Customers hand over whatever change they have while a suspect punches video monitors at the counter but the cameras are still rolling. That's when the suspect in black approaches Dylan Hays.
"They tried to take his DS, his Nintendo DS and he wasn't having that -- so he came back swinging," said Wolery.
"Then he hit me and I kind of just got angry and I bull-rushed him out there door," said Hays.
"I pulled him down the ground over here, the table got moved and I had him down on the ground he was still hitting me," said Wolery. "Dylan pulls off the guys mask -- he runs out the door -- his friends are outside waiting. Let's get out of here, let's get out of here and we were holding one guy in and still fighting him and the other guys come into the store --pull him out and take off."
"I mean we're gamers, we've been immersed in that culture where like we all want to Superman, you know we're missing something partial in our brain that says yeah this might be dangerous," said Hays.
"Sid Meier is known throughout Maryland and the world as a pioneer of electronic gaming, having co-founded his first studio in Baltimore County, Maryland in 1982, and today continuing a tradition of developing the talent and creativity of future generations," Governor Martin O'Malley said in a statement.
"Now, therefore, I, Martin O'Malley, Governor of the State of Maryland, do hereby pay tribute to the outstanding achievements of Sid Meier on this day, July 28, 2010, and hereby recognize September 21, 2010, as Sid Meier's Civilization V Day, and call upon the people of our State to join in celebrating this salute."
Unfortunately, a creator -- any creator, in any creative field -- has to recognize his or her limits, and if he can't, that's what an editor's for. And you eventually come to a point where either the editor has to look at something and decide that it's an unpublishable mess or the creator has to take a step back and ask himself if he really wants his contribution to a 70-year legacy be a story where Batman gets high and pisses himself.
Not too long after the success of Star Wars in 1978 Lucas went to work on constructing the Skywalker Ranch near Nicasio, California. What’s amazing to me about this is that instead of embracing Hollywood as the center of his operations Lucas instead fled north to get away from tinsel town. From a corporate culture point of view this allowed Lucas to “think outside of the box”. And in many ways his move reminds me a great of how Microsoft founder Bill Gates made it a point to not center his company in silicon valley, but rather in Redmond, Washington where they would thrive in isolation.
On an immediate level this allows Lucas to focus on the product instead of getting caught up in the trappings of the film industry. The practical result of this is that it allows the people who work in the marketing department to avoid the “me too” approach. Hollywood is famous for not taking risks, but if you’re going break through the noise you have to chances — and Lucas has avoided that trap which in turn has helped his longevity.
There are no great analogues for the Jedi in modern American society. They are a secretive, powerful religious sect contracted by the Republic to do vital governing tasks that include policing and diplomacy. Perhaps the Knights Templar were similar in some ways, although I don't think the Knights had any real authority within European society. Their jurisdiction was the Holy Land. In some ways, the Jedi sound more like the Taliban than anything we've got going in the U.S.
