I’m a bit late in suggesting this, but can we all offer Santcimonia developer Kevin Fishburne and his wife a note of congratulations? It would appear that they are expecting their first little Ultima fan later this year:

Garriott wants to have kids so his legacy can live on. I don’t blame him. I’m having a kid now. Crazy… Time to kick the game into full gear, to provide.

She’s approximately 2.5 months pregnant. According to my calculations she’ll be due around the first or second week of August. The doctors say the 17th, but I’m not so sure about that.

We don’t know the gender yet, though it’s probably because it’s too early rather than not wanting to know; Maria can’t hold a secret to save her life so I’m sure she’ll find out at the first opportunity.

The Fishburnes are in for a particularly unique adventure in the months and years to come, and I for one wish them all the best in their new calling as parents. Speaking as a father of two, I can say (and will readily do so) that it is not an easy journey, although it offers some truly unique (and often very touching) rewards as one progresses along it.

“And that,” as Gandalf said, “is an encouraging thought.”

But first…here is the trailer in all its starring-Codex-Dragon glory:

:extralife:

Alec Meer at Rock, Paper, Shotgun weren’t terribly impressed with it, and to be fair their criticism of the apparent production values isn’t an illegitimate one; web series of this nature tend to straddle the line between particularly good fan videos and moderately good professional productions, and they certainly don’t tend to have the budget of larger efforts…including video game DLC. Meer points out that the trailer for Mark of the Assassin (the Dragon Age 2 DLC and which also stars Felicia Day) looks, sounds, and just generally feels better.

Mark of the Assassin was released today, by the way. Here is the trailer for it:

Anyhow…here is the first of the miniseries’ six episodes:

Do give it a watch, Dragons and Dragonettes, and decide its merits amongst yourselves.

Rob Craig — who runs the Realm of Ultima, a short but informative site that gives details (and some trivia) about the games that comprise the Ultima series — has begun brewing up a batch of lager (it’s still cold in Spain; the finer ales will have to wait for the warmer weather, apparently), and has settled on a fine name and label for it:

Blue. Serpent. Lager. I mean…is that not worthy of Dupre, or what?

Note to my project director: Can we include and/or homage this in Ultima Return? Can we? Can we? Pleeeeeease?

Felicia “Codex Dragon” Day was on the Jimmy Fallon Show last night, promoting her new web series, Dragon Age: Redemption. The trailer for the series aired at some point during the interview, and NBC has kindly posted it for online viewing:

Fallon’s interview with Ms. Day is also online:

My apologies if one or both of these videos isn’t available to you, good Dragons and Dragonettes; NBC doesn’t seem to be region-locking their video embeds, since I can view them here in Canada. That doesn’t mean, of course, that the videos aren’t region-locked in…say…Europe.

If in fact the trailer, at least, is region-locked, you can find it on YouTube here. (Sadly, I can’t seem to locate a copy of the interview for alternate viewing.)

Felicia “Codex Dragon” Day has been tweeting about her latest “mystery project” for the last couple of months (if not more), and today news broke concerning exactly what that project is: a six-episode Web series, Dragon Age: Redemption, set in the world of BioWare’s Dragon Age franchise:

A peek at the Dragon Age II narrative shows Day wrote an original story line around a character for herself, Tallis, an Elven assassin.

“Tallis is headstrong, she fights dirty, and she has a really sarcastic sense of humor,” she says. “I wanted to bring a modern sensibility to a fantasy character in a fantasy world.”

Tallis goes on a quest to capture a renegade magician. Along the way, she gathers her own fellowship. “She can’t accomplish her mission alone, so finding allies is tricky,” Day says. “The success or failure of the mission will have a big impact on her future and her freedom.”

And it sounds like there is some serious production firepower being brought to bear on this project:

Filming took place over a dozen days last month in the L.A. area, with Independence Day associate producer Peter Winther as director and John Bartley (Lost) as cinematographer. “They are going to take this a step above what we have seen on the Web before,” says Day, who also co-produced Redemption.

So here’s what needs to happen, Ultima fans. First, BioWare Mythic needs to get their still-kinda-secretive Ultima project off the ground. Then, the first major (AAA-grade) Ultima title in over a decade needs to be announced. And then, of course, Codex Dragon needs to make a triumphal return to Ultima-dom with a suitably high-production-valued web series which…I don’t know…tells the story of what happened between Ultima 3 and Ultima 4, culminating in the Battle of the Bloody Plains.

Seriously though…this sounds cool. Granted, video game adaptations have a dirt-poor track record as far as quality goes, and it’s entirely possible that these webisodes will be seriously cringe-worthy. Then again, they aren’t a straight-up adaptation, but rather are a wholly original side story (I wonder if BioWare will consider the events of Redemption canonical or not?). Which is to say: there might be hope. Day has demonstrated considerable talent in making gaming entertaining with The Guild, which is another positive.

I suppose we’ll see come summer.

My co-worker Ben, the de-facto captain of the Movember team that I am on, has issued a challenge to the rest of us on the team:

I pushed my goal up to $1000 for the month and I think I might actually make it. I will admit that a lot of my donations are from very amazing family members and friends, and I will still need to do some work to reach my goal by the end of the month, but I think I can do it.

I have noticed though that we do need a few donations throughout the team to even things out. The nice thing is that I know a lot of donations come in near the end of November when people can unveil their ‘masterpieces’ upon the world. But sometimes a bit of reminder throughout the drive can help out a lot.

I’ll put up a night of dinner, for you AND your spouse, with me and my girlfriend, at someplace nice downtown (anyplace is fine with me, your choice) if you can raise $500 before the end of Movember.

Currently, I’m at a heady $40, which…certainly falls short of the target he’s set out. Honestly, I didn’t enter into this campaign with any set donation goal in mind, and to be fair I won’t be crushed — or even mildly put out — if I fall short of the $500 goal that Ben has set here.

At the same time, I wouldn’t mind attempting to rise to the challenge either. I mean, a gauntlet thrown down is a gauntlet thrown down, and a prize dinner to claim is tasty indeed!

So if you are able, good Dragons and Dragonettes, drop some dollars to support prostate cancer research; make the irritation that this beard and mustache are inflicting on me worth something!

Born: 7 November 2010
Sex: Girl
Weight: 7 lbs. 10 oz.
Length: 20.3″

As yet, we haven’t decided on a name, but we will have done by tomorrow.

We’re back at the hospital (if you were following my Twitter feed yesterday night, you’ll know the story) and it’s definitely not a false alarm this time. The Dragoness will be having this baby to-day!

So…I may be offline for a few days, or at least less present in the online realm.

But: yay!

Update: It’s a girl!

A big shout-out and thank you to the excellent BanditLOAF of the Wing Commander CIC, who chipped in the second donation for my Movember campaign.

A big shout-out and thank you to my very own Dragoness, who chipped in the first donation for my Movember campaign.

Movember? What the? Yeah, some of you are probably asking that right now. Others may already know.

The Movember concept, if you will, started back in 2003, in Australia; it has grown since then to include Canada, the US, UK, New Zealand, Ireland, Spain, South Africa, the Netherlands and Finland.

The official story: “The plan was simple — to bring the moustache back as a bit of a joke and do something for men’s health. No money was raised in 2003, but the guys behind the Mo realized the potential a moustache had in generating conversations about men’s health. Inspired by the women around them and all they had done for breast cancer, the Mo Bros set themselves on a course to create a global men’s health movement.

In 2004 the campaign evolved and focused on raising awareness and funds for the number one cancer affecting men — prostate cancer. 432 Mo Bros joined the movement that year, raising $55,000 for the Prostate Cancer Foundation of Australia — representing the single largest donation they had ever received.

…In 2009, global participation of Mo Bros and Mo Sistas climbed to 255,755, with over one million donors raising $47 Million for Movember’s global beneficiary partners…last year’s Canadian campaign was the second largest in the world behind Australia, with 35,156 Mo Bros and Mo Sistas coming together to raise $7.8 million for Prostate Cancer Canada.“

This year, I’ve joined the Movember team formed in my department at work. And I have a bit of a personal stake in the matter, not because I am myself stricken with prostate cancer, but because a close family friend — the ever-smiling uncle who always used to visit us kids with bags of M&Ms in his pockets — had to go through some pretty rough treatment when he was diagnosed with it earlier this year.

He made it through; 4400 men in Canada alone won’t have been as lucky, by the end of 2010. So if you can spare a few dollars, good Dragons and Dragonettes, hit up my donation page.

And if you’re interested in learning more about the work that is being carried out as a result of Movember funds, feel free to read the details here.

(And of course, feel free to share cancer-related stories or other relevant musings in the comments.)

Some of you may remember Brad Venable (follow him on Twitter!) from his various contributions to the Ultima remake community — he was, after all, the voices of Iolo, Geoffrey, Gorn, and Sentri in Ultima V: Lazarus.

While he hasn’t been involved with Ultima as much in recent years, owing to the fact that he has really begun to make a name for himself as an accomplished voice actor (by day) and voiceover superhero (by night), he was thrilled as anything when I asked him if I could post some congratulatory news on Aiera, as part of the new Dragonly Doings section, when I found out that he got married last weekend.

To that end, I’d like to offer my congratulations to Mr. (and now, Mrs.) Venable on their marriage, and wish them many happy, fun-filled years together. As I wrote previously: Marriage is more than just a legal arrangement; at its core, it has a Spiritual quality that sanctifies and blesses the married couple, making their union into something more magnificent than just the sum of two people. Sacrifice is necessary in marriage, and the need for Honor and Honesty are absolute. Though marriage and the intimacy of a couple is not a war or a battle of wills, marriage should be approached and committed to with Valor, a strength of mind and soul that enables one to encounter everything with firm resolve. Marriage should inspire Compassion, make one thirst to both seek Justice for one’s spouse and be in all things Just with her. Marriage requires both spouses to act, toward each other, with Humility.

There must be, in other words, Truth, Courage, and Love in marriage, without question. Let us all hope, then, that Opera Dragon and his Dragoness’ union will be strong in the Virtues!

That’s right, Dragons and Dragonette’s; it’s October 20th! Three years ago today, the Dragoness and I stood on the altar at Holy Name Catholic Church in her home town of Vermilion, Alberta, said “I do,” put rings on each other’s left hand…and with those outward professions and actions declared our marriage to one another. (I’d say that the priest “pronounced” us “man and wife,” but that’s not how it actually works.)

Three years, already…it seems, at times, as though they’ve raced past. Granted, having a child like Dragonlet #1, who at times seems to be the physical manifestation of motion itself, would tend to have that effect. I seem to recall that our first year or so as a married couple went by at a quite reasonable pace, in our cozy little apartment not far outside of Edmonton’s downtown core. It’s a pity we had to leave it behind, and thus leave behind the little tea shop, the ice cream shop, and all the other little places we liked to retreat to as well. (That too is an effect of having kids, at least in Edmonton; there are some properties that will refuse to rent to you. Bollocks to that, I say.)

Don’t let anyone tell you, Dragons and Dragonettes, that marriage isn’t a challenge; it most certainly is, or rather it most certainly is a series of challenges, some short-term and some ongoing. Chesterton said it best: “The whole pleasure of marriage is that it is a perpetual crisis.” Equally, however, don’t let anyone tell you that marriage isn’t immensely rewarding, and among the greatest of gifts that one can both give and receive in one’s life. At the core of marriage is giving, the giving of the totality and sum of oneself to another person, and then just that person.

Marriage is more than just a legal arrangement; at its core, it has a Spiritual quality that sanctifies and blesses the married couple, making their union into something more magnificent than just the sum of two people. Sacrifice is necessary in marriage, and the need for Honor and Honesty are absolute. Though marriage and the intimacy of a couple is not a war or a battle of wills, marriage should be approached and committed to with Valor, a strength of mind and soul that enables one to encounter everything with firm resolve. Marriage should inspire Compassion, make one thirst to both seek Justice for one’s spouse and be in all things Just with her. Marriage requires both spouses to act, toward each other, with Humility.

There must be, in other words, Truth, Courage, and Love in marriage, without question. I know, for myself, that I have not always lived up to this standard in how I have approached my marriage to my lovely Dragoness; she, on the other hand, has tended to live up to it in how she has approached me. For that, I can really only be grateful.

And I am.

Okay, here’s the thing: I never really went for Buffy the Vampire Slayer for more than a season or two. It had this neat, kind of quirky vibe to begin with, but (much like with Firefly) I find I can only take Joss Whedon’s writing in smallish doses. The man’s style just…irks me.

I tuned back in for the episode where Buffy took a bazooka to some sort of judge-demon-thingy, and then again for the episode where she sent Angel to hell and promptly left town on a bus (which, in turn, put me on to what remains — to this day — the only Sarah McLachlan song I can stand).

So I completely missed Felicia Day’s appearance on the show, and the story arc of her character, Vi. This may have been a pity, since it turns out that Miss Day is, according to this post on her Facebook page, a huge fan of two of the same games that I love, starting with Ultima 7.

As the good reader can see, the post attracted over a thousand comments and a lot of attention; floored, Day did a follow-up post listing five games that appeared on a lot of the comments she received, but which she herself had never played. Which, in turn, was an interesting read.

Ultima has a friend in Felicia Day. Especially Ultima 7.

And just for the record, here’s my “Top 5″:

1. Ultima 6
2. The Marathon series
3. Mass Effect
4. Hero’s Quest, later re-done as Quest for Glory
5. The Longest Journey

Feel free to chip in your own in the comments.

Update: And thanks to Barry Ramirez, I feel as though I should eat some part of my foot, lightly salted and glazed with a red pepper and basil sauce. For indeed, Miss Day is none other than Codex Dragon, according to the UDIC “current members” roster. I observe that her listed email address is “@udic.org”; she is evidently a very old-school Ultima fan from way back.

Which. Is. Awesome.

In the comments to Cael Pearson’s birth announcement, commenter Xyzzy asked if I would consider posting news — like the birth announcement — about any other happenings and doings in the lives of Ultima fans who visit/frequent the site.

Quoth she:

Any chance we can start finding out about *other* events & accomplishments of fellow Dragons?

Frankly, I’d be all for it! To that end, I’ve created a new category, Dragonly Doings, and added Cael’s birth announcement to it. If any of you Dragons and Dragonettes have stuff going on in your life that you’d like to celebrate and share with the Ultima community — graduations, marriages, births, baptisms, bar mitzvahs, First Communions, etc. — then by all means, drop me a line and I’ll gladly write up a post about it.

Commenter and contributor Saxon1974 dropped a comment to let us know that he and his wife have just welcomed their son into the world:

Cael Pearson the future Ultima fan came into this world of Earth on Saturday Oct 2nd, 2010 at 3:09pm. 7.7 lbs and 19 1/4 inch long beautiful and healthy baby boy!

Update: And here’s a picture of the wee one:

Excellent news, Saxon, congratulations to you and your wife (and may she have a speedy recovery!), and welcome to baby Cael!