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W. Eric Martin
United States
Apex
North Carolina
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Time for another round-up of game news from across the webs, starting with that giant toy and game show taking place in Nürnberg, Germany:
• Photos from the Nürnberg 2011 Spielwarenmesse have started to appear; check out the 60-ish photos from German retailer Milan-Spiele, which includes a taste of what's coming from Amigo for Spiel 2011 and other surprises.
• Matt Leacock's Pandemic has won MinD Spielepreis 2011 – the annual gaming award from Mensa in Deutschland (aka, MinD) – beating out (in order) Dominion, Agricola, Galaxy Trucker and Blokus.
• Michael Lewis, author of Liar's Poker and The Big Short, is interviewed by Tim Harford for an article in Financial Times (and reprinted on Slate) while playing a learning game of Saint Petersburg. Says Lewis, "This game is all about trade-offs ... it's made for the Anglo-Saxon Protestant work ethic. The Greeks would never appreciate it."
• Sid Sackson's classic book A Gamut of Games is returning to print in late March 2011 from Dover Publications.
• Fantasy Flight Games is hiring an Associate Media Producer. Head to the link for details on how to apply.
• Cubo Magazine is a new Spanish-language site devoted to game news.
• Designer Jeffrey D. Allers has sent his latest Postcard from Berlin on Opinionated Gamers, this time talking about limits in life and in game design, with designers needing to keep the limits natural and (ideally) invisible during play. Props for working in a reference to Mark Dunn's Ella Minnow Pea.
In a January 2011 post on Berlin Game Design, Allers noted that after receiving a royalty check he realized that his published designs have collectively sold more than 20,000 copies since 2008. While a nice milestone, Allers adds this warning note to prospective designers:
Quote: To put this into perspective, even if I would have sold four times the number of games since 2008, my income would still put me below the poverty level in the United States. It's a good thing I'm not trying to support my family with my game design hobby, and I wouldn't recommend anyone else trying to do this, either, unless he or she is already milking an established hit.
• And finally some Wall Street employee named Derk Solko is quoted on why Monopoly is unpleasant to play in an article for Cracked.com on "5 Classic Board Games With Disturbing Origin Stories." Cracked doesn't spend time fact-checking its articles and verifying source info? Who knew?
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