Author Archive for Chris Dias
Chris Tavares Dias is the literary equivalent of that crusty burnt cheese at the bottom of the fondue pot. Some people claim he looks like Mathew Perry. He would like that to be true. It's not. In 2010, Chris co-wrote and created Amethyst Foundations, a 4th Edition setting based on the previous version under 3.5. It has received critical acclaim for integrating science fiction into classical fantasy. In August of this year, Chris was last seen staring at a dead raven that had fallen beside his car. Two months later, his watch and notepad were found in the stomach of a basking shark that had washed ashore off the coast of Florida.
Economics of Gaming: Pre-Ordering
Before I address this topic, I have to come clean about the “question.” Basically, I was curious about why anyone would pre-order a game in an encroaching digital future. I was also curious if companies are really required to offer them anymore. Initially, the reasons for pre-ordering were two-fold. Firstly, it was a way for [...]
An Infinite Rant about Bioshock – The Spoiler filled Analysis
The title should give it away… You have been warned… …so I’m just going to dive into this thing… In Bioshock Infinite, you play as Booker DeWitt, an ex-cavalry man, recently involved in the massacre of Wounded Knee, emerging from that experience emotional scarred and wracked with guilt (still a far better fate than most [...]
Good Endings
One of my all time favorite terms relating to writing is “saccharine.” It’s such a great metaphor. It indicates that while a naturally sweet story point is just that, one that is saccharine, as you’d expect, is artificially sweetened, meaning the author has manipulated the characters and events in a jarring way to create something [...]
NeuroSpasta Released
It might a year and a half late, but NeuroSpasta, DEM’s cyberpunk setting, has finally been released. It was a difficult process trying to create rules for hacking and cybernetics which was still GSL-compliant with 4th Edition D&D rules as well as being actually fun. Originally, NeuroSpasta was meant to be part of Ultramodern but [...]
Bad Endings
Have you ever had a campaign end properly—I mean properly, like it ended with a climax and not because the group disbanded or lost interest? It happens rarely, I understand that. I mentioned recently my own Amethyst game finally ran its last session after eleven years. It did so with a note of finality to [...]
Economics of Gaming: Digital Rights Management
My PC build is two years old, loaded with top of the line hardware at that time. I can still run nearly every game at max settings, something my previous ten PCs couldn’t do for more than six months. Yes, the industry is slowing but one of the reasons is because publishers have little incentive [...]
Is Tolkien Irrelevant?
I’ve heard from some people that JRR Tolkien was the worst thing to ever happen to fantasy, while others defend him to exhaustion that there would not be a fantasy genre at the successful state it is in now if it wasn’t for him. Whether or not he was a good writer is different than [...]
Economics of Gaming – Microtransactions
Recently, a few of my friends confused micro-transactions with downloadable content. Generally, downloadable content is a game extension, including new maps, characters, story-missions, and can run anywhere from a dollar to as much at $30. Microtransactions involve paying small to moderate fees to enhance an existing experience, occasionally in the form of a new weapon [...]
Economics of Gaming – Downloadable Content
I recently teased on my company’s Facebook page that DEM’s next book, NeuroSpasta will have DRM which will result in either the digital book deleting itself or the physical book bursting into flames after it’s been read seven times. The economics of video games has been under considerable fire recently, with most of warheads focused [...]