CM Simpson: Writer & Gamer

Over the last two weeks, we've looked at the business side of why write short stories - something I hate doing. I'm a writer, dammit! I love story. I love seeing worlds unfold beneath my fingers, to watch characters come to life, to see the story unfurl - but, let's be real, business is important if you want to make a living from that kind of magic, so it needs to be looked at. This week, we get to look at something much more fun: the creative reasons to write short stories. This is one of those intangible things that writers need to grow and develop. It's hard to measure from a business sense, but it's there, and it's vital. To put it briefly, short stories are a way of discovering new stories, new characters and new worlds - in the same way I've found flash fiction can be - but that depends on your approach. Up until recently, my main approach was to simply sit down and start typing. If I was writing for a magazine, I'd make sure I was writing in...

Mission Day showed me just how unfit I've become, so, this week, I'm trying to get my walking habit back on-line - and what better way to do that, than to take on an easy mission through the centre of Canberra? Created by Resistance agent, Frostbeast, this colourful 12-mission banner walks you around the city centre, and features were as follows: Time to Complete:   The average time for each mission is around 10 minutes, although some are much shorter. If you’re taking the time to glyph-hack, capture, fully deploy, link and field, then these times will be much, much longer due the portal density of the area. Complexity:   This is a very straight-forward mission series, with easily accessible portals, but, as noted below, you should be wary of hacking portals not included in the mission you’re on. Terrain and Location Notes: Location Accessibility: You can travel to the mission area by bus, although there is plenty of parking, if you prefer to travel by car, al...

There was a major event for Ingress last weekend, and I took some time to join in—these things don’t come around very often, and it gave me a chance to meet other players, instead of playing on my own. I think I walked over 30km over the two days—Saturday was the Anomaly, a competitive battle between the Enlightened and Resistance teams; and Sunday was Mission Day, which was much more relaxed as players followed the 24-mission series around inner Canberra, trying to complete a minimum of 12 in order to earn their Mission Day medal. I got to meet a bunch of really great people, and got my butt out of the chair for several hours, which did me a lot of good, and reminded me I really need to work on my fitness. I’m extra-thankful to my husband for taking on podling duty for the weekend so I could get out and about and visit with the growed ups for a change. The Mission Day medal hasn’t arrived, yet, but the Anomaly medal has, as you can see and the missions you can see on the screen ar...