Release The Geek

Blockchain technology, sports, and pop culture - on the face of it, there doesn't seem to be much cross-over of these two areas. The Canadian based Sports Technology Group (or STG), however, knows the value that can be unlocked for both professional athletes and sporting franchises & organisations through inspired applications of the tech. It’s estimated that even for an organisation no less esteemed the National Basketball Association spends over $600,000 on athlete administration every year - a figure which could be reduced dramatically by using blockchain tech to structure 'smart contracts' for athletes. Why should the opinions of STG be listened to? Well, not many organisation can claim to have the insight of no less than five Olympians, with over 100 combined years of data and technology expertise. Gary Boddington, CEO & co-founder of STG, was kind enough to chat to us about many things in this area of sports technology including how much has changed (and how much has stayed the same) when it comes to athlete contracts, the incredible applications of smart contract technology in relation to contract performance clauses, and what it will take for this tech to snowball.

Put simply, Cat Machin is here to fill your social feed with space art. But there's lots more going on that just the incredibly sought-after pieces that do a wonderful job capturing the beauty of stars, nebulas, super-bubbles, and other parts of the universe. After a substantial career in the video gaming industry, Cat made a major life change - she left her job, learned art, and now has taken on a new mission - to bring the joy and knowledge of the cosmos to everyone. How successful has she been? Cat owns no less than the record as Australia's highest crowd-funded artist of all time and has a client waitlist that stretches around the globe.Cat was gracious enough to chat to us recently about many things including how her family were a fantastic geeky influence (despite the many gaming grievances Cat still holds); how stressful the video gaming industry can be; and how she managed to get her brother a tour of Space X - which is a wonderful story on its own.

Back in 2017, the team at Ominous Press brought us the original "Beast of the Black Hand", a horror/adventure graphic novel based on an idea by Paul Harding, set in the waning days of World War 1. With plenty of supernatural action - and they did it by smashing their goals in a successfully funded Kickstarter project. Now, the creative team is back for more horror, espionage, amd diesel powered adventure. Beast of the Black Hand writer, and friend of the show, Ron Marz joined us to talk about volume two of the multi-part epic: Beasts of the Black Hand Vol 2 - The Viking League. We chatted about about many things including how Ominous Press manages to get its Kickstarter projects consistently funded; what amazing news perks are on offer for Volume 2; and how sometimes the best names you can come up for characters are ones based on real life characters.

When it comes to art, South African artist Loyiso Mkize is a multi-threat. A successful stint as head illustrator for the world's biggest-selling monthly comic books in the world - the proudly South African Supa Strikas; creating South Africa's first superhero comic book series, KWEZI through his own visual arts company (LM Art); projects for Archie comics, MTV Shuga, Disney and Standard Bank; plus multiple solo and group exhibitions around the world all add up to an impressive, and growing art CV. His experience has also led him to be named as a judge for the biggest online Art Tournament in Africa - the VX Art Tournament. Pulling from our 'found recordings archive', Loyiso was a guest at Fan Con back in 2018 and was kind enough to chat with us about many things including his path to art geekdom, the origin story of South Africa's first superhero and much more.

The world is … well … doing it tough right now. Here’s a message from the RTG team that we hope might help.

Spencer Williams, and his wife Lara, are board game geeks of the highest order. With a shared passion for board games, the Williams created the "Married With Board Games" podcast which talked about games that can be played as a couple and as a family, especially games with a co-operative element. The world of content creation can have some substantial negative aspects to it - crummy attitudes, hate and negativity can make online experiences tough to navigate. Recently, Spencer has expanded his content creation strategy to address this particular topic with the "Lighten Up Initiative" - to quote from the website, its 'board game media with a lighter touch'. Spencer was kind enough to chat to us recently about many things including: his path to geekdom growing up in Texas and the origin story behind the 'Lighten Up Initiative'

The comics industry is currently calling itself into account - again. Multiple reports of predatory behaviour are being brought to light and with it the opportunity for voices in the comic book community to be heard about a range of issues - including the topic of diversity. While strides have been made in terms of representation in the industry, there is still a great deal that can be done.In 2018, I was fortunate enough to moderate a panel at Fan Con Comic Convention in Cape Town about diversity in comics, and it's a great time to revisit the discussion. On stage were convention guests Cape Town based artist Danelle Malan, and comic book industry veterans Loyiso Mkize and Declan Shalvey who were gracious enough to share their feelings and insights on the topic. Declan was a guest at Fan Con in 2018 and was kind enough to chat to take time out and chat to us about many things including his path to geekdom, going to his first comic book convention, the importance of diversity in the comic industry and who his favourite Trek captain is. And an apology - we spend some time nerding out about 80's X-men comics.

Matthew Dow Smith is an American comic book artist and author. He's worked on a range of titles for publishers DC, Marvel, Dark Horse among others including Hellboy, Sandman Mystery Theatre, Dr Who, The X-files Starman, Beasts of the Black Hand and the X-Men. He's also releasing his new work "Johnny Chaos" in weekly installments on Twitter (which you can find via @matthewdowsmith), and has just announced the formation of his own studio Skeleton Tree Media.Matthew was kind enough to spare some to chat about many things including his path to geekdom, what would be a good starting point for the Cthulhu mythos for a new fan, why he's started his own creative studio now and the clever logic behind why he's releasing Johnny Chaos the way he is. We also discuss the current state of accountability in the comic book industry and why there needs to be increased representation. Plus we also geek out extensively over Doctor Who - you were warned.

Declan Shalvey was a big comic book reader as a kid, with lashings of Star Trek thrown in through a caring mother who also supported his artwork: up to and including the drawing on the walls at home. From such humble beginnings, Declan has become a renowned artist and writer who has worked for DC, Marvel, Boom! Studios, Image and others. He's also the co-creator (along with Gavin Fullerton) of Bog Bodies - an original graphic novel featuring Irish gangsters stranded in the Dublin Mountains - which also comes with a companion soundtrack. Bog Bodies is now available, and you should definitely head over to bogbodies.com for more information. Declan was a guest at Fan Con in 2018 and was kind enough to chat to take time out and chat to us about many things including his path to geekdom, going to his first comic book convention, the importance of diversity in the comic industry and who his favourite Trek captain is. And an apology - we spend some time nerding out about 80's X-men comics.

If you ask Ben McKenzie what his trade is you'll get a multi-pronged response: performer, writer, and game designer, but all carry large swaths of geeky interests. His "Man in the Lab Coat" persona shares his enthusiasm for science to comedy audiences; he was the head writer for the Table of Tales: The Crooked Crown video game, now available on Playstation VR, and along with Elizabeth Flux he co-hosts a podcast that is effectively a Terry Pratchett book club. The Pratchat podcast is a six(ish) year mission to read every Terry Pratchett novel, one a month, discussing the book with a special guest.Back in May 2018 during a visit to Supanova in Melbourne, Ben was kind enough to chat to us about many things including his path to geekdom, the origins of the Pratchat podcast, how there are more opportunities for geek content than ever before, and what it means to be a "TRUE" fan and how nerdom should be celebrated (a hint: it definitely should include more 'nerd dates'). Plus we find out why the Stegosaurus is the BEST dinosaur, and the reasons are quite compelling.

Comedy's Best Kept Secret podcast ... he gets to have interviews with porn stars. On the podcast 'Porn Stars are People', Dan interviews female adult film stars about matters of life, love, and happiness with the hope of de-stigmatising porn and the performers who choose the lifestyle. The podcast hopes to humanise comedians, porn stars, people, and listeners alike to see that life is not about labels, judgments, and critiques.During a visit to South Africa in 2018, Dan was kind enough to take time out of his schedule to chat to us about many things including his path to comedy, the story behind how he managed to start interviewing adult film stars, the lessons he's learned from these conversations and the impact it's had on his personal life.

Jeff Ayers has a job that many content creators and fans of coffee would envy - he's translated his love of pop culture and his experience as a kind of "geek consultant" to the Death Wish Coffee Company, makers of the world's strongest coffee, into a full-time role. Today, he handles the company's popular 'Fueled By Death' cast and is involved with other video and audio content for the company. Jeff was kind enough to take We chat about many things including: - how his love of comics as a kid grew, despite the local comic store owner being an incredible jerk - when he realised he could translate his love of geekdom and pop culture into paid creative work - and the importance of saying yes when opportunity knocks. - plus he tells us the incredible story of how Death Wish Coffee managed to get its product on the International Space Station. And it's quite a tale.

Felix Kessel once referred to himself not as the CEO of the advertising agency he co-founded, but as the Magic Steam Turbine Driver - his position being that we all have an engine that makes magic: his job was to help steer and mantain the machine driven by that steam. He's been responsible for an impressive array of brands including McDonald's, Nintendo, Dimension Data, and Amstel Lager. In his current role as Creative Lead WPP Liquid, it's Felix's job to guide of some of South Africa's most wonderful and powerful brands through the transforming landscape of communication.Felix has been a guest previously on Release The Geek (waaay back in Episode 20), where he discussed being openly geeky in the corporate space: for example, he's worn his Live Action Role Playing costumes to the office during casual days, and being a geek is a key part of who Felix is. Last year at ICON 2019, Felix was kind enough to share his knowledge of how to build a brand with creatives who are looking to start their own company in the geek space, and we're proud to present this insightful session to you now - if you know anyone who is looking to start a business in COVID-19 times, or looking to revamp their own company image, we would strongly suggest you share this with them.

Jim Starlin is a name that really doesn't need an introduction - but we'll give one anyway. Thanos, Gamora, Dreadstar, Shang-Chi, Captain Marvel, Adam Warlock ... Starlin has had a hand in creating, co-creating or revamping some of the biggest characters and is responsible for some of the most iconic storylines in comic book history: Infinity Gauntlet and Death In The Family just to name two.On April 14, in conjunction with the fine folks at Ominous Press, Starlin launch a brand new Kickstarter project - Dreadstar Returns: the first all-new Vanth Dreadstar adventure in 3 decades. How well was it received? Well, the 100-page brand new graphic novel hit its funding target in just 14 short hours. With over a week still to go (as at the time of this recording), the project has blasted through all stretch goals and is now about hit the USD$100,000 mark.Jim was kind enough to take time out of his busy schedule to chat with us about many things including the story behind this new Kickstarter project, which current industry talent he'd like to work with, and what he does to help deal with a missing creative muse. Plus he reveals just why he hates Walt Simonson. Which we're sure is a friendly grudge. We hope. You’ve still got time to support the project, especially with all stretch goals well and truly covered. Check out all the options on the project’s Kickstarter page. And finally, a shout out to Jamie Jameson - while all will be revealed in the interview, we wanted to wish her a full and speedy recovery.

In 1990, Thanos set out to acquire six Soul Gems in order to fulfill a very specific mission for Death herself. This quest shaped Marvel comics for the next three years, and led to the current state of the worldwide box office records. Ron Marz was there for it all, with a 50+ issue run on Silver Surfer part of the many Infinity Gauntlet/War/Crusades.This panel with Ron from ICON Comics & Games Convention 2019 took a deeper look at the mad Tital himself – his motivations, the resulting impact on the Marvel comic book universe, and how this story was interpreted for the big screen.

Over the last few years, Johannesburg-based artist Jason Masters has had a pretty cool run when it comes to work - he was selected by Warren Ellis to work on the James Bond comic from Dynamite Entertainment; he partnered with Jason Aaron for a few issues of the Avengers; he worked with the rapper Common on the web comic Caster, and he's killed it on Captain America with Ta-Nehisi Coates. At ICON 2018, Jason was kind enough to let fans peek behind the curtain on how he works. At a live panel, Jason shared (with permission) a Warren Ellis script for the James Bond title and took us through the process of taking Warren's words and notes, and bringing it to life visually. While this presentation was highly visual, it still translates pretty well to audio, and we're happy to present it here for you.

Donny Cates is a writer of comic books, and he's pretty good at it. The Texas native has become a fan favourite with amazing runs on titles such as Thanos, God Country, Buzzkill, Venom, Thor, Doctor Strange and much more ... but it wasn't the easiest path - as Donny will attest, he's a ten-year overnight success. Donny was a guest at Comic Con Africa 2019 and was gracious enough to talk to us about many things including - how his Dad gave him his impetus to read through comic books, how he approached the character of Thanos when he was tasked to write him, and what his internship at Marvel taught him.

Artist, cosplayer, fashion designer and now business entrepreneur, Hannah Kent has gone well and truly beyond the term triple threat. Growing up as a thoroughly nerdy girl loving Dr Who and the X-men, Hannah focused on making animation a career, which was also influenced by her love of cosplay. Today, Hannah has achieved no small measure of success in these fields including working as an animator at Dreamworks; being one of the winners of the 2016 iteration of the Her Universe fashion show and designing official Wonder Woman, Batgirl and Tomb Raider clothing; and now, taking the plunge and becoming a business owner with her own venture, Moto Muse, that combines her love of motorcycles with fashion design.Amongst the madness of starting her own business, Hannah was kind enough to chat to us about many things including her path to geekdom, her fascination with Rogue and Gambit, and the moment when her passion for cosplay crystalised her focus and direction in her animating career.

Riki LeCotey is better known to her legion of fans around the world as Riddle. Regarded as one of the world's premiere cosplayers, Riddle's impressive collection of skills goes well beyond cosplay - she was a main cast member on Syfy Channel's Heroes of Cosplay reality show and has worked as a specialty costumer on movie sets, helping to bring some of Marvel's biggest heroes to life on Captain America: Civil War, X-Men: First Class, and the Infinity War and Endgame movies. She's also civically minded, creating the Cosplay for a Cause initiative, where cosplayers use their passion for costuming to raise money for charity.Riddle was a guest at Fan Con Comic Convention in Cape Town in 2018, and was incredibly gracious enough to spend some time chatting with me about many things including: how it felt eating Lucky Charms cereal for months at a time living in a remote part of Canada; how the heat of Boston contributed to one of her worst convention experiences, and how she feels about fan service in anime. Plus, she gives us a little bit of an insight into life on the set of Infinity War and Endgame and reveals which prop she would have 'appropriated' from the set. If she would ever do such a thing.

On February 21 2020, the comic book world was stunned by the sudden stepping down of Dan DiDio as co-publisher at DC Comics. As of now, no explanation has been provided for the move, with speculation rife over whether DiDio had been fired or had quit the position. With speculation swirling around the reasons and ramifications of DiDio's departure, we reached out to previous guest Rob Salkowitz for help in understanding what's just gone down. Rob is an author, consultant, educator, and is well known as an expert on the business of pop culture, providing regular insights to industry site ICV2 and as a senior contributor on media and entertainment to Forbes. And, with convention season now in full swing in the US, we also took the opportunity to discuss the potential effect of the coronavirus on attendances and potential guest cancellations for events across the country.

With the One Esports DOTA 2 World Pro Invitational starting this week in Singaport, Release The Geek turns its attention to growth industry of esports. Paul 'ReDeYe' Chaloner is an esports panel host, compere, shoutcaster and consultant for the industry at large. When we first spoke to Paul back in 2016, he was a guest in South Africa to help promote, at that time, the country's largest esports event. We chatted about the growth of esports globally and how the SA scene compared skill wise to best in the world.Esports has grown in a number of ways in the ensuing three years - amateur event coverage has given way to slickly produced events and an expanded generation of professionals, both on the playing side and in the broadcast sphere.Paul was in town for the Vodacom rAge 2019 event and was gracious enough to share some time to chat about many things including: - his role as an ambassador for Vodacom and TenCent to help promote the recent addition of PUBG servers for the mobile gaming market - his advice on how to help grow the local industry with regards to gaming servers and get major competitions organised for the SA scene. - and why he feels the days of esports education are coming to an end.

Brian Stelfreeze is an American painter, penciler, inker, and colourist. From humble beginnings in a small town in South Carolina, Brian now has the distinction of having worked for nearly every major US comic book publisher, with an incredible run of over 50 cover illustrations for DC's Shadow of the Bat. Brian's work with Ta-Nehisi Coates on Black Panther was also instrumental in defining the artistic style of the hit movie - Chadwick Boseman at one stage revealed in an interview that the entire Black Panther production team had read Brian and Ta-Nehisi's run as a key influence for the massive Marvel hit.

John Higgins is a colorer and artist who has an incredible array of comic book credits under his belt - from over 100 appearances in 2000 D to his great run on Hellblazer with Garth Ennis, his work on The Boys, Swamp Thing, Pride & Joy and so much more. How much more? John also just happens to have worked on two of the greatest comic book stories ever - Batman: The Killing Joke and genre-defining Watchmen.

From a young age, all Dean Rankine wanted to do was draw. While today, Dean is a well established Australian comic book artist, he'd still describe himself as a big hairy kid - but a kid who has now worked for a range of companies and a variety of titles including Australian MAD magazine, The Simpsons comic book for Boingo and a cover for the Rick and Morty comic. Dean is now a popular mainstay on the Australian pop culture convention scene, and has developed his own fan following with his popular 'Simpson-ised' portraits of guests at each event. Dean has also started a recent podcast which we encourage you to check out: it's called The Ogres Basement Podcast, and you should totally check it out.

Ku Liang has potentially one of the best jobs you can think of - working with the coolest events around the globe and trying to figure how to make them even better? Ku is the Global Director of Business Development at ReedPop - the company behind some of the biggest comic and pop culture conventions in the world including New York Comic Con, the MCM chain of events in the UK (which is running its Birmingham event this weekend, where guests include Star Wars's C3PO Anthony Daniels and geek hall of famer Sean Astin), PAX events around the world, and the relatively new kid on the block, Comic Con Africa. It's Ku's job to help develop and grow these events further ... no mean feat when there are over 40 events worldwide, each with their own regional challenges and trends against an ever-changing international pop culture backdrop. Against the backdrop of the MCM Birmingham event this weekend, Ku was in Johannesburg recently for the second edition of massively successful Comic Con Africa and was kind enough to chat to us about many things including: - how Japanese animation and manga, a good smattering of kung fu books and plenty of Chinese translated sci-fi novels started him on a lifelong path of geekdom. - how his extensive experience in retail and publishing helped give him the clarity and understanding of what fans may want, and how to make sure ReedPop is getting it right. - and whether the convention scene, and fandom itself, in the US and internationally is close to hitting its saturation point. Plus we discuss how the recent Comic Con Africa experience in Johannesburg compares to other Comic Con events internationally.

Patric Reynolds is a comic book illustrator, who has worked with some incredible names over the past decade. A former public school teacher, Reynolds took the jump in 2009 to become a comic book artist, and hasn't looked back. Patric has some impressive credits to his name, including many "Mignolaverse" titles including Hellboy & the BPRD 1954 and Abe Sapien - and we chatted to him during his recent visit to South Africa courtesy of Comic Con Africa

With great thanks to the team at Comic Con Africa and the Death Wish Coffee podcast ‘Fueled by Death’, we celebrate Halloween by interviewing the ‘ghoul of your dreams’, LeeAnna Vamp!

Back in March, RTG got to visit the brand new site of the Comic Con Museum in San Diego, checking out the ‘Cover Story’ Exhibit. We then chatted to Executive Director of the Museum, Adam Smith, about his path to geekdom and how he came to helm what will be a true temple of pop culture history.

Many things have been happening in the Release The Geek world - here's what's been going on before the launch of Season 5 later this week.

Ed Hoff shares the origin story of the World Cosplay Summit - the biggest cosplay event in the world!

Tegan Phillips started drawing comics to win bicycle, and turned it into ‘Unclipped Adventure’ - a full time job with her comics gracing tshirts, jugs and greeting cards.

One of the things that marks us geeks is passion. Geek passion is on display everywhere - from heated arguments online around whether Superman could beat the Hulk, to cosplayers spends dozens, even hundreds of hours making precise replicas of costumes as an homage to the character.Passion in geek culture is undeniable, which makes the topic of this podcast potentially relatable, even if most geeks aren't necessarily interest in it.This week's podcast is going to discuss sport, (Please, geeks, give it chance before skipping this episode to move on to another podcast). In particular, we're going to discuss cricket. Played mostly in Commonwealth or former Commonwealth nations, it's an incredibly popular sport around the world but in India ... the passion Indian fans have for the sport and their national team is unlike anything any other fanbase can muster.Chetun Narula is a sports journalist and author based in Delhi, and has been following the Indian cricket team since 2011. During the Indian team's recent tour to South Africa, Chaytun covered the team and also played guest commentator during radio coverage of the matches. We reached out to Chetan to ask for his help in understanding of the depths of the passion Indian cricket fans have, and he was gracious enough to make time in his incredibly hectic schedule to discuss many things including his path to geekdom (there are Tintin references enough to keep the average geek interested), the moment on a Doha beach that led to his big career change from engineering, and how difficult it can be to negotiate the politics of covering the sport in cricket's biggest market.

Our last RTG episode spotlighted Gina Nelson, lead artist on the new mobile game Dragon's Watch. During our chat, Gina discussed what the design team was looking for when it came to the theme music for the game - they really wanted to music to be more than just 'background noise', but an enriching aspect of the game.As it happens, Gina's father, Carlo Mombelli, is a South African bassist, composer, and educator - she suggested that he submit some samples to the game design team and they loved what they heard. Gina also gave some insight on Carlo's history, which sounded incredible.We reached out to Johannesburg based Carlo, and had an incredibly entertaining discussion about his path to musical geekdom. As a quick example - as I record this intro, the largely self-taught Carlo is currently in Bern, Switzerland, where he's performing in a series of concerts.Carlo was incredibly gracious with his time and we chatted about many things including how he fell in love with the bass guitar, how he created the soundtrack to Dragon's Watch with acoustic instruments (sometimes, custom made for the sound), and how he got his first performance gig - singing at a restaurant as the lead-in entertainer for one of South Africa's well known exotic dancers.

Gina Nelson is a young South African developer who became enamoured with the computer game industry and quickly decided that this was the career for her. After working with local game dev company ‘Luma Arcade’, Gina set off to the UK to seek her fortune, and has landed the role of Art Lead for London games studio ‘The Secret Police’ - a company that comes with some impressive credentials.In late 2017, Gina, as part of the ‘The Secret Police’ team, launched their first game: 'Dragon's Watch' - a fantasy RPG game with over 700 heroes to collect and evolve through multiple levels as you attempt to rescue dragons in order to save the kingdom. On Monday, GeekXP will be posting a full review of the ‘Dragon's Watch’ game itself plus details of a competition just for ‘Release The Geek’ listeners. We'll be asking a question in that article, but you'll only be able to get the answer on this podcast which is ... Tin Fingers. Check out geekxp.co.za on Monday, 26th of Feb to find out more.But back to Gina, who was kind enough to share with us her path to geekdom, how she fell in love with both art and game design, and the secret behind the amazing soundtrack to ‘Dragon's Watch’.

Back in 2015, we interviewed Johannesburg author Natalie Rivener, who had taken on the task of co-ordinating an array of South African authors to self-publish an anthology of stories. The group were instructed to use the imagery of the phoenix as their short story inspirations and the Flight of the Phoenix became available from Amazon via digital and print-on-demand versions Now, three years later, Natalie has braved the perils of herding cats once again to produce a new anthology, with the idea of Fire playing the inspirational muse. The new book, Phoenix Fire, officially launches on the 24th of this month with an event hosted by the Nexus retail and gaming venue in Randburg, so if you're in Johannesburg you should definitely pop by from 2 pm, pick up your copy and get it signed by the authors. We sat down to talk to not only Natalie about the ups and downs of producing this particular edition, but also to chat to a first time published author who contributed to Phoenix Fire - and he's a name and voice regular listeners will instantly know.

In 2016, we interviewed Kelan Gerrity from ‘Sera Blue’, a new age publishing company based in Johannesburg, South Africa. Kelan, a writer herself, offered a very interesting promotion - if you purchased a copy of her book, ‘Crimson Skies’, you could submit a story idea that ‘Sera Blue’ would edit and publish for free.After a long and challenging process, due to the quality of the entries, Sera Blue declared a winner - Joburg based writer Jason Hes, for his horror novel submission, ‘Our Immaculate’.We recently sat down with both Jason and Kelan to discuss Jason's path to geekdom, the competition process overall, and how Jason came upon the ideas that formed the basis of his horror story.

For a number of years, Bravado Gaming has been THE dominant force in the South African esports scene. Last weekend (Jan 21st), Bravado got 2018 off to great start by taking out the World Electronic Sports Games African qualifiers which sees them off to China in March to compete in the World Finals.But that isn't the biggest news around Bravado Gaming. On January 17, the team announced that the CS:Go squad are relocating to the United States - South African teams have always struggled to compete against northern hemisphere teams due to the sheer physics of distance. By shifting to the US, Bravado will be competing against America's best on a level playing field.We sat down to chat with Bravado Gaming CEO Andreas Hadjipaschali at Bravado's new boot camp headquarters in Johannesburg to talk about the origin of Bravado Gaming and it's how it plans to take over the US.

The ‘Star Wars: X-Wing Miniature Game’ has, in a few short years, managed to become the top ranked tabletop game around the world. So how is it doing in South Africa? Release The Geek chatted with Gerhard Pretorius and Shaun Rushmer from the Mole Men Gaming Group, based in Johannesburg, to discuss the game, its basic mechanics, and the factors that make it one of the most popular tabletop games around.

To believe Jim Zub's bio on his website, he's merely a writer, artist and art instructor based in Toronto, Canada, but that would belie the incredible amount of work Jim does.Not only does he currently have multiple comic projects on the go at one time, including The Uncanny Avengers for Marvel and Wayward, a modern supernatural story about teens fighting Japanse mythological monsters for Image ... but he's also an animation teacher and program co-ordinator for a local college. Further, he manages a Patreon account that truly gives you access to the 'behind the scenes' of his work, but also somehow finds the time to give new creatives advice through an amazing catalogue of industry tutorials as well as giving direct advice when he can via his Twitter feed.Jim was gracious enough to conjour an hour out of his hectic schedule to chat to us about many things including is path to geekdom, his love of roleplaying and comic books, how he got his start in the comics industry and what it was like to finally land the job of handling . Plus, Jim lets us know just how often he might drop some sneaky callbacks into his stories.

Dave Gibbons is, to put it simply, a titan in the comic book field. While it's easy to say that he might be best known for his collaboration with Alan Moore on Watchmen, Inkpot and Jack Kirby award winner Gibbons has massed more than an enviable body of work: he co-created Rogue Trooper alongside Gerry Finley-Day for 2000 AD, also working on Judge Dredd, Dan Dare, the Harlem Heroes and the ABC Warriors for the same publication; Gibbons worked with Moore again to create what is widely acknowledged as one of the best Superman stories of all time, "For The Man Who Has Everything", working alongside Len Wein, Gibbons made John Stewart the primary character of green lantern; and in a synergistic full circle, worked on the title that was his favourite as a child - "World's Finest" staring Superman and Batman.Dave was gracious enough to take time out of his busy schedule to chat to us about a range of topics including his path to geekdom, getting his first comic book assignments, and who is still on his bucket list to work with.

It's now officially December, which means we can start with the year in review stuff! Vittorio and Les sit down to discuss the gems they discovered and made them happy through the year to date: from movies to games plus much more!

This week's episode examines the world of tabletop miniature gaming - if you're not sure what I'm talking about, the simplest explanation is 'toy soliders', but it's much more detailed and interesting that that. In particular, our focus is on Warhammer 40KProduced by the UK's Games Workshop, Warhammer 40K is one of the world's most popular tabletop games - the rich backstory explaining the various armies, and the quality of the figures has made 40K a dominant game worldwide for over 30 years. However, the universe the game exists in has rarely changed in any great way - there has little 'progress' in the storyline, to put it in a very basic fashion.But June of this year, saw the release of the 8th edition of the 40K rules, and there have been some earth shattering developments that are moving the story forward in a new direction. Why, after almost 30 years, has this happened, and is this a good thing? To get to the bottom of the story, we reached out to our fellow casters at the Geek of All Trades podcast - Gregg Barlow and Douw Pretorius - who are up on all things 40K to get the low down on the latest edition changes, what the potential ramifications are game-wise, and what were the market forces that might've driven Games Workshop to make these changes after so many years.

Lisle Wilkerson is an American voice actress, with an impressive list of credits to her name. Fully fluent in Japanese after growing up in Tokyo, Japan, Lisle moved into radio DJ work on J-Wave and was inspired by the voice luminaries of the age, including Wolfman Jack.Lisle has gone on to achieve fame as the voice behind Nina Williams and Christie Monteiro from the Tekken series and Sarah Bryant from Virtua Quest. Lisle was gracious enough to chat to us about all manner of things including getting her start in the radio industry in Tokyo, the differences between voice acting auditions in the US and Japan, and her experiences with Sofia Coppola and Bill Murray on the set of 'Lost In Translation'.

This year has seen the rise of the term 'alternate fact' - the phrase was used to describe demonstrable falsehoods in an attempt to make them seem real.This particular podcast, recorded earlier in the year, is inspired by the term. Alternate universes abound in the comics world, some to much greater effect and fan acclaim than others - we invited the Variant Covers team of Greg Nell, Limpho Moeti and Nas Hoosen to discuss which comic alternate universes were their favourites.

Rob Salkowitz is an internationally recognised expert in the intersection of digital media and social and business trends. Rob has worked with a range of organisations to help engage with specialised audiences, identify new opportunities and articulate their vision for the future.In addition, Rob has written four books including Comic-Con and the Business of Pop Culture, which uses SDCC as the backdrop in discerning what the drivers will be for the future of entertainment.Rob graciously found time in his schedule to chat to us about a range of topics including some of the trends in pop culture conventions around the world, where the newest innovators of technology can be found, and we discuss future trends in the people management of pop culture events.

Esports has become a massive part of the gaming landscape, and rAge is becoming the showcase venue - Kwese was on hand with an incredible stage hosting the first ESL Africa tournament (congrats to Energy Esports for a comprehensive CS:Go performance over Bravado gamingWe chatted to two people at rAge who are in different areas of the esports world: first up we chat to Lauren "Pansy" Scott - a professional CS:GO shoutcaster from the UK who has become a full time ESL employee. Lauren was brought to SA by the Kwese, and was gracious enough to spare some time to chat about her origin story, and some advice on managing the expectations of budding shoutcasts.Then we spoke to Zybrand "Zeylox" Lombaard who manages the CS:GO Rejects team for Veneration Esports. Zybrand has shifted from player to manager, as he realised he couldn't commit to the amount of time required to be a competitive gamer, but still wanted to contribute and be part of the scene.

South African born comedian Urzila Carlson is a regular on televisions screens across Australia and her adopted home of New Zealand. With appearances on "Have You Been Paying Attention", "7 Days", "Super City" and "Road Madness", Urzila has become much sought after on the international stage, both as a headline stand up act and as an MC.Urzila was recently holidaying South Africa, and was incredibly gracious enough to take some time to sit with me after performing at the Goliath Comedy Club in Johannesburg, where she shared her comedy origin story, her love of watches, and discussed the state of coffee across the SANZAR nations.

Graeme Selvan and Louis Du Pisani are the developers guys behind Robot Wizard, a Joburg based game development studio who are hard at work on their debut game, Jengo - a retro throwback to the 'point and click' era of gaming with a modern and appealing coating. Jengo is very much a story-driven game filled with with bittersweet humour & brain teasing riddles in a world of failed video game characters that didn't quite make it as top-line gaming characters in games we know and love. In June this year, Robot Wizard announced that Playdius Entertainment had signed on to be the publishers for Jengo, which also brought the guys to Gamescon in Germany where they showcased the game for the first time. But now, the time has come for South Africans to try out the game at rAge this weekend. In addition to being able to try out the game itself, you also have the chance become part of the game: Robot Wizard is still looking for the voice of the game's main character, Jeff, plus other voice-overs the game might require.We sat down with Graeme and Louis (with input from Cody, the shaman general of the operation) to chat about their respective paths to geekdom, the origin story behind the game itself, and we talk about their future plans for their Kickstarter proposal.

To kick off Season 4, we decided to take a slightly different angle on an age old facet of geek culture, regardless of interest: he scenario argument. It could be book versus movie: which was better? Who would win: uperman vs Hulk? Kirk vs Picard vs Sisko vs Janeway etc. etc. Tech geeks could argue over which flavour of operating system is better. Sports geeks argue about which their top five players of all time, or which championship team would beat any other championship team.Part of the fun of being a geek is the ability to play around with the variables, put them in different situations and see what happens. Earlier this year, Vittorio and I sat down with the Variant Covers crew of Limpho Moeti, Greg Nell and Nas Hoosen to throw around some scenarios of our own, but not in argument format: if you could have access to any comic book artist for a commission, what work would you have them create? Money was no object, nor was time - this conversation was more about which artists we cherish and hold dear, and what we would like to seem them create.

We round out our third season with one more panel from ICON 2017 and we're continuing with the esports theme. Last year, ICON 2016 played host to a panel discussing the state of esports in South Africa, and it was a very busy year for esports since then.Last month saw the completion of TWO major esports events in South Africa (the Rush event brought to you by NAG, and the VS Gaming event), last weekend saw the inaugural Valkyrie Girl Gamer competition with 50 thousand rand prize money as well as the announcement that the Nexus in Randburg, Johannesburg will play host to the Hearthstone European Summer qualifiers for South Africa. The profile of esports has never been higher. And all of this can be framed against the backdrop of Valve's DOTA 2 The International, which has amassed an incredible prize pool of over 24 million US dollars.With the massive growth of esports locally, we'd like to present to you this year's ICON 2017 panel talking about the state of esports in South Africa, hosted by SA's Tech Girl, Sam Wright.

Esports continues to surge in popularity all over the globe, and South Africa is no exception, but without a doubt it’s still very much seen as a male-dominated space. This makes it difficult for females to find a way into gaming without feeling intimidated by their male counterparts. Steps are being taken, however, to get more women involved, and to identify up and coming female esports talent. This weekend, SA's Tech Girl, Sam Wright, in partnership with Mettlestate and Evetech, is launching the "Valkyrie Challenge" - two all-girl CS:GO teams (Amaryllis Gaming and Energy Esports) battling it out in a winner take all R50,000 best-of-five matchup. To give you some background as to the importance of these sorts of events, we're proud to present another ICON 2017 panel recording. At ICON in June, Sam Wright took to the main stage to discuss the state of gaming from a female perspective in South Africa, and talked about the local girl gamers who are on the verge of big things, as well as the recent, and future initiatives to help girl gamers make the mark.