Chasing the Dream

I spent most of the weekend finishing up the release of my first Magic expansion. It’s been out awhile, but this was a huge update that fixed a lot of problems.

I wonder why I put so much time into it.

Many people will instantly scoff and explain how I’m wasting time and potential. Don’t you know there are more important things in life?

Of course I know that, and I agree with you. But creative endeavors don’t need a point. It’s like Charlie said in the Chocolate Factory: “Candy doesn’t need a point. That’s why it’s candy.”

And to me, this is my candy. It makes me happy to design, compile, and play with my set(s) (I’m currently polishing the 2nd and am 60% finished with the 3rd). In a “business sense” I can show the set and its expansions to CCG companies as an example of being able to start a project of that size, maintain it, and modify it based on playtesting and focus group reporting (That’s a fancy way of saying “Guys on the forums”). But it’s also something I think is cool and can bring to Magic events and show off to friends.

My Magic playing buddies, however, aren’t quite as enthused about it. But what can you do? When the boat’s drifting in the ocean, someone has to pick up the oars. And I guess that someone is me.

Years ago me and my friend Neil would spend hours and hours, weeks upon weeks, creating comic books. Entire story arcs, huge, crushing crossovers, world’s colliding as you’d never seen them.

And, of course, you never would see them. It was far easier to explain to one another the ideas in our head than show them. Even if we did draw a few pictures and write a few scripts, it wasn’t the same. But it taught me a lot about dreaming and how delightful it was to create huge chasms of my own content, easy to fall into and get lost in.

The Great American Novel is as elusive as the Headless Horseman but people still find a way to don the jack-o-lantern.

If people like this and this have found a way to don the cape, why can’t I with my silly cards?

And that’s why I put so much time and effort into creating “worthless” fantasy sets for a game that is played primarily by underage geeks. Because somewhere there’s a brass ring with my name on it. Unfortunately, it’s nestled in a towering pile of blass rings. But I’ll keep looking.

And for the first time heaven seemed insane
‘Cause heaven is to blame, for taking you away