Practice Random Acts of Disdainfulness

Not this sort of text-based game.

Upstart start-up Choice of Games offers up a fine debut effort with the text-based (but tasty) Choice of the Dragon. Versions are available for the iPhone and Android, or you can play in your Javascript-enabled browser for free. The game owes some of its narrative structure to the old choose-your-own-adventure paperbacks, but adds some CRPG flexibility — mostly behind the scenes, so you need never worry about the mechanics.

In my opinion, more RPGs should track “disdain” as a stat. I certainly found this one worthy of repeated playthroughs. Via io9 by way of Gizmodo.

Netbook Décor

If this site has a topic at all, then it’s technology and dragons. (It’s right there in the tagline, after all.) Usually I have to make do with one or the other. This is the rare post where I can get both involved. Pictured right is my Acer Aspire One netbook. You might note (“Just look at it!”, etc.) that it has gone from being plain and corporate and boring to being attractively decorated. The process involved a Sharpie permanent marker, and the considerable skill of an artist (not me) who made me swear to conceal his identity, on account of — and I quote — “not being able to draw dragons.”

Much happiness. Your netbook is not as nice as mine. (If you believe otherwise, I want to see pictures.)

In Soviet Russia, Dragon Uses eBay to Buy You

DSC00218I’m allergic to “cute”, but the little fellow to the right doesn’t read that way. (Not cute; much fierce!) He was a steal on eBay, and came to me all the way from the former Soviet Union. This is the kind of global economy I can get behind: buying a one-of-a-kind item from the opposite side of the globe. (Don’t worry; I still support local dragon-sculptors whenever I can.)

He showed up in an actual, literal brown paper package tied up with string, too. More pictures after the cut.

Lego Dragon Necromancy

4083641006_275c427e65_oUsing the blackest of all dark rituals and a whole lot of expensive Danish plastic, Flickr user “necromancer7” from Seoul, Korea has brought this creature to terrifying un-life. You can see a number of other shots of this bone dragon (as well as other good stuff) on his photostream.

(Via Gizmodo.)

A Dignity of Dragons

local copy; follow link in article text for original
local copy; follow link in article text for original

Dave Malki at Wondermark presents the Stoakes-Whibley Natural Index of Supernatural Collective Nouns, and in so doing performs a valuable service for a worried public. So many confusing and embarassing errors might have been prevented through the timely use of Mr. Malki’s comprehensive and accurate reference.

(Via Making Light.)

ETA: Other dragon-related collective noun suggestions include flight, wing, weyr (from multiple sources), doom, blaze and horde. None of them appeal to the same degree as the definitive Stoakes-Whibley answer.