Friday, November 29, 2019

Abstract game or art project?

Some board games make good art activities for younger kids. And, at least for me, abstracts are the games that seem to do the best job at it.

Two occurrences in about a week’s span really brought that home for me.

First of all, I learned that our son’s kindergarten teacher uses both Blokus and Blokus Trigon in the classroom. Not as the games but as cooperative activities. I found out about this by our son pulling out my copy of Blokus Trigon and saying that they had a copy at school :D

The second was when our son decided he wanted to have a board game night with daddy and started pulling out my stack of GIPF games. (TAMSK is stored elsewhere due to its size and I don’t have LYNGK, in case your curious) And gosh darn it, didn’t he find the games interesting to manipulate and make patterns with, ZERTZ and DVONN in particular. He actually paid attention to the rules of DVONN but wasn’t interested in actually playing it :D

It makes sense that abstracts are good for this kind of play. Games with tiles and chits and cards and such don’t have the same ‘artifact’ appeal. Glass beads and stones and balls and pyramids and such are actual physical objects with all the dimensional and tactile elements that go into being just that.

I am hoping that this eventually turns into actually playing the games :D

Tuesday, November 26, 2019

The usual Boardgame Burnout

Ah, it’s that time again. The time when I get kind of burnt out on gaming. Really, while it happens under different circumstances, it’s been happening to me for years. The only real change is what I’m still doing. (Years ago, it was playing only Button Men online)

I have long stopped worrying that I’m actually in danger of giving up gaming. Life is a series of peaks and valleys and life. If life were a flat line, I’m pretty sure you’re doing something unhealthy.

I can trace it back to the start of October. I had my big convention experience of the year, which was very good. And, after that, I was apparently sated.

But one thing I’ve tried hard to do is still do at least one ‘real’ Print and Play project a month. Yeah, that’s my one hold out from burn out. As much as I do enjoy crafting, didn’t expect that.

Sunday, November 24, 2019

No spoilers initial impressions of Frozen 2

Okay. It’s been about twenty-four hours since I watched Frozen 2. So this is all about first impressions. I’m curious to where my thoughts will be six months from now.

No spoilers no spoilers no spoilers

Frozen was the first Disney movie our son saw and it remains his favorite movie. I have possibly seen it more than a hundred times and I still like Let It Go and think it is a great movie.

So, as a family, we are invested in Frozen and, as parents, we were afraid it would be bad.

But, in some ways, I liked it more than the first movie. Time will tell if that’s just because I haven’t seen it literally dozens of times or because it has some elements that I think were really well done.

Still no spoilers still no spoilers still no spoilers

Here’s a couple problems sequels can have:  the original work tied up all the loose ends so there isn’t more story to naturally tell; the characters did all their character development in the first movie and they are flat characters in the later movie. Worse, they repeat the same character arcs.

I firmly believe that Frozen 2 continued to the next natural stage of the story with higher stakes and the characters had further character development, leaving them all meaningfully changed by the end of the movie. It was also a darker movie than the first one with a couple deeper choices than I expected. I don’t know if I’d have let our son watch it at three-years old.

Frozen is a big deal. Not only did it have a once-in-generation song with Let It Go, it deconstructed the idea of love at first sight, which is a dangerous idea in real life. The sequel doesn’t recycle the story but instead explores how we grow older and sadder and wiser. Maybe that’s why it resonates with grownup me.

Saturday, November 23, 2019

Dunsany Dreams 9

When He Walks Again

There will come a time when the hubris of not one but all will come. When it does, mankind on a whole will be gone from the Earth, leaving only crumbling ruins and poisoned waters and gutted mountains.

But life will find a way. Life will not end even when we do.

And in that time, Pan will walk the world again. Pan is dead but Pan knows he will live again.

Thursday, November 21, 2019

Ring Tales is an interesting experiment

Every once in a while, as I’m combing through Print and Play options, I come across a game that is actually a role playing game. And, boy, is Ring Tales one of those games.

https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/2136282/wip-ring-tales-9-card-storytelling-game

Not that it tries to be anything but a role playing game. But I found it in the 2019 9-Card Print and Play Contest. And those contests can be really experimental places but an RPG is still an unusual thing to find there.

And, unusually for me, I’m more interested in the mechanics of Ring Tales than the narrative concept. And I’m much more a fluff guy compared to crunch. I firmly believe people love the stories they tell with games than the tools they use to make those stories.

The concept is that you are natives of Larry Nivea’s Ringworld with the registration number filed off, although it’s a ring around a world, not a star. I’m not actually sure how that works in a ring world sense. Anyway, there are twelve locations and they help you define each scene with twelve scenes making a game.

[The first draft of this blog, I spent five paragraphs trying to explain the mechanics and I knew it was a slog so now It’s one paragraph]

Ring Tales has a rotating game master and each scene will have one conflict. There are  four possible methods of resolution which really break down to force, guile, intelligence and persuasion. The game master secretly lists the potential methods in order of how well the game master decides they will do. Than players then vote in the decision. Depending on the vote, you get success, success but, failure but and failure. 

Boom. That’s it. 

Okay, there is more but that’s the meat and potatoes of it.

[I also have to note that the graphic design, while simple, does the job well. You track character health and how dire the global situation is by rotating cards. The game is designed to be played with just the cards. No dice, no pencils, just the cards. Which is far from unique but still nice for a light, portable RPG.]

Man, every time I look at a super rules light RPG, I always think that they are so group dependent. That you need the right chemistry and trust and creativity to tell the story. And Ring Tales is no exception. You don’t have the ‘game’ of something like Dungeons and Dragons with discrete wins and losses, with room for individual wins and losses. it’s all about working together not for a story goal but creating a story.

However, a lot of tiny RPGs are practically group therapy with an almost painful level of bleed and intimacy. Ring Tales doesn't have that. It supports the style of a casual, freewheeling adventure. And I know from experience that pushing the bleed works.

But Ring Tales isn’t about figuring out how to solve problems, even though that’s what it looks like on paper. It’s about figuring out a way to tell an interesting story with a level of hidden information or maybe even bluffing. Is that going to work or get in the way? Honestly, probably depends on the group.

I like the idea of a super portable RPG. I like collaborating to tell a story. And I like the idea of a tiny, short form game that doesn’t involve bleed but tell a more traditional adventure story. Does Ring Tales deliver? I don’t know but I like that it was tried.

Tuesday, November 19, 2019

Invisible Cities - an inner atlas

I stumbled upon Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino by completely by accident with no idea what it was about or its reputation as a great book/modern classic. Which might be a very appropriate way to fall down this rabbit hole of literature. 

The book consists of fifty-five descriptions of cities, interspersed with conversations between Marco Polo and Kublai Kahn. Which sounds pretty simple. Marco Polo describing cities to Kublai Kahn.

Except that it isn’t simple. The cities are fantastical, impossible cities. Sometimes anachronistic, sometimes magical, sometimes just plain bizarre. The book is a dreamscape of cities that have never been and could never be.

And it’s not even clear that Marco Polo and Kublai Kahn are real themselves. One or the other might be imaginary. Except that they are just characters in a book. They really are imaginary!

My personal favorite interpretation (and it’s not my only one) is that the book is deconstruction of the very concept of places. The cities say more about the person who is describing the cities than the cities themselves. Invisible Cities doesn’t tell us about places. It asks questions about the human condition.

What is real? What is unreal? And what do we get out of the unreal, what do we need from the unreal?

Invisible Cities isn’t just a book that I’m glad that I read. It’s a book I want to reread every six months to see what has changed in it, what new things I get out of it. It is a classic and it really asks you to explore concepts you hadn’t realized you accepted.

Monday, November 18, 2019

Dunsany Dreams 8

Three Learned Goals

The business man said ‘I will build factories and museums in my name. I shall be remembered forever after I die.’

The politician said ‘I will write laws and make treaties. I shall be remembered after I die.’

The post said ‘I will write poems and lyrics that will move every ear. I shall be remembered after I die.’

Death in his dusty long coat looked at the three of them. ‘I shall give you your chance,’ he said.

Friday, November 15, 2019

Thoughts about RPGs in small spaces

I have been looking at Ring Tales from this year’s nine-card PnP contest and, at some point, I’m actually going to write about the game. However, the game made me ponder some random thoughts that didn’t fit neatly into discussing the game itself.

First, the game was designed to be played in the car. Which is an idea that I love, an RPG that you could play during a long, boring trip. It’s also an idea that I’ve never been able to pull off :P I think there is inevitably too much to distract you, particularly if you’re the one driving.

But the idea of a game that can work under those restrictions, minimal rules let you forgo dice or maps or miniatures or other randomizers, that seems like a kind of platonic ideal to me. Mind you, I am already aware of games that already fit that bill, like Baron Munchausen or Puppetland. But it seems like a design space worth exploring.

Second, the designer’s notes describe the ‘no and’ to ‘yes and’ mechanic as old. To someone who got started with first edition D&D, that mechanic still feels fresh and innovative. And as someone who has gamed with a lot of improvisers, I think it is such a great mechanic.

Third, Tales of the Ring is a micro RPG, a concept that I am still trying to wrap my mind around. A micro game, in the board game sense, is easy to understand. It’s a game with only a few components. (Often, that also means a small footprint and easy to teach rules and a short playing time but not necessarily) 

But it doesn’t take much space or stuff to play most RPGs, as long as you’re using theater of the mind instead of miniatures. A handful of dice and some play sheets plus some pencils doesn’t count as a lot of components.

And a short playing time or being rules light doesn’t qualify a game as a micro rpg. I’ve never heard anyone ever call Baron Munchausen a micro RPG even though it has practically no rules and is designed to be played in one short sitting.

I think there are two things that can make a RPG a micro RPG. One is small volume of total printed material. If the total game, rules and background and fluff and all, is only one or two pages, it might be a micro RPG. The other is narrowness of focus. Not just limiting a game to a specific genre or even a specific narrative but a very narrowly defined scenario. 

The Name of God _might_ be a micro RPG. The original rules take up less than a page and you have a very specific structure and goal. Even then, the game is open enough that I’m not sure it qualifies as a micro RPG. 

Game poems as a genre fit the bill but I never hear them being called micro RPG. They have their own goal of evoking an emotion or experience.

Really, while there is a need and a design space for rules light RPGs and short form RPGs, micro RPGs might be too limiting an idea.


Thursday, November 14, 2019

Abstracts and kids

Some board games make good art activities for younger kids. And, at least for me, abstracts are the games that seem to do the best job at it.

Two occurrences in about a week’s span really brought that home for me,

First of all, I learned that our son’s kindergarten teacher uses both Blokus and Blokus Trigon in the classroom. Not as the games but as cooperative activities. I found out about this by our son pulling out my copy of Blokus Trigon and saying that they had a copy at school :D

The second was when our son decided he wanted to have a board game night with daddy and started pulling out my stack of GIPF games. (TAMSK is stored elsewhere due to its size and I don’t have LYNGK, in case your curious) And gosh darn it, didn’t he find the games interesting to manipulate and make patterns with, ZERTZ and DVONN in particular. He actually paid attention to the rules of DVONN but wasn’t interested in actually playing it :D

It makes sense that abstracts are good for this kind of play. Games with tiles and chits and cards and such don’t have the same ‘artifact’ appeal. Glass beads and stones and balls and pyramids and such are actual physical objects with all the dimensional and tactile elements that go into being just that.

I am hoping that this eventually turns into actually playing the games :D

Monday, November 11, 2019

Hisss: not great but great with five-year-olds

I recently bashed Rivers, Roads and Rails for being a children’s game that really doesn’t work well as either game or an activity for kids to enjoy. The next kids game that I tried out was Hisss, a game that is mechanically similar but worked much better for us.

The short explanation for Hisss is that it’s a tile laying game where you are building snakes.  The heads and tails are all either one color or wild but each segment are two colors. Colors need to match when placing tiles, just like in games like Carcassonne. If you complete a snake, you get that snake and its tiles count as points. Most points wins.

There are three things that made Hisss a more enjoyable experience than Rivers, Roads and Rails, most of them being the game being simpler. There are less than half as many tiles. The connections are simpler, one snake segment as opposed to three kinds of possible  paths. And the rules are _much_ better written.

In short, Hisss is a lot more accessible for little minds who don’t have that much patience. Hisss takes the concepts of tile laying and makes them manageable for the young.  Which isn’t as easy as it sounds. And having a tighter rule set is so much better.

For adults, it’s not a great game. I’m not even going to call it a good game. Hisss is not one of those kids games that adults can get into. However, it is a game that can keep a child engaged until the end. That might be be damning with faint praise but it’s also true.

The Last Kids on Earth was too awesome for me

After I learned that the cartoon The Last Kids on Earth, which my son didn’t care for, was based on a series of books, I read the first one. Which I didn’t care for :D

The Last Kids on Earth is about a group of middle-schoolers/high schoolers in an apocolypse that includes both zombies and kaiju.

And that was kind of my problem with the book. It was a mashup of zombie apocalypse and giant monster disaster and superheroes. (Seriously, superheroes. The kids fight giant monsters in hand-to-hand combat and win. They are totally superheroes.) Now, all three of those genres can mesh but I didn’t think they did that very well here.

The books have a goofy, lighthearted tone that I found very jarring. and much of that centered around the protagonist. An orphan and a social outcast, Jack uses the end of the world to live his best life. Any elements of angst are lost in him treating the disaster  like a video game.

Which could still work if it came across as a coping mechanism. But the world really does act like a video game for him. He is living the dream of the end of the world letting you do whatever you want. 

In fact, every other character in the book comes across as more nuanced and relatable :D Which is actually fascinating for me. That means making Jack so one-note was an intentional choice. He is a video game protagonist, like Mario or Link, a blank slate for the players or readers to fill in.

One of the core elements of zombie apocalypse fiction is being grounded. Adding giant monsters and the characters somehow gaining the fighting skills of Daredevil or Batman is far from grounded.

(I actually do wonder if ordinary middle schoolers becoming basically superhuman gets addressed in the later books, if that is a side effect of whatever the disaster really is. If that is the case, that would really help my suspension of disbelief.)

All of that said, these books have been very successful and I can see why. Take your average thirteen-year-old and ask them to describe a zombie apocalypse and this is what you get. It might make Warm Bodies look like Garth Ennis's Crossed but it is clearly the most fun apocalypse you could hope for. The rule of cool is always in place. Common sense or rational thought take a second seat to things being neat.

The Last Kids on Earth has a lot of problems but, man, it knows its audience. Which, from a publisher’s viewpoint, is the most important thing.

Saturday, November 9, 2019

Dunsany Dreams 7

Finding Memory

I found myself walking in a field that I had never been in but I knew from dreams. It ended in a hill that was green with grass and seemed to rise up into the sky.

The hill seemed too steep to climb yet climb it I did. Up and up, the hill carried me and I knew that it was the place that I needed to be.

And at the top of the hill, I saw Pan before me, shaggy and hooved and horned. All I could do is fall face down with my face in the green grass.

And he said ‘I need neither reverence or fear. But remembrance is good.’

Thursday, November 7, 2019

Italo Calvino makes me want to play impossible games

Reading Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities, I have a craving to design a game about creating cities in a few paragraphs, developing a map of urban worlds. Which means I’m completely missing the point of the book :P

The book has Marco Polo describing fifty-five cities to a bemused Kublai Kahn. He breaks the cities down into eleven categories and they all have women’s names. Beneath this poetic atlas structure is a deconstruction of language and geography.

Or so reviews and analysis of Invisible Cities tells me. I don’t grok that yet. In fact, I feel like I should be rereading the book again in six months and see how much it’s changed for me over that time.

So my desire to make a game out of it is based on the most superficial reading of it. But it’s still there.

I picture a set of tables. On your turn, roll to see what category the city is. Roll to see what name it is. Roll to see what details you are allowed to describe, like architecture or trade goods or monuments or such. From those rolls, you create a city in a few words.

Perhaps there might be two tables of categories and you must find where the city you are dreaming up fits on the matrix, turning a spreadsheet grid into a map of imagination.

Or perhaps the city that you dream of must fit onto a postcard. And after you have written your city into existence on your postcard, you must put a stamp on it and send it to the next player, letting them know it is their turn to bring a city to life on a postcard. And at the end, everyone has a physical artifact of a city that has only come to be due to the game.

Aaaaand I’ve just crossed the line from game to performance art. Probably the kind of performance art that would end up annoying everyone involved.

I’m actually not even halfway through Invisible Cities and I know it’s not a book about world building but more of world unbuilding. My feeble understanding makes it feel more about how you describe a place says more about you than the place.

But it still makes me want to build dreamy worlds.

Wednesday, November 6, 2019

A five-year-old’s experience with Go

I recently took a crack at introducing our five-year to the basics of Go. 

And while I have heard Go described as having five rules with one of those rules being that you play it on a board, quite a bit of it didn’t sink in. Go is theoretically simple in theory but it is ridiculously complex to understand in practice.

But it was his idea so I ran with it.

The one thing that he really clicked on was the concept of eyes and that having two eyes makes a group of stones safe. Which, to be fair, is a very important idea.

I wonder if he will ask for Go again and what he will learn if he does.

Monday, November 4, 2019

2019 holiday card planning

Ah, it’s that time of year. The Boardgame Geek Holiday Card exchange.

And, yes, I’m going to participate. While I bowed out of the Secret Santa awhile back because, frankly, I’ve cut my my game budget to the point  that I rarely buy games for myself, let alone other folks, making homemade cards to send out to strangers is a lot of fun.

However, while I’ve participated in the Mini PnP Secret Santa for the last two years, I’m bowing out of that as well. And that’s due to budget as well.  While actually crafting the games I sent out didn’t take long and cost next to nothing, I always drew international recipients and the shipping was prohibitively expensive :(

Still, I’m thinking of including a one-card game in the cards I send. That way, I’m still sending out some PnP love. And there are options out there other than Coin-Age, which everyone already has, or Bonsai Samurai, which isn’t very good.

It’s not quite the same but it’s a hint of Secret Santa.

Dunsany Dreams 6

The Business Man and the June Bug

The business man regarded the June bug that buzzed around his head.

‘What have you done to fly around me and bother me so?’ he asked the June bug. ‘I am a man of means and wealth. I have leveraged trades and bought and sold companies. My decisions can be the ruin of thousands. I can make the markets dance at my command. What have you done?’

‘Me?’ asked the June bug. ‘I have lived.’

Friday, November 1, 2019

My October PnP

Okay, here’s my October list:

Loot Boxer 
Xscape

October was a crazy busy month and I wasn’t sure that I was going to get any Print and Play crafting done. In fact, I printed out one of the play sheets for Loot Boxer and laminated it just to make sure I made something in October.

However, at pretty much the last minute, I threw together a copy of Xscape, which had been on my list to make sometime or another. i had already printed and cut the pieces so it was a quick and dirty project to get done at the eleventh hour.

And I have to admit that the biggest drive to make Xscape was so that I continued my plan of making one ‘big’ project a month. Sometimes that been at least one a month but as life has gotten more hectic, it’s really bee making just one.

I made the black and white ashcan version (It takes a lot more for me to decide not to make the simplest version of a game. Toner is precious) At three pages of components with fifteen tiles and four cards, Xscape is pretty much the bare minimum for what I’d consider a ‘big’ project. Still, it just barely squeaks in.

Frankly, I’m more likely to  play Loot Boxer than I am Xscape. But I am glad that I made it. Sometimes, just the act of making something is good.