Apr
10
At the New York Toy Fair in February 2007, I walked every aisle, looking for games in unusual places. In addition to numerous unappealing titles from companies both old and new, I ran across a few games that sounded appealing, although I couldn’t look deeper than the surface since Toy …
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Nov
8
Mankind has been creating myths since it first crawled from the sea umpteen million years ago, and the ancient pantheons of gods and heroes could fill numerous encyclopedias. Although most of these sacred figures have faded from the hearts of believers, some still survive in small ways in the modern …
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Oct
27
Humans must satisfy four basic needs in order to survive: food, shelter, procreation, and the experience of watching teens being defenestrated by an unstoppable killing machine that wears some article of outré clothing like a facemask, a hook, or a striped sweater. How else to explain the weekly release of …
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Oct
16
Theme Week: Ubergames—Germany’s Award-Winners
The German game industry hands out the Spiel des Jahres (Game of the Year) each June to the best family game published in the previous twelve months. If you’re looking for games that are easy to learn and fun to play, pick up one of these winners.
Nothing says fun like going over Niagara Falls in a canoe and meeting your end. Don’t agree? Then you might want to avoid this game, winner of 2005’s Spiel des Jahres, as you constantly face the risk of taking a very long fall off a very wet cliff.
Oct
8
Theme Week: Why That Game Sounds Just Like…
Games aren’t created in a vacuum—the bag’s too small, and it’s really dark inside—so don’t be surprised when a new game reminds you of a title from yesteryear.
One of the first games many children play is Candyland, a racing game in which you draw a card and move your pawn forward to the closest space of that color. The next player does the same, and so on until someone reaches the end of the track. Candyland’s not …
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