Tag Archives: essays

Roleplayers Chronicle: Designer’s Diary

Posted on June 13, 2011 by Jason L Blair

Aaron T. Huss, from Mystical Throne Entertainment, contacted me recently about doing a Designer’s Diary for his Roleplayers Chronicle website and I quickly agreed. The piece went live over the weekend and touches briefly on the work that went into … Continue reading →

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Operation: Awesome – The 1000-Word Plan

Posted on May 5, 2011 by Jason L Blair

One thousand words. It’s not a lot. But neither is a single grain of sand. Earlier this year, I hit a hard realization: Writing wasn’t working for me anymore. I was writing in spurts. Some days I’d hit 3000 words … Continue reading →

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Death of a PlayStation

Posted on October 13, 2010 by Jason L Blair

I awoke Sunday morning to some terrible news: My PlayStation 2 was dead. Some kids were playing around and one of them, a friend of my daughter, had accidentally stepped on the disc tray, shattering it. As far as I … Continue reading →

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The Write Identity

Posted on September 21, 2010 by Jason L Blair

See, I lost focus. And that happens. I’m fallible and I know it. If I wasn’t, I wouldn’t have initiated Operation: Awesome. I would have just sat around wondering why no one recognized my genius. A couple weeks ago, I … Continue reading →

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Hamlet’s Hit Points

Posted on September 2, 2010 by Jason L Blair

A couple months ago, I had the honor of proofreading Hamlet’s Hit Points, the new work by esteemed game designer Robin D. Laws. In the book, Robin discusses how stories work and codifies the aspects that you find over and … Continue reading →

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The Three-Headed God

Posted on August 19, 2010 by Jason L Blair

Over at his blog, Daniel M. Perez shares the stomach-twisting playtest premier of his first tabletop design, a reimagining of the popular roleplaying game Vampire. Daniel’s travails at running his first design reminded me of the terror I felt when … Continue reading →

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It’s the Mileage

Posted on July 8, 2010 by Jason L Blair

I’m obsessed with age. I wasn’t always. Throughout my 20s, I rarely felt the pressure of a ticking clock. That’s not to say I didn’t wonder about my future and think about how I was going to be successful and … Continue reading →

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Preparing to be Awesome

Posted on June 30, 2010 by Jason L Blair

A couple weeks ago, I mapped out the basics of my plan to reprogram myself as a writer. It’s a process I call “Operation: Awesome” because that’s an incredibly uninspired and pretentious title and nothing amuses me more than uninspired … Continue reading →

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Rattling THE BONES

Posted on June 29, 2010 by Jason L Blair

Last September, I managed to convince the folks at Gameplaywright that I was worthy of being included in their next book. Their previous publication, the well-received Things We Think About Games, was buzzing around the gamer zeitgeist with supersonic speed … Continue reading →

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Operation: Awesome

Posted on June 8, 2010 by Jason L Blair

Earlier this year, I kicked off Operation: Awesome, a multi-phase attempt to reprogram myself as a writer. I had spent far too much of my life under this delusion that the traditional rules of writing and story didn’t apply to … Continue reading →

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