Michael S. Miller

The only time I can recall online discussion of a game of mine making me smile was an ancient RPG.net thread that called FVLMINATA the "worst initiative system of all time." I relished the fact that I had outraged someone's (several people's, actually) sensibilities.

I'm a moderate at heart. I'm not in-your-face. I'm not offensive. But I still can't wipe the smile off my face when I recall that thread.

Should I be doing more of that kind of thing? Should I be more assertive and controversial? I dislike when people generate controversy to garner attention. I find it cheapens any interaction.

But I've still got some assertive, controversial things to say. I just say them nicely. Serial Homicide Unit says to society and fanboy culture: "Your fixation on violence and identification with criminal behavior is wrong. It is sick and twisted. You're on the wrong side." It is a subversive game that puts the lie to its genre.

And nobody plays it.

Maybe I should be more controversial for the most American of reasons: To make more money.

I don't know the answer to this. I've got to ruminate on it some more.

Gerald Cameron posted a review of SHU on Game Cryer I LOVE it when people grok what we were aiming for. It's thought-provoking and well-written. Check it out!

DEXCON 12 was only half a con for me, due to my inability to get any time off from work. It was a good time, but I couldn't seem to get up a head of steam that would have made it a great time.

( Plenty of words describing not so much gaming )

It's about an hour and half since we arrived home from Origins 2009. I sit here with more caffiene than blood in my veins and try to unwind enough to go to bed. It was a great con. Attendance looked light, but the folks that were there had a good time. Here's my high points of the show:

Tuesday
A rush to pack and an error made months ago with the rental car was a bit of a scare, but by the time Bill arrived, everything was A-OK. Got to bed late, but raring to go in the morning.

Wednesday
The Drive. Michele was battling a cold, so we took plenty of rest stops. I didn't mind because we had no booth obligations and therefore no deadline. We left at a sane 7 AM and arrived about 4 PM, which allowed us to eat at the fabulous North Market. My pad thai was hotter than I could stomach, but that proved beneficial later on. We got checked in, taught Michele how to play Euchre, and got some sleep.

Thursday
Both Kat and I wisely scheduled our Thursday games to begin at noon, so that we would avoid the early-morning lull that sometimes occurs when there's a hiccup in the registration system. This time, there was no hiccup to worry about, but there was also a noticeable shortage of attendees. Even with a huge swath of the breezeway missing due to renovation, the place didn't feel crowded enough. I think I got a picture of the crowd present at the opening of the exhibit hall, and it wasn't nearly as large as it's been in the past.

Anyway, I kicked the day off w/ dropping off 5 copies of SHU with the ever-gracious and ever-upbeat Andy Kitkowski. He and his boothmates allowed me to grab a bit of space in his booth to make SHU available for sale. It was greatly appreciated.

At noon, Kat ran a new WGP... scenario, and I ran Ganakagok. I had 2 players: Cary and Amber. Thinking that 2 characters would be too few in the reaction rounds, I also made a character myself. In the end, it added nothing to the game, and I wouldn't do it again. The game was good (as always), and I even found a few ways to improve the text that I had overlooked while editing.

After dinner, I hung out a bit w/ Luke, Thor, Jared, and Jamey. We caught up on RL stuff. I got to see the tail end of Jamey's satirical Nicotine Girls hack. Plus, we playtested ... Yonder Knights! I never would have imagined playing that in my wildest dreams! The game doesn't really work, but there was much discussion and diagnosis of exactly WHY it doesn't work, which was really super helpful.

Friday
Friday started w/ both Kat and I having 10AM games. Hers was, of course, some incredible, amazing WGP... and mine was SHU. I had two great players: Todd and Lisa. We stopped a serial killer whose profile was that he was hunting down children's entertainers. As often happens, the kinda silly profile did not impede the drama and tragedy of the inevitable deaths. I can't think of a game that I enjoy more consistently than Serial Homicide Unit.

After the SHU game, I checked out the maiden voyage of Luke and Jared's new seminar: Practical Game Design. It was a clear and informative roadmap to take someone from the Three Questions to being able to judge whether dice or cards will do the job their game needs done. It gave me much food for thought, particularly in light of the previous night's unfun playtest.

One of the great disappointments of this year's construction was the closing of the kitchen in the Krema Nut Company store. NO PEANUT BUTTER MILKSHAKES! However, Thor's clever cell phone knew of the company's headquarters store 2 miles away. Being New Yorkers, they were going to hoof it. But with my power of Rental Car, I got us to the peanut-flavored heaven and back again in air-conditioned comfort!

Friday evening saw a nice dinner w/ Kat, Bill, and Michele, and then chatting till midnight w/ the NYC crew.

Saturday
Saturday was supposed to be my busiest day. I was scheduled to run SHU from 10AM to 2PM, and help Luke run a seminar from 1PM (fun scheduling error!) to 3PM, and then run Ganakagok from 8PM to midnight. Unfortunately, I had no players for SHU, which gave me far too much time to shop. I looked at every booth and still had time to spare before the panel.

The self publishing panel is, as Luke likes to call it, a firehose of information. We ran right up to the full 2 hour mark, barely stopping for questions and could have kept going. It's a thrill to give that panel.

Afterwards, Luke was running a demo of Mouse Guard for a reviewer named Ben and his girlfriend Danielle. I sat in to bring the group up to three, and got to deliver the killing blow to a vicious milk snake that wanted to devour us all!

A surprising one-on-one dinner w/ Kat followed, which allowed for a nice de-stressing to occur.

After that, it was back to frozen lands of Ganakagok, where 6 players showed and we made a great myth about the splintering of the island and its fertile ground floating into the sunlit worlds.

Sunday
Today started with some great news: Mouse Guard won the Origins Award for Best RPG! Congrats to Luke and the Burning Crew for another game well-designed (and one I can actually play this time!)

Then there was just last minute shopping, lunch, The Drive, and now this. An excellent weekend in an excellent city at an excellent con. You can't ask for more than that.

The audio demo of Serial Homicide Unit is now available here.

Russell Collins, our esteemed narrator, has produced a brilliantly atmospheric and informative demo that is FULLY PLAYABLE. The recorded instructions are a bit longer than 7 minutes. They provide step-by-step instructions for playing a brief demo of Serial Homicide Unit. The demo is provided in MP3 format, and is 13.5MB. Feel free to link to this demo from wherever you think appropriate.

Try it for free. Protect the innocent. Hunt down a killer.

I just listened to the upcoming free demo of Serial Homicide Unit. Again, Russell Collins has used his vocal and musical talents to drive the dread of our game right up your ears and into your brain.

Look for it to be available for download on Monday.

Well, now that the nasty stomach bug I picked up on Sunday (the only bad thing about Dreamation 2009) is finally behind me, I can recap my con experience.

( A whole lotta fun )

Overall, I'd say this was the most successful Indie Games Explosion yet. We scheduled over a hundred sessions, and I only heard of a handful that didn't attract enough players to run. That's quite an accomplishment. I'd like to thank each and every publisher, GM, attendee, con organizer and staff member who helped make that possible.

I've only had a chance to barely scratch the surface of the kerfluffle kicked off by Vinny's remarks on Sunday. I've seen some people like Judd, Fred, and jason Morningstar saying very sensible things. I've seen other people say some very inflammatory things. Such is the way of the internet.

I'll weigh in on some specific points later, but right now I don't know the best way to reach our common goal--a continually-improving Explosion--but I do know that we'll get there the same way we've gotten to where we are--with good ideas being put into practice through effort, communication, and cooperation.

View with awe the sight that greeted me as I came home tonight:


Guess who's going to be collating this week? With a massive grin on his face?

Paul and Brennan of Voice of the Revolution have reviewed Serial Homicide Unit in their latest episode. Their observations are insightful and enlightening, as always. It's always gratifying when someone else understands what we're aiming for in a game design.

Thanks to Paul and Brennan for giving the game their thorough scrutiny. Give it a listen.

Per Fischer, Jason Dockins, and Ludanto have started a play-by-post game of Serial Homicide Unit. It kicks off in this thread. They've nearly finished their first round of civilian scenes, and the game is quite interesting. The profile they've chosen is "grade school teachers" and I'm anxious to see what they come up with.

For a limited time, you can preorder the physical edition of Serial Homicide Unit at a special rate. The final retail price will be $25.00 plus shipping fees. From now through January 31, 2009, you can preorder this game for only $20.00 including shipping (US shipments only). In addition, you will get the electronic edition of the game absolutely free.

This physical edition is packaged in a DVD case for easy transport. It includes:

• audio instruction CD that explain the rules of the game as you play.
  
• rules reference card
  
• six investigator cards
  
• one chief investigator card
  
• six civilian cards
  
• six name cards
  
• six name envelopes
  
• one pad of clue notes
  
• PDFs of all documents

I got an e-mail from a gamer in Mexico (isn't the Internet cool?) asking about Serial Homicide Unit. He wanted to know whether it was like a Choose Your Own Adventure book. I'm still getting used to talking about the game. This was my response:


Thanks for your interest. Serial Homicide Unit is not very much like a Choose Your Own Adventure. It's more like being taught how to play a game by audio tutorial. The audio doesn't contain details about the serial killer or clues found at the crime scenes. It tells you when the serial killer strikes again, and explains how your group can create these clues on your own.

The first few tracks give an overview of the game and--because there can be no investigation before there has been a crime--teach you how to make interesting civilian characters that might be the killer's next victim. Then another track explains how to play out a scene from the life of these civilians. After everyone has played out a civilian scene, the next few tracks describe how the police begin to investigate the murders. Everyone plays their own investigator and imagines their own clues found at the crime scene. These clues work together in a growing pool of evidence that may eventually lead to the killer's capture. Then you play another civilian scene. Then, track 9 tells you which of your civilian characters have been murdered. Then, your police characters investigate that murder. You continue back and forth between civilian scenes and investigation scenes, with the killer murdering another civilian each round. Once you think you have enough evidence, you roll the dice to see if your case holds up in court. If so, you capture the killer! If not, the murders continue and some evidence is thrown out. The game ends when the killer is captured, or when the killer has murdered every last one of the civilian characters. Can you save them in time?


What do you think? For those who have played the game: Does this explain SHU without giving everything away?

For those who haven't played the game: Is this clear and understandable? Does it grab your interest and make the game seem appealing?

The electronic edition of Serial Homicide Unit is now available at Indie Press Revolution. The electronic edition sells for $15.00 and includes:

• 14 audio files in .mp3 format that explain the rules of the game as you play.


• A PDF of the complete script used to create the audio files.


• PDFs of all forms needed for gameplay.


• A "ReadMe.pdf" that explains how to prepare the game for play.

Preorders for the print edition will start within the next week or so, and will include the electronic edition as a bonus.

Thanks to all who have made this game possible. Have a Happy New Year, everybody!

I've got the proof of Serial Homicide Unit in my hands. It needs a few tweaks, but on the whole, it looks good. We won't be able to ship physical copies before the end of the year, but January 15 looks VERY likely. Yay! Preorders will open in the next week.

There was lots of noise and chaos in the house yesterday. None of it needed my help, so I read through my PDF of the Mouse Guard RPG. Wow! I love the way Luke and company keep their games firmly rooted in sweat and mud. In this game, mud can even kill you!

Plus, they've streamlined the Burning Wheel architecture down to its most essential parts. I playtested it back at Dreamation and commented that it seemed like an implementation of Burning Wheel that could actually fit into my life. Reading it, I can see that I was right. I'll be running two sessions of it at Dreamation.

I'll also be running two sessions of Serial Homicide Unit. And a session of Mechaton for good measure. I'm toying around with possibly running a session of Ganakagok, but I'm not sure.

Speaking of which, deadline for IGE registration is less than three weeks away and we've only had a handful of people sign up! C'mon, people. It's the Indie Games Explosion at Dreamation! Run some fun!

Here is the cover for Serial Homicide Unit. With a little luck, I'll be able to start shipping these before the calendar says "2009." More details on preorders to come!

The Serial Homicide Unit playtest period is closed. Thanks to all of you who requested playtest materials, whether you playtested or not. My most extreme gratitude to those who playtested the game and gave us greatly useful feedback. Serial Homicide Unit will be a far better game because of it.

It will also be a far better game because we've secured the confident and creepy voice of Russell Collins to do the recording. Russ is probably best known to readers of this LJ as gainsclockwork, the designer of the hitman RPG, Contract Work, and the man at DexCon and Dreamation in the pinstripe suit, rubber gloves, and air of menace. Russ has also composed and arranged the music for the game, as well as playtesting it. Kat and I greatly appreciate the talent he brings to our game.

Things are really looking bright for the future of Serial Homicide Unit.

To those waiting to get their hands on the finished version of the game: You'll have to wait a bit longer. I hope to be soliciting preorders around Thanksgiving, and shipping them in time for Christmas. Watch this space. And watch your back. There's a killer out there...

This past weekend Kat and I traveled south of the Mason-Dixon for a little get-together called Cleavercon. Dave Cleaver's birthday is coming up, so he threw himself a game day. It was a good day, and I like the gameday/birthday party idea. Hmmm, I have a birthday coming up in the fall...

( We played Mist-Robed Gate and Serial Homicide Unit )

In other news, I just finished editing Bill White's amazing Ganakagok. This is a game I've been anticipating for a long time. The text is in good shape, and I'm glad I can help get it ready to release.

Thanks to all who suggested names. Kat and I have been suggesting several of them, plus ones of our own creation, to one another over the weekend. The current front-runner is: "Serial Homicide Unit: Hunting the Hunters"

I like it. It's a simple, direct name for a simple, direct game. But, what do you think?

ALSO, the deadline for playtests of this game is six weeks from today: September 9. If you, or anyone you know, has not yet played the game, and would be interested in playtesting (and receiving a free electronic copy of the game for your trouble), please contact me in the comments or at my gmail account: stalwartIP

Thanks!

I mentioned earlier that Serial has an image problem. People really enjoy the game once they play it, but are very reluctant to play (or playtest) it to begin with. Kat and I think we need to focus more on the police procedural aspects of gameplay when explaining the game, rather than the day-in-the-life-of-the-victim stuff.

Due to this the game also needs a new name. "Serial" also makes perfect, elegant sense AFTER you know what it is, but says nothing BEFOREHAND and isn't esoteric enough to intrigue people into finding out more.

Plus, when spoken, makes people say "Like breakfast cereal?"

Kat did an LJ entry looking for new titles, but as we have slightly different readerships, I wanted to solicit the brian trust over here. What would be a good name for Serial? A name that says "Play this game and catch a murdering monster" but it a short, snappy way.

Suggestions?

I sent out the material for the final playtest of Serial this morning. I've had several volunteers from new friends and old who have never played the game before. They've offered to print out the forms, listen to the audio, and let me know how well this format teaches the game. Getting help is truly a great thing!

If you wanted to playtest the game, but did not receive an e-mail this morning, let me know in the comments.