"A Sidhe is an earthen mound where mythical beings live. It's also an independent New Zealand videogame company that's moved away from the hill-dwelling fairy thing to release six titles in the last five years. I've known about them for a long while: Like fantasy films, Antarctic storms and flaccid politicians, Sidhe has become part of the Kiwi landscape. But I'd never gotten near the source code, the how, why and what-the-hell of growing your very own game development ecosystem at the bottom of the South Pacific. So I called them up, begged my way in and spent a week learning the secret. Here it is, in seven easy steps, complete with magic beans and beer."

"Harris is one of an increasing number of mainstream video game veterans who have abandoned big-budget, big-business game development and 'gone rogue' as small, self-funded, often self-published independent game developers, or 'indies.' Some see indie development as an entry point into a career in the majors. But for some jaded professionals who love gaming but are dissatisfied with the mainstream industry, indie development offers an escape - and a unique opportunity."

"The job was supposed to be easy. All I had to do was find some missing art supplies. That was, until I found myself being attacked by a goblin barbecue team. Next thing I know, I'm getting a severe tong-lashing (not a typo) from the chef.

"Realizing how dangerous goblins with access to hot coals are, I did the only thing I could. I bashed them in the face with my trusty disco ball. But that's all in a day's work for an enterprising Disco Bandit, on a quest to save the strange and puzzling world that is Kingdom of Loathing, a browser-based, multiplayer RPG."

"The epiphany hit me a few months ago when my girlfriend and I visited her cousins' Long Island home. Their 14-year-old son and his friends were playing Guitar Hero III, and most of the group lacked skill. As the in-game crowd booed another wannabe rocker off the stage, my girlfriend's cousin delivered the stinging words:

"'You died.'"

"Either the audience was particularly bloodthirsty that night, or this 14-year-old kid just pointed out how often death is synonymous with failure in videogames."

"There are lots of independent game developers trying to make a living off of their craft - I'm occasionally one of them - but there's a growing number of people who create free games simply to make their voices heard. These are people for whom game development is not a primary profession; whose background is not in computer science or 3-D modeling; who build games in their spare time out of a curiosity and love for the medium and a desire to make the games that no one else will. Hobbyist game developers, self-published authors. Videogame zinesters."

"Presenting sex in the context of a mainstream videogame poses unique challenges. It's not a straightforward competition with winners and losers; but the consequences, both positive and negative, can be equally significant and long-lasting. And with the sophistication of current-gen A.I., camera work and gameplay balancing, we're more ready than ever for a game that demonstrates a more complex understanding of sexual encounters than a cut scene could ever present."

"Tijuana bibles were Depression-era smut booklets, eight-page comics on cheap paper that gave you the real lives of the rich and famous. You too, my friend, can finally see Donald sweeping Daisy's chimney. J. Wellington Wimpy laying the pipe to Olive Oyl. You can find out once and for all whether Betty and Veronica look the same when you flip them upside down. Big-lipped black people, sex-crazed nuns, grasping old pensioners and every other ugly caricature known to man? Right here in this suitcase, yours for fifty cents."

"Not too long ago, Age of Conan made headlines with a rumor that turned heads across the internet - not only would it contain nudity, it would actually allow players to have sex. Players would be able to screw each other's brains out in-game and get a temporary stat-boost for their ... er ... pleasure. When the game actually shipped, however, the sex turned out to be nothing more than a casual reference. Female player characters could still go topless, but actual coitus wasn't in the code.

"Age of Conan stopped at bared breasts. But imagine, if you will, an MMORPG with the audacity to go 'all the way.'"

"They coo under the rhythmic thrusts of your fingers, deaf to the heaviness of their own breaths. The three of you are almost there. You tighten your grip, accelerating the movement of your moist fingertips. You slide your thumb over the circle. Then the triangle. Back to the circle. The X. Finally, you wrangle the analog stick like a madman, and their sighs of pleasure reach a fever pitch. Onscreen, a vase on the nightstand next to you tumbles to the ground, shattering. Congratulations; you've achieved orgasm."

"Tally up the reasons I have biffed relationships. Narrowly eking out emotional immaturity and fear of commitment stands the number one culprit: electronic entertainment. Nowadays, the industry incorporates sex and love into more videogames, but how does today's gamer handle sex and videogames?

"If my story is any indication, he (or she) doesn't."

"While the rest of the world explores the competitive side of the internet, however, Australia lags behind, listening for results via dial-up. Forget professional gaming - people struggle to get quality broadband. If you are lucky enough to find a decent service, you'd better hope it holds up during peak hours for your online fragging fix. And don't get me started on those who live in the bush."

"Xbox 360 owners can personalize their consoles by swapping out the removable plate that snaps on to the front of the unit. You can find faceplates featuring art from games like Assassin's Creed or a simulated wood grain finish quite easily online or in retails stores. Other, more exotic designs are available from Japanese sellers. True collectors lust after the limited edition faceplates that PR firms hand out at industry events such as E3 - they often go for big bucks on auction sites like eBay. But why settle for something ordinary or pay a fortune for a limited edition model when you pay a pittance for something that's truly one of a kind?"

"I thought it would be different. We had an Organized Play guy at White Wolf Game Studio whose job consisted, in part, of arranging tournament events all over the world for the Vampire collectible card game. He'd be gone for weeks at a time, living off his per diem, refereeing official tournaments with cash prizes and drinking scotch instead of eating food. He came back one time with a decorative mirror from Romania, painted with a vampire theme as I recall, and a T-shirt that said 'Never Leave Hungary.' That's what I thought it would be like to play games for money."

"Testing unreleased games is both fascinating and mind-numbingly boring."

"For some, it's the ultimate dream job. Many aspiring game developers see testing as a way to get a foot in the door, a stepping stone on the career path to a 'real' game development position. But others have a much more dismal view of game testing, envisioning it as little more than a room full of button-mashing monkeys. Even so, people continue to flock toward the game testing labs at Nintendo of America (NOA) and Microsoft Game Studios (MGS), eager to live their own small part of the game development dream."

"Despite our persistent obscurity, we have managed to accomplish our primary goal of GamersWithJobs.com, which is simply to perpetrate an excuse for refusing to grow up and stop playing these silly games. 'Look,' we say to our uncommonly patient wives, 'we have literally tens of people who want to know what we think!'

"This is, of course a lie."

"Whatever you do, don't click."

"That's the mistake most players make upon first loading up The Marriage, the first widely released artgame by Rod Humble. In Humble's minimalist, abstract exploration of relationship dynamics, even the seemingly innocuous act of clicking the left mouse button forcibly restarts the game. As is the case with so many aspects of Humble's games, the 'don't click' rule first causes irritation, then confusion and, finally, acceptance (probably followed by a second, much more subtle confusion)."

"I'd spend hours daydreaming - drawing and writing stories about imaginary creatures and worlds I invented out of thin air. I couldn't take a breath without some absurd creation popping into my mind, begging to be smudged into life via crayons and a piece of paper. At the same time, like many boys, I discovered an ability to turn any appropriately shaped piece of wood, kitchen utensil or cardboard tube into an imaginary gun. I couldn't walk through a forest without mentally reconfiguring at least one branch into a laser rifle I could use to destroy some evil alien monster or, more often, my younger brother."

"I want to introduce you to an entirely different perspective: Piracy supports an underground economy and the livelihoods of thousands of people in Asia, especially in countries where most people live below the poverty line. This underground exists primarily because its participants cannot afford the exorbitant prices charged by game publishers. It's a point of view that isn't often raised in American or 'industrialized' media, but it's easy to miss when you aren't surrounded by piracy on a daily basis."

"Sex has remained generally unchanged since cavemen were humping in, well, caves. (They apparently enjoyed it.) Up until about 20 years ago, sexual encounters were generally between two (or more) people in a private setting. Then the internet came, and the floodgates opened. With the wide availability of advice, diagrams, cell phones and instant messenger programs, our ideas about sex have become more fluid than ever. We no longer need to suppress our passions, fetishes or dirty thoughts; we now have plenty of outlets to nurture and share them with others."

"After three years, you're still one year shy of a college degree, two years shy of being able to apply for U.S. citizenship, and 70 years from seeing that saguaro cactus you clipped while driving drunk in the desert fully re-grow its arm. Three years is nothing.

"Then again, three years can be an eternity. Three years is more than half a lifetime for a game console, and twice a lifetime for most games. For gaming celebrities, it could be a career. On the internet, it's an epoch."