Is it too much to ask that we just have a few black guys who have done something in gaming and leave it at that?
Iselin nicked who I was going to pick darn you!
Pondsmith has done video game work but I am leaving that to one side.
The whole feel and background of Mike Pondsmith's Cyberpunk tabletop RPG was seminal and quite true to the work of the authors who established the genre though far closer to William Gibson's books than the genre as a whole. Indeed Gibson's version and from that Pondsmith's RPG treatment is in the main what the general public think of today as cyberpunk.
Of course there are other good RPG treatments of cyberpunk, but none were as true to Gibson vision. For example when Gibson heard about Shadowrun (released a year later) he said, "Spare me Elves".
Apart from that he helped write one of my favourite DnD settings Kara-Tur The Eastern Realms. Though not a DnD mechanics fan I have used a number of their great settings like this one myself.
He wrote Teenagers From Outer Space, a lark of an RPG which is (as far as I know) still dying for an anime series to be based on it.
And who can forget Castle Falkenstein, another seminal work which melded a clever game system with brilliant ideas and historical/pseudo historical background.
He has won multiple "Gamer's Choice Awards" and was inducted into Origins Hall of Fame.
Yeah I kept it brief and focused on current events. Thanks for fleshing it out though.
He's definitely one of my heroes especially since he is also an old fart from my generation
Good insights about Gibson and his visions also. He's another of my heroes and a local (to me) Vancouver writer.
I don't know how many here saw the first season of Altered Carbon and if they did, how many noticed the Gibson homage by changing the setting from the book to San Francisco and having squatters living on the bridge just like in the Gibson Bridge trilogy. I noticed it and got a kick out of that.
Not that I think cyberpunk has to adhere to the Gibson like vision but AC was one of the rare SF TV series that did. Which is noticeable as we get so few real SF series anyway, by which I mean not just an SF element like Travellers (still a really good series btw).
AC did mess Richard K. Morgan's vision around mind you, condensed characters and role swapping, but still it maintained the spirit of the book which it followed in the main. Fine series.
I did not catch that Bridge Trilogy reference, well spotted! Shame there was no third series, it may get revived but its a costly series for sure.
All things should be equal, Where is white history future month in gaming ?
damn. I bet klash was wondering how long it would take for this thread to get some super racist comments and you have done it in the 3rd post, at 6:18AM.Bravo!
It should have been Jerry Lawson month in gaming.... Why is it black history month ! Whos the racist ?
What does race have anything to do with this fine gentlemen's achievements ?
That's my point
Based on my wee bit of research, the celebration was first conceived by a historian named Carter G. Woodson. It was first practised in February of 1926 as Negro History Week. In 1976 it was expanded in duration and renamed Black History Month.
Though President Gerald Ford urged Americans to celebrate Black History Month, it was President Jimmy Carter that first officially recognized it in 1978. Since it has become a regular event in American schools with the federal government's blessing.
Black History Month has to do with the recognition of the achievements of black people. Jerry Lawson being black qualifies his achievements for that recognition.
Comments
AC did mess Richard K. Morgan's vision around mind you, condensed characters and role swapping, but still it maintained the spirit of the book which it followed in the main. Fine series.
I did not catch that Bridge Trilogy reference, well spotted! Shame there was no third series, it may get revived but its a costly series for sure.
Based on my wee bit of research, the celebration was first conceived by a historian named Carter G. Woodson. It was first practised in February of 1926 as Negro History Week. In 1976 it was expanded in duration and renamed Black History Month.
Though President Gerald Ford urged Americans to celebrate Black History Month, it was President Jimmy Carter that first officially recognized it in 1978. Since it has become a regular event in American schools with the federal government's blessing.