Several people have asked me about this – what the hell does “Dire Clown” (the URL of my blog) mean?  Allow me to explain.

Back in 1992, I was obsessed with the game Shining Force for the Sega Genesis (newer games in the series are still popular).

One of the battles in the game takes place in a circus tent, and there’s a particular enemy that you fight called the Dire Clown.  It looks like this:

Creepy, huh?  Given that I also have this bizarre love/hate relationship with evil clowns, that combined two of my major interests.  I then began using the name “Dire Clown” as an online handle as well.  If you’ve never played the game, here’s a video of the specific battle in which Dire Clown appears: Shining Force: Chapter 2, Part 3 (Circus Battle).

When I started blogging, much further down the road, I adopted the same name for a couple of blogs – not because I couldn’t think of anything else, but I still thought it had a nice ring to it.

I’ve since started using other names for newer accounts, but the Dire Clown character still holds a place in my heart.  Oddly enough, I rarely see any “Dire Clown fan art”; the Shining Force games are still immensely popular, so you would think there would be!

So now that the blog is called “Secrets of the Dark,” perhaps I need to combine the two – a Dire Clown peering out from a dark alley or something…

Has anyone encountered creepy clowns elsewhere on the web?  (Or is that a silly question?)  Feel free to share your evil clown stories.

And watch out – they’re after you…