Recent Media 4/17

Recent Books:

I’m currently reading Thomas Jefferson The Art of Power by Jon Meacham. I’m currently up to his time in Paris, which is coming to a close. He’ll soon be returning to America.

Recent Podcasts:

The Dice Tower, episodes 297-300.
297: A solid episode, Fantastiqa sounds like a game I should play.

298: A great science fiction games list, with a guest who didn’t detract much from the standard “Tom and Eric talk about stuff” formula.

299: The talk was about GTS, the GAMA Trade Show in Vegas. It was detailed enough for nostalgia, but even with their lighter schedules, they were also exhausted by the show’s end. Unfortunately, their interviews were focused on designers, publishers, and distributors, so I didn’t hear much about our peers. And it sounds like the big presentation this year, on Kickstarter, was hopelessly one-sided instead of a decent debate. As they commented at the end, it’s unlikely that retailers’ fears were quelled.

300: The culmination of several weeks of lead up, the Coup was fun for the first few spots, and amusing for a few more. I had just about given up on the whole episode and was going to skip the whole week when they finally broke character and ended the bit. [I very much understand how once the contributors started pouring in spots, it became difficult not to feature their hard work. I’m glad they had the restraint not to give the whole episode over to their “April Fools Coup”.

I liked the rundown of Worker Placement games; it’s a category that’s more distinct than I had originally thought. I haven’t waded deeply into these waters, though Lords of Waterdeep did get held up as a great intro to the genre. Agricola is fun in the light two player variant that Jennifer and I have been tackling, and Keyflower also features a lot of worker placement elements.

Recent Video Games: I’ve been enjoying Starcraft [Wings of Liberty]; it’s taken up a couple of evenings a week for the last few weeks. I like the update; it feels like a faithful continuation. The single player campaign is a good storyline, and I like the illusion of choice that the branching structure provides. I just completed my first mission on Char… whew!