Feelin' very monochrome today

That was item one. Here's item two:


Copies of Mogworld will be available to buy from the bar for $12 each, on the night. I'll be there from 5pm. Hopefully that clarifies everything. Now I have to get back to practising my signature.

Worlds of the mog variety

Can you hear my fingers drumming in anticipation against my IKEA self-assembly writing desk? We are barely days away from the official launch of my debut novel Mogworld, a comic fantasy story about undead mobs in a sophisticated near-future MMORPG gradually realizing the true nature of their world. Also with lots of juicy violence.

And to mark the occasion, the launch party is (predictably) at the Mana Bar next week on Wednesday, September 8th, the official release date of the book and the day after quiz night. Everyone's invited and we're actually going to be selling actual physical actual copies of the actual book, before any other retailer, probably. I'll also be there to sign them (and anything else you feel like bringing in), exponentially increasing their eventual resale value. Plus they're first editions! Double trouble! Come on down at any time after opening (5pm), but move fast! We only have 100 copies in stock, and these things are going to be flying off the shelves so hard they could potentially become embedded in human skulls.

But don't despair if you're one of those fools who haven't done the smart thing and moved to Australia yet: you could be in with a chance of getting a copy of Mogworld even before then! All you have to do is get down to PAX this week, where the Escapist are giving away a limited number of copies to anyone who attends the Escapist Movie Night events, where Escapist videos such as Doraleous & Associates, I Hit It With My Axe and some rubbish called Zero Punctuation are being shown. 25 advance copies are up for grabs, just show up and enter the random draw.

Also, my tireless editor at Dark Horse, Rachel Edidin, is also at PAX, and will have a number of advance copies on her person each day to give away on a first-come, first-served basis, so go up and ask her for one. I'd tell you what she looks like but I've never met her in person. Maybe this could be a fun little detective game for you guys. Here's your first clue: I think she has short hair.

Why, there are so many ways to get a copy of Mogworld, it seems like you'd have to have learning difficulties to not have one in your possession by the end of next week. If all else fails there's always Amazon, I guess.

Oh yeah, and the results of the best Zero Punctuation ever debate are in: Duke Nukem Forever. The only review I've ever done of a game that doesn't actually exist. I really don't get you people sometimes.

Back to reality

Hello everyone, I'm back from holidays. This may be a little confusing since I clearly stated in my review and column last week that I was on holiday next week. Well, it's not that hard to figure out: I do my videos and columns a week in advance, so I was on holiday at the time last week's stuff was released. There still won't be a video or column next week because at the time I should have been working on them I was lying on a sunbed becoming more red and covered in flaking-off skin than a zombie's used tampon.

Anyway, here are links to last week's stuff. First there's Tuesday's Extra Punctuation, which was about the word 'gamer':

"The point I'm trying to reach is that playing games, as entertaining and fascinating and beneficial as it might be, is just something people do, not something they should be defined by. People don't call themselves moviegoers, or TV watchers, or book readers. That's the job of marketing agencies."

And secondly ZP itself, this week Transformers: War For Cybertron.

Also, you may not have noticed but the Escapist were running in my absence a little competition over which ZP video is the best, perhaps (on an educated guess) to decide what they're going to show instead of a brand new ZP next week. Here's a link to it, because you can still vote to have a chance to win a signed copy of Mogworld! Phew!

Later I may post a fuller account of my trip with some photos I took. If you're very good.

Zero/Punctuation

This week's ZP is Split Second: Velocity, published by Disney Interactive Studios. I'd say more but I kind of have to fly to Melbourne. Like, now.

The great adventure of publishing

Some important news about Mogworld (my book coming soon buy it buy it): there's going to be a little postponement on the release date. Nothing to worry about, just some technical cock up at the printers apparently, so we're now looking at an on-sale date of September 8th. And presumably the Mana Bar signing event will be around then too. Update your diaries.

It's cool, the book's still good. At least, I presume so. Maybe the publishers are just telling me this to let me down gently because the book's actually crap. I've been out with girls who used the same tactic.

Anyway, this week's Extra Punctuation is on the subject of exploration as a gameplay mechanic, and continued tongue baths for Shadow of the Colossus. Here's the clip.

"I think the use of exploration for its own merits is something that's been neglected lately. I can think of a lot of open world sandbox games that seem to actively discourage it; the ones with dreary, repetitive environments, a minimap you will spend half the game staring at, and a live GPS system to hold your hand in case the freedom gets a little bit too scary. I'm thinking of you, Red Faction Guerrilla."

A quiz for me and a quiz for you

Today I've just got a few housekeeping things to sort out. I forgot to link to an interview Tom Francis did of me for PC Gamer, so I'm going to do that now. Here's a clip.

"PC Gamer: Some of your best gags are in the animations – do you do those after you’ve recorded the review? Do you ever make a point specifically for the fun of illustrating it?

Yahtzee: I generally write the script first, then do the images, then record the voice, because sometimes I’ll be making the images and realise a point can’t be easily visualised and I need to reword it a bit. Colourful analogies help. ‘This game controls bad’ doesn’t immediately throw up an image, but ‘this game handles like a stag on an icy lake with its antlers tied to two different windmills’ does."

Other topics include my occasional game development aspirations, my guilty pleasures, and inevitably another plug for my book. Check it out.

Closer to home, we're working on sorting out a signing event for Mogworld to take place at the Mana Bar. It's going to be an event where you can buy copies of the book and get them personally signed and it looks like it's going to take place some time around the end of August. The book's official release is still August 18th (although I hear some Amazon preorders missed the first printing and will have to wait a bit longer), but it may take some time for a stock to finally get to us, plus I'm going on a week's holiday next Saturday. Doing it a bit later might work out better, on reflection, 'cos it'll give people who ordered the book time to get their copies so they can bring them in for signing.

As for signing events elsewhere, none are currently planned. Give me a break, I don't have the kind of lifestyle where I can just drop everything and do an international tour. Maybe for the second book if the first one becomes, you know, global #1 bestseller and ensures I never have to work again. Mm.

Finally, in Mana Bar-related news, I'll be hosting Gaming Trivia Night there again this Tuesday from around 6:30, so feel free to drop in and register a team. Half gaming trivia, half general knowledge, but no half measures where prizes are concerned, I assure you that. Come on down and be a man, or woman, or whatever unnatural combination of the two you are.

Colossal in every sense

This week's ZP is a retro review because the release schedule is still a bit dried up. Late August is looking a little busy, though, with Mafia 2 and a number of other things. The pre-Christmas period gets here quicker every year, doesn't it. Anyway, enjoy Shadow of the Colossus. I command it.