D&D: Really Cool Packaging!

Look at this package. It's a thing of beauty:


On December 5th, BCI is releasing Dungeons & Dragons: The Complete Series, the classic 1983 animated series based on the legendary adventures-by-the-roll-of-the-dice game. If you played this game yourself in the '80s, then you will easily recognize the design and layout of the DVD packaging above as being based on the design of the adventure modules that were sold by TSR "back in the day".

Great job, BCI.

Y'know, these guys have done some really outstanding packaging in the past. I first noticed it with their After School Specials DVD releases, where they went from from "Trapper Keeper" designs to "school locker" designs to "school yearbook" designs to an actual "school bus" design!

While their packaging has been less "gimmicky" since then, their package art itself has been outstanding, especially on the animated releases from their Ink & Paint brand. All look very good, but the crown of those are the He-Man and She-Ra titles, which features a composite picture that assembles together from the spine art, when the boxes are lined up together.

And their photographic covers for live-action show releases, like Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom, are nothing to sneer at either! So, as you can see, BCI's cover art is always well worth a look, just to appreciate what you're seeing.


But the D&D packaging above - a show I've long waited for on DVD - just took me by surprise nonetheless with exactly how good it is! I was expecting something as good as the other Ink & Paint titles from BCI, but man oh man! This just blew me away with how good it looks, having Tiamat (the five-headed dragon, a.k.a. "The Chromatic Dragon" featured in the series, taken from The Advanced D&D Monster Manual) look over the shoulders of the heroes of the series. And putting that picture smack as the centerpiece of a cover done in the traditional style of a D&D adventure module. Wow. Sensational design, sensational artwork!

So, I just wanted to share my joy for this picture with all of y'all, and commend BCI for a sensational cover that went above and beyond what I expected! Their absolute love for their products shines through with this level of care, and we reap the benefit here. Because in this case, you CAN judge a book (or rather, a DVD) by its cover: the love that BCI puts into these art designs shows up with good-looking video, good-sounding audio, great extras, and good entertainment.

What more can you ask for?


Well, if you're a fan of D&D the game, maybe you can ask for a cool webcomic to go with it. If you haven't discovered it already (in the 3 years it's been going!), get in on The Order of the Stick, the fun webcomic that you'll laugh at and laugh at, especially if you've ever played D&D itself. Yeah, I'm a geek. But isn't it fun to be one?

Best Series Finale?

Alright, this may be a bit tricky, but I want to know what your favorite series finale is WITHOUT including any spoilers.

My favorite series finale right now would be "Six Feet Under." It was a great combination of wrapping the series up and awesome music. I went out and bought the Sia CD because I wanted to own "Breathe Me," the song used in the final few minutes.

So, what's your favorite series finale....without including any spoilers!

Gord

Where the Hell is Dave?

Some of our regular readers may have noticed that Gordo's been posting most of the news lately, and wondering just where in the heck I am. Well, I'm here, and I'm not sick or anything. Just busy.

You see, TVShowsOnDVD isn't my full-time job. I help out Gord as much as possible, but my first priority of course has to be earning a paycheck for me and my family, and I've got a full-time job as a Business Systems Analyst. Where? Well, I can't say, basically because the corporation I work at has recently adopted policies that prevent associates from blogging about the company. You know, they're just trying to protect themselves from getting a black eye on the web because of disgruntled employees. Understandable in this day and age, and I don't want to jeopardize my job by running afoul of that policy. So I won't mention the company name or what goes on there.

However, I think I'm pretty safe to explain that - like all big companies - we run the place off of a big Enterprise Resource Planning ("ERP") system. You know, one of those management information systems that handles accounting, inventory, operations, purchasing/materials, personnel, etc. You've probably heard of many of the applications that do this (and possibly work for a company that uses one or more of these): Oracle, SAP, PeopleSoft, Lawson, SSA, and Baan, among others.

So the site I work at is in the process of switching over from one of these to another (can't name which ones, that would help identify the company I suppose, which is a no-no), and I'm working long hours and on weekends to help with the project. And there it is in a nutshell.

We have one big milestone deadline coming up this weekend, and another one on the horizon soon after, so I am joining the rest of the team in putting forth as much effort as possible to make the deadlines and keep the project on schedule. Gord has been very understanding of my commitments there, and so he's taking care of the news as much as possible. Even while traveling a bit this week!

Anyway, I just wanted to take a minute and explain, so nobody thinks I've abandoned the site. I certainly haven't, and I look forward to getting back on a more regular work schedule in the near future, so I can post TSoD news once more. Now, I gotta go hop in the shower and get to work. Talk to ya' soon!

Obsessed with Geotagging

Flickr recently introduced geotagging to their website, and I'm hooked! It's so easy to drag a photo to the little map, and the **POP** there is it! I don't have very many photos uploaded to Flickr, but I've become obsessed with tagging the ones on there. I took some photos of graffiti in downtown Edmonton; that's on the map. I snapped photos when I was in Hawaii last summer; they're on the map too. I even tagged some photos I took on the backlot of Warner Bros (Gilmore Girl stuff).

Sure, it's cool to have photos online, but it's even cooler when you can look at see where a photo was taken!

Want to see the map? It's right here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/gordlacey/map

Gord