Jake and the Barrel

This is a short story I wrote a few weeks back about one of the characters in our D&D group. It was an attempt to emulate the voice of an Adamsian or Pratchettean narrator, and more generally to delve into comedy, which is something I don't do too often. Though comparing myself to the aforementioned authors borders on masochism, I was kind of happy with the finished piece.

The story is the lead-up to a new member of our D&D group joining the party. The titular character, Jake, was the player's first character. As is often the case with first characters, Jake is less "inspired" and more "inspired by," in a way that should be thoroughly transparent by the end of the piece.

Rowan of Rin

Over the summer break, I decided to re-read a bunch of Emily Rodda books that were lying around the house. I'm starting a Children's Literature unit at uni this semester, and thought it'd be useful to refresh my knowledge of a few of my favourites as a child.

I hadn't read any of these books in over ten years. I started with Deltora Quest, mainly because I'd only read it once, but also because I thought it'd be good fuel for D&D. I enjoyed quite thoroughly, and even continued into the second and third series, which I'd not read before. After that, I went back into the books that had introduced me to the author, starting with Rowan of Rin.

For those of you who haven't read the book, I recommend it. It'll take you less than two hours, and it's a good one to add to the "when I have kids" library. Spoilers will follow the jump, but I'll give you the premise, and you can decide if they really count as such.

Rowan is a small, fearful boy in the valley of Rin. The Rin people value strength and courage, and Rowan is considered to be fairly useless. The valley of Rin is fed by a single river flowing from the ominous Forbidden Mountain, said to be guarded by a fierce dragon. One day, the river mysteriously stops, and a group of the strongest villagers volunteer to travel into the perilous unknown and find the cause. A witch decides to help out, and gives them a map showing the dangers of the journey, which only Rowan can read. Rowan must accompany the party, who think him a burden, on a dangerous journey to save those he loves.

Spoilers follow

Welcome to The Hearth

Welcome the The Hearth, my first blog. That the intro follows the first post should give some indication as to how experienced I am in this medium. The Hearth is a simple experiment I'm running, testing nothing more than my own ability to write a blog.

The Hearth is going to be extremely unprofessional. Irregular, unscheduled updates will cover anything my thoughts fancy at the time, which is most often going to be impressions on games, film, books and other fluffy entertainment. As an (unpublished) writer, you may also see some of the less-horrible of my works pop up here. Trust that they will be carefully selected to make myself seem much more talented than I am.

So who the fuck am I? My name is David, and my life is about as interesting as my name. I'm studying writing at uni, which I fucking love, and before that I studied game design, which was okay. I enjoy everything a mid-twenties, middle-class Australian does, though a particular emphasis can be laid on games and film. I take part in a weekly D&D game with a small group of friends, and we suffer together under the tyrannical rule of our sadistic dungeon master.

So that's what you've got to look forward to. There may be some people out there who can stomach my incomparable self-indulgence, and hopefully you will find something of value here. To those who can't, I offer my heartfelt sympathies, and hope that the Rest Of The Internet will suffice.

Welcome to The Hearth.

Titanfall

The beta for Titanfall ended about an hour ago. This saddens me, because I was having a shit-tonne (metric) of fun with it.

Entry into the Beta was initially meant to be controlled, but logistical errors quickly saw the price of entry change to "an Xbox One." Of course, I've yet to part with the money required to own any next (now "current") gen console, and those of us on PC were still subject to the draw.

My brother was lucky enough to be selected for the beta, and I was lucky enough to be the nearest person with a computer that could handle it. Titanfall is the first game I've seen that requires a 64-bit operating system, though any of us with the technical understanding of what that means knew it was only a matter of time. He and I entered in to a fairly predictable agreement, splitting play time between us.

We sunk a little over 10 hours into the beta, and I'm sure the lion's share of it was mine. This is highly unusual for me; I've never been one for multi-player shooters. The only purely competitive game I've spent any real time in it League of Legends, and even other members of the MOBA arena weren't enough to hold my attention. In addition, betas don't generally sell me on games I wasn't planning on purchasing to begin with.

Titanfall is another matter entirely.