weekly board game reviews and thought pieces in written and audio format
Changing your plumage from pure white to a rainbow of colours wasn't easy. It took time and patience. It was the fruit from the rainbow tree that contained the necessary pigment. Unfortunately, the fruit wasn't always in season and when it was, other birds were quick to eat it before I had a chance to get to it. It was a race, be it a slow and thoughtful one, to become Aves by Shi Chen from Play With Us Design.
Oliver KinnePost read time 4 min read2 Comments on Second chance – giving games another try (Topic Discussion)So sometimes you play a game and you just don't get on with it. That's understandable, because not every game is for everyone. At the same time, I do think there is a game for everyone. I also think that games deserve a second chance. In this article, I want to look at why we might bounce off games and why the game experience is a lot better when we play the game again at some point later.
The Great Plague was slowly becoming a thing of the past and you had decided to move into the country and start a new village. You had found the perfect location that was big enough to build new houses, workshops and other structures, while also being close enough to farmable land, a large wooded area and there were indications that coal could be mined nearby. It had everything to support a growing community of craftspeople and labourers. Now all you had to do was find Villagers by Haakon Gaarder from Sinister Fish Games.
Oliver KinnePost read time 6 min read6 Comments on Salty tears – losing gracefully (Topic Discussion)Nobody likes losing. Most of us don't mind it, but I don't think anyone actually relishes it when they come last. When we play board games with others, we want to have an enjoyable time. That's something we should keep in mind. So in this article, I want to talk about how to try and be a good loser.
After Earth had been mostly laid to waste, major corporations took charge and colonized much of the Solar System. Interplanetary trade was the only source of money and therefore power. Earth's few remaining societies still held a fair amount of political influence, but controlling as many of the independent planetary parliaments as possible was probably even more important. If you timed it right and invested your money wisely, you could gain power in the Solar System's ultimate authority, the Plutocratic Council. After all, Earth's political systems had been replaced by a Plutocracy by Claudio Bierig from Doppeldenkspiele.
Oliver KinnePost read time 4 min readLeave a Comment on Let’s face it – the joy of in-person gaming (Topic Discussion)For some of us, not being able to see friends or family, or anyone else for that matter, in person is becoming a distant memory. I appreciate that for some of you, it's still very much the present, depending on where you are in the world or the health of the people you would otherwise meet, you live with or your own. In this article, I want to write about how it feels to be playing board games face-to-face with other people, as this has now been possible for me for quite some time.
"Afloat, upon the surface of a smooth and silent river, slowly breathing, you observe the shifting currents . There is little much to do, but let the river take you. Surrendering to its flow, slowly you realise that perhaps there is no separation between surface and sky, between your mind and the river itself and if your mind is the river and the river your mind, perhaps if you can balance the thoughts and feelings and sensations that arise, you may have some say in where you are taken" as you Float Downstream by Jeremy Dawson from Blood Moon Games Ltd.
Oliver KinnePost read time 4 min read6 Comments on Slow death – player elimination in board games (Topic Discussion)In many modern board games, all players participate until the very end. Everyone continues to take their turns until the game has finished and it's time to decide the winner or winners. That's true for co-operative as well as competitive games. Player elimination games are very different in that respect. In these games, some people around the table could be out of the game early on and end up sitting it out until it's all over. If done well, player elimination can be a very interesting mechanism in modern board games. In this article, I want to look at different ways this mechanism is implemented and discuss how well these work.
Oliver KinnePost read time 3 min readLeave a Comment on 3 Minutes to Freedom (or Death) (Saturday Review)A game about dancing sheep, rockets, lasers, cabbages and sometimes fun. I would like to add "death" to this list, but other than that, it's pretty much a good description of 3 Minutes to Freedom (or Death) by Samuel Edmondson and Daniel Somerville Roberts from Icarus Games.
Oliver KinnePost read time 5 min readLeave a Comment on Teaching games – responsibilities as a learner (Topic Discussion)Here is another article in my series about teaching games. Last time I spoke about the responsibilities the person has who teaches the game. This time I want to cover what is expected of the people learning the game. After all, the teacher will not get anywhere if no one is willing to actually learn the game. So, as a learner there are certain things you have to try and do to make the rules teach easier for everyone.
