Author: Drew
In A Game of Thrones: The Board Game, King Robert Baratheon is dead. Westeros has fallen into chaos, and the fate of the land rests in the hands of 6 players who will fill the shoes of the 7 Kingdoms’ mightiest houses: Stark, Lannister, Baratheon, Arryn, Martell, Tyrell, and Tully. You either live or you die when you play the Game of Thrones. The stakes are high – will you end up sitting on the iron throne or will you be just another one of Westeros’ sacrificial lambs? When playing the board game, there are several things that players must…
In the board gaming field, there are dozens of quality podcasts – and almost a dozen *high*-quality podcasts. That’s the result of the Maronization of our hobby. In the past, for talented writers and creators to get heard they needed to be connected to high-powered radio people. Nowadays, they just have to be connected to high-powered surge protectors. It’s a Brave New World It’s not just that podcasting has made the airwaves more democratic. That was desperately needed, as politically, radio is far more polarized than television. But it’s also broken down the walls of “format,” which seems to be…
I’ve never been one for customizing board games. Drew loves it – mash ups and tweaks and custom-modes of games he loves. I long found the process tedious, though, and honestly would rather just play an already good game. But things change when you have kids. First of all, they can’t really play the games you love, at least not right away. And this would be fine except my son, who turned four over the summer, really wants to play the games he sees in my office – the “big kid” games. He has a collection of his own –…
Over the next couple months, leading up the premiere of BGA’s newest production, “On The Table,” I’ll be writing about the process of creating a brand new show from scratch. This isn’t a simple matter of hooking up a microphone to my computer and grabbing an hour of quiet time to make a podcast. No, I’m going to be doing a radio show instead. Podcast Pros & Radio Cons There are a lot of differences between producing a radio show and producing a podcast. What a podcast has going for it is freedom, complete, unexpurgated freedom. You can say what…
A mid-week recap of the best blog posts from Nov. 12th through Nov. 18th (For the full text of this post, please visit the blog at Board Game Geek.) AT THE TOP OF THE CHARTS . . . BOBBY—THE MAN WHO LIKES TO BREAK GAMES Allen O’Connor @ Van00uber’s Blog, Nov. 17, 2014 I love a story about someone who marches to their own drummer. Quite often, as Allen tells us, the non-conformist comes out on top. Take Coup for example… Bobby’s strategy is simple: never look at the cards that you have face down and you don’t have to…
(A mid-week recap of the best blog posts from Nov. 5th through Nov. 11th. This is an excerpted portion of the full article. Please see my blog at Board Game Geek for the entire text.) A lot of great writing this week as deepening cold weather is keeping Northern writers indoors. AT THE TOP OF THE CHARTS . . . WHAT DEDUCTION GAMES LIKE WEREWOLF TELL US ABOUT OURSELVES Matt M. Casey @ Boing Boing, Nov. 11, 2014 Boing Boing defines ‘social deduction’ games as ones that “pit players against their own ignorance and paranoia.” That’s a bit disingenuous, as…
(NOTE: This is the first part of the full post that I wrote. For the entire text, please visit the Board Gamers Anonymous blog at Board Game Geek) A few years ago, needing something to get me out of the house and way from my home business, I tracked down some local board gaming groups through Meetup.com. I started gaming first with the Staten Island group twice a week, and also made occasional trips into Manhattan for the NYC Boardgames Meetup, a sprawling group made up of some 3000 players. One Sunday afternoon in 2011, I visited a meetup held…
(For the full-length version of this post, please visit my Board Game Geek page.) This is a mid-week recap of the best blog posts from Oct. 29th through Nov. 4th. It was a tough choice picking the best out of 4 really good posts this week. A lot of great writing, now that Essen is no longer a distraction. AT THE TOP OF THE CHARTS… CHEATING IN COOPERATIVE GAMES GeekInsight @ Giant Fire Breathing Robot, 10/29/14 If everyone is doing it, does that make it right? With cooperative games, bending or breaking the rules doesn’t cheat the other players out…
Please read the previous installments in this series: Part One: The Story of John and Robin Part Two: John & Robin’s Mentor, Sid Sackson Part Three: The Sad Story of Sid’s Estate When Sid Sackson died (see part 3), his family was overwhelmed, both by his medical bills, and by Sid’s estate of 18,000 games. They had to liquidate Sid’s collection, and quickly. You can’t blame the family for acting out of necessity, as Sid never made plans for his future. What happened to Sid Sackson’s collection could have easily happened to John and Robin. They just kept piling up…
A mid-week recap of the best blog posts from Oct. 22nd through Oct. 28th. The post-Essen period continues to be quiet on the Blogwatch. Everyone must still be busy playing all the games they brought home… (This is an excerpted version of the original post. For the entire article, go to my blog at Board Game Geek.) AT THE TOP OF THE CHARTS… HIGH ADVENTURES IN HIGH FINANCE—ACQUIRE RETROSPECTIVE San Il Defanso @ The Rumpus Room, 10/27 Think of this as “Part One” of a series on this landmark game. This a great introduction for gamers who were born decades…