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Rob Zacny

Episode 257: Vietnam Solitaire with Dave Kershaw

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Bruce Geryk begins his three-part look at games based on the Vietnam war by talking to game designer Dave Kershaw. The pair talk about Dave's game Vietnam Solitaire, the assumptions that it challenges, and modeling an unwinnable war.

 

Make sure to check out Dave's site and Boardgamegeek profile.

 

Listen here.

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I am incredibly excited to listen to this episode and will look forward to the other two episodes. I've been reading a lot about the Vietnam war recently, and am super curious to hear what Bruce and guests have to say!

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This is going to be part of an ongoing series called "Thinking about history, talking about games" in which I explore other historical topics with game designers.  Your feedback is important, because the more (or less) that people enjoy this format, the more (or less) likely there will be further ones.  But there are for sure two more coming up, at least - they're already recorded.

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Are the three parts all going to be about Vietnam? I'm not totally clear on how this is a distinct series, although since it's only one episode in maybe it will become clear later. Though even if it doesn't that's okay too since I'm basically fine with any excuse that results in interviews with game designers that have designed interesting games.

 

I am definitely looking forward to the iPad port.

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I really liked the episode. It was very interesting to hear about Mr. Kershaw's interpretations of the American involvement in the Vietnam war and how he translated into a solitaire board game. The issues and challenges of trying to take a big. messy piece of history and distill it down into a formalized rule-set are really interesting to me.

 

I loved the 'Winter of War-gaming' and was sad to see it come to a conclusion. This series looks like a continuation of the bits of the 'Winter' that had me hooked.

 

Does anyone have any recommendations for Vietnam War computer strategy games? The only ones I'm aware of are Men of War: Vietnam (which I heard mixed to negative things about), and two John Tiller's Squad Battles games (both of which are rather imposing looking and at $40 are a bit expensive for an impulse purchase). If I go with a Tiller game, it seems like Tour of Duty is the more recent and improved version(?). If anyone's interested, I think this is Mr. Geryk's review hosted on 1UP: http://www.1up.com/games/pc/tour-of-duty/review

 

edited to add: Here's an interesting piece by Mr. Tiller himself about making a war-game covering an era that is still unresolved and raw: http://fly.hiwaay.net/~tiller/html/a_vietnam_wargame.html

 

edited later to add: Well I went and bought Tour of Duty, let's see what happens when someone with little background in computer war-games tries to play the finest 2002 has to offer

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think this is Mr. Geryk's review hosted on 1UP: http://www.1up.com/games/pc/tour-of-duty/review

 

"Tour of Duty was another Wargame of the Year contender from John Tiller, some guy that Bruce Geryk of CGW felt compelled to write about in every goddamned issue. Of course, none of Tiller's games were in our online database. Hurray for the time consuming manual add! We hate you, Bruce."

 

Ha!

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 loved the 'Winter of War-gaming' and was sad to see it come to a conclusion. This series looks like a continuation of the bits of the 'Winter' that had me hooked.

 

That seems to be a recurring sentiment - the good news is that we're in the planning stages for a "wrap up" show for the Winter of Wargaming. 

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That seems to be a recurring sentiment - the good news is that we're in the planning stages for a "wrap up" show for the Winter of Wargaming. 

Yay!

 

Also keep being rad and making the shows sound good!

 

(any chance of hints on who the other designers will be for the other two Vietnam War episodes?)

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I have my fingers crossed for Volko Ruhnke/Mark Herman, but considering that their Vietnam game Fire in the Lake isn't out yet I guess the chances of that are really low.

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This is going to be part of an ongoing series called "Thinking about history, talking about games" in which I explore other historical topics with game designers.  Your feedback is important, because the more (or less) that people enjoy this format, the more (or less) likely there will be further ones.  But there are for sure two more coming up, at least - they're already recorded.

 

Keep it up as far as I'm concerned.

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 Your feedback is important, because the more (or less) that people enjoy this format, the more (or less) likely there will be further ones.

 

It was great! I really enjoy designer interview episodes, like this latest episode and the ones with Lee Brimmicombe-Wood. Keep up the good work.

 

 loved the 'Winter of War-gaming' and was sad to see it come to a conclusion. This series looks like a continuation of the bits of the 'Winter' that had me hooked.

 

Me too, the Korsun Pocket episode was one of my favorite 3MA episodes.

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Yay!

 

Also keep being rad and making the shows sound good!

 

(any chance of hints on who the other designers will be for the other two Vietnam War episodes?)

 

I'll leave it up to Bruce as to whether he wants to let that cat out of the bag... but I will tell you (so that you're not surprised when you hear Rob and Troy this week) that Bruce's Vietnam series will run every other week. The other two shows are already recorded but we figured we would spread things out a bit.

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I enjoyed this episode a lot. I know very little about the Vietnam-War (or any war really). Turns out that when I hear about them in game-mechanics terms, I pick up a little bit. From the episode, I gathered that the bombings in Laos and Cambodia decreased political support in the U.S. I think I've heard about that in a documentary about Daniel Ellsberg, but I didn't understand that the bombings were related to the stopping such a influential supply-chain.

The game sounds fascinating. I especially like the part where Bruce explained how the mechanics express the retreat through cities and jungles.

Great episode.

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It was a surprise to hear Dave talking about the Northern Ireland marching season and the Garvaghy Road nonsense. I grew up about 6 miles away from that delightful little incident (and its yearly sequels), and I sympathise with the sensation of being unable to move around because of idiocy. There are worse places to be stuck than Portrush, I suppose. I'm delighted with the concept of coping with frustration by turning it into a game. That's delightfully playful and productive.

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