IDW Publishing and Wizards of the Coast have launched a Forgotten Realms Character Creation Contest to coincide with the upcoming comic book series penned by Forgotten Realms creator Ed Greenwood.

The winner will see his or her character appear in a future issue of the series, as well as receive a nice chunk of swag. Runners up will all receive D&D prize packs.

Perhaps I can finally find a creative avenue for my one-armed dragon-raised undead Minotaur pimp.

(fingers crossed)

Entries must be received by Wizards no later than 12:01 a.m. PST on February 10, 2012. All the info on this and the other nifty contests going on can be seen here.

2011 was an exciting year for Dungeons and Dragons. 4th edition was going strong, the D&D Encounters gaming sessions were successful, and the Adventure System board games were a hit. They started a big push with the Neverwinter brand, up to and including a Facebook game. So what will 2012 bring us?

A new D&D. While they're not quite calling it 5th Edition yet, that seems to be the common inference. They have already begun playtesting with 'friends and family', with public playtesting opening shortly. D&D Essentials was met with mixed reaction, so it'll be interesting to see which way they take the new system as far as complexity goes. WotC is selling hard the idea that this next system will be shaped by the players, taking into account as much input from the games as they can, which may prove to be a daunting task. Enigmatically, they also say the system will be 'flexible', and  "rich with options for players and DMs to embrace or reject as they see fit, a game that brings D&D fans together rather than serves as one more category to splinter us apart."

Whatever that means.

The full press release, as well as how to sign up for the playtest can be found here.

Funimation has acquired the rights for Goofy-yet-enjoyable fanservice anime High School DXD (based on the Japanese light novel series by Ichiei Ishibumi) for broadcast, home video, merchandising, mobile and streaming rights. Streaming begins January 23rd, with home video to follow.

Admittedly, Dungeons and Dragons isn't always an easy sell on the uninitiated. Geekdom has made a huge surge in credibility over the last few decades, granted, but D&D still has a bit of a social stigma to overcome when trying to introduce new players. And once you get them to the table, it's occasionally a tough sell to explain that the campaign could take days, weeks, even months to complete (or, in our case, years. Stupid dragon, JUST GIVE US THE GEM ALREADY.) Once they've rolled up their characters and gotten into the swing of things, validation is surely near...but it's that first climb up the mountain that can be rough.

Enter the D&D board games... Wizard of the Coast's D&D gateway drug.

First up is Food Fight. I had a chance to sit down and give this game a spin, and enjoyed it so thoroughly that I purchased it directly after. In Food Fight you command an army of anthropomorphic food, battling meal by meal for Victory Points. Certain troops give you benefits at certain meals, such as Dinner Rolls which are considerably more effective at dinner as opposed to breakfast, and there are instant effects such as Ketchup Mechanic and Medic Mustard for last-second buffs to your troops. Also included are powerful ‘mascot’ cards such as CrunChe Taco, the food version of Che Guevara, which can quickly swing a battle in your favor.

One of the most significant challenges in designing a game is deciding whether to cater to the hardcore gamers or the casual ones. Trying to accommodate both typically weakens the entire experience, so developers will typically choose one camp or the other...not so with Nival's ambitious new MMO Prime World, which attempts to bridge that gap. At E3, I had a chance to give the game a spin with some other members of the media, as well as some of the dev team, and think they could be on the right track.

While the show itself was open to the public on Thursday, June 8^th, a private E3 reception was held the night before featuring a DJ and some free beers, and handing out these lovely beers were girls wearing the dress Alice wears in the game series.

Check out the gallery here.

You may not know Michael Sinterniklass by the above picture, but there's a pretty good chance you've heard his voice. Michael is an accomplished voice actor, ADR director, and writer, most recently known as the voice of Dean Venture on Adult Swim's ridiculously funny The Venture Bros. and Leonardo in the 2003 version of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles animated series. As a voice director, he has a long list of anime credits under his belt including Berserk, Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn, and Slayers Revolution. Michael was a guest at Anime Central in Rosemont, IL and met with the press to answer some questions. Here's a quick recap...

We've posted a new gallery of the cosplay pictures from Anime Central 2011. Click the pic above to check 'em out!