Blog Archives
More Than Just a Theory
Look, we’re all grownups here. By now it’s obvious that the theory of evolution is a hoax. Just like dinosaur bones and Plaid Hat Games being sold to F2Z Entertainment, it’s there to test our steadfastness. So yeah, maybe I was tempted into agnosticism when Evolution appeared at my doorstep, box buckling under the pressure of a thousand demons and belting passages from The Communist Manifesto at the top of its lungs. It took a lot of soul-searching before I came to the realization that I’ve survived dozens of Tolkienist fantasies brimming with wizards and talking trees. Why not give a Darwinist fantasy a shot?
Long story short, I’m happy I did, because Evolution is easily one of the best card games of the year.
You’ve Got Red On You
If there were any one thing I would not have guessed about Viking warriors succumbing to battle-fury as Ragnarök tears the world apart beneath their very feet, it would be the sheer quantity of planning that goes into every wild chop of the axe, every swing of the hammer, and every jab of the spear. Which is to say, Blood Rage isn’t about your usual Vikings, all snarl-toothed and animal-eyed. By Odin, if they’ve got a shot at reaching Valhalla, they’re going to plan it out. To the last detail, if need be.
Don’t Resistor
I’ve long been of the opinion that the highest authorities in the land, the dudes who carry matching sets of nuclear launch keys with grave determination and a too-wide gait that hints at unbroken years of constipation, really ought to hire some regular guy off the street. Just to sit in on their super-secret meetings. To sip coffee in the corner and look bewildered while they talk about foreign policy. That way, when someone gets the bright idea to transfer control of the nation’s nuclear arsenal to a digital mind with genocidal tendencies, that guy can twiddle his thumbs for a bit before clearing his throat, leaning forward, and putting them straight.
“Hey, that idea? About the murder-bot and all our nukes? It’s, ah… I don’t know how to say this nicely, Mr. President, but it’s shit.”
And that’s how we’re going to prevent RESISTOR from happening.
Reach Out and Slap Someone
A fairly long time ago, I spent a lot of time in the back of high school buses en route to various band competitions. This was before smartphones, and laptops were reserved for college students and first class passengers on airplanes, so we passed the time with Egyptian Ratscrew, a game about slapping cards as they were flipped over. I never understood the rules. For me, the only rule was to slap red-headed Hailey’s hand, because I was crushing like diamonds. Because diamonds are formed by intense pressure and infatuation, see.
And while I never ended up dating the object of my oddly manifested affections, I departed with some small fondness for slapping games. Which is why I’m going to tell you about Slap .45 even though it hardly warrants an introduction.
Real Archaeology, Inc.
There’s something jarring about Artifacts, Inc. And yes, I’m talking about how it feels downright peculiar to play a game about archaeology during the interwar period and not be pitted against the Nazi Paranormal Research Division in a hunt over land, air, and sea for the Spear of Destiny, where “Roll a d6 to keep your eyes pressed shut,” is the final challenge.
Instead, Artifacts, Inc. is an entirely pleasant game, one where rival antiquarians might occasionally become kind of snitty with each other, but otherwise behave and don’t go exploding or stealing each other’s stuff. Surprisingly, this works way better than it has any right to.
150,000 Weenie Jokes
The advertising blurb for Knee Jerk boasts that even though it’s an easily portable game, insignificantly larger than your regular deck of playing cards — there are 55 in Knee Jerk, plus a rules sheet — and able to slip into your back pocket with ample room left over for beef jerky, that it still provides over 150,000 possible “situations.”
What they meant to say is that it’s good for 150,000 weenie jokes.
Chaosmos in the Old Universe
Like an animal dead at the side of the road, the universe has begun to decompose. Too hot, too bloated, collapsing beneath its own weight. Making this metaphor even flimsier, as a member of one of the organism’s last surviving races — all of them charmingly weird, no jack-of-all-trades humans in sight — your only hope rests on the shoulders, boggles, or tentacles of the agent sent to find the all-important Ovoid. Without it, your extinction is guaranteed; with it, your people will be reborn in the universe to come.
Unfortunately, somebody went and told all the other species about it too. The race is on.
Welcome to Bright Sunny Indines
In a lot of ways, Indines seems like the ideal tourist destination. It’s bright. Sunny. The people are exotic and vibrant, and have sexy, unfamiliar names like Kallistar Flarechild and Zaamassal Kett. The general populace has long ago gotten used to inter-planar travelers popping into existence left and right, so there’s nary a grouse to be heard about bloody foreigners or damn tourists or anything ugly like that.
It’s so nice, it’s almost easy to forget that there are apparently only two careers in Indines: university professor and punching bag. More often than not, they’re the same job.
Eighty-Minute Empire
When I asked Ryan Laukat at SaltCon why his latest expansion wasn’t entitled Eight-Minute Empire: Legends: Lost Lands — a fair question in my estimation, seeing as how it’s only compatible with Legends and not the original Eight-Minute Empire — he responded that when he considered it, his wife shot it down as too long. Too wordy.
Fair enough. You don’t want people taking longer to say the title than it takes to play the game, after all.
Still Better than Camp Mill Hollow
Where do you wanna go?
Hey Mom, I wanna go,
Gee Mom, I wanna go,
to Mill Hollow.
With a hundred other kids crammed into a semicircle on our elementary school stage, I belted out that song. I blasted my lungs out, eyes damp and smile earnest but hopeful. It was basically a fundraiser dressed up as a play, the weight of parental guilt over their children’s dreams pinned on paying the fee that would let their kids spend three days and two nights at a camp in the High Uintas Wilderness.
Many of us boarded that bus to Camp Mill Hollow. And I’m living proof that at least some of us returned.
SPACE-BIFF! 