If you're a Twitter user (which is a bit longer, but a lot more polite than calling you a 'Twit') and you would like to follow my escapades at the Origins Game Fair this upcoming week, then be sure to follow the Escapist Twitter account at twitter.com/RPGadvocate

And if you're going to the convention and would like to meet up, send me a message through Twitter! (I won't have email after Tuesday morning when we head out, so this will be the only way to reach me.)

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I've been so busy making last-minute preparations for Origins, that I almost forgot to mention Free RPG Day, which is tomorrow!

Free RPG Day is a yearly event where game publishers offer special promotions to customers, to get the word out about their products. It's also a great way for people who have never tried RPGs before to check out a free game and maybe even find some people to show them the ropes.

So head out to your Friendly Local Game Store, score a free RPG, and have fun!

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This time next week, my family and I will be making our 10-hour trek from Delaware to Columbus, Ohio for the 2009 Origins Game Fair.

This will be my eighth Origins, the sixth with family in tow, and our fifth one in a row. And every time we've attended, we've played a lot of games, made new friends, and had a lot of fun.

I will be continuing my tradition (now in its third year!) of running RPGs for kids - and I've even added a game for the grownups this time. I'm running two games of Toon, and one each of Faery's Tale, Fuzzy Heroes, Mazes & Minotaurs, Monsters and Other Childish Things, and Tooth & Claw, and the 'grown-up' game is a very special episode of Cartoon Action Hour.

My kids' games have been known to sell out quickly - last year, most of them were sold out two weeks before the convention! So if you are interested in any of them, be sure to sign up as soon as possible.

If you will be attending the convention and would like to meet up, I'm always happy to do so. You can contact me via email or follow me on Twitter - I'll be posting Twitter updates regularly at the convention.

Hope to see you there!

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Recently, a reader submitted an idea that I like a lot - posting pictures of gamers enjoying a good RPG or LARP on the FAQ page and various other pages, to put a human face on the hobby for the non-gamers who visit the site.

So, if you're interested in participating, and you have some good pics of you and your group playing an RPG, drop me an email!

Here's what I'd like to get from you:
- A picture (naturally)
- The names of everyone in the picture (or aliases) and which of you is the GM
- Where you are from (outside the U.S. is great, by the way!)
- Your statement that I have permission from everyone in the picture to post the picture and names on my site (just a little CYA here...)
- What RPG you're playing in the picture

Thanks in advance!

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Boingboing's Cory Doctorow blogged about this D20 wedding cake today.

It's so awesome that I'm at a loss for words.

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XKCD demystifies one of the greatest literary enigmas of all time, the Voynich Manuscript:



Yeah, I should have known it all along...

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Over on libraryjournal.com, Liz Danforth has posted a new piece on roleplaying games in the library. Don't miss it!

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...and this is the first post!

I figure it's never too late to catch up with the 21st century. I would have done this a while ago, but certain tech limitations prevented it.

Big thanks go out to Jacob Ezzell for his help and patience, and Stormbringer (from the Citadel of Chaos) for suggesting a CMS and answering my myriad of questions about it.

The news and updates that I used to post to the main page will now be posted here, at www.theescapist.com/blog This does mean that any of you who are following the updates on the LiveJournal feed will want to subscribe to the RSS feed for this one, as I will stop updating the LJ feed after a while.

Coming soon - on-site forums and wikis. (The current Escapist wikis will be moved here when they go live.)

Stay tuned!

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