capane.us|Video Games. Rotting my brains for almost 30 years.

Hello fans!  I am humbly amazed how many people are still coming to the site and dropping kind words on the project.  It seems people are still discovering the awesomeness that is Skyrim on a daily basis. Unsurprisingly, I’ve still not heard a peep from Bethesda on if they appreciate what I am doing or not, so I guess I will continue with my plans of world domination, err, I mean, Tamrielic Chronicling.  In the upcoming weeks, I’d like to release Books of Oblivion and Books of Morrowind, but for now, enjoy a quick update to the Books of Skyrim.

Here are today’s updates:

• New cover! Credit goes to Aladario, the cover on the Spanish version was too good not to use.
• Original images from the books are now included. I made a design decision to not include the decorative calligraphy for first letters in a paragraph.  It made it harder to read, and just did not look good in a digital format.  The updated books are:
• The Firmament
• Harvesting Frostbite Spider Venom
• Herbalist’s Guide to Skyrim
• Kolb & The Dragon
• Shadowmarks
• Songs of Pelinal Volume 7
• Surviving A Horker Attack
• Troll Slaying
• The Alduin/Akatosh Dichotomy has been moved out of the Books of 2920 section.  (Despite the game’s copy saying it was a Book of 2920).
• The book A Minor Maze has been added.

So without further adeiu, here are your links:

• Kindle (MOBI)
• Nook, iOS, and all others (EPUB)

I’m still receiving a steady stream of very kind comments on my post Dovahkiin Gutenberg.  It seems people really liked the idea of taking all the lore of Skyrim on the go.  Today in the comments, a very kind reader who goes by Aladario informed me that he had compiled all the books of Skyrim into a Spanish edition!  That’s right, SPANISH!  I’m not sure how many languages Bethesda has localized Skyrim into, but it’s pretty impressive when you think of just how much text had to be localized for this release.

What’s even more awesome, is that Aladario even went through the trouble of adding in all the images that were originally in the book.  So you get all the original figures, and decorative text.  All in all, a trabajo well done!  Hit up the links below to download your very own copy, and everyone give a warm thank you to Aladario!

• Kindle (MOBI)
• Nook, iOS, and all others (EPUB)

If any other kind souls feel like tackling this project into other localized versions of Skyrim, feel free to contact me, and I will host it on my blog.

Check out a new shirt design I created on CafePress.  It’s a performance shirt for wicking away sweat while you run.  I know “geek” and “runner” types generally do not overlap, but I’m both, so I figure there must be more out there like me.  If you like it, you can pick one up here.

Like King George VI in front of a live mic, I am at a loss of words.  I haven’t put up a blog post since Dovahkiin Gutenberg, frankly because I didn’t know what to say.  The response has been astounding and (almost) entirely positive!  I got posts on Joystiq, Kotaku, Destructoid, Yahoo! News, and even TUAW.  I found countless random threads in forums where people were so happy to have the books in a digital format. Heck, I even got a free year of premium access on one of my favorite gaming sites, Giant Bomb.  So, to all of the thank you’s floating out there, you are very welcome!

I guess at the very least, I can answer a few of the more popular questions:

1. Is Bethesda cool with this? So far, I’m not sure.  I have attempted to contact them to see what they think about it, but so far no response.  I will respect their wishes if they want to shut it all down, but I’m definitely hoping they will see how much fans love this.  Technically, I am redistributing content from their game without their express written consent, which is a definite no-no.  But, logically, I’m not making a cent from it, the content generally only appeals to those who have purchased access to the content, and the content in this format is not available to buy anywhere. With all that said, I strongly believe in a dialog with Bethesda on the subject, because I know that they love to make great games, and to please their fans.  They don’t have to put out TES Construction Sets or GECKs, but they do, and for that they kick ass.  As soon as I hear from Bethesda, I will post and adhere to their wishes.
2. Will you do this for Oblivion and/or Morrowind?  Yes, I’d definitely love to do that, but first I’m going to wait and see what Bethesda’s official stance is on all this.  I’d hate to spend a lot of time on something, only to have the plug pulled before release.
3. Will you release a better version with images, and a better cover?  Yes, again, so long as Bethesda is cool with it.
4. Will you make a PDF? Nope! PDF is actually a terrible format to read, and I’d like to do whatever I can to discourage people from reading on it.  Almost every device out there, whether it be a computer, phone, tablet, even an iPod Touch should have software to read an .epub or a .mobi.  They are the best formats for your brain to soak up gobs of text.  If you need to, check out applications like Adobe Digital Editions, Kindle, or Nook.  Keep in mind, Kindle and Nook are platforms (devices AND applications), not just devices.  With all that said, I don’t mean to be some sort of digital book snob, but a format that does not allow text to be reflowed or reformatted is not a good format to read.  PDF does however, remain a good format to print things with.
5. Why can’t I view it on my Android phone/tablet? Sorry about that.  Turns out I didn’t force the MIME types for .epub and .mobi files on my server.  Most systems are intelligent enough to force the download even though WordPress was saying the content type was plain text.  It’s fixed now.

So there you have it good folks.  I hope to keep you updated, and I hope to keep you interested in my blog.  I’d love to keep the ball rolling and resurrect my gaming blog to its previous glory. Stay tuned!

Skyrim is big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind- bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist’s, but that’s just peanuts to Skyrim.  And that amazing sprawling landscape isn’t just boring, empty space.  It’s full of of interesting people, vast structures, and a cornucopia of stuff to make the world come alive.

Lately, one of my favorite parts of Skyrim are the in-game books.  At any time, you can pull a book off the shelf, and get a nice fresh slice of lore to go along with your hearty adventures.  I’ve even gone so far as to break into houses in the middle of the night just to read their books.  After getting chided from the local guards, and shamefully ponying up bounty, I thought to myself, there has to be a better way.  Could I possibly take these fine narratives on the road with me, to read while I can’t be in front of the computer actually playing the game?

So, I took a look at how Skyrim actually stores these nuggets of incidental storytelling.  By the 9, it was in plain text! I pasted the book text into separate docs, slapped on headings, created a table of contents and a cover, and just like that, I can read my copy of The Lusty Argonian Maid on-the-go!  If you’d like to read this fine fiction on your own device, just download one of these files and throw it on your e-reader:

• Kindle (MOBI)
• Nook, iOS, and all others (EPUB)

P.S. Technically you should own a copy of Skyrim to read these books.  But if you’re nutty enough about Skyrim to care about the in-game books, chances are you have a copy on the shelf.  Enjoy!

Update 1: A kind reader has been kind enough to do the same thing in Spanish. Click here for my post about it!

Update 2: By popular demand, I’ve added images and cleaned up a few details. Click here for my post about it!

I got some exciting news for you today! I just got my first review posted on CAG today! This one is my review for Final Fantasy XIV. I really, really wanted this game to be better, but in the end, I just had to be honest. Go check out the full text at CheapAssGamer!

Guess who just found a 60 Day code for Warhammer Online.  This guy!  That’s right, once the Starcraft II Beta is over, level 40 here I come!  If you want to join me, I will be busy killing Empire punks on Gorfang.  WAAAAAAGGGHH!!!!

I honestly cannot seem to get enough of this game, and it’s still in beta. I played a good bit a of Starcraft in ’98, but then seemed to give up on RTS games for a while. Not sure if it was console games, or what, but I really hadn’t picked one up again since then. However, I figured I would at least give Starcraft 2 a try. I was able to get a beta key easy enough, and I was curious to see all the improvements that were being made to battle.net. See, really I was mostly looking forward to Diablo III, but since I seem to like Blizzard games so much, I figured I’d give it a try. Then I found out just how much strategy and skill this game can contain, and I have become completely addicted. I even confess, I have begun watching commentated professional matches. The beta just got extended to June 7, and needless to say, I will be playing gobs of it this weekend. Oh, and also some Dawn of War II Co-op with RoboTofu. Capaneus out.

For the most part, Sony’s entries into their new “mini” category of games have been nothing to write home about.  The games, designed to be bite-sized small portions you can pick up and play on your PSP or PS3, have been either boring, poorly made, or too expensive.  But I feel like we might have our first contender.  Today marks the release of “Monsters (probably) stole my princess!”  And it looks pretty sweet.  Interesting gameplay, a good soundtrack, and a good sense of humor all delivered for $4.99?  Sure, I will (probably) buy that.

Again the blessed weekend is here!  Spring has sprung, the birds are singing, and the sun is shining.  I’m gunna stay in and play some video games!  This weekend’s forecast calls for finishing off Heavy Rain, playing some Madballs off of Steam, and some DJ Hero.  That’s right, I added yet another silly plastic controller to my collection, the DJ Hero Turntable.  Toys ‘R Us has it on sale for $50, and I had $30 credit, so the price point of $20 was right where I wanted it.  Much more reasonable that the ridiculous $100 MSRP.  So far I really like it.  The mashups are varied, the production quality is high, and there’s a heapin’ helpin’ of Daft Punk.