Fantasist's Scroll

“He’s go the whole blog, in his hands!”

My darling wife sent me a link to the World as a Blog, which is as fun a site as I’ve seen. It shows you a map of the world and, as registered blogs update, it pops up those updates in little windows! How cool!
So, if you sit and watch, you can see what bloggers all around the world are posting about. In real time! I haven’t signed up for this, yet, but you can bet I will!

Yes, this appeared on my other blog last week.
Now, it’s Friday, go have fun!

Cool article at Wizards…

At least, if you’re into the new d20 Modern game. The article is about “crossing over” from a fantasy world to “real” world and all the problems that might be encountered. Very cool and well thought out.
The article addresses things like getting ID when one is from another reality. Dealing with the “locals”. How to make money, or otherwise deal with the harsh realities of life. Written by one of the veteran gamers who actually wrote the d20 Modern rules, the article is both insightful and thought-provoking.

It’s also useful to an author who may be interested in writing about some of the same issues. How would an elf who’s found themselves alone in the big city react? What would be their first goal? What kinds of challenges would they face? All excellent material for a story.

brought to you by Wizards of the Coast.

Or, is that Hasbro? Well, I can’t keep track anymore, but whoever they are this week, they’ve collected a bunch of desktop backgrounds into a single page. Over the past couple of years, gamers have been treated to a new set of Dungeons and Dragons rules and a whole new set of rule books. As part of that marketing campaign, the current creators of D&D 3E have made some of the art from those books into desktop wallpapers. And, finally, they’ve collected most of them on one page. So, here they are, the Dungeons and Dragons fantasy wallpapers! (Oh, there are some d20 Modern wallpapers, too.)

Enjoy!

Okay, ready?

Here’s a website called Googlism that’s a Google based free association engine. You just fill in your name, or a friend’s name, or whatever, and go for it. You’ll see all kinds of free association associations that Google makes with your input.
My wife found this endlessly entertaining. And, I can see how it might be good to generate starting sentences for a writing exercise.

Anyway, it’s Friday and, if you’re week has been anything like mine, you probably could use a creative stimulation break. So, go have fun!

Remember Warehouse 23’s Basement?

Well, it doesn’t exist, as such, any more, but I really, really liked it. So, I created a fantasy version, which I call The Alchemist’s Attic.
I still need to add a form for submissions, so you folks can do my creative work for me, but I’ll get there. I’ll especially need strange, but real, books for that last shelf. I really want to keep it fantasy, not science-fiction, though, so keep that in mind if you e-mail me anything.

Anyway, it’s Friday! Have fun!!

A “do-it-yourself” Rosetta stone!

For those of you who are already familiar with my conlang resources, you know that they’re mostly based on scripts originally written by Chris Pound. Well, one of the scripts he wrote was to automatically transliterate a text into a more or less realistic conlang text that’s generated on the fly. Sounds fun, right? Well, now you can do it on the web with Fantasist.net’s Rosetta Stone Game! Using the same principles and source files as the Conlang Word Generator and the Name Maker, you can make your very own, original Rosetta Stone to “decrypt”.

Okay, so maybe this is only fun for linguistics and conlang geeks, but still, it’s Friday, so lighten up and have fun with it.

A fun literary game.

I actually found this on Joe Clifford Faust’s blog, but I’m gonna’ post it anyway! The website is called First Lines. It’s a simple game, actually, the page presents you with a series of first lines from novels and you try to remember (I.E. Guess) who wrote it and in what novel. There’s no grading or anything, but it’s still fun. And, it’s a powerful reminder of the importance of the first line of your own work.
But, heck, it’s Friday, go have fun!

Ever want to learn a conlang?

Was it just too intimidating? What if you could learn it one word at a time? Well, Terrence Donnelly created the Tsolyani Word a Day page just for you! Yes, now you, too, can learn a created language one word, per day, at a time. Don’t delay! Start today!