Topic Discussions
Topic Discussions 337 posts
Reviews
Reviews 283 posts
Let me illustrate
Let me illustrate 24 posts
Exhibitions, Events, Conventions
Exhibitions, Events, Conventions 12 posts

Don’t Get Got (Saturday Review)

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"Guess what?" I asked - but there was no reply. The other player just looked at me - suspiciously. "Guess what?" I asked, this time with more feeling. Yet, there was still no reply. The other player tilted their head and squinted at me. "Guess what?" I tried for the third time. The other player started to open their mouth, but then thought better of it. It was going to be harder than I thought. The other player clearly knew what to do so they Don't Get Got by Big Potato Games.

Critical reviews (Topic Discussion)

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I always wondered what the difference is between a reviewer and a critic, or even a review and a critique. These terms are sometimes used interchangeably, sometimes they're describing two different things, but very often they seem to be used for things that have a lot of overlap and are very similar in many ways. In this article, I'm trying to grapple with those terms and decide for myself what I think they mean.

Viticulture: Essential Edition (Saturday Review)

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The irrigation system was ready, but there was still work to be done on the trellises. The windmill, cottage and tasting room were still just ruins and only the first third of the wine cellar was accessible. The crush pads were all clean and ready to receive the first harvest of grapes, yet the fields were still bare. Orders for some red and white wine had already come in and two types of grapes were ready to be planted. It was the beginning of a vineyard that was going to be splendid. Mama and Papa were looking forward to putting the work in and creating a heritage that would make the family name proud. At the same time, it was daunting, because they knew nothing about Viticulture by Stonemaier Games.

Complex complexity (Topic Discussion)

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Complexity is a fairly vague term. The Cambridge Dictionary defines it as "the state of having many parts and being difficult to understand or find an answer to." Yet, it's not clear when parts are considered "many" or at what point something is difficult to understand. Here are my thoughts on complexity in board games and what I think it all means.

Five Tribes (Saturday Review)

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The task in hand wasn't going to be simple, but the rewards were huge. You could become ruler of Naqala if you were able to influence the people of the land to help you reach your goal. You were hoping to get the help of the djinns, but they would only listen to you if the people were on your side. It seemed impossible, but you knew that you could talk to each group individually and over time you would eventually have the help of all of the Five Tribes by Days of Wonder.

Limited components (Topic Discussion)

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I have previously written about small box games in my article "Compressed collections" which can create a lot of gameplay with only a few components. However, even larger box, or big box, games are sometimes very inventive when it comes to using components in a clever way to create more gameplay and possibilities than would otherwise be possible. After all, board games have it much harder when you compare them to computer games. They have a limited number of components that come in a box, even in a large box. So I want to look at how the same components can be used in many different ways.

Swatch (Saturday Review)

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"Hm. Deep Purple looks good. Life's A Peach is also very warm and rich. Oh, and of course, we want the Cactus Jack. That would be the perfect triad of colours." You step back and look at the colour samples you just painted onto the wall in the kitchen. "Yes, that's it." You're so pleased to have come up with this perfect colour scheme. It had been harder than you had expected. Mixing the 13 cyan, 14 magenta and 15 yellow in the right combination had been a bit of job, let alone getting all the red, green and blue to mix up the cyan, magenta and yellow, but the result was more than worth it. "Yes," you say out loud, "that's the perfect Swatch by Minerva Tabletop."