While I have a dedicated game room / office, I think I’d hold a first game in my dining room. It’s got more room to move, easy access to the kitchen for snacks and drinks, and it’s easy to welcome in new arrivals (the front door being only two rooms over from the dining room). … Read more
My mom got me the Dungeons & Dragons Basic Set (the Moldvay boxed set, to be specific) sometime in 1981 or ’82. It’s hard to say exactly when; the Moldvay edition was released in 1981, and the next revision didn’t come until 1983. I got it sometime between those two dates. The exact timing doesn’t … Read more
The answer to what makes for a great introductory RPG depends on what your goals are. Are you looking to get people hooked based on a well-known brand? Are you looking for exciting game mechanics to draw them back to the table? Are you looking for a straight forward game mechanic that’s easy for non-gamers … Read more
My initial thought was … no one. I already introduced Dungeons & Dragons to my kids, and frankly, it feels like everyone my age who wants to be playing role-playing games is playing role-playing games. Except, as I dig into that thought a little more, I realized I’ve got options (if not time). RPG Dinner … Read more
A review of Combat, a classic video game for the Atari 2600.
The Ready Player One Replay is an ongoing exploration of the games that inspired the novel Ready Player One by Ernest Cline. Love it or hate it, there’s value in revisiting our geeky roots. Quote Since then, we’d used Street Fighter II to settle our disputes. My Joust skills were a lot rustier than I thought. — Ready … Read more
Dungeons of Daggorath is one of the most important games in Ready Player One (Amazon). Located in one of 256 recreations of James Halliday’s hometown (and childhood home/bedroom) on the planet Middletown, TSR-80 version of the game provided to be the gateway to one of the keys associated with dead programmer’s Easter Egg hunt. Quote “Daggorath” (with … Read more
Released in 1982 by Williams Electronics, Joust is a two-player game in which you take control of a giant flying ostrich or stork, launch into the air, and defeat enemy knights flying vultures. It plays a notable role in the novel version of Ready Player One, as it forms one of the tests that Parzival must … Read more
It’s February, which means snow, long days that are slowly getting shorter, and zines. So many zines. For the last three years, Kickstarter promoted ZineQuest, a celebration, and promotion of print and PDF zines for role-playing games. This year, Kickstarter moved ZineQuest to August to coincide with GenCon. That left a vacuum in February, which … Read more
I’ve participated – as a consumer and fan – in ZineQuest for two years running. This year, there is no ZineQuest, but there is Zine Month, a creator-centric, platform-independent website for promoting zines. As I think about backing a few new zines for 2022, I decided to look back on how 2021 went. 2021 Strategy … Read more