I'm Not Dead
I'm done writing boardgame reviews. I know people like hearing about the latest games, but it was never really what I set out to achieve here at the Fort. My initial vision was to write articles about various different boardgaming topics...and occasionally review something random/obscure that wasn't getting proper exposure. So I'd like to get back to that, and this article is my first step towards that original direction. Basically, I'm going to go over where I'm at as a person roughly 12 years into this hobby.
The Great Purge of 2017
The first thing that I realized and needed to change was the simple fact that I own too many games. I own a stupid amount of games. I don't play roughly 75% of them. A few months ago I (mostly) stopped buying new games and started selling off the useless chaff of my collection. So far I've managed to remove some 20+ games from my shelves. A cursory glance tells me that I've got at least another 20-30 games that can be sold. If I look at the box and think, “Christ, I’m NEVER gonna get that to the table.” consider it terminated from the collection.
Let me be clear that this isn't a shelf space thing or something dictated by my wife. It also isn’t some “I’m holier than thou” because I don’t need a storage unit of games rant. This all came about because I realized I don’t ever play my favorite games. How utterly daft is that? You have a hobby that you love, but you never actually play the games you completely adore? How does that even happen?
You guys know exactly how it happens. New exciting games would get purchased and I would gleefully tear through the rules and get them to the table. Older games would get pushed aside because of this. Pretty simple really. Over time this led to a boardgaming malaise where I just wasn't excited by too much. Reading up on the latest and greatest games made me realize that what I found exciting in the hobby didn't match up with the tastemakers. At this point I know exactly the type of games I want and frankly I'm always more interested in weird, different, not exactly perfect designs. Coming to gripes with this has made me much less frustrated with the hobby.
Re-centering My Boardgaming Qi
A big reason why my interest in games waned and I needed a “How Stella Got Her Groove Back” type experience was because I lost track of WHY I played boardgames. It’s taken me years, but I think I've managed to figure out exactly what I want out of the hobby.
When I open up a box, lay out the cardboard and plastic on the table I want to do one single, solitary thing. Escape. Not only escape, but become a part of the world set up before me. It doesn’t matter if it's a Euro, hybrid, or Ameritrash game, if it’s good then the world around me will melt away. I can happily get lost in the narrative of everyone’s actions. The fury of combat, the planning of treachery untold, or bracing for inevitable doom. Each game can offer something delicious and exciting that makes you forget you’re plopped squarely on a wooden chair in front of cardboard bits and plastic-y trinkets.
I think this says more about me as player than I initially realized. Come closer and I'll let you in on a little secret. I suck at boardgames. I've finally figured out why. It's not because I'm bad at strategy, tactics or planning. It's because I tend to get too involved in the game with my imagination. When I'm playing Lords of Waterdeep and I place an Agent at the tavern, I'm not simply collecting 2 black cubes. Maybe that is all YOU’RE doing with that action. But me? In my mind I'm sending in a cloaked messenger to bribe two scoundrels to do my bidding. They are but a tiny part in my laborious plot that I’m weaving in the shadows of Waterdeep. In Mission: Red Planet when selecting the Saboteur role, I think about that evil son of a bitch twirling his mustache and taking sadistic pleasure in blowing up a rocket ship devoid of my astronauts. I absolutely LIVE for these “theatre of the mind” moments. If I'm unable to internally visualize the action/mechanics of a game I tend to get bored. The catch is that this can really only occur when the rules have become second nature. As you might have suspected by now, constantly learning new rules/games will over time make me sort of unhappy with the hobby.
Entering Familiar Worlds
Another aspect of my “self reflection” in the hobby is taking the time to explore the worlds of the games I already own. All of those Talisman expansions I snatched up when the FFG/GW split happened? Yeah, I want to head back into that game for a slew of absurd, fantasy hi-jinks. I’m in the process of putting together an Imperial Assault campaign with a few friends, because it’s a game that, frankly, I don’t get to play as often as I’d like. These are the worlds I want to fully explore in two different ways. With Talisman I want to taste all of the different flavors and variations that the expansions can offer. With Imperial Assault it's the thrill and joy of actually devoting time to finishing a campaign with friends. I want to play these games so often that they’re forever seared into my cerebral cortex like a favorite pop song.
Think about other mediums of entertainment for a moment. Music, movies, TV shows, books and videogames are all things where you constantly revisit your favorites (or at least I do). Why do favorite boardgames get constantly pushed aside for something new? Is it because the hobby is more reliant on groups? Are we in a proverbial “Golden Age” where so much amazing shit is coming out that we dare not miss ANY of it? I’m not exactly sure, but I know that moving forward I want two things to happen: 1) Play my favorites more often. 2) When I play a new game, play the ever loving SHIT out of it before I move on to something else.
As someone that needs to get lost in the false cardboard world set out before me I think these two simple choices will greatly enhance the joy I get out of the hobby.
2017 and Beyond?
If you read this article and think that I'm being pessimistic, you couldn't be further from the truth. I love boardgames more than ever. For a person to evolve and question things in a hobby that they're deeply involved in is only natural. Taking a step back to assess what I love most about the hobby has allowed me to embrace it even more. I've come to fully appreciate the unique and impossible to replicate escapism that is only found in tabletop gaming. The hobby looks a hell of alot different than it did back in the mid 2000s. See exhibit A) Hamburgum
There was a time when this type of shit was normal. 2007 Ladies and Gentlemen...what a time to be alive!
The boardgaming hobby has certainly grown and more than ever people are discovering the allure of plastic and cardboard. I'm excited to see what games break new ground in 2017 and I'm looking forward to getting re-acquainted with many of my favorites. Boardgames are a HUGE part of my life and I'm always humbled when they find new and surprising ways to make me appreciate them.
It's liberating.
Still don't play games like I want to (or guitar) but at least when I do get to, they're not bad.
But I echo Rafael: don't stop writing, even if it's just game reports or a change in view of a game as it ages, because I appreciate your perspective, too.
I'm also taking a step back from reading reviews, which I find is often the momentum that causes me to ride the CotN wave.
I don't think they're a disservice, certainly not from the contributors on this site. I've acquired excellent games because of some of those reviews... but many of these games also aren't getting played as much as I'd like and sometimes don't command my attention enough to make any firm plans to play them again.
I think it's a consequence of owning a large collection and an increasingly defined idea of what I'm looking for in a game; even small hiccups in newer games tend to make me set them aside and revisit older games that hit the same notes, maybe less elaborately, before the ongoing salvo of incremental designs started happening. It has the effect of a constant tide of reviews that implicitly, and understandably, value the new things that games are introducing, which are genuinely compelling, but whose purpose inevitably crashes against the bulwark of games I've already learned and continue to play, mostly because... they got there first.
The new aspects need to be that much more worthwhile and I'm learning that they are seldom worth it for me any more.
When newer games mostly distinguish themselves through incremental differences, they also damn themselves through those differences at times: little design missteps and flourishes with negligible payoff that make me think twice about taking the game off of the shelf when it's sitting next to something more classic and solid, or simply more enjoyable & already learned.
This "new games fatigue" I think is something of a trend. This doesn't mean we're not interested in boardgaming, but simply that there're a LOT of games both out there and in our collections and we'd rather go deeper than broader.
I was thinking about writing something about it, but this nails what I'm thinking so clearly and exactly that I don't need to!
So, well-put.
Rafael Silva asked about games that I'm keeping and why....perhaps that is an entire article for further down the road when I feel that the purge is complete.
Here is a peek at some of the stuff that didn't make the cut:
Small World - I think Small World is a fine game. However, I don't love it. It's just a touch too clean and mechanical for me. If I'm going to break out an area control game or something that scratches a similar itch I'll reach for EVO or Origin instead.
Arena Roma II - This battle line variant is fun...but it doesn't blow me away. I'd rather reach for Blood Bowl Team Manager...or um Battle Line.
Dungeon Lords - One of my favorite games actually. It's just such a motherfucker to teach and it requires experienced players...so I finally said aidios. I struggle to fight the urge to replace this with the big ass anniversary edition like some chump resisting getting back with his ex girlfriend.
Defenders of the Realm - I like Defenders of the Last Stand much better. Plus I've got more fantasy games than I know what to do with.
Bruges - There was a time when I thought this game was good. I was wrong.
Hyperborea - Another instance of getting rid of a legitimate game that I adore. It's very unique, but the chances of it getting played were next to none.
Spartacus - Yeah, I know this is like heresy. It just wasn't ever getting played. And if we're being honest with ourselves the gladiator combat is kind of shit.
I'm not going to bore you with an entire list, but yeah sometimes you get rid of stuff you like...other times you part with junk you don't know why you bought it in the first place.
@ Black Barney
Yes that box of Hamburgum is very real. Drink it in!
@Engineer Al
You know you never need to twist my arm to play some Talisman. I'm always up for a game!
Very nice point which I recognise about the difference between wanting your game to give you something experiential in your imagination, against someone sat just optimizing the game based underlying maths of it.
I'm with you on reading fewer reviews and tracking less with new games though. That's even coming from a guy who writes reviews. I find my own enjoyment of what I already have goes way up when I keep a certain set of blinders on. It's much easier to be satisfied with the games I already have when I'm not reading about the games I don't.
I'd like to get the whole collection down to one Expedit 2x4 shelf, but I can't see it happening without some major upheaval.
Bojack wrote:
Very nice point which I recognise about the difference between wanting your game to give you something experiential in your imagination, against someone sat just optimizing the game based underlying maths of it.
Yeah it's crazy how important it is to me as a gamer. The funny thing is that the imagination thing isn't necessarily a thing reserved for AT games. Sure when you flip a card and read some flavor text in Eldritch Horror it's easy to picture what just happened. I also REALLY like it when in some abstract way the mechanics directly tie into action/theme that is happening. For instance, in the Bloody Inn, after the round is over if there are policemen staying at the Inn they look for anything fishy going on (i.e. they find corpses that haven't been buried). It totally makes sense thematically and it's actually an incredibly fun way to dick someone over in the game. I find that these moments get even better once the rules fade away and everyone is just playing. It really makes boardgames stand out as this truly unique form of entertainment.
On a side note, it snowed like a bastard in New England today and I was able to play a game of Talisman with the Winter themed expansion mixed in. We also used the City board. So much goddamn fun. Yetis, Ice Drakes and polar bears were slain while a couple of adventurers cruised around the icy realm. We played using the Ice Queen end game variant because it felt right. Lots of laughs...we even had the dreaded "roll a 1, get toaded...spend fate, roll another 1 get toaded for real" turn. I could play Talisman once a week until the end of time and never get sick of it.