SPECIAL GUESTS

James Ernest James Ernest worked for many years as a professional juggler before discovering that he could earn more money just sitting in his basement. Once that got boring, he had a vision: Cheapass Games, a multinational entertainment corporation employing thousands of skilled workers and dedicated to the creation of cheap, funny, and eminently playable board games. And the betterment of mankind. Ernest is the president and lead designer of Cheapass Games. Along with creating nearly all the game products for that company, Ernest has also written trading card games for Slag-Blah Entertainment and Wizards of the Coast, and other games for GAMES and Dragon magazine. His best-known Cheapass Games include Button Men, Brawl, Kill Doctor Lucky, and Lord of the Fries. Ernest started Cheapass Games in late 1996. Since then, the company has published nearly 30 titles; mostly board games and card games, all priced under $10. His wife keeps reminding him that if game publishing doesn't pan out, he can always fall back on his juggling career. With the release of the not-yet-theatre-wide feature film, "The Man Between," James places himself amongst the greats of ultra-low-budget film producers/directors. In the film, Anthony Gallela stars as a man with a mission -- uhmmm... that is... withOUT a mission. He's a famous secret agent between assignments -- the foils and fumbles of this agent's life -- in between.

Kenneth Hite Kenneth Hite started out a fresh-faced amateur ten short years ago as the author of SECRET SOCIETIES for Chaosium's cult favorite NEPHILIM and the co-author of GURPS ALTERNATE EARTHS. Parlaying that early "indie cred" into quick success, he became NEPHILIM Line Developer, edited two books for IN NOMINE, wrote NIGHTMARES OF MINE on horror gaming for Iron Crown, THE CAINITE HERESY for VAMPIRE: THE DARK AGES, and part of three books including the core book for MAGE: THE SORCERERS CRUSADE. Beloved by thousands, his two columns -- "Out of the Box," a gaming industry news and review column now at GamingReport.com, and "Suppressed Transmissions," a high-weirdness column for the webzine PYRAMID -- made him the voice of a generation, albeit a small, disturbed, and insular one. He co-designed the Origins-Award-winning STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION RPG, scaled the dizzy heights of high-concept magical horror with GURPS CABAL, and saw his SUPPRESSED TRANSMISSION column collected into a book. But soon, it all came crashing down. We'll have the shameful story of his spiral into addiction, groupies, and sequel-mania (GURPS ALTERNATE EARTHS 2, GURPS INFINITE WORLDS, SUPPRESSED TRANSMISSION 2, STAR TREK: THE ORIGINAL SERIES RPG, GURPS HORROR 3rd edition, and Decipher Games' STAR TREK RPG) when "Behind the Gaming" returns.