tberton

I can vouch that The Duke is legitimately great. It's one of the best two-player games out there.

Haha! It was a combination of typo (although a different one: a was missing a quotation mark) and no backslashes. Thanks guys! So, is anyone else doing anything with Twine?

Well, considering there's really no combat in this game, that might make things easier for you.

What are your feelings on the disembodied "historical force" or generic "commander" that the player usually embodies in strategy games? Do you think we need to see more strategy games that put the player in a more realistic, specific and grounded role, like Captain Olimar in Pikmin or something similar?

I haven't tried Netrunner drafting, but it seems fun. It's expensive though. I will say that if you're on the fence about trying Netrunner, you should just hop over that fence and play.

This seems like an odd statement to me, equivalent to saying that the dominant strategy in Catan is to collect resources. How else could you win Waterdeep other than completing quests?

The stuff about pitching games is really interesting, especially when I think about it in terms of tabletop games rather than video games. I used to work at a board game cafe here in Toronto and a lot of my job was helping people pick a game to play, which often involved pitching several options to them. This is different than what Tom Francis was talking about, since they weren't games that I made, but it similarly required talking about the unique things in the game, the fantasy it provides, and situations you might find yourself in. However, I found that it was pretty impossible to apply any sort of formula to the pitches. Some games worked really well with a one line elevator pitch emphasizing some unique or silly aspect: "Hey! That's My Fish is a game of tactical penguin deployment," "Bohnanza is a game about the brutal, heartless, unforgiving world of bean farming." Some games you could sell on the fantasy: "Smallworld puts you in the shoes of a god commanding civilizations of high fantasy races," "Battle Beyond Space lets you live out your dreams of commanding a squadron of space ships." Some games could only be described mechanically: "Genoa is a negotiation game where everything - your money, your resources, your objectives, even your actions - is fair game for trading." Most games had multiple ways you could pitch them and it was really important to know a) would this game appeal to this person and if a) is true, which pitch will convince them that they'll like it. I might think that a group would love Alien Frontiers, but whether I describe it as Settlers of Catan in space or a dice-rolling worker placement game with area majority elements entirely depends on which description I think would be most appealing to them. Anyway, I'm not sure what the point of this post is, I just like thinking about how to describe games to people and the problems that surround the process.

Ugh, yes. I wish you could turn off certain cherry effects like items in Smash Bros, because the rocks make the game a lot less fun. I imagine they are less powerful if you're playing with two captains each, though.

Oh, I see.

Nah, it was on NBC tonight.

The best thing about that Nature Box story was that if Nick had just said "Hey, you like Nature Box? That's awesome. They sponsor a podcast that me and my friends host," there would not have been any awkwardness at all. But no, he had to Breckon it up. As a Breckoncast, this one was obviously great, but very weird. It starts with a Sean adread, but then Sean's not in the episode. Then it goes forward in time, then it goes back in time, then Sean's back and then Sean's gone again. It was so weird. Also, you mentioned Talking Time, the other forum I hang out in. Sweet!

Ha, Jake told this exact story about The Phantom Menace after Chris told this exact story about Star Citizen in Episode 134: Sports. You guys are looping over yourselves.

Unfortunately, it does nothing against Punitive Counterstrike if that's worrying you, nor does it really help if they're using Midseason to Scorch. But otherwise, it's a great option.

You aboslutely can upload Mario Kart 8 replays to YouTube. It's pretty slow, apparently, but yeah, you can do it.

Decoy works pretty well as Scorched protection, as long as you're not planning on floating tags.

Nah, the game is still a while away.

With the right choice being Pikmin 3.

As a representative of Idle Thumbs, you know what you must do. House Goldgame, motto is "We've taken the money and we're not giving it back" and the sigil is a puffin. Alternately, House Phaedrus, motto is "We are Phaedrus", sigil is a telephone.

Only the Corp has a mandatory draw.

Too bad you couldn't pack in a "What is game?" question.

They get bigger the more you play with them.

Me too.

This reminds me: I was at the Beer Store the other day when I noticed that one of my favourite beers has a logo conspicuously similar to that of Firewatch: This is a golden co-branding opportunity right here, folks.

The Blue Jays have won 8 games straight, the last two of which have been against the Rays, our nemesis. It's so nice to be excited about baseball again.

It's weird, I'm pretty sure I saw Spaceballs before I saw Star Wars, or at least before I had strong ideas about Star Wars other than those I had absorbed from pop culture. Yet I thought the movie was hilarious. Star Wars feels like the backdrop of the movie, while most of the best jokes don't have a ton to do with the trilogy. "Combing the desert," "A ship full of assholes," "Bleeps, sweeps and creeps," watching the movie on VHS: all those work without any reference to Star Wars. So that might be proving the point about jokes that rely solely on reference not holding up as well. As a side note, I just remembered that Spaceballs is where I first learned the words "virgin" and "ludicrous."