So last weekend I had the opportunity to get together and hang out with my brother. It doesnt happen as often as either of us would like since we're two hours apart, both somewhat recently married with somewhat new places. Oh, and jobs. We both have jobs that don't have condusive schedules (ie, he has to work on most Saturdays). But he had the week off for vacation and so I took Friday off and headed down to see him Thursday night.

 I got there around 11 I think and was greeted with wine and Guitar Hero. Great start! I'd only played the original GH, so this was the world tour where we could both play "in a band." I got bass because really I kinda suck and stuck with medium as he wailed on lead on Hard. I'm the little brother though, so I think he's *supposed* to take the lead, right?

 We rock hard until around 3AM when I could no longer focus on the flying disks coming at me and we muddled through FREEBIRD.  At this point I've been up, driving and/or working since 430AM, so I'm beat. Off to dream land we go!

 Up next morning for some egg sammiches and OJ. I break out the first of the few games I brought to share with my Bro. Blokus! Didn't know how he'd like it, but figured it was easy to teach (I suck at teaching) and would wrap up quickly if it tanked. Oh no. We go on to play 4 more games - complete with trash talk, piece flicking and questioning sexuality. I win the first four but he comes back and beats me by about 7 points on the last game.  At this point we've blown through lunch and I've got about 1.5-2 hours before I'm gonna head home.

 Enter Last Night on Earth. My brother is a huge zombie fan - and he's critical. He might buy every zombie flick that comes out, but he also is known to buy a lot of crap. Period. He's a movie junkie. But knowing that he likes zombies at least as much as I do (I'd also brought WWZ to lend him), I thought this would be perfect for us. So I start my bumbling teaching (I've played it all of once) and had decided that the basic game was going to be enough for us for now. Plus it would save us time.

 So we set up the Kill 15 Zeds in 15 Turns basic scenario and he starts racking up kills at an alarming rate. With the Drifter finding good items, the Preacher with that Faith card - Jenny was gunning down Zeds left and right and the Track Star guy was sitting in the HS finding items that would NOT be in your traditional educational establishment. He's above the curve and I only manage to kill that darn LUCKY Sally to be replaced by Jenny. Preacher man is wailing on me and even regains his Faith after I get rid of it. But then my Zeds kept up their forward trek and I was able to get ALL 14 on the table! They closed in on the Drifter in the Hanger (Lights recently Out). All the other heros had at least a wound or two so it seemed just a matter of time and I pulled out the win by killing the Drifter next. He needed like 3 more kills too. First thing he said: "So I guess we don't have time for another... Why did we keep playing Blokus?!"

 Hah! That said, we both really enjoyed both games and finished off the trip with some head to head GH action. I won the first somehow and got whipped on the next. And so I departed what will be the first of many following gaming meet ups between us. He's been a gamer for a long time and it was his copies of A&A and Heroquest that we played when we were kids. But *I* bought the HQ expansions. And he got me into MtG in Revised but it was I who kept up through Exodus or so.

 Next time:

Magic. Break out some newer and old school MtG (plus I bought a pair of beginner decks a while ago to try out either head to head or vs. one of his older decks).

Dungeon Twister. My Bro was a little AP during Blokus, which I pointed out on numerous occasions, but I think if you play this sort of fast and loose it's a lot of fun. Havent played yet where you super over think every move - that might kill it.

 BattleBall. When I get my copy - this will rock.

Descent. This would be my crowning goal. We both LOVED HQ back in the day and I think this would be just right. Only thing is I'd have to teach him and no really, I *suck* at teaching. Still, we'll get there.

More LNOE! He was already really jonesing to try the Defend the Mansion scenario since it reminded him of Resident Evil 1. With the two downloaded scenarios I think this game'll have legs for a good while before I have to get any of the expansions.

Bottom line: Good to reconnect with those you love the most doing something you both love the most. BOOYA.

Okay, so a lot of you may have noticed not just that games are changing over the years, but so are the artworks put on the boxes. Take a look at pre-FFG Talisman 4th Edition:

This looks less like a Family Games themed board game and more like something you'd see on the cartridge art on Clash At Demonhead:

As you can see the comparison of the artwork is closer than what you might say about the Modern Risk version put out by Hasbro as compared to older, pre-Photoshop artwork I remember fondly on the 1990s-early 2000s version:

Note the focal points on the horse compared to the armies raging on each side of his body. Not only does this box art tell us that this is a light wargame with minis (which it sometimes lacks in certain editions) - it preserves an element of game art design that was previously seen in the NES and SNES and Genesis eras of video game box artworks. The only difference is that board games consist of physical components rather than digital pixels, and thus have a very different look on the inside than they do outside.

Let's take a look at a game coming out recently, Survive:

Now let's look at something similar in the video game world, the rerelease of Super Street Fighter II Turbo: HD REMIX:

For some reason whenever somebody says "reissue" to me, I think of this game as what might occur to the interior and exterior artwork of a game when it is rereleased to the public in a new edition. Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix is a lot like what I've seen of Survive, since in order to reach a new audience with a game, sometimes components have to be remastered, artwork changed, and the general "style" of the game altered to a more contemporary aesthetic. This is what Dungeonquest did horribly wrong, but Talisman did wonderfully right. In fact if you own the Talisman version reissued by Black Industries, you can buy an "Upgrade Pack" from Fantasy Flight Games that allows you to use the new components while keeping your old game and its old components/ruleset in case you want to play the older version of the game.

And I've noticed with older video games because of the nostalgia factor attached to pixel art, companies like Capcom made Mega Man 9 in 8-Bit - preserving the essential experience of old school Mega Man in a way Street Fighter was forced to evolve past - see the difference between Street Fighter IV and SSFIITHDR.

What a board game should do with its art style depends on whether it is a reissue game, or whether it's an entirely new game focused at a modern audience - specifically if it is a game for children. Let's take a look at Tales of the Arabian Nights to get an idea of this:

This is a newer, remastered artwork cover of the classic game, and yet even though we can tell Photoshop is used in the cover's creation we can still realise this is a reprinted game as opposed to Survive's artwork. Survive seems more like the artwork used on a downloadable game title you get from your Xbox Live Arcade or Playstation Store Network. There's nothing wrong with this considering the shift in the components from plastic to wood, and there's a good feeling of "Gee, this looks like a fun sea themed game for modern kiddies!" there. But with Tales of the Arabian Nights, the artwork needs to be more stylised and elaborate because the 1001 Nights this game was based on were indeed deeply rooted in Arabic mythology - and from what I've heard the game is too. I like covers which don't lie to me or are borderline false advertising, and while old NES cartridge artworks look great, they're often not representative of the game itself. Tales of the Arabian Nights gives you a "Yeah, this is most likely gonna be in the game somewhere, and it's about the Arabian Nights in its setting".

The key element of a compromise between old game artwork style and new game artwork style is the presence of imagination and pretty pictures together - a good visual image evokes something - I mean Warhammer 40,000's been doing this for years:

Good game art is thematic, as well as interesting. A lot of problems occurred with NES era game art where the art on the box was better than the game, whereas many a good game suffered from bad cover art that turned people off. Gaming in general, that is to say gamer culture, has always been the ghetto where strange, weird ideas that don't quite fit into literature, movies or comics end up. This is true for both tabletop/board games and video games. There are concepts that work better as an interactive game that wouldn't quite work in the world of literature (no visuals except imagination) movies (visuals yes, but would it work financially or with special effects?) or comics (OK, hear me out. Comics are essentially the grandfather of the simply strange imagery that both forms of gaming acquired over the years, because a lot of good game art comes out of a very strong illustration tradition in the genres of fiction that date back fifty years or more. I'm not exactly saying that Super Mario Bros. wouldn't work as a comic book, it probably would, but it would be a vastly different experience and would require much greater depths of storytelling than the original game did.).

Visual mediums by their nature are more toyetic than non-visual mediums like literature and music - and if you're designing something to be played with, the art that goes with it has to be compelling to sell it. This is possibly why Transformers and He-Man And The Masters Of The Universe worked as toy-related shows rather than it starting off as a game first. Monopoly is a very influential game, but Uncle Pennybags isn't as toyetic as say, Super Mario is.

Games are very different playthings to regular toys like action figures - and as a result more narrative based mediums are better suited to being toyetic, like anime and manga plus Western comics and cartoons for example. Mario is one of those weird toyetic examples you see once in a blue moon - he's quite hard to forget and he's not very generic in his design. Contrast this with modern first person shooters like Halo and Gears of War, which are also toyetic but said toys aren't aimed at young children like Mario originally was.

To sum up, game art reflects the time the game is created in or adapted to, which is the reason why you see less RPG games being played by young people and more lifestyle games like minis games and CCGs such as a favourite of mine, Magic - which by the way would be nowhere without the awesome art on the cards and significant game design which is geared towards the collection of a vast array of game components with varying art and characters on them.

I just finished watching The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and was going to mention my thoughts on it in the movie thread, but I realized I had more to say than just a paragraph or two, so here we are. This is my first ever blog, F:AT or otherwise, so please bear with me.

Re-makes have always been around, but recent years have brought us far more Hollywood versions of foreign films than ever before.  After reading about this  one year old flick being remade and the upcoming American version of another recent  great Scandinavian movie Let the Right One In,  my wheels started spinning. Why aren't there more original movies coming out these days, and why does Hollywood keep piggybacking on the success of others? The more I thought of this, the more I saw how this is being mirrored somewhat in the gaming industry.

Ringu was a wildly successful film and some studio exec figured that by purchasing the rights to it, adding some A list actors and American FX they could make a hell of a lot of money. And that exec was dead on. What the hell does this have to do with games you ask?  How many times have out of print games or just a great game without a whole lot of bells and whistles been discussed and folks said "What this really needs is the FFG treatment." or something along those lines? Sometimes a good game can be made great, but other times, as we've discussed here recently, we realize that there was nothing wrong with the original and adding all of these bells and whistles can sometimes do more harm than good. A lot of great movies don't need to be remade with top notch acting and special effects;  they're perfect as they are. 

Let's go back to Ringu for a moment. Based on the success of this movie, dozens of imitations came out in Asia, and many of them were remade in Hollywood. This makes me think of Dominion; an unremarkable game with an amazing and quite innovative mechanic that has spawned shitloads of clones. Ditto with Pandemic albeit without as many imitators. How many movies are there about a haunted cellphone or computer, or videotape, or house, or shower, or whatever the fuck that are essentially the same movie? You get what I'm saying.

I'm not saying this is always a bad thing. I never played the original Arkham Horror, and the FFG version is one of my favorite games. Ditto with Fury of Dracula. I have played quite a bit of Dungeon Quest however, and while it's certainly FFG's right to make it their own through adding  their own little tweaks (The Terrinoth setting with it's heroes and creatures, porting the card combat system that's used in so many of their games into this one) it seems like it really takes something away from the original. (I've yet to play the new version, but I've come to trust the opinions around here.)

I'm not trying to ruffle anyone's feathers here, but for me at least, this is a disturbing trend both in film and gaming. It seems like there's a hell of a lot less innovation going on, and when some comes along it's imitated to death.  Sometimes it's just re-themed or polished and sold again. (Think Wallenstein/ Shogun  and maybe the Austrian then American versions of Funny Games.) I just think it would be nice if the game companies and Hollywood would get back to making great games and not thinking about how to sell us the same shit over and over again with more polish and extras.

That said, Nemo's War sounds like it would be pretty bad ass with the FFG Treatment.

It is said that life is just a game. Should games be made that are just about life? Are board games a way to escape from our real lives and have fun or are they a tool to discover and build ourselves so we can face our real lives?

"Isn't it ironic?" - Alanis Morrisette

There's a certain dread that you find creeps over you when you discover you have become the fashion plate you have mocked for at least a year, the terror as you find yourself in the same thrift shop jeans you'd claim you'd never sell out and wear because really, at this point you're not going to pay a cent more for Levis then you have to. And it's not because you want to buy more board games either. The problem isn't even money anymore when you've established a budget.

You might as well face it, but you've become the dirty hipster that you would have previously ridiculed and mocked standing in front of you in the mirror. Right down to your legitimate Ray-Bans you didn't start wearing when you bought them years ago in America until you realised they looked... kind of cool.

This is the lifestyle I find thrust upon me. At art school, it's where the quirkiest of my generation go to ruin their brains with coffee and cigarettes. I've stayed away from the coffee mostly, and completely avoided cigarettes - but one thing I can't avoid is the dirty hipster this ex-mental institution morphed me into like the Lovecraftian horror it truly represents.

And what bugs me the most is, I have no right to judge these people because they're just legitimately nice folk who happen to be artists. The whole mooching off one's parents thing for most of them is an outright lie in terms of stereotypes - and among them I feel like a horrible, spiteful human being for having judged them for so long. For one reason in particular.

Hipsters, tend to do things ironically. They say irony like it's a throwaway word, but what they really mean is they legitimately like doing things but are a bit embarrassed about liking, say, Lady Gaga for example. But hipsters don't just like music acts ironically. It also applies to other activities. Like board games.

It would surprise you to know that hipsters have officially deemed Magic: The Gathering, one of the most mainstream CCGs out there, as "ironic". Most of the hipsters on campus were unaware Magic was still kicking. I had to explain it to them in terms of Mickey Rourke's career, "it's made a huge comeback." - and they just smile and nod, asking to see the cards in question.

Now normally I wouldn't trust my own mother with my Magic cards, but chances are if a hipster isn't even aware they still MADE Magic cards, they're pretty safe handling them and you won't get them stolen. I have yet to encourage a hipster to play an ironic game of Magic: The Gathering(whatever that entails in the definition of "irony") - but my encounter on campus with getting them to play Barrel of Monkeys was a huge success.

The problem no longer seems to be the nerd/geek barrier. The barrier is now mainly related to me getting the pine tree out of my arse so I can non-ironically have fun with these people. Contrary to what AdBusters and Pitchfork.com have led me to believe about this demographic, they're not that bad in terms of elitism. They're just... normal people who happen to be interested in the board games I introduce them to.

And one could always use more players for Talisman.

We wear our games. Gamers, especially gamers active on the net, treat the games they play as a point of pride. We compartmentalize ourselves in these genre boxes as AT, Abstract, Euro, War... and cling to them as if they are some reason to be proud. I was talking with my brother this evening about music. We talked about genre distinctions in music, specifially around metal. He complained about how there must be a hundred different types of metal in a realtively brief time span and how many fans are so particular that he doubts they are really music fans at all. He said something like;

So, several discussions lately have been about the direction of the hobby and different trends in the hobby.  Some people have talked about the changing demographic of people who purchase boardgames --- I have always contended that this isn't an "old man's" hobby and really that young people play games.  The reason being that I am fairly young (32), and have been playing games since I was a little guy.  I always thought that as I aged, i would likely quit playing boardgames as it didn't see very adultish in general --- and definitely didn't have that modeled as appropriate behavior in the farming community I grew up in. 
Now, i am beginning to rething my position.  I am starting to think that it is an older persons hobby -- especially from anectdotal evidence from what people relay on this site.  So, I became curiuos about how old you guys are?

I know this so far:

SpaceGhost - 32
M. Barnes - 34
Avery - 42

So instead of making it to WBC my brother ended up coming over for the weekend so we could just hang out and game. Maybe next year, and hopefully we'll make it up to Euroquest in November... But with a 2.5 month old and a lot of other stuff going on, it just wasnt in the cards this year.

Speaking of cards, that's pretty much all we played over the course of 3 days. He got there late on Friday night and my wife joined us for some Dominion because it was all we were mentally up for after a long work week and getting the baby down. Finally played one of the mixes of regular and intrigue. I'm really liking the set ups and the 1 expansion has given the game a lot more legs. We played one with a lot of attack cards and my brother went witch happy as he usually does. I think my wife and I each split a win and we call it a night.

Next morning my brother dutifully comes with me to the DMV b/c I have to change a car title. We get there 15 minutes after opening and the line is literally 75 people long. UGH. We wait about 10 minutes, which is long enough for us to overhear the coversation behind us about how this guy doesnt want his girl answering the phone and talking to the cops. HE didnt do anything and no one can prove anything. He doesnt have to take no polygraph. Shit, he wasnt even AT Brian's house. At least that's entertaining before we just leave. I dont wanna subject him to my errands for that long. We make it back and play with the baby for a bit before she naps and then he and I start up the first of a very many games of Warhammer: Invasion. More cards! I'm VERY excited to play since he and I always loved MtG and I've had it since my birthday in May. He takes Chaos for the 5-6 games we bang out. I start with Dwarves, then Orks, then Humans, then back to Orks. They end up being my favorite as I like their cutthroat attitude and bonuses for having damaged units. I sweep him, but he ends up learning the Chaos cards/deck pretty well.

We break for lunch and after my wife joins us for more Dominion! Another combo set up (Hand Manipulation), which we play 7-8 games for the duration of the night. We really just have a blast trash talking and experimenting. I know there's a lotta hate for the shuffling and autopilot play, but it works for us. A lot.

My wife's also on baby duty during all this and has to leave the games a bunch, so my brother and I set up and start a game I mentioned in my last blog where I tried mixing Dungeon Twister and Mage Knight. Worked pretty well, but the map is just way too tight. He played a 300 point team with necromancy and I played Atlantis guild bots. He jumped out to an early lead and it was like 9-2 (we played to 10) before I killed his big bad vampire draconium for the first of what ended up being FOUR TIMES. Needless to say, if we play a version of this again, NO NECROMANCY. But it was fun. He ranted for a while about how I kept coming back to win. Same happened earlier in W:I. Needed to win on my turn before I decked myself and was able to pull it off. He was pissed =)

Next morning my brother and I were up early and I said it was his choice. We finally got to play the manor house scenario of LNoE and even with him starting with the dynamite and gas can with a lighter, I was able to kill one hero and surround the house, easily getting 9/10 zeds in after like 4 turns. I think since the objective was different than usual that it threw him (plus it was like 8am). Must play it again.

Then back to Warhammer before my wife/baby woke up. He took me down with his Chaos minions this time 2 outta 3 games. Then I handed him the Orks and tried Chaos where we split a pair of games. He's a huge fan and wants me to get the expansion so he can play dark elves. Anyone with expansion experience, please let me know what you think of what's out there!

Wife/baby up and we ended the morning with a few more hands of Dominion. As long as you mix up the kingdom cards, I'm fine with this game. After I feel like I've explored all I can with a certain set, I'm ready to move on. Comment of the weekend: "I think Dominion is my favorite game." Even over Euchre, I asked. "Yeah..." My wife. Go figure =)
Now if only there was a partner's varient out there, I think she'd be sold forever.

Wanted to play some Settlers and AoE3, but there just never is enough time. It was nice getting to hang out with just my brother (instead of the whole family) and game. Been too long since that happened and we're going to try to make it monthly. Here's hoping! And like I said, I REALLY want us to make it up to EQ in Nov. I liked playing in the Settlers tournament there so I'm thinking we'd go for Dominion this time around in addition to the main draw: Open gaming. I'm DYING to play my copy of Siege of the Citadel (thanks again Squighearder!), but I need 4 other devoted gamers. C'mon November...

The latest wargame I've covered on Shut Up & Sit Down is the kickstarter-funded War Stories. I mention that it's a kickstarter project because it's got a lot of the things we've come to associate with kickstarter projects. While it's far from the worst offender, it still has that nagging sense of something not quite finished, not quite complete. And the FAQ document is beginning to build toward epic lengths.

But while there's a fair number of disgruntled backers out there, I think War Stories deserves more patience than some seem prepared to give it. Because it's packed with excellent, unique, inventive ideas and there's nothing else quite like it. It's the fastest, smoothest playing tactical wargame I've ever played. And it has total fog of war, which I had long ago written off as impossible outside of digital ConSims.

So while it has its problems, I think it deserves support. Not least to encourage the designer to keep on tweaking until those ideas come together into a better whole.

Speaking of kickstarter, a friend of mine is running one for his new design. This is his second professional game, and I can assure you there's no sense of half-finishedness about his designs. It's called Pocket Imperium and is very much what it sounds like: a super stripped down 4x game that plays in under an hour.

Video Games

Hearthstone. So much Hearthstone. Been enjoying the way Gnomes vs Goblins has temporarily upended the meta into a glorious free for all. I'm playing so much Hearthstone it's narrowing the number of other games I'm playing, and making it harder for me to come up with article ideas.

I have, however, found time to get into Portal. It's one of the big gaming franchises I've just never gotten round to playing until now: I don't usually much care for puzzle games so it didn't feel like I was missing out on much. But the first-person perspective and creative ways you can solve some of the levels make it fun. To say nothing of the story and the humour, of course. It's a shame it's so short and there's a sudden difficulty spike at the end.

My 8-year old daughter started playing it. It's great training for other, more reflex-intensive WASD games.

Films

I got struck by a sudden urge to see American Beauty again. What an amazing film, so rich with layers of image and text that it's almost impossible to decode, yet ferociously entertaining for all that. If I enjoyed it as a young man, I think I enjoyed it more now I understand what it's like to be the middle-aged protagonist. One of my top ten films of all time.

Finally got around to watching Django Unchained. Which was 75% awesome and then just trailed off into a feeble ending. Having built up unbearable tension with such patience and skill, why did Tarantino go blow it all for an unnecessary second ending? Sometimes I think big-name directors end up making yards to celluloid masturbation, convinced of their own brilliance. It happened to Peter Jackson. After this and Inglourious Basterds, it looks like it happened to Tarantino, too.

Also caught Rise of the Planet of the Apes. Which was okay, although the opening thirty minutes were so preposterous that I almost gave up there and then. But Andy Serkis pulling an amazing performance as the miming ape saved it.

But it made me wonder: why do studios remake films that are famous for their twist endings? Money is the answer, obviously. But there are so many great old films that might make a cool reboot. Why pick ones like Planet of the Apes or The Wicker Man that rest on classic plot switches that everyone now knows? How can the result ever being much better than a train-wreck?

Music

When I was a student, it seemed that all my friends ever listened to was Bob Dylan and Pink Floyd. The latter became a regular fixture for me, but I never quite embraced Dylan in the same way. I thought he didn't make a single decent album after Highway 61 Revisited.

I could see why he was such a profound influence on music, and why he was so acclaimed. But I always felt his skill was as a lyricist, not a performer. A lot of his words could stand alone as poetry, something you could say about few other musicians, but a lot of his songs sound better covered by other people.

I got a sudden urge to go back through his catalogue and try it again, to see if I could get it this time. So over the course of several days, I queued up his studio albums in chronological order and ran through them again. And you know what? I was right. Highway 61 Revisited was his last good album.

It did leave me with a heightened appreciation of his early music. Freewheelin' and Bringing it all Back home are the highest points, and I've been spinning them a lot. Both albums that have become genre templates in their own right, and incredible achievement for a single artist. But I remain mystified by the appeal of many others. Even Blonde on Blonde. Even Blood on the Tracks. I'd rather go back to Pink Floyd.

Through the Ages is one of my top ten favourite games of all time. Yet I've never had the opportunity to review it. The recent New Story of Civilization edition gave me the perfect excuse, and the lovely folk at the Rollin' Dice Show asked me to do it for them. Here's the result.

I've been playing some Borderlands the past two nights with my bro. The gaming is growing on me. So copying from Kotaku's review format here are some things I didn't like and things I'm liking

My game order arrived tonight. It was a belated Father's Day order. I was waiting for Kingsport to come out.

Detroit Cleveland Grand Prix. Father's Day gift for the Man. He needed something in the cupboard to counter the overwhelming girliness of my pink game. I taught him how to play, and we played one lap. Then I started feeling sick again, so we quit. Plus it isn't much fun as a two player. But it was enough for him to know he he likes it. He'll be teaching it to the band boys next band night.

I spent the rest of the evening on the sofa, drinking OJ and watching Strictly Ballroom, while punching and bagging. I usually save the chick flicks for band night, but I got special privileges tonight on account of being sick. Plus we watched Cloverfieldlast night, which was mostly lame. I just didn't give a shit what happened to any of those annoying characters. I was like hurry up and f'ing die already. Maybe if a big monster was chasing Antonio Vargas I'd care. Yikes, he's hot.

Quest for the DragonLords. Father's Day gift number 2. Showed this one to the Man a few years back, but he said no more long games with lots of little pieces that we won't be able to play. That was when our spawn was just a wee demon in constant motion. Now she's older and leaves us alone while she spends hours using up the cell phone minutes, and she doesn't stick little game bits in her nose anymore. So I showed QftDL to the Man again, and he said cool. But then it was out of print and I couldn't find it, but then it suddenly showed up in stock at SuperHeroGameLand, so I got it. The Man cracked this one open first thing, but then was all put out by the 40 pages of rules, which means I'm going to have to be the one to read the rules. Well, it was my turn anyway, since he did Memoir '44 Air Pack.

La Citta.I played this several years ago and remember liking it, but I can't remember much about it other than it felt like a micro civ building game. Plays in under two hours. Plays two player. Francie might like it. I think I got a misprinted token sheet, so I had to email RGG. So this one probably won't get played this week.

Kingsport Horror. Haven't even broke the shrink wrap. Punching and twisting out the figs for QftDL took up most of Strictly Ballroom, so I didn't get to the The Beast yet.

I can't believe it.

 I actually did it.

To a real, live person.

 Not a retarded bot.

But a person.

A simple person, but a meatbag nonetheless.

Yes, I'm talking about The Ship.

Yes, I need intervention.

Anyone of you actually on Steam will see my plight.  

Portal?  Finished it.  Don't really feel like playing the bonus levels yet.

 Left 4 Dead?  Played it on demo time, but I'll wait for it to go to my game whore price (=<$19.99) and I'll get it.

 If you take the hours played on my Steam game list, it'll be in this context:  Wake up, eat, play The Ship, sleep.  Go to the bathroom (Remember, don't have catheters/colostomy bags like in the.... Uh, never mind.)  Repeat Ad Nauseum.

Okay, enough with the rambling.  Onto the matter at hand.

*IS FOCUSED*

Now, in this game, you hunt people on a  cruise liner and try to kill them.   Simple, really.  The cruise liner is very big and you can't swing a mannequin arm without hitting a repository of implements of destruction.  As if the cornucopia of weapons lying around are not enough, they have traps in which to kill your quarry.  These things are not used often, if at all, even though they're touted on the box: Drop a lifeboat on your quarry!  The reasons are as follows:

1) They're static, which means you have to have divine providence gifted to you for your target to go near them, much less be set up to stumble into one.

2) They pay scale.  $2500 only, when if you spend the same amount of time with your Machiavellian scheme to get someone lined up for a trap, you could probably find a weapon with a higher payout, beat/shoot your victim to death, have a tea party with the corpse, and legged it to the safe area.

3) They're obvious.  Lifeboats are outside and fairly easy to notice.  Saunas and walk in freezers are rooms which players have no real reason to go into.  You're not feeling the therapeutic  properties of slow basting and you're certainly not Rocky. 

Now, there is one carrot dangling in front of the donkey for players to go in them, and that's because they have boxes located in them that have weapons that are, sometimes but not always, high paying.  Faced with the prospect of being stuck in one of those rooms, when there are easier places to get better weapons, they are usually avoided.  A reckless, or desperate, person would enter during a between round break, check the box quickly, and get out.

 Only a simple person, or a Rush Limbaugh listener, would actually be silly enough to actually stay in the room while they are still being hunted.

 Tonight, I think I bagged a simple person in a sauna.  He could be a Ditto-head, but the jury's still out on that.

Anyway, here is the setup:  Between round break happens.  I run around, change clothes (to throw people off), and ready my weapon.  The computer supplies me with my quarry and tells me their location.

 Sauna, Deck D.

Oh, no....  They're not actually in there, are they?

Seeing that I'm in spitting distance of the sauna, I naturally saunter over; not expecting that the person is still going to be in there.  I walk into the rec area and my quarry is still in there.   She just standing there, not looking in the box, just standing there well away from the door.  The player figures that I'm his hunter, so she draws a Claymore out and sits there, waiting for me to charge.

 I sense much stupidity in this one.

Instead of charging in, I dart to the left of the door, and pop the trap's controls.  Now, I have activated the trap without the quarry, just to see what they do.  Two things happen.  One, an loud alarm sounds.  Two, the door slowly closes.  Note I said slowly. Any reasonably alert player hearing the klaxon and seeing the door, can easily run out.  Hell, even a paralyzed snail could get out of there with time to spare.

Not this one, ohhhhh no.  After I activate the trap, and the door does its rendition of the falling stone wall at the beginning of Raiders of the Lost Ark, I turn to see if I was successful.  I was able to watch the effects on a quarry because the guy started  walkingto the door, not running like a reasonably intelligent person interested in self preservation and who is stuck on a ship with others who are trying to kill each other for the amusement of Mr. X.

The door slams shut.  So, I walk to the door window to watch.  He pulls out his Claymore and hits the door a few times with no effect.  Then, when the sauna starts broiling him, he pulls out a Winchester and then promptly dies.

 The reason why I make a mention of the rifle is because ranged weapons are relatively few and are difficult to come by.  They rarely show up in the boxes located in the deathtraps.  So, my theory is that he already had the gun from a previous round or just found it searching the cabins and was being stupid, and greedy, by checking out the sauna's box for a higher paying weapon during a round.

So, for his boneheaded maneuver he takes a roasted dirt nap and I walk away with bragging rights and 2500 large.

I wonder how you say, "Let me out, its getting somewhat humid!" in Estonian.

Typically in tabletop and card game, rules need to be clearly laid out. You want anyone to be able to pick up the game and know exactly how to play. This is the typical case, for good reason. Confusion and lack of clarity leads quickly to frustration.

Last night while playing Nefertiti, I realized that I'm good at games with a 'break the rules' mechanic. Things like variable player powers, tech trees, one time use cards. Whether it is deciding what weapon to purchase in Runebound, when to use that special card, which gene to buy in Primordial Soup, what special action, improvement or favor to use in the Euro of the week. I never thought of this as a skill, but last night I came to realize that some of the people I play with find it challenging to read all the text, absorb it, remember it, and understand it's strategic implications.

I talked before about my love of megagames. And now we're putting one on ourselves! As there are a few wargamers and Ameritrasher out here not from the US, I thought they might be interested to join in.

Breakthrough 1940 is a map based game of the 1940 campaign in France and the Low Countries that will give room to about a hundred players and umpires. The game plays at a strategic level, so includes army commands, but also national governments so that you might use your political skills.

The game brings in the problems of alliance warfare for the Allies - joined together in some cases for the first time. Belgium and the Netherlands being unable to jointly plan with France and Britain prior to hostilities due to their neutral status.

The Germans, on the other hand are faced with the prospect of launching their new Blitzkrieg doctrine against the strongest and best-equipped army in Europe, the French. It is one thing to use this successfully against an outdated and numerically inferior enemy like in Poland - quite another against an enemy numerically superior and with, in many cases, better technology. If this new doctrine fails to bring the campaign to a speedy conclusion, the Germans face the unwelcome prospect of a prolonged and bloody war of attrition.

Although the game is based on history both sides will get the opportunity to devise their own plans. How well these plans are thought out and executed will determine the outcome of the game. And history may be changed as a result.

Breakthrough 1940 will take place on the 25th of April 2009, in the Liefland College, Utrecht. Located centrally in the Netherlands, and easily accessible by car and public transport.

For further information on the game, on travel arrangements and accommodation and to register, go to:

http://www.xs4all.nl/~derkgroe/megagames/

or contact me by private message