A new Spirit of the Century review has been posted over on RPG.net:

http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/13/13793.phtml

A Spirit of the Century review popped up as part of RPG.net's Actual Play Review Week:

http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/13/13704.phtml

I'm pretty sure you do.

It's a good thing you've got your actual play reviews all ready to go and get submitted for RPG.net's Actual Play Review Week, isn't it? :)

Extra cool thoughts will be generated and focused upon your person by yours truly if you happen to do some actual play reviews of Evil Hat's products, naturally!

One of the phrases that has emerged from the lessons the gaming community is learning from improv techniques is "Here's how I make you awesome." This is a good lesson, one which folks can and should be taking to the gaming table. It's far more rewarding to the game, to the sense of camaraderie, to the social fabric of play, when everyone around the table is working hard to make everyone else awesome -- rather than grand-standing to show off how they are, by themselves, awesome. Don't get me wrong -- grandstanding is good and fun and has its place, but I find it works far better when it operates as the punctuation mark at the end of each sentence of communal play.

I'm using the word "communal" there with much intention, because here's what's going on with "here's how I make you awesome": when put into practice, it builds communities. This is in pat because communities form around emotional bonds with one another, and it is an incredible feeling when you get that moment of being awesome by being carried on the shoulders of those you're playing with, those people you respect and admire. It's a feeling of belonging, and as social mammals, that's a pretty important feeling for us to have.

So I'm glad that portions of the gaming community are picking up on this, and putting it into their play, whether through play-habits at the table or through systemization in the game texts themselves.

But that's just a starting point, if you ask me. The principle can, and should, be used more outside of games, inside the communities themselves, in social interactions with one another, online and off.

It's a principle I use when I'm participating in forums like RPG.net. I don't get into those threads to ring out the clear note of "me me me me". I get in there to say "here's how I make you awesome" to the rest of the folks in the discussion. I point at ideas that aren't mine that are cool and say "Yes! That's great! And here's something building on that!" When I act in a customer service capacity for either IPR or Evil Hat, I try to make use of it as well. It informs what I do and who I am online, whenever possible.

Heck, this is part of why good game reviewers are worth their weight in gold. When they do their job right, they are pure machines of "here's how I make you awesome" in action, bringing exposure, clarity, and insight to the good stuff out there. They are on the construction crews of community.

Yes, I do talk about my own stuff and the things that I do, but I do my level best to talk about the cool stuff out there that's not mine: that's how I make *them* awesome -- with attention, with audience, with respect, with praise. This is how I do what I can to feed and build communities I'm a part of.

(This is also why I go absolutely bug-nuts when folks who should be community builders suck the life out of them by failing to follow the principle of making others awesome. I try to go bug-nuts quietly rather than overtly, but it's hard to keep that particular demon down sometimes.)

There are plenty "be a good human" reasons to make this a part of your lifestyle. We are social creatures who wish to belong: create belonging through who and how you are online. But there are solid, pragmatic business reasons to do this as well.

If you're a game designer or publisher, you are your brand, you are as much a part of the product experience as the product itself. When people bond with you emotionally and positively, they're forming an emotional bond with your product, your brand. And you can take that to the bank.

This is why as a publisher it's so important to think about what you are doing as a community builder, as a participant who makes others awesome and in turn strengthens those emotional bonds that will keep the community strong and healthy. That's the currency -- in my opinion, the best kind of currency -- that you'll be investing in the years to come to build your success.

Make the folks who aren't you awesome.

The rest will follow.

Extra credit: Tell me who you made awesome today.

The deadline on getting in your Indie Games Explosion events in for GenCon is at the end of March -- this month.

Details here:

http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=25915

EDIT: Folks able and willing to run Spirit of the Century or Don't Rest Your Head or one of Chad's PDQ games as a part of the IGE will get prize support (or personal reward) from Evil Hat. This might be a copy of Spirit of the Century, Spirit of the Season, or some other title. So if you think you're one of those guys, hook up with the IGE folks at the above thread.

SECOND EDIT: Semi-relatedly, quoth RPG.net: Actual Play Review Week begins March 24th, so get your Actual Play reviews actually sent in, with "[Actual Play Week]" in the review's title so we know what it's for. Send any other reviews you think we'd be interested in, too. I mention this because Evil Hat is offering prize support to this review week event as well. :)

Another installment. These are the threads on RPG.net that have been going "ping" into my inbox from January 8th up to today.

SOTC/Fate
OK, talk to me about Spirit of the Century
[SotC] Exalted + Transhumanism + Cthulhu
[SotC] The Spirit of Westeros
Starblazers - Any more news?
[Evil Hat / Atomic Sock Monkey] Spirit of the Season -- It's Christmas at Tax-time!
Spirit of Exalted?
[SotC] Spirit of the 'Verse (Firefly/Serenity)
Spirit of the Season!
[Unisystem Star Wars + SoTC] Importing Aspects
[SotC] Inspirational Art
[SotC] Looking for a pregen group of 3
[SOTC] A villain concept
[SotC] A couple of queries
[SOTC, FATE 3.0] What's the difference between FATE 3.0 and FATE 2.0
[SotC] I'm just ruined for other games now....
Spirit:1889
[SotC/Dark Heresy] Fate Points
[SotC/nWoD] Aspects in place of Vice/Virtue?
[Sell Me] On a SciFi Setting [SotC]
[SOTC] Salam al Cartouche in The Hourglass of Ptah
[SotC/Exalted] Spirit of Exalted?
[SOTC] attacking a boss opponent directly
[Spirit of the Century] Inspirational Image Aspect-Off! Library of Congress Edition.
Spirit of '76
[SoC and others] Pregen pulp adventures?
[sotc] Combat moves?
[sotc] Combat moves?
[Exalted/SotC] Aspects instead of stunts.
If this wont get the pulp ideas flowing
[Spirit of the Century] Secret Language of Character sheets
[Spirit of the Century] The Empire City Centurions
[SotC/Fate3.0] Using different color fate chips?
SotC Star Wars
[SOTC] Creating Dinosaurs
Just thinking out loud: C&C + FATE Aspects
[SotC] Son of the 28 Character Challenge: The Halls of Villany!
[SotC] Alternative phases for character creation?
[SotC] D&D conversion?
A deficiency on my part I'm sure...(a rant)
[SotC] Knights of the Yellow Cab
[FATE/SoTC] Spirit of the Nightside
[Sell/Unsell, kind of] How is SotC combat "tactical"
Indiana Jones-style campaign
Spirit of Callahan's
[AP - FATE v3] Fate of Dominia Campaign
Spirit of the Floating Vagabond
[SotC]: Never thought Spirit of the Century would be rules HEAVY
[SOTC] New Horizons - a Spirit of the Century supplement by Bruce Baugh
[WFRP/Sotc] Spirit of the Warhammer?
WW2 pulp horror setting problems
Pulp Gaming + System
Changeling: The FATEd
[SotC] Native American Hero in Pulp Timing
[SotC] NPCs as teammates
[SotC] Question about defending one's self...
How to get Spirit of the Century?

DRYH
{IC}DRYH - Six 'till Second Midnight
[DRYH] Wax King's Coin
New Discusion group for DRYH
[RPG]: Don't Rest Your Head and JAGS: Wonderland, reviewed by migo (4/5)
{OOC} DRYH-Six 'till Second Midnight
[DRYH+Changeling] Don't Rest Your Hedge

DFRPG
Dresden Files
[Dresden Files] Gateway City: Newark in Dresdenverse
Gaming in The Dresden Files
Austin in the Dresden-verse

Publishing

Amazon's Createspace versus Lulu
Desktop Publishing Help!!
RPG self-publishing Hard Numbers!

IPR
Do IPR really want to be seen as elitist twats? (Just ignore this)
Service from IPR?

Other Interests
Interview with Evil Hat Productions
[Wilderness of Mirrors] Question regarding Saturn AOE
Thousand Suns SF RPG?
Indie RPG Awards Question
[RPG]: Truth & Justice, reviewed by Baz King (3/5)
Clinton R Nixon Rocks!
[Hollow Earth Expedition] Couple questions
Wild Talents 2nd Edition
OMEGACON Indie Games
[Polaris] Did it ever come out in PDF?
making rules-lite a little heavier
[FUDGE] Help me understand it
Sell/Unsell Me on a Thousand Suns
Exalted-to-PDQ. 2nd edition
RPGs designed for one-session play
[s7s] The crystal compass
Help me spend a bit of money
Free D6 System (SRD)
When will the D6 SRD be out?
[System?] Girl Genius
[HEX] Secrets finally surfaces
So, tell me about Sorcerer
pulp rocketship musings ?
[Exalted/PDQ] My Conversion
Tell Us About The Top 5 Best RPGs of 2007!
No More HEX love???
[Monters and...] The 12 Monsters of Christmas
Destination Game Stores

Quoth the formidable cwricheson:

Cross posted at RPGnet:

The week of March 24th is Actual Play Review Week here at RPGnet. While past weeks have focused on overall themes, this event will focus on reviews based on actual game sessions. Share with us your best and worst experiences with all sorts of games! All it takes is a little time to write it up and including [Actual Play Week] in front of the title when you send it in.

This event will have a prize pool, but it's a different system from our past events. We're restricting the event to just ten winners who may choose as they wish from any donated prizes. Don't let that intimidate you, though, as newcomers and old hands alike have walked away with some wonderful prizes from our past events. For this event we're also restricting the prize pool to RPG reviews, though we would love to see reviews of any non-RPG products you care to submit that week as well.

If you're a publisher and would like to sponsor this event then please PM me here or contact me at cwricheson AT gmail DOT com and I'll add you to our beloved group of supporters.

Never written a review before? Check out my guide to RPG reviewing for some tips!

And whether you participate or not please join us during the week of March 24th for some fantastic reviews!

Aside from the meme I'm tryin' to kick off, I also started a thread over on RPG.net. The folks over there have been finding some really great images:

http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?p=8345848#post8345848

The last update I did of this nature was on November 8th or so. If older threads stayed active, they may show up on this list -- but that's not much of a problem from where I stand.

Subscribing to threads on RPG.net is half of how I achieve my "internet ubiquity" with as little effort as possible. Whenever possible, convert something you find yourself having to "pull" with regular effort into something that "pushes" itself at you whenever it wakes up. This, combined with Google Blogsearch + setting Google up to email me daily alerts of those searches, is really all a "lazy" publisher needs to do to make the effort of staying in the loop as easy as possible.

Plus, folks really love it when you appear on their J. Random Blog and talk with them about what they've said about your game. Try it!

That said, on to the big list.

Spirit of the Century / Fate

[SotC] Question about defending one's self...
[AP - FATE v3] Fate of Dominia Campaign
[RPG]: Spirit of the Century, reviewed by James Gillen (4/4)
[SotC] Powers and other systems
[SotC] How does it handle magic?
Rule Question for Spirit of the Century
PULP SHOWDOWN
Savage Worlds v. SotC - what's a +1 worth
[FATE 3.0] Detailed FATE of Dominia CharGen
Spirit of the Century Hardback from Lulu - how is it?
[FUDGE/FATE] Using 3d6?
[SotC] Help Me Build....The Franklin Device
[SotC] Inspirational Art
Savage worlds OR Spirit of the Century?
[Fate 3] Truncated SotC Actual Play
[SotC] Cheat sheet! (under testing)
Looking for Fate v3.0 fantasy stuff not on the FateWiki
(SotC) Race to the Finish!
Spirit of the Century + Heroquest: Am I Crazy?
need some help with a first SOTC game..The Tuskegee Space Men
[Exalted] Stealing From SotC
[SotC] Spirit of Amber
[SotC] Stat your favorite novel character!
[SotC] Gadgets and Mad Science - Help!
[FATE/SotC] Starblazer, the roleplaying game of space adventures
Adding FATE Aspects to BRP?
(SotC) Rasputin
Spirit of the Season!
Savage Worlds with a dash of Spirit of the Century
[Spirit of the Century] The Empire City Centurions
SotC, ORE and Wushu's blind spots
SotC- page reference please?
SOTC-ideal final conflict
[SotC] Candidates for a League of Extraordinary Gentlemen?
SotC/Fate3 forum?
[RPG]: Spirit of the Century, reviewed by C.W.Richeson (5/5)
[SotC] Hellboy and BPRD
[SotC/PDQ] Freebie
[Sell Me] Spirit of the Century
[SotC] Upcoming attractions?
[Evil Hat] [SotC] [T&J] The Spirit of the Season Is Upon Us
[Spirit of the Century] Crime Story Adventures
[SOTC] New Horizons - a Spirit of the Century supplement by Bruce Baugh
[SotC]...a devil's deal
[Spirit of the Century] Narnia Style Fantasy?
[SotC] Aspect compelinvoke-a-thon!
[FATE 3.0] Looking for Aspects and Stunt Names
[SotC] Speeding Up Conflicts
[SotC / GitS] Spirit of the Shell!
[Fate] some system modifications
[SotC] How to do this?
(SOTC) Thank you Penny-Arcade!
My copy of SotC is now a Tome of Power!

Don't Rest Your Head

{IC}DRYH - Six 'till Second Midnight
{OOC} DRYH-Six 'till Second Midnight
[RPG]: [Horror Week] Don't Rest Your Head, reviewed by magustrate (4/5)
Playing DRYH tonight, need some tips.

PDQ Stuff

[PDQ] Why Ranks?
[Exalted/PDQ] My Conversion
[PDQ] Swashbucklers of the Seven Skies?
Truth & Justice: More Than Meets The Eye!
Zorceror of Zo!
PDQ vs. Savage Worlds for newbie one shot
[ZoZ] Tales of the Nimble Legion

Other Games

[Monters and...] The 12 Monsters of Christmas
[ORE]Tell me of/Sell me on Monsters and other Childish Things
No More HEX love???
[Monsters and...] OMG, it's out already!
[Dread/Jenga/Cthulu] I really love the Jenga mechanic
New "Trail of Cthulhu", coming really soon!
[RPG]: Dirty Secrets, reviewed by matthijs (4/4)
Free D6 System (SRD)
So it looks like we are going to get another Doctor Who rpg...
Cubicle 7 gets license to produce Doctor Who RPG
Tell Us About The Top 5 Best RPGs of 2007!
Just got my copy of Reign!

General Gaming & Publishing

Destination Game Stores
GM CHALLENGE: New Year, New World: 24-Hour RPG Settings
Game of the Year
The Third Annual Top 5 Best Indie RPGs Poll!
so you just made a game
Lulu is annoying
Flaws for Pulp characters
Ideal group size
[Dragonmeet] so, what did I miss?
Supers, Gadgets,"why doesn't Mr. Fantastic feed the world?" and a Christmas adventure
Indy without the "Awesome"
My first IPR order
Good Hollow Decision Scenes.
What game should I do a 101 Days of?
RPG self-publishing Hard Numbers!

The results of the Third Annual Top 5 Indie RPGs voting on RPG.net are in... and Spirit of the Century took the top spot this year, with Don't Rest Your Head placing tenth:

This year: http://wiki.rpg.net/index.php?title=Third_Annual_Top_5_Indie_RPGs_Poll

We have ridiculously active fans on RPG.net, and this is mainly an expression of that, at the end of the day. Last year, SOTC placed third (and DRYH placed tenth as well!), but it's interesting to compare the votes of the top five between the two years -- there's always a big set of consistent favorites in the top ten, but the votes distributed differently this year (did SOTC cannibalize the votes among the old guard, or is this evidence of fresh-blood voting overall?):

Last year: http://wiki.rpg.net/index.php/Second_Annual_Top_5_Small_Press_RPGs_Poll