active_apathy | Entries tagged with games:lexicon

The Lexicon game is nearly ready for play, and even has a wiki now.

The game is one of collaborative world-building, where players write (in character) about a particular fictional incident, or place, or time. The setting for our game is steampunk fantasy - complete with gaslights and pointy hats - and the characters are all working for
an institute that'd really like to investigate the portals that the city seems to have, but is first being made to write a guidebook on the city itself.

Once the game gets started, the time commitment players will be looking at is two articles a week, of at least 150 words, for thirteen weeks, with the option to defer a week's entries to later if there absolutely isn't time.

The game is at a kind of unofficial turn zero at the moment, for players to join and create characters and such. There's more information on the wiki, and at

apathy_games, and if you have questions you're perfectly welcome to ask them.

So, if you're interested in playing, come and join us.

But first, an icon from a Questionable Content comic, because:

That panel with Hanners and Faye needed to be made an icon;
I had a lamentable lack of Hannelore icons; and
[insert third point here]

So, icon. Yay.

And now, because I haven't really been doing much that's exciting, I'm going to talk about some comms for a bit. Namely, mine.

apathy_games is very nearly ready for everyone to start playing Lexicon. We nearly have the theme sorted out, and once we've got that (and a name for the damned thing) I can make a wiki somewhere and we can all make stuff up and squabble in-character about it. Hooray, hooray, hooray. (Also: Hooray!)

apathy_books has one post. It's the post template. This is kind of saddening, actually. For everyone who plans to read more books this year, TELL US ABOUT THEM. Or make other people join, and do it instead. That is all.

critique_club has one post, but that's because it's a writing critique comm that was created on the 8th of November. November! Clearly not the best timing. But now, since I've noticed people again posting writings and works of poetry and such, it seems like a good time to tell everyone about it again. As a special offer, since there's exactly one post already there, Rule 6 will be very, very minimally enforced for the rest of February.

nomicide, well, just kind of works (and I personally blame

packbat for it not dying like the others), and can always do with more players. If you like seeing laws being made, and enjoy arguing with people, and trying to make and exploit loopholes, then we can always do with more players. If, on the other hand, you like seeing sausages being made, try the Yummy Channel.

And, lastly, I've somehow managed to miss posting about the pancakes and polls of Shrove/Super Tuesday. While I do mean to write at length about the US electoral process it won't be just yet, for I still need to get around to learning about the damned thing myself.

Still, for those of you voting today (um, your time) in a primary, please try not to confuse Shrove and Super Tuesdays. Not only is it inadvisable to eat ballot papers, I'm fairly certain you're not actually allowed to vote on pancakes. Or for pancakes. Unless pancakes are, in fact, your candidate's platform.

Dear WiiSports Tennis,

You might like deuce. Other people might like deuce. I don't mind a little deuce every now and then, up to a point.

You just went well past that point.

I should not be able to download 10% of an album (FROM ENTIRELY LEGITIMATE SOURCES, WHY DO YOU QUESTION ME SO) over a 46.7kbps Internet connection in the time it takes to win one service game. When this happens, there is an excess of deuce. A preponderance of deuce. And, unless you're trying to get through a stockpile of deuce, or exchanging deuce credits with other copies of WiiSports, it really has to stop.

(Preferably with match point, but still. There are people in the world who don't even have any deuce.)

Trapped at 40-40,

active_apathy

But, yes. WiiSports. About which I'm posting, oh, A YEAR after the rest of the world. And I do so because my WiiSports tennis skill level thingy has departed the graph and started for the edge of the screen at all of 2041 - as opposed to my WiiSports baseball skill level, which is at a much less lofty 24. These extremes are reflected in nothing quite so much as the Wii Fitness test thingy; I get something about mid 20s when there's no baseball games on the test, and something in the high 30s when there is baseball on the test, so my graph looks like a hedgehog's come by and drawn its ideal haircut.

Also, while I'm posting stuff about games: would those people who said they were interested in Lexicon (five definite, nine maybe, and I'm not above just naming all of you) please either come and join the rest of us, or tell me that you're not actually interested anymore. Thanks!

And, that's all for now.

This poll is to refine the genre and theme and such for the game, and to get a final idea of who's playing. So, without further ado...

[Poll #1125461]

Comments and discussion are encouraged here (and disabled here) so that we're not trying to have a discussion spread over three different journals. Plus, the sooner we get to something everyone's happy with, the sooner we can make the wiki and start playing.

Also, if you're planning to play, please do remember to join

apathy_games while you're there. Thanks!

People interested in playing Lexicon:

I've cleaned up

apathy_games for the most part, so, if you're interested in playing, feel free to wander over and join. The genre at the moment seems to be leaning toward some kind of blend of fantasy, steampunk, new weird, and maybe a couple of other things, but it is subject to change until people are happy with it.

I think we'll probably move most of the planning-type stuff there, too, instead of the current cross-post system we seem to be using.

And if you haven't a clue what this whole Lexicon thing's about, you can find the previous posts here.

Non-Windows people who wanted to do the comment stats meme:

There's a working online version of it here. It won't let you exclude your own comments and doesn't stop at 100, but, on the plus side, you don't have to even think about touching Windows.

Australian flist people who have televisions:

Burn Notice starts at ~~8:30~~ 9:30 tonight on Ten. Watch it, for it is good. Then, after, make stabby motions at pretend programming executives who make last-minute changes to timeslots.

(Or, if you'd rather not see it on evil commercial TV, find a copy from the Alternative Source™ of your choice and watch it that way, for it is good.)

People reading this post who may or may not fit into any of the above categories:

Hello!

That is all.

As a follow-up to the previous posts, we've been working on sorting out some more details for the game.

For those who missed it, or who'd like a summary here: Lexicon is a game where players take on the role of revisionist scholars writing an encyclopaedia about some fictional setting, or event, or place. Each turn, players write encyclopaedia entries with topics that start with a particular letter; these entries must link to a previous entry (where such entries exist) and link to two as-yet unwritten entries. Entries may (and should!) disagree wildly on interpretations, but any fact given in an entry is true within the game world; your colleagues are misguided idiots, but are honest in their work.

Most people who answered the first poll seem to be happiest with using a wiki for the entries, and an LJ comm to sort out administrative and metagame stuff. To this end, we're currently planning to use Wikidot.com to host the wiki, and to clean up and recycle

apathy_games for the rest of it. (Don't join the comm just yet, though; we'll be clearing out the members list at the same time as the old entries.)

At the moment, we're mostly settled on the idea of players writing two entries each week - A and B, C and D, and so forth, which would make a game last about 13 weeks. The "rule of X" would also be used - on the W-X turn, the X article can instead begin with any letter at all.

For those who can't write their entries by the due dates (for whatever reason), stubs are perfectly acceptable, provided they meet the linking requirements. These stubs could then be filled in at a later time, but would have to agree with any facts posted in later entries.

Theme and genre are yet to be decided; what we'd like to do at the moment is see what you think of what we've got so far, find out who's probably going to play, and start trying to sort out a game topic that works for everyone.

To that end, if you're still interested in playing, please answer the poll below and post any other ideas or comments you have in the comments here. Thanks!

[Poll #1109658]

(10 points for anyone who can tell me what the subject line references)

palmer_kun has notions of starting a game of Lexicon.

Lexicon is a game where players, in the role of scholars in a fictional setting, are collaboratively writing an encyclopaedia. There are twenty-six turns in a game of Lexicon, with each corresponding to a letter of the alphabet.

The player whose turn it is must then write an encyclopaedia entry on a topic beginning with that letter. If undefined topics exist for that letter, they have to pick one of those; otherwise, they can make up one of their own. The entry must link to at least one previous entry (if any exist) and two undefined entries that begin with later letters (unless there's at least one undefined entry for every letter left in the game, in which case no new entries may be created).

Overall, the game can be fairly well described as a blend of role-playing, world-building and creative writing. It runs smoothest as a wiki, but

palmer_kun has some ideas about how it could be adapted to be playable in an LJ comm like

apathy_games.

So!

[Poll #1106984]

And should you have any other ideas or suggestions, do feel free to comment.