Blog Archives
Country Directions
“Landmarks” isn’t the best title for Rodrigo Rego and Danilo Valente’s Landmarks, and not only because a heap of other board games go by the same moniker. (We are all of us indentured to SEO.) Rather, it’s because “Landmarks” sounds like one of those games where you’re visiting a bunch of state parks. Bo-ring. It deserves better.
Picture the solipsistic vocabulary terror of Vlaada Chvátil’s Codenames, the cooperative nature of its own spinoff Duet, and an adventure that sees players dodging traps, digging up treasure, and managing a dwindling water supply. That’s Landmarks. It’s sublime.
Apart from that title. Landmarks. Landmarks. Blech.
O Holi Night
The Hindu festival of Holi isn’t something I know much about. The largest celebration in the United States takes place only fifty miles from where I live, although its proximity to both BYU and UVU fill it with so many Mormon revelers that it was years before I realized it wasn’t a local custom. Having handfuls of color flung at my person was never in my wheelhouse anyhow.
But don’t go into Julio Nazario’s Holi: Festival of Colors looking for background. “Throwing color” and “collecting candy” are pretty much the extent of its interest in Holi. At least we’re on even footing.
SPACE-BIFF! 