Archive for Games
It occurs to me that often, when I’m reading or watching a work of fiction, one part of what I’m doing is essentially like playing the storytelling card game Once Upon a Time in my head. When I play OUaT, at any given moment I usually have a pretty clear path in mind from where […]
I backed Supernova on Kickstarter, and I really like the idea of it: spaceships moving inward on a spiral path, harvesting energy cubes moving outward on the same spiral path. Loosely “inspired by the ancient Egyptian game of Mehen” (which did not involve spaceships). But Kam and I have now played it a couple of […]
Way back in 2011 or so, I bought two sets of pro-quality bocce balls, paid for by work. My group at work at the time was starting to get into occasionally playing bocce, and I thought it would be nice to have a couple of good sets. So I ordered them and expensed them. Over […]
Kam and I played the boardgame Maglev Metro today. We both liked it, and want to play it again. But there are two things that I find really disappointing about it: 1. The game description starts out: “Welcome to the future of train games! With the use of cutting edge magnetic levitation technology, transport passengers […]
I recently finished playing a lovely puzzle game: The Gardens Between. It’s a sweet, wordless game about friendship and memory, available on a bunch of different platforms, including iOS and Steam. The game starts with two kids who are friends (and next-door neighbors), Arina and Frendt (I read them as being a white girl and […]
Interesting article about Wingspan, which I’m posting mostly because it’s such a different perception of the game from mine. Though I’m also posting it because it includes interesting stuff about Elizabeth Hargrave and her process of developing the game, and how her success is helping to open the door to more diversity among game designers. […]
This year’s Hugo ballot has a (one-year-only) Best Video Game category. I had heard of (but not played) most of the nominated games, but was curious about one in particular that I had never heard of: Blaseball. Turns out that it’s a free, web-based “absurdist […] take on fantasy baseball,” in which you bet imaginary […]
I’ve acquired a ridiculous number of boardgames lately—eight of them in the past three weeks. (I bought 11 boardgames in all of last year, and most of those were near the end of the year.) Which I’m calling ridiculous partly because I’ve run out of space on my boardgames bookcase, but mostly because I’m unlikely […]
This started out as a Facebook comment about my history with story/plot in RPGs, in response to a discussion between Ben and Kel in comments on a post of Mary Anne’s; but it got long and sort of morphed into a broad overview of my history with RPGs. (In this post, I’m using the term […]
Flash Player will stop working at the end of the year. (It’s already been shut down in some browsers.) So if you want to revisit any old-favorite Flash games, now’s the time. For example, there’s the lovely flOw, made by (at least some of?) the same people who made Journey and Sky and Flower. Microbes […]
It turns out that it’s possible, and fun, to play various kinds of games on a video call (such as Zoom or Google Meet). Note: In this post, I’m talking about games to play with friends and family. The topic of playing games online with randomly chosen strangers is a different thing, and not something […]
I’ve been playing Blooms on Boardgame Arena, in an asynchronous session where we each play a couple of moves a day. I’m finding it really interesting. The designer of Blooms, Nick Bentley, describes it as “a bit like the classical game Go, but shorter, easier to learn, and more colorful.” It’s an abstract strategy game, […]