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Where are your games? Displayed?
For me: for years, throughout my teens and twenties, I was so mortally embarrassed of my nerd interests that I threw virtually all of it away and put most of my video games away, hidden. I've gotten over that a lot, but I still definitely have a strong sense of non-kosherness from my boardgames. So I put my games in our library with all the books, open and on IKEA shelves. It serves as a middle ground---people would have to come into my library, which is upstairs near my bedroom, to see it. That means random company does not see it and I keep the tacky, nerdy shit under wraps. On the other hand, I think it fits in the library, and it serves a bit of a symbolic function. I put my games in the open and don't intentionally try to find a space where I and others cannot see them, like they've got the plague. But that's a context specific decision, for my circumstances and background.
The side problem, of course, is that from an artistic perspective games are tacky. But I put this up there with paperback books, which have the same problem (not hardback, which do look fairly put together, esp without sleeves). Sure, people think reading is a fancy pants, high class design statement decoration, but most paperback books look horrible and tacky.
Really curious to hear everyone's responses, I have sort of a complicated relationship with the social acceptability of my hobbies that my wife is constantly trying to get me over.
Sag has a really good point: Age: 32
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- Sagrilarus
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I'm 49, so I've gotten to the age where I don't care so much about what other people think. I'm married, and I have four kids in the house so I'm essentially immunized. I don't need to care what people think and it's not unreasonable for them to assume that the games with teeny-bopper covers aren't even mine.
My Dad used to come home with a little tin toy train car and when my Ma ask how much he paid for it he'd say "fifty-five." When she'd mention he already had one like it he'd point to a flange on the wheel and say, "this part right here is copper on the one I have, it's nickel on this one."
She'd end the conversation with this phrase -- "it could be drugs or women." That's a killer response to anyone who asks.
For the record mine are in the finished basement where people do occasionally go, they're visible and take up the better part of a whole wall and look like a disheveled mess because all the boxes are different sizes and colors.
Also for the record -- I told a publisher I wouldn't purchase his game because the anime girl on the cover was in her underwear and had the face of a nine-year-old. I can't buy a game like that with kids in the house and don't want it for adults showing up either. One parent raising the issue with the school district or the scouts could get me on a black list and, though highly unlikely that would happen, that would have a major impact on my kids' upbringing. Covers can make a difference, though this is certainly an extreme case. Were I to want that game I would have to discard the box.
Catacombs isn't within 100 miles of that by the way. I'll concede that it has a distinct look, but isn't terribly interesting to me. A C+.
S.
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- Black Barney
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Edit: To add I'm going on 34 this month.
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- Erik Twice
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Boardgames, however, somewhat more difficult to display in an artistically sound manner than books or videogames simply because of their irregular size. I think the ways games are being displayed is very nice in these pictures:
boardgamegeek.com/image/731653/manutd03
boardgamegeek.com/image/687997/pdoherty
I also like how this (digital) game room looks even if I'm not a fan of keeping system boxes and the systems themselves have to be plugged into the screen to play:
www.racketboy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=45657
You can be nerdy and have a lot of taste. I mean, this is a D&D room and it looks pretty damn great despite, well, being a D&D room!
www.acaeum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?cache=1&t=8714
Concerning bad game art...well, as long as you don't have Sentinels of the Multiverse or Twilight Imperium, you should do fine. My ugliest game is The Republic of Rome and the seen from the side it's more than perfectly fine.
If you are going to display miniatures you should invest on a glass box, though.
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- SuperflyPete
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I also have two big ass shelves along one wall, 2 tiers of 12 foot shelves, that house SOME of my miniature terrain. in front of my L-shaped "executive-style desk" (a term I have come to loathe) I have some 6.5 foot, 6 tier pine shelves I built that houses my Heroscape, my miniatures, and the smaller miniature terrain set pieces. In the closet behind my desk lies my 6 tubs of Dungeon Forge terrain and some maps and whatnot. My walls are adorned with Star Wars Epic Duels terrain, a Crokinole board, and a Heroscape map.
Anyone entering this room that has any objection to my decor can eat a bag of dicks. It's my house, and my dude dungeon is set up the way I like it.
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But for practicality, I've been thinking about putting them in the library and putting some type of gaming conversation piece in the living room. Something like a clock made out of Catan or Tikal tiles. Should be pretty easy to throw together with one of those clock movement kits from Michaels.
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So I don't have the option of buying hundreds of games and I don't have the option of displaying or not displaying. We do what we have to to utilize the space we have. So that means that some games end up being "displayed" (sitting on a book shelf) and some end up "hidden" (in a closet) based on a Tetris like system of what fits best where. There is a tiny amount of attention payed to aesthetics but it's mostly space and availability we consider.
Looking around my living/dinning room right now I can see I'm the Boss, Love Letter, Space Hulk, Railways of the World, Earth Reborn, X-Wing, and Cutthroat Caverns. Just through happenstance. If I stand up I can add Tide of Iron, Ninja, Mansions of Madness, Puzzle Strike, Betrayal and yes... Catacombs to that list. No plan in place at all. There are dozens(?) more hidden in various location around the place.
To be fair to me I don't give a shit. I don't like clean style, I don't like everything in it's place, organized looking living spaces. It bores me and reflects poorly on the occupants in my mind. I have instruments hanging off the walls, book cases all around the room, various bits of family mementos around the place, lots of art on the walls and floor in various states of completion. We are an art household (my wife is a painter and I play music) and the house looks like it's occupied by artists who have stuff on the go, constantly.
It is clean though, we vacuum every day, sweep non stop, etc.. Clutter I like, mice I do not, and if the place was dirty as well that would suck. So it is a very 'lived in' place and the games... even though several look tacky as all fucking hell, kind of add to the place. They make us look more balanced because at first view you might think we were pretentious fucks but a couple cheesy looking board games kind of balance it out a bit.
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- Legomancer
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So I guess it's a sort of "man cave" tho I just call it the "geek room" or office. I wouldn't really care if they were in a more public area (nobody really goes in my office because it's usually a mess); this is just where it makes sense for them to be.
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- Sagrilarus
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JonJacob wrote: So I don't have the option of buying hundreds of games
Minivan.
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I have my games buried in a shallow grave in the back yard lest my guests come in contact with some of the played out, over wrought, kitsch that adorns the box covers. Can you imagine the talk that would be all over the Country Club if they did?
In seriousness, my games are on shelving units I got at *gasp* K-mart. They are in the second bedroom that I use as a game room. When we lived at the old place they were in a closet because that's where the shelves were.
I don't have casual visitors at my house. If you are here it's because I invited you and if I did that it's because we are friends. My friends know about, if not actually like, my hobby. On the other hand, games don't embarrass me and I don't worry too much about the artistic sensibilities I project. So if a person had a problem with them...
And yes that is a fabulous artistic rendering of a poster for the Star Trek Episode "And the Children Shall Lead" hanging framed on my wall. Proudly displayed.
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EDIT: I'm 48 and in a long-term relationship with a woman who is moving in with me this year. She is less geeky than me, so would probably want me to put away all my gaming stuff if we had non-geek company over.
EDIT #2: Although my current unemployment status has cast a long shadow over all my plans for the future, if we do have kids, that storage room has a handy lock on the door to keep young kids out.
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- Disgustipater
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I didn't mind that they were out on the open previously. However I do like the sleeker, cleaner look of the closed cabinet. I'm 32.
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- ChristopherMD
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