So I have returned from Origins Game Fair, and I am glad to say that I returned safely and without any major incidents. Compared to last year, this is a huge improvement. All in all, I have to say that it was an amazing convention. There was so much that happened that I know I won't be able to capture it all, but I will mention some of the highlights in no particular order.

First and foremost, I cannot stress how awesome it was to see friends I only get to see a couple of times a year. It is always a blast to see friends from far away and play games with people I don't see often. Codenames was intensely popular, as I knew it would be. I brought it to introduce some writer friends to it, since I thought it would be up their alley. I first pulled it out when a bunch of the writers were gathered at the Three Legged Mare for dinner. As we were about to head back, the rain started to come down in veritable sheets. A bunch of us decided to wait it out and stay in the bar rather than run through the downpour. We wound up picking two people from the bar who saw the game and said "We love that game!" Our immediate response was "Why don't you join us?" We played a couple of rounds and loved it. By the time we had finished, the rain had tapered off and we were able to make it back to the hotel without getting drenching wet.

Aaron Rosenberg and I were amazed that the powers that be let us sit next to each other in the library. Not only that, but we were allowed to sit next to each other on panels. That was incredibly fun and entertaining! But, I don't know if we will ever be allowed to do it again. I will say, he is an extremely helpful panda.

Working the table went well, and I was up to my usual antics. Traffic seemed slow, but as I tallied up my final numbers, it appears that I actually sold almost as many books as my previous year at Origins. Only two less in fact. So from the business side, it was good. In addition, this was the first year that I had my trilogy available at my table at Origins. Last year, I was able to have the hardback version at Gen Con, but this is the first time I had the paperback version and the first time that I had either available at Origins. The joke that I received (and told) a couple of times was that it was the first time I had a book on my table at Origins with my name on the cover. According to the final numbers, over 2/3rds of the books that I sold were my trilogy. I am excited about this and I feel that it reinforces my decisions to focus on my trilogy moving forward rather than continuing to have a large collection of anthologies. I will still bring new ones as they come out, but in a lot less quantity and with a more decided focus on my books.

While I was there, an author that I very highly respect took a moment out of his day to pull me aside and speak to me. He said that I was a good writer (which was a HUGE compliment) and that I had the skill to make a major career out of my writing (which was an even larger compliment). He told me that I was reaching a point where I needed to decide if I wanted to focus on my antics, or let my writing stand for itself. This was a very sobering conversation, and something that meant a lot to me considering the source. It also gave me a lot of faith in my writing and what I am going to be pursuing from here on out.

Following the example of Robyn King, I need to say that I had a massive bucket list item crossed off this weekend. I had the honor of sitting at a signing table at the Catalyst booth. You can see a picture of it here. True, true, I finally got an opportunity to use my head. Nonetheless, that did not dampen my excitement for being part of this. I am officially a Shadowrun author now. There is nothing that can be done to take that back. There is official evidence! And you know that once it is on the web, it cannot be removed. Catalyst even invited me to sit at their table and watch the Origin Awards.

Even with all of these highs, there is one thing that trumps it all. I designed a board game and had the opportunity to demo it in front of a major publisher. It was probably one of the most nerve-wracking things that I have done at a convention since I first started going to conventions as a professional writer. It was AMAZING.

It went as well as I thought it possibly could have. I was astounded by the feedback that I received. I received some critical feedback, but I was told that the amount of feedback I got was less than the players give for some published and released games! There are some few adjustments that need to be made, but it is still in the development and balancing process, so I expected as much. Still, it was not a lot of criticism. They even enjoyed playing a three hour long game without complaining about the length or wondering when it might be over. That alone is a huge compliment!

The next morning, I received an update, which made things even better. After that, the next day, I received even more updated information, and it was even better than I had hoped. It literally was a situation where I thought it was as best as it could have possibly been, and then it kept getting better. I do not have words for how excited I was and still am! The current update is that I am going to be running a demo for it in the near future here in the Seattle area. The people that I need to run it for live in the nearby area, so it made sense to wait until after Origins when we have more time and the play through wouldn't be as stressful. I am looking forward to that and can hardly wait to set it up!

Whew. I think that is most of the highlights. It has been an amazing weekend and even with as much as it burnt me out, it was well worth it and I would do it again in a heartbeat. Thank you everyone for making it such a wonderful convention, with more stories, more games, and more good times all around! Convention-wise, next stop is Gen Con!

Howdy folks. So I will be going to Origins Game Fair this week. While I am there I will be gaming, selling books, talking on panels, and having a good time - not necessarily in that order. The following schedule is when I will be on panels or am otherwise scheduled. When I am not on panels and the dealers' room is open, I will be at my table hawking my wares. Come by and say hi. I'm excited because this is the first year I'll have my trilogy available at Origins! Hope to see some of you there.

• Thursday, 10 am: Making Magic 101
• Thursday, 12 pm: Where Are We? (world building)
• Thursday, 3 pm: Medieval Combat
• Thursday, 5 pm: Playing Carcassonne
• Friday, 11 am: Writing Combat
• Friday, 2 pm: Incorporating History in Fiction
• Sunday, 10 am: Writing for RPGs
• Sunday, 1 pm: Time Management

Over the last week, I spent a significant amount of my free time playing a little game called The Witness. For those who are not familiar with it, it’s a puzzle game that recently came out for the PS4 and the PC. It is the next game from Jonathan Blow, of the (in my opinion) well-deserved Braid fame. Braid was an amazing game and if you have not had a chance to play it by now, I will still strongly recommend it. However, I digress. The Witness is his latest creation and I have heard amazing things, not the least of which included calling it a throwback to Myst. Having enjoyed that game at the time and still having fond memories of the worlds it created, I was very excited.
 
Before I go any further, let me say that the game is extremely well done. The puzzles start out simple, but rapidly become more challenging. There are multiple regions where new puzzle concepts are introduced and you can figure out what you are supposed to do with a limited number of variables. Then the puzzles ramp up in that zone, gradually becoming more complex. There were several times that I had to walk away from a puzzle because I just couldn’t grasp what I was supposed to do. There was one area in particular that I came up to six or seven times before I finally figured out the secret to solving the intro/tutorial level. But, the best part of it and something that the game does amazingly well is making you feel smart for figuring it out. If you don’t use hints or walkthroughs, you gain a sense of accomplishment and there is this wonderful “ah ha!” moment when you finally crack a puzzle that has been stumping you for hours or days and invading your mind until you dream of mazes with obscure rules that you sometimes are guessing at.
 
So yes, I really enjoyed the game and if you are a fan of puzzles and piecing small bits of logic together from limited clues, I highly recommend it. As I said before, this game will make you feel smart as you stumble through it. However, it does not feel like a game.
 
I spent hours upon hours on that island, exploring the beautiful scenery trying to find another puzzle to solve or another laser to activate. I searched high and low for the little recorders that read back famous quotes, poetry, or speeches. I played and watched the hidden movies in a projector that is not easy to find. But, at the end of it all, I can’t really tell you anything about The Witness as a world. And to keep this in perspective, I completed the game just over twenty-four hours ago.
 
Contrast this to Myst. Sure, the island in The Witness is several times larger, but I know nothing of the world. What do I know? I know the rules for the puzzles. That is what I remember. I have some images in my head of the scenery, but those will fade with time, I am sure. With Myst, I remember the world, the universe, the idea of creating worlds in books and visiting them, the story of the two brothers and the inevitable (but not sudden) betrayal as they try to play you for a patsy. I cannot tell you how many years ago I played Myst, but this still stays with me. I think this is very telling.
 
I can’t help but make comparisons to Braid, as I am sure many people do. Both of the games have clever mechanics and are beautiful. Where The Witness has those moments of intelligence and making you feel smarter, Braid has substance and story, one that I found amazing and will not ruin for anyone. My recommendation for Braid? Play it, you should absolutely give it a shot unless you are not a fan of games or strongly detest platformers. My recommendation for The Witness? Do you like puzzles? If so, pick it up, but otherwise stay away. You won’t find anything else here.
 
This is a subtle but very important difference, and to me, it shows the importance of narrative. I think the memory is very telling. No matter how good a game is with mechanics, the range of emotions that it can evoke – that ability to etch itself into memory – is very limited if it is lacking of narrative. As a storyteller myself, I want to have that effect. I want to push people to that sense of wonder. To paraphrase an idea that is on one of the recordings in The Witness itself, I want to inspire awe. In my opinion, The Witness fails to do that.
 
Yes, I am biased, and I admit that. I want more than just a challenge. I want a story. I believe that stories flush out a world and make it real, which then creates the ability to move us in a way that stays with us for years afterwards. The story can be simple. The story can be told in a different manner than just putting a player on rails: it can be told through scenery, through characters, through item descriptions, or through those extra collectibles that offer viewpoints into the world you are temporarily inhabiting. But, for a game to really have that impact, the narrative has to be there.
 
In summary, while I enjoyed the game and it was satisfying, it felt empty. I had fun, but it was temporary, and not something that will stay with me. And I think calling it another Myst, as I have seen many reviewers do, is a disservice to one of the things that made Myst (and many other games) truly fascinating and captivating. Playing The Witness felt like playing Portal, but without having GLaDOS and the arc of trying to escape a testing facility.
 
So now it will be jumping back into Dark Souls 3, where I will be challenged, die a lot, swear some more, and feel like I am part of a world.

Yesterday while I was on the way to practice for the Seattle Knights, I started having an asthma attack. It was at this point, several minutes from home, that I realized I left my inhaler behind and did not have it with me. This is not unusual; I do not need my inhaler often. I’ve had asthma my whole life and have learned both how it affects me and how to manage it. I know that if I stay calm, and avoid engaging in strenuous physical activity, I can get through it. I might have more than my fair share of coughing fits, but as long as I focus on breathing and stay relaxed, it will go away. My asthma is exercise-induced. Since I was going to be sitting the car driving for at least twenty more minutes, this was not going to be a problem. I did exactly as I had taught myself to do, staying calm and taking the deepest breaths I could manage. By the time that I got to the armory, my breathing was back to normal and I could once again fill my lungs to capacity.
 
This incident brought up a memory from when I was training in a dojo several years ago. I was sparring and I noticed that my asthma was starting to trigger. I told the instructor that I needed to sit down and catch my breath. When he came over to ask me about it, I explained that I was having an asthma attack and that I needed to sit and not be active for a while in order to get my breathing under control. I wanted to make sure he knew that I wasn’t just taking a break, that I honestly couldn’t breathe. He asked if I needed my inhaler and I shook my head explaining that as long as I sat still, I would get it under control. His response surprised me.
 
“I always thought asthma was like that. You can get through it if you’re strong enough mentally.”
 
Because of his experience with me on that day, I am confident that I cemented his opinion on what asthma is. He had a preconceived notion (or perhaps it was based on experience, I do not know), and I served as another case to verify that definition. I think we as human beings like to define things solidly. We like to make a clear definition of what something is. It either IS something, or it IS NOT something. It is asthma or not, black or white. But here’s the thing – it isn’t black and white. It is not a binary decision, no matter how much we want it to be because of our natures.
 
I can get through most of my asthma attacks by sheer power of mental will. However, that is just my case. I know other people with asthma who are not quite so lucky and no sheer power of mental will alone will get them through an attack. Yes, I have asthma, but I do not have it in the same way or as strongly as others. It is not a bitwise decision; it is a greyscale one that has different degrees of severity. You cannot assume that someone else can easily overcome their asthma just because I can get through most of my attacks with a calm mind and focus.
 
And I think it is important to realize that this goes a step further. As I said, it is in our nature to want to define things and create bitwise categorizations. It is either A or B, yes or no, black or white. But that is often not the case. It should be no stretch of the imagination to think that this goes beyond the physical and treads into the category of mental state.
 
I have friends who are depressed to varying states. I have people in my life who have PTSD for different reasons and to different degrees. They respond to their triggers and pain differently. This is not a bitwise condition. Not all depression is the same. It is a greyscale. Just because one person can climb out of the mental hole they have fallen into does not mean another person can do it in the same way. It does not always look the same, and it is a mistake to assume it does.
 
I have seen people say that “So-and-so can’t be depressed, they don’t do X, Y, or Z.” That is a case of assigning your definition of depression to someone, something that falls into the bitwise trap I was mentioning before. Just because someone doesn’t fit your definition doesn’t mean that you have the authority to say whether or not they are depressed. It doesn’t matter if you know someone who is – heck, it doesn’t matter if you know ten people who are. Different people feel things to different degrees and it is not just a simple switch.
 
And here’s the thing. I also know people fall into that same trap when talking about themselves. “I can’t be depressed, I don’t do X, Y, or Z.” This is the exact same trap, just projecting it on yourself rather than someone else.
 
Remember, just because I have asthma and can breathe, doesn’t mean everyone else with asthma can. Or perhaps more pertinently: just because someone with asthma can’t breathe without an inhaler, doesn’t invalidate my asthma.