Like a lot of (or all? is this a defining trait?) geeks, I'm pretty obsessive by nature. I focus on things intensely, and work in sprints so I can concentrate my current obsession into productivity (by some definition of "productive"). I work in the tech industry, which also works in sprints, so I'v...
Death is so frequently the lose condition in games that I think you could argue it's a little lazy. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind when a game threatens my game avatar with death. In fact I enjoy it as a threat. Morbid though it may be, I enjoy imaginary over-the-top violence and pretend gore in m...
I'm watching the Interrogator animated series on Warhammer+, and this is my review of it. There may be very minor spoilers, but ideally no more than you'd get from the episode description.
This show is 2D animatation, done only in black and white. It's a lot of computer 2D animation but even w...
Recently, I watched the Iron Within animated feature on Warhammer+, and this is my review of it. The feature is about 30 minutes long, of beautifully rendered by somewhat rigid 3D animation. There may be very minor spoilers, but ideally no more than you'd get from the episode description.
Iron
...The facts are these: in 175 CE, Gaius Avidius Cassius, a Syrian Roman general stationed in Egypt, declared himself Emperor of Rome. The problem was, Marcus Aurelius was already the Emperor of Rome and had been for years. It seems there was some miscommunication (or subterfuge, we're not sure which)...
I'm playing a historical fiction campaign about Gaius Avidius Cassius's attempt to appoint himself Emperor of Rome from his seat in Egypt, and Aurelius's fight to stop him. The plot is based on the historical events of 175 CE, but the battles never happened due to Cassius's assassination, and my Egy...
With the exception of a handful of pioneering academics and specialist publications, serious critical consideration of gaming as an art form feels, to me, to be seriously lacking. Sure, it's commonly accepted that gaming is now very much mainstream, but it's pretty clear that what most people are t...
I work in the tech industry, so I think I'm supposed to be really excited about 3d printing but I have to admit that actually, I'm not very. It's a cool technology and all, and maybe some day I will be excited about it, but since it started I've never seen a great use case for it (I know, I know, yo...
Most tabletop roleplaying game systems have the concept of rolling dice as a way of determining whether a player character in the game succeeds or fails when attempting a non-trivial task. A die roll doesn't itself have any meaning. A 20 on a 20-sided die is just a number, no better or worse than a...
At the time of this writing, I'm preparing to run Tomb of Annihilation for the first time. It's been out for a good 5 years, and I've played scenarios from it, but I've yet to run it. As I read through the book to prepare for the game, I've decided to post about my impressions. This review contai...
At the time of this writing, I'm running Tomb of Annihilation for the first time. As I read through the book, I've decided to post about my impressions. Although I started this review before the campaign started, I'm now running this module (using Pathfinder 2, incidentally) for my weekly session,...
I'm a hobbyist game designer. I love looking at games for ideas on how to improve or change them for fun, and I enjoy making up new games. I've arbitrarily decided that during 2024, I'm going to publish one new game each month. Some will be mods of existing games, others will be new games I've devel...
I'm reading through the Starfinder adventure path Attack of the Swarm. The second module in the series is The Last Refuge. This review may contain minor spoilers.
The previous module, Fate of the Fifth, was a punishing, non-stop chase scene. It was thrilling to read. I couldn't put it do...
At the time of this writing, I'm running Tomb of Annihilation for the first time. As I read through the book, I've decided to post about my impressions. Although I started this review before the campaign started, I'm now running this module (using Pathfinder 2, incidentally) for my weekly session,...
I love the concept of all-in-one starter sets. I think they're the answer to providing an entry point into gaming for people who don't know anything about gaming. Recently, I happened to purchase a Lord of the Rings boxed game plus a mostly-unrelated Lord of the Rings wargame rulebook, and the d...
At the time of this writing, I'm preparing to run Tomb of Annihilation for the first time. It's been out for a good 5 years, and I've played scenarios from it, but I've yet to run it. As I read through the book to prepare for the game, I've decided to post about my impressions. This review contai...