Friday, November 16, 2007

Lifehack edit copy is here!

The one and only copy of the Lifehack 2nd edition 'edit copy' is in my hands. This means it's not time for me to rally a volunteer edit/proofread team! The book will be passed from editor to editor, each one highlighting any mistakes or other ****-ups they see. Eventually, the mutilated book will return to my hands, for me to go through and make corrections to the master manuscript before the official release.
Whoops! Just now my mother (who was on the volunteer editing crew for the first edition) has got her hands on it- she's pretty fast tho...

Anyone else who wants a crack at the edit-copy of the book, let me know, I'm forming a list. When all is said and done, there's a 'at cost' copy of the finished tradepaperback or hardcover in it for ya, as well as a mention in the forward.

(I'd say a FREE copy, but that's just not in the budget for a huge, world renown publisher like myself....)

Monday, November 12, 2007

Lifehack progress and game pre-order stupidity.

Well, I'll have the 'edit copy' of Lifehack in my hands this thursday. I had it sent to our PO box in the US, saving a pile in shipping and junk.. but It's gotta wait until my wife goes shopping across the line.

I've got my own copy of Oblivion, (game of the year edition, no less) after a couple extra weeks of delay in the Canadian release.. traditionally, Canadian release delays are attributed to legally requiring a french/english cover and manual.. but this delay was a lot longer than usual.

They're smarter about it now though.. Instead of making a whole other package for the bilingual cover and manual, they just take the english US copy, and slap a new wrapper around it containing all the bilingual junk. The face-stabbingly stupid art of it all, is that essentially 0% of games that get treated to a francophone-friendly addition for the printed material... well... they're all english in the actual GAME...

Somewhere is there a player who knows only french, who picks up an RPG game, overjoyed with the detailed french manual, then pops the game in and suddenly knows how to play the game with it's english content? It's a typical example of ridiculous canadian red tape. And it kept me from Oblivion:GOTY for two added weeks. Heh. Oh, the cruelty of it all.

Ironically, if I just ordered form the US instead of doing a pre-order locally, I would have been playing a lot sooner.

Note to self: Never do a pre-order again. The last time was for Warhawk. I did the pre-order online. Granted, Bestbuy had a sale that must have been a mistake, the game priced at around half what anyone else was selling it for... but when you do pre-orders, isn't that supposed to tell the store how many they need? Why then did they have none for the people who essentially made a reservation?

Well, that was OK, it turned out good for me.. futureshop beats competitors prices, and gives ya 10% better... so I got one for my friend, too. They weren't so happy to be selling a brand new game for half price... the irony? Futureshop and best buy are owned by the same parent company.