geometry of shadows
---
The National Reconnaissance Office recently released a selection of images taken from the newly-declassified GAMBIT and HEXAGON reconnaissance satellite programs. Dwayne Day examines the relevance of those images to American space and defense efforts from the 1960s to the 1980s.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/2013/1

Review: Tweeting the Universe
---
Can the vastness and majesty of the universe be condensed into 140-character snippets? Jeff Foust reviews a book that offers a Twitter-inspired examination of various questions in astronomy.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/2012/1

If you missed it, here's what we published in our previous issue:

Caution and optimism about the future of human spaceflight
---
Six months after the Space Shuttle completed its final mission, many are still uneasy about the future of America's human spaceflight efforts. Jeff Foust reports that many in the field see cause for optimism for the future, mixed with a dose of caution about the obstacles in the path ahead.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/2011/1

A vision for a new frontier purpose for American spaceflight
---
Supporters of spaceflight have struggled to find rationales to back continued expenditures on relevant projects. Robert D. Lancaster argues that future spaceflight efforts should be based on planetary defense, access to resources, and settlement.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/2010/1

The difficult road to the Moon
---
Fifty years ago this week NASA launched the first in a series of Ranger spacecraft to the Moon, with poor results. Drew LePage examines the development of those spacecraft and the unfortunate outcomes of those early missions.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/2009/1

Review: Saving Hubble
---
One of the biggest space advocacy victories of the last decade was the grassroots push to restore a shuttle servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope. Jeff Foust reviews a documentary that recalls those efforts that attracted support from a broad swath of the general public.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/2008/1

We appreciate any feedback you may have about these articles as well as
any other questions, comments, or suggestions about The Space Review.
We're also actively soliciting articles to publish in future issues, so
if you have an article or article idea that you think would be of
interest, please email me.

Until next week,

Jeff Foust
Editor, The Space Review
jeff@thespacereview.com

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

XCOR Aerospace Contest Press Release

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 08:00:00 GMT

PRESS RELEASE

XCOR Contact:
Mike Massee
XCOR Aerospace
Phone: (661) 824-4714 x127
Email: press@xcor.com [mailto:press@xcor.com?]

Final Call to Register and Win Suborbital Research Flight at Next Generation Suborbital
Researchers Conference (NSRC-2012)

XCOR's Lynx suborbital vehicle

January 30, 2012 Mojave, CA: XCOR Aerospace and the Southwest Research Institute
(SwRI) announce the final week to register and become eligible to win a suborbital
research flight on XCOR's Lynx I vehicle at the Next Generation Suborbital Researchers
Conference (NSRC-2012) in Palo Alto, CA on February 27-29. The deadline for early
conference registration and for entering the drawing is the 10th of February at
nsrc.swri.org. "We don't want the researcher, educator or student attending NSRC-2012
to register late and miss this great opportunity to advance their work," said Andrew
Nelson, Chief Operating Officer of XCOR Aerospace. "We want as many as possible
going to NSRC-2012 to experience the possibilities of reusable suborbital research
opportunities and have the chance to win a flight that would otherwise cost $95,000
on Lynx, or up to $200,000 on competing suborbital vehicles."
XCOR Aerospace, the industry leader in fully reusable manned rocket-powered spacecraft
for suborbital research operations and SwRI, globally recognized as a leader in
the suborbital research field, have made this flight available to promote the
start of this revolutionary new capability for the educational, microgravity,
atmospheric and astronomical research community.
An additional highlight of the meeting will be a keynote speech by former Apollo
astronaut and X-15 Pilot Neil Armstrong. Mr. Armstrong will be speaking about
his experience flying some of the first and most ground breaking suborbital research
flights.
Additional NSRC invited speakers include XCOR's Andrew Nelson speaking about Lynx
development, Challenger Center Founding Director June Scobee Rodgers who will fly
as a teacher in space, SwRI Associate Vice President Dr. Alan Stern, and NASA Ames
Center Director Dr. Pete Worden. Engaging panels will bring together researchers
in the microgravity, life, planetary, and atmospheric sciences with suborbital
vehicle providers, market/policy analysts, educators, and many others. Further
program highlights include an exciting anchor keynote presentation by FAA Commercial
Space Transportation Associate Administrator Dr. George Nield and a NASA Flight
Opportunities Program workshop.
"NSRC-2012 is providing the first ever opportunity for a researcher or educator
to win a suborbital research flight and to hear from suborbital research pioneers,"
said Dr. Alan Stern, former NASA Associate Administrator for Science, and now Associate
Vice President of Research and Development for the Space Science and Engineering
Division at SwRI. "In addition NSRC attendees will hear from colleagues across
numerous fields, the suborbital flight community, and government officials about
the state of this new industry and where it is headed. NSRC-2012 advance registration
closes on 10 Feb, so get your seat and your chance to fly for free on XCOR now!"
Registrants are encouraged to read the Official Contest Rules available on the
XCOR website at:
http://www.XCOR.com/NSRC-2012-contest-rules [http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?llr=nrhoezcab&et=1109176838488&s=4119&e=001H9Oa3MS02gT_sMv_ui4jONylCRewhwg1Jd-ZgSAa0zg9est_q70kjHEqQTOOMM6sfalbzMbxZzyUO0YWFHPNYIINtER6R34X1yV2URz-EPLG8ZGvWYgYanij_-z2iOtZRD-xkzOBj1PmZUdWESpLMg==].

###

XCOR Aerospace is a California corporation located in Mojave, California. The company
is in the business of developing and producing safe, reliable and reusable rocket
powered vehicles, propulsion systems, advanced non-flammable composites and other
enabling technologies. XCOR is working with aerospace prime contractors and government
customers on major propulsion systems, and concurrently building the Lynx, a piloted,
two-seat, fully reusable, liquid rocket powered vehicle that takes off and lands
horizontally. The Lynx-family of vehicles serves three primary missions depending
on their specific type including: research & scientific missions, private spaceflight,
and micro satellite launch (only on the Lynx Mark III). The Lynx production models
(designated Lynx Mark II) are designed to be robust, multi-mission (research / scientific
or private spaceflight) commercial vehicles capable of flying to 100+ km in altitude
up to four times per day and are being offered on a wet lease basis. (www.xcor.com
[http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?llr=nrhoezcab&et=1109176838488&s=4119&e=001H9Oa3MS02gRUvm9F3dc6q-LdeuIMB253vzZTBZ0AnLVKfttFLADMBqwFH0w_10RocVhcp5z0nP3a8Hll90HEAXUIcGRy5AafHI0EsHm9Cg4=]).

Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), headquartered in San Antonio, Texas, is one
of the oldest and largest independent, nonprofit, applied research and development
organizations in the United States.SwRI's 11 technical divisions offer a wide range
of technical expertise and services in such areas as chemistry, space science, nondestructive
evaluation, automation, engine design, mechanical engineering, electronics and more.
The Space Science and Engineering Division focuses on the development of scientific
payloads aboard scientific satellites, the International Space Station, reusable
suborbital vehicles and sounding rockets. Institute teams formulate concepts, design
and manage complex hardware and data systems, develop advanced space borne instrumentation,
and address theoretical aspects of space physics and planetary astronomy. (www.swri.org
[http://www.swri.org/])

###
View Web Version of Press Release [http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?llr=nrhoezcab&et=1109176838488&s=4119&e=001H9Oa3MS02gQOTm-TGrtpdryPuRX2NxSsr2xedXF3n_Lc3t8e8Pyy_CSwp0A0yK2UxW59NADP3U1R0Ed7L7Q_M4mEet5thqP8iD50RRTBCCU75w1RWNxJrWT-_CFb9WKsALyRID2KOanGyRJwW4UdTduClfOlW9AVSFac0GBiOMjsg4pv84ngorWABTf7BayVIeiiS2wFO2vCdVIwo8-MrqwizyNxNZRvbzKjZHr29M0=]
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OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

Trade Wars Rising News

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 08:00:00 GMT

SYLIEN GAMES NEWSLETTERJanuary 27th 2012ITS ON!Good news. The update we had planned for today is now completely live and functional.

Enjoy!

For more details, I wrote a special release news.

Play and have fun!

Tradewars® Rising

Hope you enjoy this.

Lehmund, Vadis and JoronasSTAYING IN TOUCHOften we leave hints and other more up to date news directly on the Tradewars® Rising website, so visit it often to stay up to date.

Invite your Facebook Friends to play Tradewars® Rising.

To keep well informed, you may want to follow us on Twitter.

Play, have fun, and be creative, always!

The Sylien Team Sylien Entertainment™ Corp. © 2005-2010 Term of Use Privacy Policy

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

F1 2011™ Out Now on Nintendo 3DS

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 08:00:00 GMT

From Codemasters:

To mark the recent European and North American launch of F1 2011 on the
Nintendo 3DS we released this gameplay trailer for the handheld game
of our award winning FORMULA ONE™ franchise. Out now in Europe and North
America, the 3DS version heralds the first time that gamers can
experience a FORMULA ONE game in full 3D.

Youtube: http://cmail.codemasters.com/a/tBPDwSvB7bZSEB8e82hC6QxQ6-2/dsvid
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Gamers can compete for motorsport's ultimate prize across a full season,
enter an individual GRAND PRIX™, jump into Time Trial mode or take on
the new Challenge mode which is perfect for portable racing.
Players can also compete on the go across a range of multiplayer modes.
Up to four-players can race in a GRAND PRIX or go head-to-head in Time
Trials while you can also team up with a friend in the co-operative
career mode. The race experience can be tailored across solo and
multiplayer modes by adjusting race distance, tuning the car, choosing
from a range of driving aids and selecting tyre, fuel and weather
options.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Season Finale Trailer!
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Our latest trailer for F1 2011 on Xbox 360, PS3 & PC shows a host of
FORMULA ONE stars, including Sebastian Vettel, Lewis Hamilton and
Fernando Alonso, racing wheel-to-wheel and battling the elements at a
variety of GP's during the course of the 2011 season.

Youtube: http://cmail.codemasters.com/a/tBPDwSvB7bZSEB8e82hC6QxQ6-2/finale
----------------------------------------------------------------------

FORMULA 1, FORMULA ONE, F1, FIA FORMULA ONE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP, GRAND
PRIX and related marks are trade marks of Formula One Licensing BV, a
Formula One group company. Licensed by Formula One World Championship
Limited. All rights reserved.
© 2011 The Codemasters Software Company Limited ("Codemasters"). All
rights reserved. "Codemasters"® and the Codemasters logo are registered
trade marks owned by Codemasters.
An official product of the FIA FORMULA ONE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP.

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

Blogging Resumes

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 08:00:00 GMT

After a too long delay, blogging on this space hereby resumes. I should also have some new movie reviews up soon with the 2011 likes of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows and the 2012 flick One for the Money in the offing.

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

OMGN Release Notes: 4.4.3.1 to 4.4.7

rfludwick@darqflare.com (Robert F. Ludwick) — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 08:00:00 GMT

Sorry for the long delay in updating you on OMGN's releases. Again. At this point it should just be expected, right?

Primary Domain

We've had multiple domains for OMGN for quite some time now, and we've allowed users to access our content using those different domains. We've also allowed users to access OMGN with and without the 'www' in front. Well, we're not doing that anymore. From now on, any attempts to access OMGN on one of our alternate domains, or with the 'www' in front, will results in an automatic redirection to our primary domain, without the 'www' - omgn.com. This is for consistency's sake, really.

Facebook Open Graph Implementation

We've added more social hooks for Facebook. Facebook is slowly rolling out their new Timeline feature, which allows other developers to hook in to Facebook to say what actions a user is performing in their application. Spotify has already been doing this - they show what songs a user is listening to, on Facebook. We've added support in OMGN to show on Facebook what a user is doing on the site, from reading articles to posting in the Forum. If you don't want to share this information with Facebook, there's a preference setting in your User Account that you can turn off.

Spoiler Text

If you read us regularly, you'll have likely noticed a feature we ran about Kotaku spoiling parts of Arkham City. We've now included the ability to black out text in our articles for spoilers, allowing those readers who want to view the spoiler to hover over the text to view it. Nice, right? We haven't used it yet, though.

Google+ Link

We've added a link in our site header, as well as in other pertinent spots across the site, to our new Google+ page. Even more ways for us to spread our influence across the interwebs!

Movie Naming

Links to movies throughout the site will now include the year, simply because movies get remade so damn often that we need to clarify what movie you're clicking to go view!

Redirects

We've added a bunch more invalid URL redirects to help our readers get to the content they were intending to view, as opposed to getting Error 404 pages.

User Forum Blocks

We've added a new control for moderators to be able to disable the ability for certain users to post on the Forum. I'm sure you can deduce why.

User Avatar File Extension Added: .jpeg

So this also goes for all images that OMGN staffers can add, but the user avatar now supports the .jpeg file extension as well. It's always supported .jpg, and it was a bit stupid that it didn't support the one-character-longer extension too.

OMGN.US Domain Support

Back in September, we acquired the OMGN.US domain. Thus, we had to add support to the site for it! You can now access OMGN on five different domains.

Publish Capabilities

One nice thing I finally added to OMGN Admin is the ability for publishers (i.e. me) to easily publish an article. This includes setting the proper publication date on the article, as well as creating a tweet on Twitter and page link on Facebook. Makes life a lot easier. It also automatically creates the redirect URL for Twitter. The joy!

Oversave Detection

This is something that most content management websites need as staffs grow, and we finally have it too. In our Admin section, we're now tracking when content was last saved. That way, if two of our staffers have the same content open at the same time and one saves, the other will be notified that the content they're modifying has been saved in the meantime by someone else. Makes it a lot easier to detect if we've destroyed someone's save. As of now, there's no support on the main site for this, as it's highly unlikely that a user would oversave their own work.

More Links Added in Admin

Again, something just for OMGN staffers, but we finally added even more view and preview links for all content that staffers are working on, in the Admin section. There are also a bunch of other thinks linked internally in Admin now. Again, making things easier for us to run the site for all of you!

Admin View Override

A nice little feature I added is the ability for OMGN staffers to view the site in a number of modes, such as someone who is not logged in, or a non-admin. It helps.

Admin Forum Signature Controls

We've had controls to clear Forum signatures for users on the site for awhile now, but we didn't have anything in Admin itself. Nor could we preview a user's Forum signature unless we loaded up a post on the Forum itself. This situation has been rectified.

Dev Images Copy

Another nice little utility I built (pretty much for myself) is the ability to copy down images hosted on the live OMGN site down to my local development machine, so that I actually have them locally. Good times!

Internal Improvements

This set of releases also saw a set of internal code improvements for performance. We tend to tackle performance on a regular basis. The last few months have been no different.

Bugfixes, Documentation Fixes

As always, we've had rounds of bugfixes and internal documentation fixes.

Wow, lots of stuff the last few months! Until next time.

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

The Space Review October 24, 2011

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 07:00:00 GMT

Welcome to this week's issue of The Space Review:

A gateway to space emerges in the desert
---
Last Month Virgin Galactic formally dedicated its "Gateway to Space", the new terminal building and hangar at Spaceport America in New Mexico. Jeff Foust reports on the event as well as the work still in progress for both Virgin's spacecraft and the spaceport itself.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1957/1

Recalling the Mars flagships
---
November is shaping up to be a critical month for Mars exploration, with the planned launches of Russian and American missions to the Red Planet. Lou Friedman notes that ongoing debates within the administration could also spell doom for long-term Mars exploration plans.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1956/1

Propellant depots: the fiscally responsible and feasible alternative to SLS
---
While NASA begins development of the heavy-lift Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, some have proposed propellant depots as an alternative architecture. Andrew Gasser argues that depots, despite the criticisms of some, offer a feasible and less expensive approach to human space exploration.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1955/1

The Moon Treaty: failed international law or waiting in the shadows?
---
The Moon Treaty is widely regarded as a failed treaty since the biggest spacefaring nations, including the United States, have not signed on to it. Michael Listner warns, though, that elements of the treaty could make their way into international law even if the US doesn't sign or ratify the treaty.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1954/1

Review: The Space Shuttle
---
With the shuttle now retired, books recounting the history of the program are making their way onto bookstore shelves. Jeff Foust reviews one such book that includes stunning imagery from various shuttle missions, but has one surprising omission.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1953/1

If you missed it, here's what we published in our previous issue:

Space is getting its groove back
---
This week's dedication of Spaceport America in New Mexico is the latest milestone in an emerging commercial space industry. Alan Stern sees these developments as signs of a new era in innovation in spaceflight analogous to the early aviation industry.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1952/1

Linking JWST and human spaceflight
---
Cost overruns with the James Webb Space Telescope will require NASA to take money from other programs, perhaps including human spaceflight, to cover its costs. Michael Kaplan explains how the two programs can instead be synergistic.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1951/1

Launch industry transitions
---
While most of the recent attention on new launch systems has focused on NASA's Space Launch System and SpaceX's plans for a reusable Falcon 9, other vehicles are reshaping the industry landscape as well. Jeff Foust reports on some recent developments by several vehicles, and renewed concerns about overcapacity in the market.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1950/1

Is a human asteroid mission a non-starter?
---
NASA's announced design of the Space Launch System rocket enables the space agency to pursue the goal set by the president of a human mission to an asteroid by 2025. Anthony Young wonders, though, if such a mission is compelling enough to hold interest over the years leading up to it.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1949/1

Revisiting the Liability Convention: reflections on ROSAT, orbital space debris, and the future of space law
---
Another month, another falling satellite; in this case ROSAT, forecast to reenter later this month. Michael Listner discusses some of the legal issues specific to ROSAT's reentry as well as broader liability concerns about satellite collisions.
http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1948/1

We appreciate any feedback you may have about these articles as well as
any other questions, comments, or suggestions about The Space Review.
We're also actively soliciting articles to publish in future issues, so
if you have an article or article idea that you think would be of
interest, please email me.

Until next week,

Jeff Foust
Editor, The Space Review
jeff@thespacereview.com

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

Trade Wars Rising Special Anomalies Game

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 07:00:00 GMT

SYLIEN GAMES SPECIAL EVENTOctober 20th 2011ANOMALIES TRADEWARS RISING GAME EVENT – GAME STARTSimply click to Join and go to PLAY. The ANOMALIES game should be at the top.

JOIN THE GAME NOW!

This is what the game will look like:

huge universe at 80x80 sectors
large amount of Turns at 5000 per day (bank at 10000)
HiClassic winning conditions
Allies and corporations (5 per team max) allowed
2 extra Class 0 ports (Vega and Antares)

Prizes: We are using the following Prize structure of 60 Premium days to the winner(s), second position gets 30 Premium days and third gets 20 Premium days. As usual, days are split between Corp members.

Good luck and have fun!STAYING IN TOUCHOften we leave hints and other more up to date news directly on the Tradewars® Rising website, so visit it often to stay up to date.

Invite your Facebook Friends to play Tradewars® Rising.

To keep well informed, you may want to follow us on Twitter.

Play, have fun, and be creative, always!

The Sylien Team Sylien Entertainment™ Corp. © 2005-2010

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

Local Indie Flick "Munger Road" Gets Positive Review from Time Out Chicago

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 07:00:00 GMT

From the Munger Road E-Mail List:

Munger Road | Film review

A suspenseful, locally shot teens-in-danger flick generates more goosebumps than speed bumps.

By Ben Kenigsberg

Not knowing that a child killer has just escaped from prison, four high schoolers in St. Charles, Illinois, head out to the town haunted spot. Columbia College grad Smith's locally shot, well-paced debut feature toggles between two threads: In one, a pair of cops (Bruce Davison and Randall Batinkoff) hunt for the murderer, who they suspect has returned home. In the other, the kids experience increasingly strange occurrences when their car breaks down in the woods. Dialogue-wise the film is a bit amateurish, and the last act suffers from continuity issues. But the teens-in-danger strand is sensationally scary, making resourceful use of a limited location, strategic blackouts and offscreen space. Despite its obvious debts (to Halloween, among others), the film sustains suspense for nearly all of its 85 minutes.

Munger Road is currently playing in 30 Chicago-land theaters this weekend, and is possibly expanding onto over 1,500 screens over the next coming months.

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

Conquer Club Launches the Conquest Cup

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 07:00:00 GMT

Conquer Club has launched the Conquer Cup - our signature mega-tournament, the largest global domination game event in the world!

There are lots of medals and prizes to be won including an iPad2 Grand Prize!!!

Do you have what it takes to win? Login at http://www.conquerclub.com and click 'Conquer Cup' on the left side of the page (under 'Game Menu').

Regards,
The Conquer Club

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

Alganon Newsletter October 2011

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 07:00:00 GMT

Alganon October Newsletter

Greetings from the QOL dev team.

Double XP/Renown Weekend!

We're having another Double XP/Renown Weekend this weekend (October 15th and 16th). During this time all experience and renown earned will be doubled! This is the perfect time to build up your characters or even get a boosted head start on a new one.

See you this weekend!

Newest Test of Faith Instance Launched!

The next phase of the Lusha'aton instances has been opened up with Test of Faith difficulty. The Mother's Chambers ToF adds new flavor to the boss fight and is well worth a look!

GM PvP/Dueling Event: October 20th - 21st

We've had many requests for another GM-killing event, so we're bringing one to you! Come log in Thursday and Friday (20th and 21st) to challenge a GM to duels or straight-up PvP fighting. The GMs will help with repair costs incurred through GM PvP fights, so grab your gear and give a GM a free trip to a graveyard!

Make plans now to join us!

Alganon the Comic

Alganon Fall of the Ourobani, tells the story of Banaserit, a young leader of the Ourobani. Under assault from rival factions, Banaserit seeks out a mythical weapon in a desperate attempt to secure the safety of her people. This limited edition comic reveals the series of events that lead into the upcoming Alganon expansion pack, Rise of the Ourobani.

Come Read it Online! MyAlgnaon | DC Comics

Special Offers!

Since you've already signed up for a MyAlganon account we've got some special offers for you. You will be able purchase these items in the Tribute Market!

Grand Elixir of Teachers
Rocket Moole
Bonecrusher Headdress
Exquisite Talisman of Fervor
Major Talisman of Resolve
Guild Creation Access
Super Pack

Start playing and take advantage of the specials!

About Alganon

Alganon is a fantasy-based MMORPG that allows thousands of people to play together in a virtual world that features a rich history dominated by commanding deities, powerful weapons and armor, deadly magic, epic quests, ancient places to discover, the utilization of detailed tradeskills, and more. Designed from scratch and based in a uniquely created world, the goal in designing Alganon is to provide "Simple Gameplay with Unlimited Growth in a massive world of immersion and interaction."

Part of achieving this goal was to create a game that is easy for anyone to play, but also to build the game so that even the most skilled and hardcore gamer has the potential to grow beyond their expectations. A world where the casual and hardcore gamer alike can adventure, grow, and share their accomplishments with each other.

Our development team at Quest Online have designed everything from the ground up, tailored to feedback from the community about what you want to see in an MMO. While it can be difficult to select new games worthy of our time with so many prominent MMOs on the market, we have sculpted Alganon to be the game you do not have to dedicate all of your time to. We have implemented a system where your character evolves even when you aren't playing.

Game Features

Adventure together with thousands of other players simultaneously.
Journey through an epic world filled with dungeons of different styles and depths.
Explore two massive continents and their huge capital cities, which serve as major hubs for the races inhabiting them.
Choose from two races with all new character models!
Choose to play as a Champion, Reaver, Magus, Mystic, Cabalist or Ranger.
Encounter hundreds of interactive characters and monsters.
Learn the continuing story of Alganon by completing a wide variety of challenging quests.
Test your skills against other players with non-lethal dueling.
Fight to the death against your faction's enemies in our fully integrated Towers and Keeps world PvP system.
Gain power in PvP, access new armor, weapons and equipment as you level up your Renown.
Practice various trade skills to help locate reagents, make and enhance custom items, acquire wealth through trade with other players, and more.
A robust guild system with extensive management ability for community managers to establish rewards and ranks to suit their own tastes.
Enjoy hundreds of hours of gameplay with new quests, items, and adventures in static and instance areas.
Buy items, beef up your character etc using the Tribute micro-transaction system.

With much more to come, there has never been a better time to enter the world of Alganon.

Join Today, Play Forever!

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

IGDA Leadership Forum Keynote Speakers

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 07:00:00 GMT

October 27th & 28th, 2011
Sheraton Gateway Hotel, LAX
6101 W. Century Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90045 Friend on Facebook Follow on Twitter Forward to a FriendREGISTER

ABOUT

SCHEDULE

SPEAKERS

SPONSOR

TRAVEL

PRESSGOLD SPONSORS

A limited block of rooms have been set aside for IGDA Leadership Forum attendees. Please contactmaria@igda.org to make your reservation.

The exclusive rate for IGDA attendees is $120/per night plus applicable taxes.

Additional information about the hotel can be found by visiting the Sheraton Gateway Hotel website.

Save 5% when flying Virgin America’s main cabin to the IGDA Leadership Forum by using this promo code: VXIGDAIGDA Leadership Forum is two weeks away in Los Angeles!

Today we focus on the keynotes. To see our full slate of talks, visit our Schedule & Speakers pages. IGDA Members SAVE an additional 25% off the Leadership Forum IGDA Member Ticket price of $399 by using discount code: IGDAPRODUCERClick HERE to Register
KEYNOTE SPOTLIGHT
Navigating Unforeseen Challenges –
Why leveling up your talent pool is key to
min-maxing your studio

Brandon Beck
President, Riot Games
Description: The game industry is undergoing the most dynamic period in its history and your teams must be prepared to adapt to a barrage of new challenges at an ever-growing rate. Traditional, “built-in” strategic advantages such as branded IP, publishing/distribution leverage, and technology no longer have the same strangle hold they once did in determining the success of your games. Ultimately, at Riot Games we have found that great people are the most important driver of the success of games. People make critical strategic, design, technology and business decisions. People also navigate the one constant that arises in game development – unforeseen challenges. We have found that there is rarely a better investment than in cultivating and refining your talent pool. This talk will explore the impact people have on the success of video games. We will explore core concepts like how do you build a self-sustaining system for attracting and retaining the best talent ? What core philosophies help ensure consistent success? How do you maintain a culture while rapidly growing a company? How do you design an environment where people can create the absolute highest quality work? How do you recruit exceptional talent from other industries?
Enhancing Your Leadership Approach through Productivity Patterns

Shannon Studstill
Studio Director, Sony Santa Monica Studio
Description: There are countless books published every year about project and studio management, written by some of the most successful men and women in their fields. Each is filled with great advice on communication, problem solving, conflict resolution, schedule management, and budgeting. And the techniques they outline are proven successes, if you happen to be the person who wrote the book. There is no one size fits all management style. No fail-safe methods, no magic bullets to solve the problems your studio faces and ship the product your team has been built to make. If we’re going to be effective leaders, if we’re going to guide our teams to success, be it financial or creative or hopefully a little of both, we must first understand who we are, where we came from, and how we arrived here. We have to take an honest assessment of our values, of what is truly important to us, and what isn’t. From there, we’ll know what works for us and for our teams, and we’ll see the results immediately. This will happen because we’ll believe in the system we’ve put in place, not because a management consultant told us it’s the way to work. It will work because we'll recruit, mentor, and develop talent which reflects those values as well. When a team sees that kind of authenticity, they’ll not only buy into it, they'll contribute to it, bringing that enthusiasm to the game you're making. That kind of truth is rare, but powerful. We’ll discuss examples from God of War, the Santa Monica Studio, other success stories, and leave with the confidence to bring the values each of us finds important when building a team and leading it to success.
Information Flow: The Secret to Studio Structure

Jesse Schell
CEO, Schell Games
Description: Growth is one of the biggest challenges any studio faces. As studios grow and change, mysterious communication problems and other frustrations start to arise, compromising projects, and threatening to tear the team apart. In this talk, Jesse Schell, CEO of Schell Games, shows the hidden source of these problems: blocked flow of information. By understanding the several types of information that need to flow through a healthy studio, and structuring teams and techniques to optimize these flows, studios of any size can grow, thrive and survive in the short term and the long haul. And everyone will be happier, too!

Four Twenty Six

John Romero & Brenda Garno Brathwaite
Loot Drop
Description: In the last few years, the industry has seen incredible change. In any other context, it would be called a revolution, a toppling of regimes and the end of an era. Those in power watched as new powers emerged, and new classes of brash opportunists shoved their chair to the table. Great leaders of just months ago announced long-term strategies which were openly mocked, while those who knew something about nothing devalued art, process and experience. "The way" became "the old way." Things had changed. It is a time of questioning and critique, industry and art, capitalism and craft, of engines and mechanics. Yet, it is also the time of great passion and purity.

IGDA FOUNDATION
CHARITY DINNER

The Second Annual IGDA Foundation Charity Dinner will be on the evening of Thursday, October 27th at the Sheraton Gateway Hotel, LAX, in Los Angeles, in conjunction with this year’s IGDA Leadership Forum. This year John Romero will be continuing his “legend on legend” interviewing of seminal game designers with an interview of David Jaffe.

The IGDA Leadership Forum:

Focuses on production and leadership
Is an intimate conference with great networking
Presentations by premier industry producers and managers
Speakers from Bioware, Blizzard, id, Intel, Insomniac, Loot Drop, Microsoft Studios, Respawn Entertainment, Riot Games, Schell Games, Sony Santa Monica, thatgamecompany and many more!
A must attend event for producers, managers and leads

SCRUM CERTIFICATION W/ CLINTON KEITH
& AGILE GATHERING
OCTOBER 24th - 26th

LEADERSHIP FORUM
OCTOBER 27th & 28th

Sheraton Gateway Hotel, LAX
6101 W. Century Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90045

Chuck Hoover
Studio Production Director, Schell Games

“I’ve attended the Leadership forum every year since its inception. It’s my can’t miss conference each year for a couple of reasons… 1. It’s a very personal conference, small enough to get to know everyone and large enough to attract great speakers. 2. The game industry tends to build leaders from with in, but being a great developer does not make a great leader. The Leadership Forum provides a wonderful opportunity to develop those traits and learn how others have gotten there. 3. Unlike some large events, this is a very focused conference. The topic is narrow enough to attract a lot of like minded people and broad enough to cross disciplines. I can’t recomend the Leadership Forum highly enoughto any producer, leader, or simply those in our industry seeking to be the best at their craft. ”

Kim Sellentin
Associate Producer,
Blizzard Entertainment

“I’ve had the pleasure of attending the IGDA Leadership Forum for 2 years now. The conference is small and focused, which is its greatest strength. Not only does it offer an excellent schedule with high quality speakers, attendees have many opportunities to connect with other developers. This networking and sharing of ideas is what gives someone the additional tools, and perspective to be better at their job. The IGDA Leadership Forum has had a huge impact on my career. Every year, I’ve come away with new friends and mentors, and new inspiration that I can immediately apply to create positive impact within my company. For such a low cost with such high return, I ask you this: How can you not afford to send yourself and your employees to the IGDA Leadership Forum?”

Brett Douville
Lead Systems Programmer,
Bethesda Softworks

“If you’re a manager in the games industry, or you have managers reporting to you, you owe it to yourself to come out or send them to the IGDA Leadership Forum next year. Your competitors are out here trying to figure out how to get better at capturing the lightning and putting it in a package to ship out to customers. We desperately need better trained leaders in the industry, and this is a proven place where they can come and improve their skills. This year I found an insight in every talk to make me better at my job, and to help my reports become better at their jobs. I really don’t feel like I can afford *not* to go. Can you?”
follow on Twitter | friend on Facebook | forward to a friend Copyright © 2011 International Game Developers Association, All rights reserved.
You are receiving this email because you opted into IGDA mailings or are an IGDA Member.
Our mailing address is:
International Game Developers Association19 Mantua RoadMount Royal, New Jersey 08061

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

RadioArchives.com Newsletter - August 5, 2011

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Wed, 05 Oct 2011 07:00:00 GMT

August 5, 2011

It's the Radio Archives Newsletter!

* New Digital Downloads Now Available
* Doc Savage Stars in New Audiobook Adventure
* New in Pulp Fiction
* Deal of the Day
* Hilarious Comedy with "Amos 'n' Andy"
* Letters, We Get Letters...

New Digital Downloads Now Available
RadioArchives.com is proud to have attracted customers from all over the world, with a sizable number of fans in the United Kingdom, Australia, France, and even as far away as South Africa. But, until recently, many of our international customers had to limit the size or frequency of their orders due to the cost of postage. Now, thanks to the new and ever-expanding line of digital downloads available from RadioArchives.com, anyone anywhere can enjoy our classic radio shows and audiobooks - with no waiting and no delivery charges!

And there's no compromise on quality, either! All of the digital downloads from RadioArchives.comcome to you as high quality MP3 files, encoded at 128 kpbs for our monophonic classic radio shows and 256 kbps for our stereo audiobooks, both with a sampling rate of 44,100. Place your order, pay for your downloads, and within minutes you'll be enjoying some great audio entertainment.

* Legendary screen comedian Harold Lloyd hosts "The Old Gold Comedy Theatre", a long-lost series of broadcasts featuring many of the top names from the stage, radio, and motion pictures. These hilarious shows were transferred and restored from Lloyd's own personal recording library.

* "Perry Mason" star Raymond Burr plays the commander of a remote cavalry outpost in "Fort Laramie", one of the best western series ever produced for radio. Created by the same team that brought you "Gunsmoke", these two volumes bring you the complete series of forty full-length episodes.

* Speaking of "Gunsmoke", actor Ken Curtis achieved fame as Festus on this long-running television series. But years before he played Marshall Dillon's sidekick, Curtis was a singing cowboy of the silver screen and the host of his own musical radio series, "The Chuck-Wagon Jamboree". RadioArchives.com brings you two ten-hour collections of this popular show, which features the sort of down-home melodies that everyone knows and loves.

* Finally, from Australia comes "The Adventures of Marco Polo", produced by and starring the talents of George Edwards, "The Man of a Thousand Voices". Restored from the only set of original recordings known to exist, this exciting fifty-episode serial takes listeners to the exotic and dangerous lands of the Far East to meet the legendary emperor Kubla Khan.

These are just a few of the many wonderful shows and series you'll find available for download atRadioArchives.com - and, if you prefer CDs, they're all available as attractively packaged audio compact disc collections, too!

Digital Downloads from Radio Archives bring you the best of everything: great shows, great selection, great sound quality, and all at great prices, too! Whether you live in Tennessee, Toronto, or Timbuktu, stop by RadioArchives.com today and see what's waiting for you!

Doc Savage Stars in New Audiobook Adventure
The place: New York City. During the depths of the Great Depression, in the shadow of streamlined skyscrapers, reporters scramble for clues about an insidious wave of bizarre deaths - everyday citizens struck dead, the eyes in their lifeless bodies turned a sightless and ghastly white. The Blind Death has the teeming city paralyzed with fear; in desperation, civic leaders turn to the one man who can discover who or what is behind this gruesome series of murders: Doc Savage, the Man of Bronze.

From his offices high above the city, Doc and his band of trusted colleagues soon uncover a terrifying scheme to gather together all of the city's criminal elements as a single and seemingly undefeatable force. Their intent: to seize the wealth of the Man of Bronze and destroy him once and for all!

"White Eyes", the second in a new line of audiobook adventures from RadioArchives.com, is an epic tale of crime from the pen of Will Murray, heir apparent to Lester Dent, creator of Doc Savage. Featuring dramatic narration by Richard Epcar, "White Eyes" is a roller coaster ride of action and excitement that will leave you on the edge of your seat. Produced and directed by Roger Rittner, who joined with Will Murray to bring you both "The Adventures of Doc Savage" radio series and the thrilling audiobook "Python Isle", "White Eyes" brings you ten hours of engrossing entertainment. Now available as both a ten audio compact disc collection priced at Just $31.98and a ten hour digital download priced at Just $21.98, this new release fromRadioArchives.com also features evocative cover art by Joe DeVito and two fascinating and exclusive audio interviews with the author.

Join the Man of Bronze for a suspenseful tale of action and adventure in "White Eyes", the new Doc Savage audiobook now available from RadioArchives.com!

New in Pulp Fiction
Pulp fiction fans are thrilling to the new audio adventures of Doc Savage, thanks to the three Man of Bronze audio collections available from RadioArchives.com. But avid readers know that Radio Archives also carries an extensive line of beautifully reformatted reprints, each featuring two novels from the Golden Age of the pulps. Three brand new and just released editions of these double-novel reprints are now available from RadioArchives.com:

"The Spider Volume 20", featuring two thrill-packed adventures written by Norvell Page and Wayne Rogers: "The Devil's Candlesticks" and "Revolt of the Underworld"

"The Shadow Volume 51", in which the Knight of Darkness battles strange supercrime in two thrillers by Walter Gibson: "The Living Joss" and "Judge Lawless".

"Doc Savage Volume 49" offers two tales of action and excitement , written by Lester Dent and featuring the Man of Bronze and his daredevil cousin Patricia Savage: "The Terror in the Navy" and "Waves of Death".

All three of these new issues, priced at just $14.95 each, feature classic cover art, interior illustrations, and many special features. Make RadioArchives.com your source for the very best in pulp fiction classics!

Deal of the Day
Looking for a great deal? Then you can't go wrong with the Deal of the Day, a new feature now available at RadioArchives.com!

When you visit our home page, look for the blue Deal of the Day box on the top right hand side. Click on it and you'll see today's special deal. Sometimes a pulp reprint, other times a book, a DVD, or a compact disc collection, these limited time bargains are available at a fraction of their regular price - and there's no minimum purchase required!

Visit RadioArchives.com often and check out the Deal of the Day. It's a great way to stretch your budget, add to your personal library, and enjoy some timeless entertainment!

Hilarious Comedy with "Amos 'n' Andy"
For over thirty years, they were two of the most popular and beloved characters on radio, enjoyed by millions of listeners who tuned in to laugh at their weekly misadventures. Created and portrayed by Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll, "Amos 'n' Andy" remains a classic that continues to delight listeners to this very day. RadioArchives.com carries five collections of their most hilarious shows, available as both audio compact disc sets and digital downloads, and they're among our most popular and best-selling items.

If you'd like to hear an hilarious clip from "Amos 'n' Andy", in which the ever-gullible Andrew H. Brown and the ever-conniving George "Kingfish" Stevens haggle over the purchase of a Thanksgiving turkey, be sure to listen to the audio version of this newsletter by clicking on the colorful banner at the top of this newsletter.

Enjoy over 100 episodes of "Amos 'n' Andy" in a series of fully restored audio collections fromRadioArchives.com!

Letters, We Get Letters...
In each issue of the Radio Archives Newsletter, we share our thoughts about all of the wonderful products we have to offer. But we know that it's what our customers think that really matters! That's why, on our website, you'll see hundreds of comments and reviews from people just like you, sharing their thoughts on our books, DVDs, CD sets, and digital downloads.

Recently, we've noticed a number of customers have "weighed in' with their opinions of "Python Isle", the Doc Savage audiobook adventure:

Arthur Sippo writes:
Will Murray tells a great Doc Savage story and really 'channels' Lester Dent's spirit and talent. The performance by Michael McConnohie is stunning. He does so many voices so well it is almost like a full cast production! The production values are high. The presentation is superior. A superb product all around. I eagerly await the next volume in this series.

From Littleton, Colorado, Dale writes:
Absolutely fantastic! The narrator did all kinds of different voices for all the characters and kept everything very well paced. All audiobooks should be like this one.

If you have a comment, a review, or an opinion regarding our products or service, why not stop byRadioArchives.com and post it to our website or drop a line to Service@RadioArchives.com? Share your thoughts with your fellow customers; they'd all like to know what you think - and we would, too!

Listen to this Newsletter!
Enjoy this newsletter as an Audio Podcast! Click anywhere in the colorful banner at the top and you'll automatically hear the Radio Archives Newsletter, enhanced with narration, music, and clips from our latest collections! This audio version of our regular newsletter is a pleasant and convenient way to hear all about our latest products, as well as the newest pulp fiction reprints, special offers, and much, much more!

The products you've read about in this newsletter are just a small fraction of what you'll find waiting for you at RadioArchives.com. Whether it's the sparkling audio fidelity of our classic radio collections, the excitement of our new line of audiobooks, the timeless novels of the pulp heroes, great books from Moonstone, or our many DVD classics, you'll find hundreds of intriguing items atRadioArchives.com.

We'd love to hear from you! Send an e-mail to Service@RadioArchives.com or call us toll free at 800-886-0551 with your comments, questions, or suggestions.

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

What's Cheryl Lemke Up to Nowadays?

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 07:00:00 GMT

Here is what's new with Cheryl Lemke, formerly of the Weather Channel:

Her new website: http://www.cheryllemke.com/

She's also helping out with TV station WSBT:

http://articles.wsbt.com/2011-08-24/weather-channel_29925110

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

Radio Spirits Newsletter August 2011

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 07:00:00 GMT

Newsletter

August 2011

This Month's Features

FEATURED ARTICLE

--The Great Gildersleeve: Character Counts!

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW

--Probing the Shadow's History and Mysteries with Martin Grams Jr.

NEWS & INFORMATION

--Celebrate the 70th Anniversary of The Great Gildersleeve on When Radio Was

RECOMMENDED

--Radio Stars on the Silver Screen--Upcoming Events

NEW RADIO SPIRITS RELEASES

--Duffy's Tavern:
Where the Elite Meet--Nero Wolfe:
Parties for Death

UPCOMING RADIO SPIRITS RELEASES

--Suspense--Burns & Allen--Mr. Keen, Tracer of Lost Persons--Candy Matson

TRIVIA GAME

--Play our new OTR and Nostalgia Trivia Game.

SPECIAL SAVINGS OFFER

--Save 20% and Get Flat $4.95 Shipping on Your Entire Order for a limited time. See details.Featured ArticleTHE GREAT GILDERSLEEVE: CHARACTER COUNTS
By Elizabeth McLeod The following article is presented in celebration of the 70th anniversary of the radio premiere of The Great Gildersleeve on August 31st.

There were two types of comedy competing for listener attention during the Golden Age of Radio -- vaudeville comedy and character comedy -- and most comedy performers on the air could be placed firmly into one camp or the other. A few performers straddled both -- Jack Benny comes immediately to mind -- but it was very rare for a radio character to move from one style to another. One who did, and with outstanding success, was Throckmorton P. Gildersleeve.

Today, The Great Gildersleeve is one of the most fondly remembered of radio's comedic figures -- an earnest, well-meaning fellow who often found himself the unfortunate victim of his own pomposity. As delineated by Harold Peary and Willard Waterman over the program's seventeen-year run, Gildy emerged as a figure of great depth. This was a testament not just to the actors who played the part, but also to the writers who gave him words, and to the supporting cast who gave him a believable, textured setting.

Throckmorton P. Gildersleeve hadn’t always been such a well-rounded personality. When he first appeared on the scene in the late 1930’s, he was merely one in a long parade of exaggerated comic types to emerge from the typewriter of the vaudeville-influenced former cartoonist Don Quinn.

Quinn, the creator of Fibber McGee and Molly, was known for his broadly-comic characters -- not the least of whom were Fibber and Molly themselves, who started out in the mid-thirties as caricatures familiar to anyone who'd ever seen a small-time husband-and-wife act cavorting on the stage. The broadness of the personalities wore away over time, however, leaving room for Quinn to surround them with an array of wildly exaggerated comic-strip-style supporting characters, portrayed by such veterans of Chicago radio as Bill Thompson, Hugh Studebaker...and Harold Peary.

Peary's natural voice -- rich, mellow, and musical -- lent itself best to a certain type of characterization. Although he had had some success on the air as a romantic leading man/crooner type before joining Quinn's troupe, his speaking voice seemed best suited to the portrayal of authority figures -- and given Fibber McGee's impudent abrasiveness, the more pompous the authority figure the better. Peary began playing these types during Marian Jordan's absence from the McGee program in 1938, when Fibber was in desperate need of a strong foil. By 1939, these random blowhards began to coalesce into a single personality. His first name might be Wilbur in one episode, or George in another, and his relationship to Fibber might be that of a banker, a doctor, a dentist, or an old classmate -- but the last name would always be the most pompous name Quinn could bring to mind: Gildersleeve.

By 1940, Gildersleeve became a Character as opposed to a mere "character." He gained the permanent name of "Throckmorton P. Gildersleeve", he became Fibber's friendly-enemy next-door, and he assumed a position in the community as the manager of the Gildersleeve Girdle Works. He became so popular with listeners that, in the summer of 1941, he gained his own program...

Read the the rest of this exclusive article on The Great Gildersleeve by clicking here.

Exclusive InterviewPROBING THE SHADOW'S HISTORY AND MYSTERIES
with MARTIN GRAMS JR.
An Exclusive Radio Spirits Interview by Elizabeth McLeod

Who Knows What Evil Lurks In The Hearts Of Men? Well, everybody knows the answer to that question. But who knows what mysteries lurk in the history of radio's greatest mystery-adventure character? That would be Martin Grams Jr., award-winning Old Time Radio researcher and author. Mr. Grams' books on a wide range of radio programs and personalities are no mystery to the discerning OTR enthusiast, and now he's turned his focus on The Shadow in an impressive new volume from OTR Publishing, The Shadow: The History and Mystery of the Radio Program, 1930-1954. Covering every aspect of the program's evolution, from its early pre-hero anthology format to the legendary adventures of Lamont Cranston, Martin's book is the most ambitious yet on the subject. Fellow broadcast historian Elizabeth McLeod recently had an in-depth conversation with Martin about the book and the in-depth research that backs it up...

Read this exclusive interview on The Shadow by clicking here.

News & InformationCELEBRATE THE 70TH ANNIVERSARY OF
THE GREAT GILDERSLEEVE
THIS MONTH ON WHEN RADIO WAS!Air DateProgramEpisode TitleOriginal Air DateMon, 8/8/2011The Great GildersleeveGildy Organizes A Testimonial Dinner For Judge Hooker5/31/1942Mon, 8/22/2011The Great GildersleeveLeroy is Expelled - Part 19/16/1945Tues, 8/23/2011The Great GildersleeveLeroy is Expelled - Part 29/16/1945Mon, 8/29/2011The Great GildersleeveArrives In Summerfield (Premier)8/31/1941Mon, 8/29/2011Fibber McGee & MollyGildy Leaves For Summerfield - Part 19/30/1941Tues, 8/30/2011Fibber McGee & MollyGildy Leaves For Summerfield - Part 29/30/1941
If you miss a broadcast, you can listen to a free stream of the show the day after each broadcast. Just visit RadioSpirits.com and click the "Listen Now" link under Listen to Our Free Radio Show. Past shows are available for one week after their broadcast date.

RecommendedRADIO STARS ON THE SILVER SCREEN Turner Classic Movies is scheduled to broadcast a number of movies this month that feature favorite classic radio performers. All times are Eastern.

DateTimeMovie TitleStarringAugust 5th4:00 amThe Story of MankindRonald Colman, Vincent Price, Groucho MarxAugust 6th6:00 amDu Barry Was a LadyRed Skelton, Lucille BallAugust 6th8:00 pmStage DoorEve Arden, Lucille Ball, Katherine HepburnAugust 8th8:00 pmThe Third ManOrson WellesAugust 9th2:00 amThe Lady From ShanghaiOrson WellesAugust 9th7:15 amSweet MusicRudy ValleeAugust 9th3:30 pmCollege CoachDick Powell, Pat O'BrienAugust 21st1:45 pmRoom For One MoreLurene Tuttle, Cary GrantAugust 22nd12:45 pmDaisy KenyonDana Andrews, Joan CrawfordAugust 22nd2:30 pmFlamingo RoadSydney Greenstreet, Joan CrawfordAugust 23rd2:45 pmWhistling in the DarkRed Skelton, Eve ArdenAugust 23rd11:45 pmCasablancaHumphrey Bogart, Sydney Greenstreet, Peter LorreAugust 24th12:00 pmColleenDick PowellAugust 25th11:30 pmThe KillersEdmund O'Brien, William ConradAugust 27th6:00 pmFallen AngelAlice Faye, Dana AndrewsAugust 28th6:15 pmTo Be or Not To BeJack BennyAugust 30th12:30 pmLovely To Look AtRed Skelton

UPCOMING EVENTS Capitolfest, August 12 – 14, Rome, NY - (Rarely-shown and newly-discovered films of the silent and early talkie era)
For more information visit www.romecapitol.com

Wizard World Chicago Comic Con, August 11 – 14, Rosemont, IL
For more information visit http://www.wizardworld.com/home-ch.html

Baltimore Comic Con, August 20 – 21, Baltimore, MD
For more information visit www.baltimorecomiccon.com

Dragon*Con, September 2 – 5, Atlanta, GA - (Science fiction and fantasy convention)
For more information visit www.dragoncon.org

SPX Small Press Expo, September 10 – 11, Bethesda, MD
For more information visit www.spxpo.com

Mid-Atlantic Nostalgia Convention, September 22 – 24, Hunt Valley, MD - (TV, movies, radio and nostalgia)
For more information visit www.MidAtlanticNostalgiaConvention.com

New Radio Spirits Releases – Available Now!

Duffy's Tavern:
Where the Elite Meet

Nero Wolfe: Parties for Death

Upcoming Radio Spirits ReleasesComing In September

- Suspense
- Burns & Allen
- Mr. Keen, Tracer of Lost Persons
- Candy Matson

* Please note all new release dates are subject to change.

Trivia GameThink you know your old time radio and nostalgia trivia? Play our trivia game and find out! Click here to play an all-new 10 question trivia game!!

Special Savings Offer20% OFF and FLAT $4.95 SHIPPING ON YOUR ENTIRE ORDER
placed now through Wednesday, August 10th.*

* Offer Details: To get 20% Off and $4.95 Flat Rate shipping on your order you must include Offer Code M08NC001 when placing your order. This special offer is good only through August 10th, 2011 at Midnight Eastern Time and cannot be combined with any other offer. Percentage savings shown in this email already include the promotional discount. Percentage savings are calculated on your order subtotal before tax and shipping charges. Flat rate shipping offer is good for standard shipping to the United States only. While supplies last. Offer not valid on past orders. This is a special web-only offer and YOUR ORDER MUST BE PLACED THROUGH OUR WEBSITE. Click here to begin shopping!

Radio Spirits is now on Facebook!
Visit our new page here!
RadioSpirits.com | RadioClassics.com

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

RadioArchives.com Newsletter - August 12, 2011

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 07:00:00 GMT

August 12, 2011

Summertime Greetings from RadioArchives.com!

* New: The Classic Whodunits of Philo Vance
* New Digital Downloads Now Available
* Spotlight on "The Big Show"
* New in Pulp Fiction
* Deal of the Day
* And in Closing.. .

New: The Classic Whodunits of Philo Vance
When we think of radio's detective shows, we tend to think of the film noir adventures of such great names as Phillip Marlowe and Johnny Dollar. But not all of radio's criminal investigators came dressed in gumshoes and rumpled trench coats. In fact, one of the most popular and long-running series featured a detective who was something of a dandy - and his name was Philo Vance.

Vance first appeared in a series of novels written by S. S. Van Dine. In the books, Vance was portrayed as a stylish fop, a New York bon vivant with a highly intellectual bent - and a nose-in-the-air attitude to match. But by the time he hit the airwaves, he was far less a know-it-all and far more down to earth. As portrayed by radio veteran Jackson Beck, Vance was knowledgeable but accessible, working closely with the police to solve their most baffling crimes.

For armchair detectives, the series offered an extra bonus: in traditional whodunit fashion, at the end of each show, Vance would usually gather the suspects, restate all of the clues, and then pause a moment before announcing the name of the person responsible for the crime. This subtle little feature, along with excellent performances by the cream of the New York radio world, resulted in a series that was popular on radio stations throughout the country for many, many years.

If you're a mystery buff, you can't go wrong with "Philo Vance, Volume 5", another great sounding classic radio collection from Radio Archives. The set offers sixteen of Vance's most fascinating cases - eight full hours of murder, mischief, and mayhem - priced at $23.98 for the eight audio CD set or $15.98 for the Digital Download. Stop by RadioArchives.com and pick up your copy right away!

New Digital Downloads Now Available
If you're one of the millions of people who everyday spend their commute listening to audio entertainment on a portable device or cell phone, you'll be excited to hear that Radio Archives has just added a dozen new downloadable audio collections to the Digital Downloads page atRadioArchives.com:

* "Johnny Dollar" star Bob Bailey is featured in "Let George Do It", four volumes of offbeat detective adventures transferred from original master recordings for sparkling audio fidelity. These collections contain many adventures that haven't been heard since their original broadcast more than sixty years ago!

* Screen star Jeff Chandler plays a hard-boiled New Orleans detective in "The New Adventures of Michael Shayne", based on the character created by Brett Holliday. Fully restored from the original transcriptions, you'll thrill to the complete run of this tough and action-packed series in two great sounding collections.

* The top dance bands of the early 1930s are starred in "The Cocoanut Grove Ambassadors", a series of extremely rare musical broadcasts from the early days of radio. Featured in these two ten-hour collections are such bandleaders as Gus Arnheim, Phil Harris, Ted FioRito, and Jimmy Grier.

* "Wake Up, America! It's Time to Stump the Experts!" as Clifton Fadiman hosts forty full-length episodes of "Information Please", one of the wittiest and most fascinating quiz shows ever to hit the airwaves. These delightful programs are sure to challenge your intellect as you match wits with such literary lights as Franklin P. Adams, John Gunther, Oscar Levant, and Ben Hecht.

* Finally, Staats Cotsworth stars in "Casey, Crime Photographer", a lighthearted mystery/detective series about a top news photographer covering events for the Morning Express. Featuring forty full-length shows from the very best years of the series, you'll enjoy crystal clear audio fidelity in these two engrossing collections.

These are just some of the many wonderful shows and series you'll find available for download atRadioArchives.com - and, if you prefer CDs, they're all available as attractively packaged audio compact disc collections, too!

Digital Downloads from Radio Archives bring you the best of everything: great shows, great selection, great sound quality, and all at great prices, too! Stop by RadioArchives.com today and see what's waiting for you!

Spotlight on "The Big Show"
With a price tag of $100,000 per week - that's close to a million bucks in today's dollars - "The Big Show" was a 90-minute extravaganza that featured the absolute cream of the entertainment world. This amazing variety show was hosted by "the glamorous, unpredictable" Tallulah Bankhead and featured Meredith Willson conducting a 44-piece orchestra and a 16-voice chorus. But, entertaining as these two were together, it wasn't Talloo and Meredith that listeners tuned in to hear; it was the guest stars that made the series such a phenomenal experience. Consider this line-up: Louis Armstrong, Bob Hope, Deborah Kerr, Frankie Laine, Dean Martin & Jerry Lewis, and Dorothy McGuire. You'd expect a program with this array of talent to be an extra-special event - but no; that's the cast of a typical show from December of 1950.

For today's listeners, it's nearly impossible to imagine that a lavish series like "The Big Show" could ever have existed, let alone run for two full seasons. But, as host Tallulah Bankhead reassured us, "all it takes is courage, vision...and a king-sized bundle of dough." Now, thanks to expert transfers from the original master recordings and complete state-of-the art audio restorations, 25 full-length broadcasts of "The Big Show" are available in five audio compact disc sets and five digital download collections from RadioArchives.com. The shows are a virtual time capsule of big-time entertainment from the mid-20th century - but, what's more important, they're a lot of fun, too!

New in Pulp Fiction
Pulp fiction fans are thrilling to the new audiobook adventures of Doc Savage, thanks to "Python Isle" and "White Eyes", the two new Man of Bronze CD sets and downloads available fromRadioArchives.com. But avid readers know that Radio Archives also carries an extensive line of beautifully reformatted reprints, each featuring two novels from the Golden Age of the pulps.

Three brand new and just released editions of these double-novel reprints are now available from Radio Archives:

"The Spider Volume 20", featuring two thrill-packed adventures written by Norvell Page and Wayne Rogers: "The Devil's Candlesticks" and "Revolt of the Underworld"

"The Shadow Volume 51", in which the Knight of Darkness battles strange supercrime in two thrillers by Walter Gibson: "The Living Joss" and "Judge Lawless".

"Doc Savage Volume 49" offers two tales of action and excitement, written by Lester Dent and featuring the Man of Bronze and his daredevil cousin Patricia Savage: "The Terror in the Navy" and "Waves of Death".

All three of these new issues, priced at just $14.95 each, feature classic cover art, interior illustrations, and many special features. Make RadioArchives.com your source for the very best in pulp fiction classics!

Deal of the Day
If you're looking for a smart way to stretch your entertainment dollar, you can't do better than theDeal of the Day, a new feature now available at RadioArchives.com!

Stop by our home page and look for the blue Deal of the Day box. Click on it and you'll find today's special deal waiting for you, selected from the vast array of products available atRadioArchives.com. DVDs, pulp fiction books, CD sets - you'll find all these and more at discounts so low you'll just have to have them for your personal library.

Great entertainment at great prices - that's the Deal of the Day from RadioArchives.com!

And in Closing...
We'd like to close this week's newsletter with a couple of the nice comments we've recently received from our customers:

Joseph Dombi writes:
I honestly only picked up the first volume of "Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar" because it was the Deal of the Day when I placed my Doc Savage order. I had never heard of the show before, but the price was just to good to pass up. What a terrific show! I am now absolutely hooked and everything that is written about Bob Bailey's performance is right on the mark. He is PERFECTLY cast as Johnny Dollar. My order for Volume 2 is coming soon!

Larry Scheflin writes:
I've been listening to "Python Isle" and I must say that Michael McConnohie has done an excellent job. His voice characterizations are a joy. Kudos to all and thanks for a wonderful listening experience. I am eagerly awaiting the next installment.

Our sincere thanks to both of these gentlemen for letting us know their thoughts. If you'd like to share a comment with us - or if you have a question or a suggestion - send an email toService@RadioArchives.com or call us toll-free at 800-886-0551. We'd love to hear from you.!

Listen to this Newsletter!
Enjoy this newsletter as an Audio Podcast! Click anywhere in the colorful banner at the top and you'll automatically hear the Radio Archives Newsletter, enhanced with narration, music, and clips from our featured collections! This audio version of our regular newsletter is a pleasant and convenient way to hear all about our latest products, as well as the newest pulp fiction reprints, special offers, and much, much more!

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

Radio Spirits Newsletter September 2011

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 07:00:00 GMT

September 2011

This Month's Features

FEATURED ARTICLE

--The Radio Legacy of Phil and Alice and Julius and Frankie

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW

--Stepping Into the Shadows with The Whistler and Dan Van Neste

NEWS & INFORMATION

--

New Radio Stations
to Broadcast
When Radio Was

--

Celebrate the 65th Anniversary of The Phil Harris-Alice Faye Show on When Radio Was

--The Shadow Returns to Comic Books

RECOMMENDED

--Radio Stars on the Silver Screen

UPCOMING EVENTS

--

Meet Greg Bell and Visit Radio Spirits at the Mid-Atlantic Nostalgia Convention

--More Upcoming Events

NEW RADIO SPIRITS RELEASES

--Suspense--Burns & Allen--Mr. Keen, Tracer of Lost Persons--Candy Matson

UPCOMING RADIO SPIRITS RELEASES

--Fred Allen--Fort Laramie--Fibber McGee & Molly--Dark Fantasy--A New 2011 Christmas Collection

TRIVIA GAME

--Play our new OTR and Nostalgia Trivia Game.

SPECIAL SAVINGS OFFER

--Free Shipping with $30 Purchase for a Limited Time. See details.Featured ArticleCOMEDY TO THE EXTREME: THE RADIO LEGACY OF PHIL AND ALICE AND JULIUS AND FRANKIE
By Elizabeth McLeod The following article is presented in celebration of the 65th anniversary of the radio premiere of The Phil Harris – Alice Faye Show on September 29th.

By the end of the Second World War, subtle radio comedy was becoming as hard to find as an unfurnished apartment, a new pair of nylons, or a porterhouse steak. The war years had brought with them a bold, brassy style of humor that asked no questions and took no prisoners -- with a machine-gun tempo and a Sherman Tank aggressiveness, the radio comics of the early postwar era beat their listeners over the ears with jokes and gags and made them like it.

The comedy characters who emerged from this era were every bit as outrageous as the material itself, wild, exaggerated caricatures of every possible human frailty -- the cartoonish, vaudevillian denizens of Allen's Alley, the flyspecked habitués of Duffy's Tavern, the screaming pop-eyed stooges who surrounded Bob Hope and Eddie Cantor and Abbott and Costello. There was nothing realistic or nuanced about these characters -- they had no grounding in the real world. They were caricatures, pure and simple, and the audiences of the time understood them as such, existing only for the sake of laughs. And perhaps no program of the era captured this zeitgeist of unrestrained lunacy quite so well as The Phil Harris-Alice Faye Show.

By the time bandleader Phil Harris and his recently-retired movie star wife Alice Faye converted the long-running Sunday night Fitch Bandwagonprogram from a musical variety format to a situation comedy, Phil had been playing a zany comic caricature for nearly a decade as a member of Jack Benny's troupe. Here was the conceited, hard-drinking curly-haired pretty-boy entertainer in all his glory, traits painted in such broad strokes that audiences genuinely believed Phil Harris to be an irredeemable reprobate of the first water -- except he never touched anything so pedestrian as water.

But adapting this caricature to a situation comedy format posed a problem. Harris and Faye proposed to do a family comedy, presenting themselves as a real-life married couple, with two young children. And with kids in the picture, Harris's zany booze-fueled antics suddenly didn't seem so funny. Writers Joe Connelly and Bob Mosher solved the problem by turning Phil into the straight man for an even more outrageous caricature -- the shiftless, scheming, childishly-irresponsible left-handed guitar player Frankie Remley...

Read the the rest of this exclusive article on The Phil Harris-Alice Faye Show
by clicking here.

Exclusive InterviewSTEPPING INTO THE SHADOWS WITH THE WHISTLER AND DAN VAN NESTE
An Exclusive Radio Spirits Interview by Elizabeth McLeod

Everybody knows that The Whistler walks by night, but does everybody know that the character spawned an 8-film Columbia Pictures series? Author and researcher Dan Van Neste knows...and tells all about it…in his new book from Bear Manor Media, The Whistler – Stepping Into the Shadows: A Columbia Film Series. Covering every aspect of the series - included rare profiles of 50 Whistler filmmakers: actors, directors, writers, and technicians – Van Neste left no shadow unexplored. Fellow broadcast historian Elizabeth McLeod recently had an in-depth conversation with the author about the book and the in-depth research that backs it up.

Read this exclusive interview on The Whistler by clicking here.

News & InformationNEW STATIONS TO BROADCAST WHEN RADIO WAS! We’re pleased to announce the following new additions to the family of radio stations now broadcasting our nationally syndicated When Radio Was show. Be sure to tune in to support and listen to great classic radio on stations in your area:

KAUS 1480 AM Rochester, MN. Saturday & Sunday, 9pm through Midnight
WTYM 1380 AM Pittsburgh, PA. Wednesday through Friday, 7pm through 9pm
WINI 1420 AM Paducah, KY. Saturday and Sunday, 7pm through 11pm

CELEBRATE THE 65TH ANNIVERSARY OF
THE PHIL HARRIS-ALICE FAYE SHOW
THIS MONTH ON WHEN RADIO WAS!Air DateProgramEpisode TitleOriginal Air DateMon, 9/5/2011Phil Harris-Alice Faye Show1st Show Of The Season10/1/1950Mon, 9/12/2011Phil Harris-Alice Faye ShowPhil, The Dramatic Actor3/11/1951Sat, 10/1/2011Phil Harris-Alice Faye ShowAlice's Burlesque Act10/8/1950
If you miss a broadcast, you can listen to a free stream of the show the day after each broadcast. Just visit RadioSpirits.com and click the "Listen Now" link under Listen to Our Free Radio Show. Past shows are available for one week after their broadcast date.

THE SHADOW RETURNS TO COMIC BOOKS Dynamite Entertainment has announced it will begin publishing a new series of The Shadow comic books. For more information, click here.

RecommendedRADIO STARS ON THE SILVER SCREEN Turner Classic Movies is scheduled to broadcast a number of movies this month that feature favorite classic radio performers. All times are Eastern.

DateTimeMovie TitleStarringSept. 9th11:30 amBeyond a Reasonable DoubtDana AndrewsSept. 9th8:00 pmI'll See You in My DreamsFrank Lovejoy & Doris DaySept. 11th10:00 am42nd StreetDick PowellSept. 11th11:45 amGuys & DollsFrank SinatraSept. 13th6:00 amMerton of the MoviesRed SkeltonSept. 13th4:15 pmGeorge Washington Slept HereJack BennySept. 14th11:00 pmThank Your Lucky StarsHumphrey Bogart & Eddie CantorSept. 15th3:45 pmRoad to UtopiaBing Crosby & Bob HopeSept. 16th6:45 amDark PassageHumphrey Bogart & Lauren BacallSept. 16th8:45 amKey LargoHumphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall & Edward G. RobinsonSept. 18th8:00 pmCitizen KaneOrson Welles & Agnes MooreheadSept. 22nd8:00 amBetween Two WorldsSydney GreenstreetSept. 24th6:00 amCollege CoachDick Powell & Pat O'BrienSept. 25th8:00 amThe Winning TeamFrank Lovejoy, Doris Day & Ronald ReganSept. 29th1:15 pmThe KillersEdmond O'Brien, William ConradSept. 29th3:15 pmNaked CityHoward Duff

Upcoming EventsMEET GREG BELL AND VISIT RADIO SPIRITS AT THE
MID-ATLANTIC NOSTALGIA CONVENTION! Radio Spirits will be attending The Mid-Atlantic Nostalgia Convention in Hunt Valley, MD from September 22 – 24th. We invite you to stop by our table to talk with us and take advantage of our special convention pricing. Our table will certainly be the place to be on Saturday, September 24th from 12:00pm – 2:00pm. That’s when Greg Bell, the host of When Radio Was and Sirius/XM’s Radio Classics channel will be making a personal appearance! For more information about the show, visitMidAtlanticNostalgiaConvention.com. We hope to see you there.

MORE UPCOMING EVENTS OF INTEREST Dragon*Con, September 2 – 5, Atlanta, GA - (Science fiction and fantasy convention)
For more information visit www.dragoncon.org

SPX Small Press Expo, September 10 – 11, Bethesda, MD
For more information visit www.spxpo.com

Mid-Atlantic Nostalgia Convention, September 22 – 24, Hunt Valley, MD - (TV, movies, radio and nostalgia)
For more information visit www.MidAtlanticNostalgiaConvention.com

Lone Pine Film Festival, October 7 – 9, Lone Pine, CA
For more information visit www.lonepinefilmfestival.org

Friends of Old Time Radio Convention, October 20 – 23, Newark, NJ
For more information visit www.fotr.net

New Radio Spirits Releases – Available Soon!

Suspense:
Omnibus

Burns and Allen:
Treasury

Mr. Keen,
Tracer of Lost Persons

Candy Matson

Upcoming Radio Spirits ReleasesComing In October

- Fred Allen
- Fort Laramie
- Fibber McGee & Molly
- Dark Fantasy
- A new 2011 Christmas collection

* Please note all new release dates are subject to change.

Trivia GameThink you know your old time radio and nostalgia trivia? Play our trivia game and find out! Click here to play an all-new 10 question trivia game!!

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

FRAG! August 2011

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 07:00:00 GMT

If you have trouble reading this newsletter click here.Issue 120, August 2011"Do not hire a man who does your work for money, but him who does it for love of it."
~ Henry David Thoreau

The August Editorial Introduction

News Direct from the Frontlines of Shrapnel Games

Trivia Time: Korea, The War That Never Ends

September Gamers Front Special Preview

The Dice Of War: Plan West

Sizzling Sellers and Those Special Offers

Link O' The Month

The Crystal Ball

FRAG! is Edited by Scott Krol

To manage your FRAG! account: Manage FRAG!
To drop your subscription: unsubscribe

To visit our blog please go to: Our Blog

Careful, man, there's a beverage here!1. The August Editorial Introduction

How easy it is to forget the simple joy of gaming, even when immersed in gaming. Whether it’s dealing with poor rules in a board game or bad video drivers in a computer game, gaming is often filled with unmet expectations and disappointments. Then there’s the joy of community, whereupon every other gamer seems to be filled with rage. From insulting the developers to insulting fellow gamers, one can only be exposed to such massive amounts of negativity for so long before the danger of becoming a misanthrope yourself becomes a real possibility.

The past week I’ve been experiencing conversations on gaming that have been bright, hopeful, and opened future doors. Not to mention actually participating in some rather positive sessions. Sessions that were what gaming was all about: the triumph of the player, the joy of discovery, the thrill of good friends and good gaming. When everything clicks in gaming, when you can stop thinking about what you’re going to make for dinner, or did you pay the cable bill this month, or ignore the hyperbole encasing the news of the globe, it’s a magical event. It’s living in the moment.

"Do we push our limits, live by chaos or live by order?"

Sex, self-medication, pain, are all events that serve to place us in The Moment. The Moment is a stoppage of time, where there is no past or future. Everything surrounding us melts away, and as these walls of consciousness drip away into pools of oblivion we can

only concentrate on the here, the now, The Moment.

That’s what good gaming does. It allows us to lose ourselves in a way that is emotionally and physically safe. When we are playing that perfect game there is just us and the game.

Today more than ever gaming is so important in our lives. Thanks to a culture of fear our race’s destruction seems imminent, whether from honeybees to shifting space rocks, and yet we know that’s not true. But it’s hard to ignore the crazy guy on the corner telling us to repent for the end is upon us. Then there’s the personal armageddons we deal with each day: traffic, co-workers, personal success and the illusion of happiness.

Slip into gaming, tighten down the straps, and one can wade through the incoming shells of misery without flinching. Surrounded by blast shields of joy, we game. We live other lives, we rule other lives, and we learn about ourselves. Are we risk takers? Turtlers? Do we push our limits, live by chaos or live by order? And we learn all this at the safety of the computer or dining room table.

Don’t ever forget what brought you into gaming. Don’t ever forget the magic.

2. News Direct from the Frontlines of Shrapnel Games

Greetings fellow gamers to another issue of the official e-newsletter of Shrapnel Games! This 120th edition marks the beginning of the end of summer, which is okay by us. Insane heat, earthquakes, hurricanes, this summer has been an interesting one but for all the wrong reasons. At least it has encouraged folks to avoid the great outdoors, bane of gamers everywhere, and enjoy plenty of gaming inside artificially cooled rooms.

Last month’s newsletter teased about a new direction for Bronze and we’re happy to report that we officially announced what exactly this meant earlier this month. In case you missed it Bronze is becoming a board game from publisher Spiral Galaxy Games of the United Kingdom! Here is an excerpt from our press release to fill you in on the details.

“Bronze, the Windows computer game, is a fast paced tile strategy game of area control set in ancient Mesopotamia. Controlling one of twelve historically accurate civilizations of the era, players attempt to dominate maps using ten construction types in historical campaigns, randomly created games, Hotseat play, custom matches, or the exciting Survival mode. Each civilization has its own strengths and weaknesses, meaning Bronze plays completely different depending on which civilization you play. And with no luck to be found in the game, victory or defeat is entirely dependent on how the civilization is played. It is this that attracted Spiral Games Galaxy to the idea of a cardboard conversion.

Dave Gilham of Spiral Galaxy Games remarks, “Bronze caught my eye on BoardGameGeek and having played the demo, and then the full version, I was intrigued with the game play. It’s enjoyable, it’s fast, there is no luck , you win or lose based entirely on your planning and tactics. The different maps and tribes leads to a great replay ability. All good points for a Euro style game.”

Currently Spiral Games Galaxy has begun sending their play testers initial test kits of Bronze the board game. The core gameplay will be the same, although there may be minor changes here and there due to changing it to a social tabletop Eurogame for two players. Initially six civilizations will be included,

which will play like their computer counterparts except for a few differences. Terrain and buildings will be the same as the computer game, although the Embassy will not be included. The visuals will be reworked to give them greater detail, so expect the cardboard version to look similar but not identical to the digital version.

While very early in the production cycle the current release estimate is release in second or third quarter of 2012. Shrapnel Games will also be carrying it at our Gamers Front.

We are very excited to be working with Spiral Games Galaxy and look forward to seeing Bronze dominating European table tops next year. It’s a charming and highly addictive game. If you haven’t checked it out be sure to stop by its official product page and download the demo.

And now for another tease. Look for upcoming news of an exciting new game system being published by Shrapnel Games designed specifically for smart phones and iPads. And no, we can almost guarantee that your guess as to what type of system this is will be incorrect. This is uncharted territory and will be very exciting.

I suppose one hint won’t hurt.

Polyhedrons. That is all.

Besides our monthly newsletter you can keep up with Shrapnel Games though our website (naturally), along with Facebook. Additionally, by signing up for our Friends and Fans email List you can be the first to know about sales, participate in special offers, and get the latest and greatest news.

To subscribe to the Friends and Fans list please visit its page here.

See you in a month! Happy gaming!

3. Trivia Time: Korea, The War That Never Ends

From 1966 through 1969 North Korea waged a very hot war against the Republic of Korea in the South, and the United States. While there had always been sporadic incidents between the North and South across the DMZ that separated the two countries since the armistice that ended the Korean War, the incidents increased dramatically in the mid-sixties.

In October of 1966 the North's leader, Kim Il Sung gave a speech to the Korean Workers Party in which he called for open aggression towards the United States. Believing that the United States would not allow itself to be drawn into yet another Asian conflict with Vietnam raging North Korea looked at this period as a perfect time to unify Korea by force.

The first major event took place a little over a month later after the speech, when a North Korean force crossed the DMZ and attacked a United Nations patrol. Leaving only one survivor, PFC David Bibee who survived only by playing dead, the attack was quite brutal. After an intense gun battle and hand to hand melee, the North Koreans mutilated their victims, emptying clips into the corpses and slashing them with bayonets. All this occurred while then President Lyndon Johnson was visiting Seoul.

Soon more attacks came, from small scale incursions and firefights to full scale artillery attacks. South Korean trains were attacked, and in one of the boldest attacks a North Korean sapper blew up a US 2nd Division barracks with a satchel charge.

North Korean commandos landed in the South with the hope of creating an insurgency movement amongst the South Korean farmers. Instead, 110 North Korean commandos were killed in battle by South Korean forces.

In Taegu four South Korean police officers were killed in combat with North Korean infiltrators, and in the summer of 1967, facing increasing North Korean guerilla raids, US Special Forces began to operate in the area, fighting off the North Korean insertions.

The attacks grew even bolder, if that was possible. In the "Blue House Raid" thirty-one North Koreans made their way into the South with a mission to decapitate the South Korean president, Park Chung Hee.

The North Koreans actually made it within a few blocks of where the President was, the Blue House, but were discovered. The battle that followed saw

nearly all the raiders killed, with one captured and two missing. The lone prisoner recounted that not only was the South Korean president a target, but also the US embassy.

After that the North captured the USS Pueblo off the coast of North Korea, even though it was in recognized international waters. After that more attempts by the North were made to start an uprising in the South. In 1968 1,245 North Korean saboteurs were arrested in the South. Another commando raid, with 120 Northern troops, ended in disaster with all raiders killed or captured.

Kim Il Sung grew increasingly frustrated with the failure to incite a people's revolution in the south. While hoping to play off US anti-war sentiment, and assuming that the peasants in the South would rise up, neither happened.

In the South most citizens were very much anti-communist, and pro-American. And while the US was definitely consumed by anti-war protests the military was ready to respond in full force if necessary to North Korean threats. Besides beefing up security among the DMZ, extending tours, creating a quick reaction force, and other military aid, the US invested massively in South Korea economically to prove their support.

The incidents began to wind down overall, though the North Koreans still played rough. In '69 a EC-121and a helicopter were both shot down, leading to a quick show of force by the United States Navy. Further hostilities then began to slow down, until life along the DMZ began to grow "normal" again, though normal along the DMZ was a very subjective term.

Both the seizure of the USS Pueblo and the attempted assassination of the South Korean president were made during the Tet offensive in Vietnam, leading many to believe that the North was attempting to work in concert with the NVA, and probably the USSR. Likewise, as Tet wound down so did the North Korean attacks into the South.

During the Second Korean Conflict hundreds of American and South Korean soldiers lost their lives. To this day incidents of cross-border raids, sniper shootings, and the occasional artillery burst are common, although never reaching the level they reached between 1966 and 1969.

4. September Gamers Front Special Preview

Another preview of what to expect when September 1st rolls around at the Gamers Front, our online store. Every month we offer at least two games at discounted prices at our online store. These sale prices are good for that entire month.

In September gamers will be able to save on BCT Commander and Scallywag: In the Lair of the Medusa.

Finding computer games on WWII is easy. Finding games on modern conflicts is a tad bit more difficult. Throw in as prerequisites that the game must be realistic and also be playable in real time and it becomes even more difficult. Thankfully, developer ProSIM is around.

ProSIM is the developer behind BCT Commander (amongst many other titles), one of the finest and highly detailed wargames to grace your screen.

As the name suggests gameplay takes place at the brigade/regimental scale, with maps measuring up to 50 km by 50 km in size. Scenarios take place in everyone’s favorite hot spots around the world such as Cuba, North Korea, Iraq, Russia, and the NTC here in the United States. Orders of battle include a wealth of current weapon platforms from American and Russian arsenals.

BCT Commander is a real time game, but it is not a real time game in the sense that it’s Command and Conquer with true military equipment. Rather it is a simulation, with all that word implies, of land warfare that is played out in a continuous time fashion. And for everyone who likes the ability to pause and issue orders in their real time games don’t fret, you can do so in BCT Commander. And with the deadly AI you might need to do it quite a bit to take a breather and reassess your grand plan for victory.

Speaking of the AI when BCT Commander was released Computer Games Online had this to say of it:

“The AI is solid and challenging as well. Every scenario played has included at least three enemy courses of action and all are damn tough to win against. Committing your forces piecemeal, improper positioning, and misuse of artillery are all punished heavily by the game's computer opponent.”

If you fancy playing against other opponents BCT Commander sports probably the widest scope of ways to connect than any other game released today. Sure, you got your standard Internet connection but how about a serial port connection? It features it, along with modem (really!) and IPX connectivity.

Gamespot said of the game that “…it's a rigorous, realistic simulation of what it's like to command a brigade of combined-arms troops in modern warfare.”

Read more about BCT Commander at its official product page.

So you like killing things and taking their stuff. Only problem is that if you do it in real life it’s a felony. Not to mention just, you know, morally wrong. That’s where the time honored tradition of dungeoncrawling comes in.

Began in the 1970s, dungeoncrawling involves sharp swords, deep dungeons, and the utter annihilation of everything that lurks in them. Remember, if you meet something that wants to talk to you it’s really not friendly, it’s just the GM trying to screw you over by seeing if you’ll let your guard down.

On the computer dungeoncrawlers have everything from text gaming in the form of the venerable Nethack to the more modern, like the Diablo series. What they don’t normally have though is an easy way to craft their own dungeoncrawls.

Enter Scallywag: In the Lair of the Medusa. At the top level it’s a dungeoncrawl from Chronic Reality in the vein of Rogue-like titles: random level generation, one life, all that good stuff. You can play it as a dungeoncrawl and have lots of fun, especially since Chronic Reality added their own spin to the genre. In most games it’s all about munchkining up, while in Scallywag it’s all about getting the heck out of each level by finding the rope to their next level. You can take it slow and easy, but your light source—a lantern—is dependent on oil, oil that is slowly burning away as you move about.

Go deeper with Scallywag: In the Lair of the Medusa though and you’ll discover that the game is much more than eating shrooms and whacking bats. The game is fully moddable by anyone. No special coding, no special tools (although if you do code and if you do have special tools, like maybe some fancy schmancy graphic programs, you can always go the extra mile). Change out the visuals, audio, game equipment stats…everything using standard Windows software.

Changes can be something minor, such as how your lantern behaves in the game, to something major like a total conversion. Start off small by tinkering with the existing game structure and then move on to recreating the entire Against The Giants series from AD&D.

If you’ve ever felt the call of becoming the Dungeonmaster but lack the players, Scallywag: In the Lair of the Medusa is definitely a title you’ll want to check out.

Check out more information here.

Remember, save on these starting September 1st!

5. The Dice Of War: Plan West

Plan West (Three Crowns Games Productions)

The invasion of Poland in 1939 by the Third Reich may have been the opening salvo of the Second World War in Europe but for wargamers it’s practically a forgotten campaign. While there are dozens of titles on the Battle of the Bulge, Stalingrad, and the Allied liberation of France once can count on one hand the number of Polish campaign games over the years.

The problem has always been the fact that Case White developed somewhat of an urban legend quality to it. Cavalry against tanks, the superiority of the blitzkrieg, all make it sound like there is no point in gaming such a lopsided affair. Yet in recent years it has been shown that many things we thought about the invasion were either completely inaccurate or not as impressive as they were originally made out to be. Stripping away the myths and legends suddenly the invasion of Poland does make an ideal candidate for wargaming.

Plan West by Three Crowns Games Productions tackles the invasion of Poland, specifically the first ten days. Why only the first ten days? Well, historically once you get past the first ten days the Poles are pretty much on the run, and once the Soviets enter the picture it’s pretty much all over. If the Polish defenses could have held in the first week and a half though the outcome could have been much different. So by focusing on the first ten days Plan West essentially showcases the heart of the campaign.

It’s really an easy game to learn, although the original manual—while short—leaves something to be desired for overall clarity. While the rules are in general well written, there are spots that could be clearer but worse are the spots in which information is completely missing. Wargamers won’t have a problem filling in the blanks but novices may be lost. Thankfully an updated manual is available to download, although there are still some minor errors that were overlooked.

Plan West uses a chit pull activation method to activate headquarter units, which in turn then activate subordinate units and independent units within command range. To illustrate the superior command structure of the German forces the German player is given command chits that can activate multiple command groups, even if they’ve been activated by their individual command. This is a big deal, allowing the Germans to create a fast paced tempo of operations. They’ll need this though to keep up with the victory point conditions.

In Plan West each turn the German player has to earn a certain number of victory points (VP). These VP are collected by capturing population centers. Additionally, holding onto Warsaw forces a sudden death victory. By forcing the German forces to constantly move forward it does two things. One, it allows a reasonable approximation of the speed of the campaign by making the player be aggressive and

two, from a gameplay perspective it keeps the game moving.

Movement and combat is straightforward and works just like any other standard wargame. One interesting touch is that even small population centers provide fairly good bonuses for defenders, and this, combined with the natural terrain defenses of Poland, allows the Polish defenders to make a good stand. Combat results are also not unusual, with step reductions and retreats possible.

There is some chrome when it comes to units. The Schleswig-Holstein is present and can assist, and the Polish OOB includes plenty of Pociag Pancerny (Armor Train). The armored trains are actually very useful, allowing Polish support to rapidly be in place across the map as long as the rail lines are clear.

Simulating the blitzkrieg tactics is achieved in two ways. First, air support is present on both sides (technically, since the Polish player does have one air counter). Air support comes in the form of ground attack, which simply acts as a regular combat, and interdiction, which blocks movement in a radius from the aircraft. But air attacks happen in a separate phase from ground combat, meaning that air units cannot combine their attacks with ground forces (but ground forces must be next to the target unit to provide a location). This may sound counterintuitive for a game on the blitzkrieg but research shows that there really wasn’t true combined air/ground successes. In fact, sometimes the Luftwaffe managed to blow up their own troops.

The next way of showcasing the blitzkrieg is in the use of combined arms. Armored formations by themselves suffer penalties in combat, which are mitigated by combining them with infantry formations. Interestingly, armored formations can penetrate further when taking ground than infantry, but because of the combined arms rule this can lead to dangerous situations for the isolated units. Still, sometimes a bold player may want to push forward with his fast moving tanks, risking the danger posed by the combat results table.

Plan West does a good job of showing that while blitzkrieg tactics could have an impact on the battlefield, they were not that supreme game changers like initially thought. Overall there is a lot of subtlety to the design of Plan West, and players will come to appreciate them.

Plan West manages to take a campaign that most people thought of as a cakewalk and turns it into a tense, turn by turn affair that is extremely easy to get into. That’s not to say the Poles should have any delusions of parading down the streets of Berlin in the game, but within the confines of the game’s victory mechanics it is possible for the Germans to fail. A worthy game on a subject rarely gamed on the tabletop.

6. Sizzling Sellers and Those Special Offers

Every month will talk about the top sellers for the previous month. In the wide world of gaming it’s not exactly as significant as the monthly NPD numbers but rather just a piece of trivia, although it is nice to see what types of game trend. Sometimes games that have been around a while will suddenly surge based on some sort of discussion.

Last month the top seller was, to no one’s surprise, Dominions 3: The Awakening. This is an epic turn based game that features enough content that few people will experience everything it has to offer even after years of playing.

Next up was winSPWW2, another title that offers up years and years of enjoyment without repeating itself. Both it and Dominions 3 would make perfect desert island games.

The third top seller was an old favorite, War Plan Pacific. War Plan Pacific does go epic like the previous two titles, but it goes epic in a micro kind of way. What does that mean? Well, the entire war in the Pacific from Allied involvement onwards is modeled, but modeled in a way that the four year conflict is playable in a single session. So yes, four years of warfare involving millions of miles of battlespace and thousands upon thousands of troops but distilled down to a game taking only hours.

The unstoppable Dominions 3: The Awakening!

Blitzing across hard drives around the world it’swinSPWW2.

The sun and eagle battle in War Plan Pacific.

The Gamers Front specials of the month can be foundhere.

For August the specials include Dominions 3: The Awakening and winSPWW2 Enhanced Edition.

The first special, Dominions 3: The Awakening, is possibly the greatest turn-based fantasy strategy game ever seen on a personal computer. While that may sound like the usual marketing hype you’d expect from a publisher selling a product, let’s look at the cold hard facts.

Since its release Illwinter Game Design, the developer of Dominions 3: The Awakening, has continually supported their beloved game, offering up enough free additional content to make up several expansion packs. This is true dedication to the game and to the fans, and one that you rarely see. Come to think of it, most gamers are accustomed to the opposite, where a game is released and never touched again.

Right out of the gate, before any new content is applied or mods, players can experience fantasy warfare in three distinct ages, fifty different unique nations, hundreds of magic items and spells, and well over a thousand units. Dominions 3: The Awakening is playable against the computer or against twenty other

players, and is a perfect game for PBEM. And again, all that it before anything is added to the mix. Everything gets kicked up several notches once you start playing with the new content and mods.

Dominions 3: The Awakening is available for Windows, Mac, and Linux. Three operating systems means chances are you can play Dominions 3: The Awakening, and since it doesn’t need to be the latest and greatest in the visual department, it can be played on a variety of machines. If you buy the physical version you get all three operating system versions on one CD. The downloadable versions are OS specific.

Normally $54.95, Dominions 3: The Awakening is on sale for $47.95.

Like Dominions 3: The Awakening, winSPWW2 is a turn based strategy game. Both offer a massive amount of content in their core game, extended through the ongoing patches. Likewise, this is a sign that the creators have made a living game, one that they love as much as the fans that work is continuous on it. Not because it really needs it, but because there is always room for some new cool game mechanic tweak, or awesome new scenario.

winSPWW2 Enhanced Edition, based on the original SSI Steel Panthers series, is a comprehensive study in combined arms warfare from the ‘30s through the Second World War. Featuring hundreds of scenarios, plenty of campaigns, and the ability to generate your own adventures (either through a few quick picks or handcrafting scenarios in the editor), winSPWW2 Enhanced Edition offers up literally years of gameplay.

winSPWW2 Enhanced Edition is truly a wargamer’s wargame. Gameplay is turn based, using a hex map, and is tactical in nature. It’s like your favorite cardboard tabletop action has been transferred into the digital realm, without the need to spend hours sorting counters or looking up rules. Play against the tough AI or against other opponents, PBEM games are easy to come by and folks are always on the prowl for a worthy foe.

Astute observers will note that winSPWW2 is also available as a free download. Indeed, the core of winSPWW2 Enhanced Edition is the same as the free download, but the “Enhanced” part of the Enhanced Edition really makes the upgrade worth paying for. There are several enhancements for the serious player, but the only that probably stands out the most is the ability to play at resolutions up to 1600x1200.

Note that the upgrade patches have added many more scenarios, units, and other content and the game is playable thanks to the upgrades with the latest incarnation of Windows. Normally $39.95 (physical or download), the game is on sale in August for $34.95.

Remember, whether it’s six in the morning or six at night if you need your gaming fix the Gamers Front is here to serve you!

7. Link O' The Month

Who doesn’t like the crunch of a hand axe through a skull or the bellowing cry of, “For Odin!” over a smoky battlefield? Vikings can be a lot of fun, especially the romanticized fantasy version of those Danish sea raiders.

Over the years vikings have been featured in a number of games, although not enough to truly make a sub-genre. Recently a miniatures based AAR (called Dark Ages, mixing a couple of rulesets) has sprung up featuring the wacky adventures of Harlin and Assur, two enslaved raiders as they seek revenge. Revenge in a viking story always means plenty of hand axes crunching skulls, plus an abundance of mead and venison, along with a helping dose of valkyrie eye candy. So far there is a distinct lack of mead, venison, and valkyries, but hopefully that will all change over time.

The AAR is an entertaining read, and the site also features plenty of interesting reads about miniature gaming.

Visit the site at:

http://thecommandtent.blogspot.com/p/dark-ages-campaign.html

8. The Crystal Ball

All American: The 82nd Airborne In Normandy: 2011

Star Legacy: 2012

Eat Electric Death! (Board game): 2011

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.

Michael Omer Promotes His New Game, Misfortune

crector@gmail.com (Charles Rector) — Sun, 02 Oct 2011 07:00:00 GMT

Hi

My name is Michael, and I am the founder of a small indie company called
Loadingames. Me and my two partners have recently released the beta
version of a browser based RPG named "Misfortune".

I believe that your readers will find my game interesting, as I have found
several of the articles in OMGN. I would be truly happy if you feature
"Misfortune" in OMGN.

A little about the game: “Misfortune” is a steampunk RPG browser game. In
the game you follow the protagonist, as he finds himself marooned on an
unfamiliar island, in a strange and violent town called Rodnia.
The game is intended to be a “casual” RPG, to be played for 20-30 minutes
at a time. However, unlike many other casual RPG games, the main emphasis
of Misfortune is the plot. As the game progresses, a complex story
unfolds, including multiple plot-lines that intertwine together.
The entire game is hand drawn by a children's book illustrator, which
gives it a unique appearance.

By default, the game has a limited amount of missions per day, but if you
are willing to cover it, please feel free to write me with your username,
and I will supply you with as many mission credits as you need to review
it thoroughly.

The game can be found at: http://www.loadingames.com

I look forward to hearing from you soon,

Michael Omer
Founder & CEO
Loadingames
http://www.loadingames.com

OMGN is not responsible for any blog post content on this site. The blog post author is responsible for all blog post content.