February Limps Over The Horizon

This one has actually been out for a couple of weeks, but the February issue of Game Developer debuted, and it features the totally rawk Guitar Hero cover (hi-res version), including flames on the GD logo. Actually, it's been one of our best-received issues in a while, which is nice.

Next up is the March 2006 issue, which actually went to the printers already, thanks to the compressed schedules leading up to GDC, and that features a pretty darn interesting postmortem of Neversoft's Gun as a cover feature, documenting why the highest-profile original IP game of last holiday season really wasn't quite the smash critical hit they might have hoped for.

In addition, there's a longform GDC preview that includes a whole bunch of editor picks for next month's show, plus a fascinating long technical piece on virtual skyscape (sun, stars, moon, cloud) construction, as well as our typical code, art, audio, design, and business columns - and it's all packaged in a bumper size, too. As for April, which we're just finishing now - more about that next month, but ahem, King Kong, Will Wright?

Outside the magazine realm, our work on Gamasutra continues to go pretty well, with a plethora of new features - go poke a few. I'm particularly enamored with the anomalous but amusing two columns thus far from 'mysterious German developer' Schadenfreude Interactive, in which we discover who "the Alexei Pajitnov of the Black Forest" is, and if "there still a market nowadays for a tern-based [strategy] game". (And no, they aren't by me.)

Also going darn well is GameSetWatch, which got Digg-ed (Dugg?) earlier this month, to the tune of quite a few hits - we're also planning to add some columns to sit among the bloglike content, because we're weird like that. Otherwise, been doing _lots_ of logistical work regarding the IGF, and also messing with a Sprint Power Vision phone that they sent me as part of a promotional campaign to get the blogosphere buzzing - FWIW, mobile TV is particularly cool, but reception is a bit spotty down here on the South Bay to use it thoroughly on my morning commute.

Phew... and that's all she wrote. I'm just planning carefully to get over the GDC hump, and then it's off to New York and Boston with Holly to see my family (over from the UK!) in early April - should be lots of fun. Over and out.