Adventure Author

Well done, Ollie

Well done to Ollie Bray, a local teacher who has won an award for his innovation with games in the classroom. "Ollie Bray, depute headteacher of Musselbrough Grammar School, East Lothian, took first place in the Innovation in Community section for his presentation of 'Thinking out of the XBOX' at the Innovative Teachers Forum 2009 in Vienna" (http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/news/2009/educational/march/news_tcm4541959.asp?strReferringChannel=aboutlts)
 Tell you what, it's all happening in Scotland!

Kodu

Microsoft are releasing a game authoring tool for kids (Kodu) on the XBox this Spring. See http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/244984/ces-video-kodu-programming-for-kids.html for a demo of some of the features, and http://www.n4g.com/News-256446.aspx for a little girl demonstrating her Kodu game at a conference. Thanks to Hywel for pointing this out to me.

R.I.P. Gary Gygax

Goodbye to E. Gary Gygax, co-creator of the Dungeons & Dragons tabletop game. D&D was and is the basis for many classic computer role-playing games, Neverwinter Nights 2 being among the most recent. xkcd has a fitting tribute.

Neverwinter Nights 2 community update blog

The original Neverwinter Nights game was released in 2002, and still has an active online community, something which few 6-year old games can boast.

Adventure Author is built upon the sequel, Neverwinter Nights 2, which is fortunate to have developers (Obsidian Entertainment) who understand the importance of supporting an online community. Nearly 18 months after the game's release, there's still an active blog (Neverwinter Nights 2 Community Update) posted every couple of weeks or so with a major update on community news, upcoming patches and fresh game content from fans and developers both. The latest update concerns an area design contest with prizes to be won, as well as developer answers to a bunch of community questions.