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Martin GUnited Kingdom
BristolDon't fall in love with me yet, we've only recently met -
Level 20 BGG poster
QWERTYUIOP
QWERTYmartin's Unabridged Insights On Play
Archive for blogging
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Martin GUnited Kingdom
BristolDon't fall in love with me yet, we've only recently met -
BGG recently added a feature to tell us bloggers how many subscribers we have, and in my case it's about 450. I generally get about 10% of that number in thumbs and the usual (much-appreciated!) suspects commenting.
If you're a subscriber but not a (regular) commenter, consider this is an invitation to say hello and a little about what brought you here!
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Martin GUnited Kingdom
BristolDon't fall in love with me yet, we've only recently met -
A couple of things to plug from geekbuddies.
Jeff Warrender
of the excellent Jeff's World of Game Design has published a book! "You Said This Would Be Fun: What makes a game good and how to make a good game" will be a thought-provoking read if the blog is anything to go by, and it's available in paperback or epub form for a very reasonable price on Amazon. I'd already bought my copy before I was flattered to discover my name in the acknowledgements!
And Dan Laursen
has finally () taken my advice and started a blog to host some of his super-smart commentary: Ought From Is. Dan came to my attention as a fellow Knizia-phile but the blog will focus more on how philosophy relates to board games. Promises to be fascinating!
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Martin GUnited Kingdom
BristolDon't fall in love with me yet, we've only recently met -
Just in case anyone was wondering, I'm fine
Have a very privileged situation in that my wife and I can both work from home, so we're doing shifts working and looking after the 4-year-old who can no longer go to pre-school.
The UK is now under a lockdown of sorts - we're still allowed to go out once a day for exercise, which mainly means a run around the cemetery at the end of the road.
Haven't been keeping up with BGG at all, but we're keeping our Tuesday games night in place as a virtual session. Last night was Bring Your Own Book, Wavelength and Las Vegas (on yucata.de).
Hope everyone's staying safe and coping well.
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Martin GUnited Kingdom
BristolDon't fall in love with me yet, we've only recently met -
And while I'm blogging again...
Voice of Experience Reviews Contest 2016: Prizes!
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Martin GUnited Kingdom
BristolDon't fall in love with me yet, we've only recently met -
I finally got round to launching the third instalment of the Voice of Experience reviews contest. Please join in here:
Voice of Experience Reviews Contest 2015: Prizes!
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Martin GUnited Kingdom
BristolDon't fall in love with me yet, we've only recently met -
I've just posted an announcement for the second Voice of Experience reviews contest, following on from the great success of the first one last spring.Quote:Like the first VoE contest, the aims are:Hope to see you over there!
• to promote critical analysis of board games that goes beyond a summary of the rules, pictures of the components and a brief opinion of the game;
• to encourage in-depth exploration of games in a community that tends to be dominated by first impressions.
To make this a little different from last time, for this contest we’re going to focus on the simpler side of gaming – the fillers, gateways, family and party games that don’t often receive a critical look. We hope this will make it even harder to rely on simply explaining the rules, and prompt reviewers to think about what else makes a good or bad gaming experience beyond the game mechanics.
So, for Voice of Experience 2.0:
• you must review a game you have played at least ten times, as last year
• your chosen game must also have a BGG ‘weight’ of 2.0 or lower.
Otherwise, it's completely open.
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Martin GUnited Kingdom
BristolDon't fall in love with me yet, we've only recently met -
I have started a BGG book club where we will be reading and discussing Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals by Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman. The introductions thread is here and the discussion list for Chapter 1 will be posted on 1st May.
Oliver Kiley has started a Guild called the Cult of the Critical for "self-identified gamers with a shared in interest in promoting critical analysis and discussion of boardgames and the boardgaming hobby".
On the guild forum I have launched a collaborative weekly digest of critical writing about board games on BGG and elsewhere.
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Martin GUnited Kingdom
BristolDon't fall in love with me yet, we've only recently met -
I am proud to present the inaugural Voice of Experience Review Contest.
Given all the chatter about criticism, metacriticism and metatmetacriticism recently, I thought it was about time that those who are interested put their money where their mouths are.
The thread in the General Gaming forum has the details, but to summarise:Quote:The aim of this contest is two-fold:I'm very pleased with my panel of judges - some of the finest critical voices on BoardGameGeek - and I hope this is going to be a lot of fun.
• to promote critical analysis of board games that goes beyond a summary of the rules, pictures of the components and a brief opinion of the game;
• to encourage in-depth exploration of games in a community that tends to be dominated by first impressions.
Anyone can participate, but you must choose to review a game you have played at least ten times. That’s the “Experience” part of “Voice of Experience”. Otherwise, it's completely open.
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Martin GUnited Kingdom
BristolDon't fall in love with me yet, we've only recently met -
As promised, some blogs that I subscribe to outside of BGG. Again, feel free to tell me what I'm missing in the comments.
Drake's Flames: snarky, usually amusing reviews of new games from Matt Drake.
Cracked LCD: Michael Barnes' regular column in GameShark. He often reviews AT games that I don't have much interest in but he's a great, passionate writer and has some excellent critical articles on Euros and gaming culture too.
GamerChris: Chris Norwood mainly posts succinct, well-written summaries of the games played at his local group, but also some longer pieces. As the organiser of a big game group, I find it interesting to read about how other groups do things.
Illuminating Games: Chris Farrell posts a lot less often than I would like but is always worth reading when he does.
Painted Wooden Cubes: fairly new and very thoughtful blog from fellow Brit Mark Taylor.
The Tao of Gaming: Brian Bankler is one of the reviewers I always look out for when checking out a new-to-me game on BGG.
The Opinionated Gamers: group blog that has subsumed a few blogs I used to follow. The collective reviews and round table discussions work really well.
Twilight Strategy: I had the pleasure of getting to know Ed Fu while he was staying in London recently. This is a brilliant, in-depth exploration of the strategy of one game - Twilight Struggle.
Bruno Faidutti: not quite a blog but a collection of excellent articles from the French designer. If a game makes his Ideal Game Library I count it as a major plus point.
Fortress Ameritrash: the Analysis section has several excellent writers including Matt Thrower and Michael Barnes.
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