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  • Do You Have a Deformity?

    Déformation professionnelle is a French phrase -- perhaps coined by the Belgian sociologist Daniel Warnotte -- that describes the phenomenon in which an individual's perceptions and behavior are unduly influenced by habits of thought and action that are acquired in the workplace.

    To the extent that professional deformation determines an individual's emphases and antipathies, it will influence his choice of leisure activities, as well.  The result is that workers in similar occupations can be expected to enjoy similar hobbies.  Consequently, during work hours and leisure time, individuals will seek out others with the same deformity.  Together, these individuals will normalize maladaptive ideas and eccentric tastes.

    No survey has been taken, but it's widely believed that Information Technology professionals are vastly over-represented in online discussions about boardgames, relative to their share of the general population.  In what ways has professional deformation influenced their tastes in boardgames?  Let's speculate.

  • Doktor Feelgood

     

    ...and now, a (satirical) word from the good  Doctor himself.

     

  • Dominion Diminished

    It’s rare that a game makes an amazing impression from the very beginning, so when it happens, you remember it. I’ve only had a few games reveal how impressive they are right away. The Settlers of Catan was one. Power Grid was another that immediately appealed to me. And in the fall of 2008, Dominion did it again. A lot of other gamers were discovering the biggest recent event in boardgaming at the same time. It was easy to be caught up in the hoopla, and if you ask me a lot of that hoopla was justified. Dominion is a rare game that essentially invented its own genre. It borrowed liberally from collectible card games, but the final result was really unlike anything I had seen before in board gaming. After that first game, we immediately set up and played again. And so began my 2-year affair with Dominion.

  • Don't spoil the ending!

    *kh.... huuhhh* "LUKE.... I AMYOUR FATHER."

    And just like that, all of Star Wars was ruined for me by the age of four.  I hadn't even seen any of the movies yet, but by 1989, this was such a commonly said phrase in American culture that any chance of me being surprised by the most important revelation of the trilogy was lost forever.  I still don't revere the movies nearly as much as those of you in your thirties and beyond, and I think this is one of the main reasons.  I don't like knowing what's going to happen before it does.  Suspense is cool stuff.

  • Don't Tell Me What I Can't Do! (The Alpha-Dog Co-op Game Problem)

    locke-dont.jpg

          "No, you can't go there... There are too many gates open... We need to start sealing some gates or we're screwed..."

          "If you clean up some cubes in Lagos, and then the Ops Expert builds a Research Center, and then the Scientist cures yellow, then on my turn we can win..."

          "You can't waste time trying to shoot that Centurion... if we don't have someone fixing some of these damaged locations, we're going to die next time the basestar attacks... and you're the only one with Repair cards... You gotta do it, maaaan!"

     

    Does any of that sound familiar to you? If so, you may be experiencing "The Alpha Dog Co-op Game Problem", otherwise known as TADC-GP. Wait... What are you saying?  You thought of a better term for it?  Of course you did... You know everything and can't resist telling everyone. That's what I'm talking about here...

     

  • Dragon 2010 Report

    OK, I've recieved several emails and a phone call asking where today's Cracked LCD is.  I kept thinking that maybe Bill Abner had finally had enough of my crap and decided that he would not run this year's Dragon Con 2010 report. Either that or the makers of MAFIA II gave him some concrete shoes.

    Come to find out, I was just dumb and sent my column to Abner's Gmail account, which he uses solely for doling out work schedules and assignments. Doh.

    So at some point in the next 24 hours, you will be able to go to Gameshark.com and see what I thought about this year's show. It's much like last year and every year since 1992, when I first went. Fat people, bad smells, terrible art, a little gaming, aging TV and movie stars like Larry Hagman whose star power has faded and failed celebrities like Brandon Routh, patiently signing autographs while waiting to die.

    Don't expect ribald tales of Saturnalian gaming excess like you'd get from a Steve Avery report.  He wouldn't even come, presumably because he doesn't "do" ITP (Inside the Perimeter, meaning I-285) events. Instead he went to some hoity toity to-do at Richard Launius' clubhouse.

    So, if one of you F:ATties would be so kind, please link in the comments below when it shows up- I'm off to the Hellfire Club for gaming this evening.

    Link: DragonCon 2010

  • Dragonmeet 2019 - Wot The Giant Brain did

    Dragonmeet was one of my very first conventions. A small RPG focused con when I first attended many moons ago, it has now blossomed into covering boardgames, RPGs and the occasional miniature game. It’s always been fun and a great way to see friends from England. The last couple of years has seen me put my press hat firmly on head and see what I can do in seeking out the new and interesting

  • DreadCube FTW

    An alternative Cubelock that doesn't feel quite as awful.

  • Dudes on a Map Board Games: Chess to Root

    Expressions of self through unchanging simulacra.
  • Dune Is The Mind-Killer

    The hunt is always better than the kill. And the hunt for a sensibly priced copy of Avalon Hill's Dune was about the longest of my collecting career. The quarry I tracked down proved to have a very battered box but pristine contents. To these I added a set of the redrafted rules and then five other friends, ready to fight for the Spice on Arrakis.

  • Dune The Right Thing

    Introducing Jonathan Volk- our new writer with a killer take on one of the best games of all time.

  • Dunesday Prep

    More fascination from Eon.

  • Dungeon Run: Interview with Colby Dauch

    dungeon_run11Thought you guys would appreciate reading this - Colby Dauch, the guy who wears the Plaid Hat, took some time to share his thoughts with MenWithDice about Dungeon Run.  Colby has been around the gaming community for years, first as the man behind heroscapers.com, the primary Heroscape internet community, and then as a game designer in his own right.  Colby's credits include a number of the later Heroscape expansion sets as well as the phenomenally successful Summoner Wars, the game on which Plaid Hat was launched.  With Dungeon Run, Plaid Hat breaks new ground, entering into the full-size game format for the first time.

  • Dungeon Run: Interview with Mr. Bistro

    dungeon_runAs a follow up to our recent interview with Colby, menwithdice.com had an opportunity to talk with the enigmatic Mr. Bistro and get some of the details we’ve been craving about Dungeon Run. I think this interview starts to delve into some of the information that folks were previously wanting. I'm particularly intrigued by the way he describes the coop / backstabbing elements - it reminds me somewhat of Cutthroat Caverns but I don't see anything like the shared loss condition. I'm looking forward to getting the rules for this as based on what we've seen thus far (which is, admittedly, not a lot) it sounds like something my group would absolutely love.

  • Dungeons of Dull

    dull

    Fantasy role-playing games have an irresistible, almost fatal attraction for me. It stems from my childhood exposure to Tolkien, I have no doubt and fantasy role-playing was where I started my exposure to hobby games in general, and remained the focus of my hobby time for many years. I delight in the mythic quality of the settings, the feeling of magic and mystery that pervades (as contrasted to cold, mechanical science fiction), the evocation of a world which parallels our own history in medieval Europe, and in the plots of both high and low fantasy. So you might think it natural that now I consider myself primarily a board gamer, I’d be all over adventure boardgames like a rash. Yet I have played remarkably few, and am interested in trying even fewer.

  • Electronic Versions of Games: Good for Business?

    pcg_catan1Here's a list of games...

    1960: The Making of the President
    10 Days in the USA
    Ablaze!
    Blokus
    Citadels
    Guillotine
    Hansa
    Jamaica
    Kahuna
    Kill Doctor Lucky
    Mr. Jack
    Settlers of Catan
    Tikal
    Vegas Showdown

    So what is the significance of that list?  If you answered, a list of mostly mediocre Euro style games, well... I wouldn't necessarily disagree. Some of those games I don't really play much anymore or have as high opinion of as I once did when I bought them, and a few I have since traded away. But the point is that I bought them... and more importantly, I bought them after having played a version of them on my computer, either online or via software or with Vassal or some other electronic means.

  • Embargo On!

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  • Emergent Gameplay

    What is the difference between a good game and a great game?

    I think the answer, after years of sort of feeling around it, is emergent gameplay. It is the one characteristic that every great game that I can think of really shares on an innate, design-level basis.

  • Escaping from boredom


    (Editor's Note:  Just had to run with this submission as a front-page item.  Truly, a story of inspiration and courage.  It makes you want to cue up "I Will Survive."  Or that cheesy song from "Over the Top.")



    Leave your eurogaming group behind and embrace life to it's fullest.  A real life story, a tale filled with sorrow that only wants to encourage you.

  • Essen '09: Go East, young man!

    essencrowd.jpg

    Put four men in a car for a three hour drive and you end up in a different part of the world. Not only is there a lot of catching up to do, life-wise, but there's lists of anticipated releases to go through. So that by the time we arrived at the Essen fair, our patience was severely tested having to stand in a queue. And by the time we were inside I was deviously tricked into a bloody train game, not worth mentioning and a waste of good time. I wasn't having that again.