I’ve packed more social activities into this week than I have in ages! Granted, they all took some form of nerdery, but it’s still hard to stay “on” for so many consecutive nights. I shall look forward to a day of rest in the morning. Not to say that I’m complaining!
We’ve started up a mostly-weekly board game night at work, and this week I brought my cards to the table in the form of Give Me the Brain and my favorite card game, Once Upon a Time. It is an absolute joy to play Once Upon a Time with a group of creative storytellers who play in to the cooperative part of the game! I really do need to get a whole deck of blank cards to expand the storytelling arsenal. It’s an exhausting game, however, requiring a lot of creative energy, so it is paired well with Give Me the Brain, which is quick and low-key.
Friday night was the first in a twice-monthly D&D campaign, again with friends from work, and it is a fantastic adventure so far! I love pen and paper RPGs, and have nothing but respect for people who are willing to DM. The format is lax enough that people can come and go from the core group, so that we don’t face the often-game-killing dilemma of not being able to get everyone together at the same time. We’re playing 3rd edition, as it was all of our favorites (I have no experience with 4th edition, but the ones who had played it didn’t like it at all compared to 3rd).
Today I visited with Josh and we gave Borderlands a try, and ended up playing all day long! I really enjoy the game, but I can see how it shines best when played cooperatively. I think the music in the game has been under-appreciated – it sets the mood so well! It’s a good combination of genres for my tastes, too. The FPSness is pretty mild, and the RPGness isn’t too deep. A good “casual” blend, though I realize that casual is probably an inappropriate word for what I’m trying to describe. Plus, anything with quests is a hook in my mouth, and I foresee playing more in the future.
Tonight, I went to Will’s to kick off the Venture Brothers Marathon which we have been talking about doing for some time. We skipped season 1, since I’ve seen it in full several times, and got good headway into season 2 tonight. It always surprises me what a well put-together show that is!
As for tomorrow, I intend to do some nesting, a bit of cooking, and then spend the rest of it in bed. Is the last week of January upon us already?!?
If you’ve got a group of fun storytellers, I highly recommend “Aye, Dark Overlord!”
In that game, one player acts as the Dark Overlord and the rest of the players are the minions trying to explain about why the last mission was a failure. Players get cards that they use to fill in the story or to pass the blame to another minion.
The goal is to get one of the minions to receive 3 withering looks from the Overlord, thus having the blame fall on them.
It’s great fun, and I think would be right up your alley!
Ahhh, I’d heard about that game but couldn’t remember the name of it! It sounded like a ton of fun *adds to her shopping list*
Have you played The Big Idea? It’s mostly an economy game, but you get cards of adjectives and nouns, and have to go around the table and make sales pitches for the “products” that you create with them (then everyone chooses a product to invest in, and you go around and roll to see how much each product made)
It generally features a good deal of laughter and silliness.
Borderlands struck me as one of the more original shooters regarding its ideas and setup. Multiplayer was a blast. My friends and i played through all of the content within a week, each with an individual class or spec. Too bad that they followed the way of “payed downloadable content” instead of polishing the base game with some patches a lot more (see TF2 here). There are horrible inbalances and lots of bugs which – if removed – could make this good game a great one.
The way it is now, BL is just a quick cash cow which will be forgotten very soon after. :/