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The History Book: Week #5
Apr. 18th, 2010 07:41 pmFinalized two more history articles this week, Judges Guild and Pacesetter.
Judges Guild took more time because it was the longer article and because it required more revision. That was primarily because of my writing up of a box on The Wilderlands, which required research and careful description. It also led me to write a box on "Adventure Games", which was Dave Arneson's publishing house of the early 1980s. Finally, I had to clean up what's been happening to the Guild since 2007.
It's a bit sad, as when I first drafted this in 2007, things looked really positive, with a lot of companies wanting to publish Judges Guild material. But since they've pretty much all faded away, and in any case all the Judges Guild publications after that period ended up being really small press.
Pacesetter was the first article I've worked on that I hadn't completed editing back in 2007. So I had to do more incorporating of comments and such. This is always a challenge because I have to figure out which comments to take at face value, and which not to (and I mean that generally; the Pacesetter comments were cleaner than most). I'm sure that everything is offered in the best of good faith, but people working at these companies have their own personal biases.
(I actually think that TSR interviews and comments have given me the most trouble, because there was considerable acrimony in that company at several different times, and it shows in how set people are in pushing out their version of events. I think I use the phrase "depending on who you believe" more in that article than anywhere else.)
As I've been writing I've been surprised by how many holes there are still in the RPGnet Gaming Index. So, as I've written this last week I've filled in info on Adventure Games, Pacesetter, 54 40 Orphyte, Judges Guild, and others.
Next week: I think I'm going to stay in with TSR's wargaming roots by editing first SPI, then Avalon Hill (or maybe vice-versa to get the wargaming chronology right). Really, I've been avoiding Wizards of the Coast, because that is the one article that needs the most expansion, both because of the early origins of the article and how much that's happened since. Maybe I'll start on that the week after ...
Judges Guild took more time because it was the longer article and because it required more revision. That was primarily because of my writing up of a box on The Wilderlands, which required research and careful description. It also led me to write a box on "Adventure Games", which was Dave Arneson's publishing house of the early 1980s. Finally, I had to clean up what's been happening to the Guild since 2007.
It's a bit sad, as when I first drafted this in 2007, things looked really positive, with a lot of companies wanting to publish Judges Guild material. But since they've pretty much all faded away, and in any case all the Judges Guild publications after that period ended up being really small press.
Pacesetter was the first article I've worked on that I hadn't completed editing back in 2007. So I had to do more incorporating of comments and such. This is always a challenge because I have to figure out which comments to take at face value, and which not to (and I mean that generally; the Pacesetter comments were cleaner than most). I'm sure that everything is offered in the best of good faith, but people working at these companies have their own personal biases.
(I actually think that TSR interviews and comments have given me the most trouble, because there was considerable acrimony in that company at several different times, and it shows in how set people are in pushing out their version of events. I think I use the phrase "depending on who you believe" more in that article than anywhere else.)
As I've been writing I've been surprised by how many holes there are still in the RPGnet Gaming Index. So, as I've written this last week I've filled in info on Adventure Games, Pacesetter, 54 40 Orphyte, Judges Guild, and others.
Next week: I think I'm going to stay in with TSR's wargaming roots by editing first SPI, then Avalon Hill (or maybe vice-versa to get the wargaming chronology right). Really, I've been avoiding Wizards of the Coast, because that is the one article that needs the most expansion, both because of the early origins of the article and how much that's happened since. Maybe I'll start on that the week after ...