(A mid-week recap of the best blog posts from the last 7 days.)
AT THE TOP OF THE CHARTS…
THE WORST THAT CAN HAPPEN TO YOU…
Boardgames That Tell Stories, 9/17, by Ignacy Trzewiczek
Ignacy knows a good story when he plays it. And it tells a good story, too. This one is a touch sad, and has been repeated in many a gamer’s household.
So we get excited. We buy the game. It looks gorgeous. We set it up, we begin to play and…
We finish the game, we win, we look at our beloved wife to share this pure joy that we feel now and to ask her how she liked it.
Yeah, you probably know how this story turns out…
WELL WORTH THE READ…
HOT GOSS!
Every Man Needs a Shed, 9/19, by Tony Boydell
The Essen Preview to end all Essen Previews. [CAUTION: Naughty words inside!]
ARE LOVE LETTER AND MUNCHKIN THE NEW MONOPOLY?
Clever Move, 9/23, by Matt M. Casey
Matt’s point is that both Love Letter & Munchkin are engaged in the same profligate reskinning that Monopoly has indulged in for decades.
THOU SHALT NOT….6 BOARD GAMING SINS
The Table, 9/22, by David
This is from a blog that I just discovered, based in Cape Town, South Africa.
(The above four blogs earn consideration for the BGA Blog of the Year Award. One point is awarded for inclusion, with an extra point given to the Post of the Week.)
HERE’S 4 MORE, IF YOU HAVE THE TIME…
REINER KNIZIA, MASTER OF THEME
No High Score, 9/18, by Michael Barnes
Many accuse Knizia of being merely a master of abstract games, merely pasting themes onto them. But Michael argues that Knizia deftly chooses just the right theme for his (often-repetitive) games.
BOARD GAME DESIGN CLASS: THE PREPARATION
Board Game Duel, 9/18, by Tessa
Tessa is a homeschooling Mom. Her plan to create a game design class for the young’uns is not so far fetched. They’ll have the opportunity to continue their education at New York University’s Game Center. Yep, designing board games is now a career choice!
WHEN I NEED TO TURN OFF MY BRAIN
Gnome’s Ponderings, 9/19, by Lowell Kempf
Sometimes Lowell just wants to enjoy a game and not have to think about it.
POSTCOLONIAL CATAN
Bruno Faidutti’s Blog, 9/20, by Bruno Faidutti
Notes from Bruno’s GenCon presentation,‘beyond Catan.’ Colonializing games tend to exist in a vacuum. But in the real world there are real people, real cultures, who get steamrolled by the colonizers.
The problem in Puerto Rico is not that there are slave tokens, it is that they are called colonists. The problem with Saint Petersburg is that one of the worst episodes of forced labour in modern European history is treated as a good spirited competition between hardworking craftsmen.
…
Settlers of Catan is colonization as we dream it, or as we would have liked it to be, colonization of a new world which looks just like the old one and is void of alien presence.