Book Review: GameTek by Geoff Engelstein

GameTek: The Math and Science of Gaming: The First Ten Years by Geoff Engelstein

I've been a fan of the Dice Tower podcast for a long time. The podcast is about board games and card games and has had segments from many contributors. The most consistent contributor is Geoff Engelstein. His GameTek segments have run since 2007. They've covered not only math and science in games, but also theory, psychology, and history. The segments are typically under five minutes and deal with one issue. His attitude is both upbeat and curious, exploring all sorts of ideas that strike his fancy. The games he references run the gamut from simple ones like tic-tac-toe and rock-paper-scissors to deeper and harder games like Die Macher and the 18XX games.

The book contains seventy-one of the transcripts from the GameTek segments, lightly edited. Engelstein has added the occasional illustration, chart, or diagram to help explain the concepts presented. Those are great. Unfortunately, the book could use more editing. I don't mind the occasional typo or grammatical snafu, but occasionally the math or example is wrong (the two instances I wrote down are on pages 233 and 268). When the book is about the math of gaming, it is imperative to get the math right. As a reader, it makes me wonder about concepts (like autocatalytic sets discussed on pp. 94-95) that I don't quite understand. Am I not smart enough or is there a problem with the text? My skeptic light switched on at some point, making the book less enjoyable.

Which does not mean that I dislike the book. Many practical tips and interesting ideas are presented that I will come back to in future gaming and just for the fun of pondering. Also, the book has a list of recommended reading. I've marked off several volumes for further reading on topics like chaos theory, statistics, and game design. Any book that can get me to read about statistics has got to be good.

The Dice Tower Awards 2011

The Dice Tower has announced its awards for the best games of last year, i.e. 2011. It was a banner year for games and many fine one were nominated. We haven't actually played any of the winners but we may be adding some to our collection soon. We love gaming and The Dice Tower podcast is fun to listen to for the whole family. But on to the winners...

The Game of the Year went to Eclipse, a civilization building game set in outer space. The game sounds interesting to me but it does require a longer playing time. Someday when the kids are older and ready to commit several hours to a game, this may hit the table. That time may be far away.

The other hot game at the awards is Flash Point, a co-operative game where players are firefighters trying to save people from a burning building. It won Best Small Publisher game and Best New Game Designer for Kevin Lanzing.

Check out the rest of the winners here. You're bound to find a game you like (unless you are looking exclusively for zombie-themed games. Sigh.)

Dice Tower Gaming Awards 2011

Tom Vasel has asked his horde of minions podcast listeners to promote the Dice Tower Gaming Awards for 2011. Being a gullible loyal listener, I gladly post a link to the list of nominees, which includes many fine games for game enthusiasts or game novices, for adults and children, for brainy people and brain-hungry zombies. If you want to find a new, fun, and interesting game, this list has got you covered. There's all sorts of categories from family games to war games to party games to game expansions, etc. etc.

His hope is that the awards will become the American equivalent of the Spiel des Jahres awards, recognizing gaming excellence and recognized as a valuable source for the best in gaming from that year. Look for the Dice Tower logo to show up on game boxes in years to come!

Even though no zombie games received any nominations (if only they had their own category!), we wish the nominees the best of luck and look forward to seeing who will win.

Game Review: Zombie Dice Expansion

I don't own this expansion, I just heard about it on the Dice Tower Podcast. Nevertheless, the rules and photos are available on the game's web page, so I thought I'd throw in my two cents (or two pence, since we are in England). The original Zombie Dice game is reviewed by me here.

The expansion is zombie-movie themed, adding three new dice to the game: The Hero, The Hottie, and Santa Claus. In Big Summer Action Movie, take out two yellow dice and add in The Hero and The Hottie (both black dice, though The Hottie has pink icons). The hero has a double shotgun symbol, so you might take extra damage; he also has a double brain symbol because getting him is like a two-for-one deal. The Hottie has three feet, so she can run, two shotguns (though no double shotgun), and a single brain. The extra twist is "rescuing," where The Hunk or The Hottie can save the other one. If The Hunk roles a shotgun while the Hottie is "brains up" she gets pulled out of the brain pile and back into the draw cup. The Hottie can save The Hunk in the same way.

In Santa Claus Meets the Zombies, take out a green die and replace it with Santa's red die. Santa has some special gifts: a helmet that lets the player take four shotguns to die (you're a tougher zombie); an energy drink that lets the player turn green Feet die into Brains (you're a faster zombie); double brains means Santa brought the player his favorite gift (BRAAAAIINNSSS!); and the three regular side (footprints, shotgun, single brain (i.e., you ate Santa's brain)). So Santa brings even more variety to the game.

Direct-To-Video Sequel adds all three dice to the game. Santa joins in on the rescuing action, though he doesn't get rescued if he gave the player double brains as a gift.

This expansion sounds like a fun way to mix-up a regular game of Zombie Dice. If you are a frequent player, you'd probably enjoy this. We don't own this yet, but I will definitely add it to my wish list.

Full House Future

We'll have a full house tomorrow. Our household goods are finally through customs and will be delivered tomorrow. Mommy and Daddy are pretty excited. The kids just care about getting their toys back. After weeks and weeks and weeks of the same two pairs of pants and six shirts, it will be nice to have the rest of my wardrobe. The children could care less about clothes. They have had a greater variety because their clothes are smaller and we could pack more of them.

Planning what should go where has been a challenge but we think we've worked out a decent layout. Just recently, I've read and heard about interior decorating in some of my favorite new media resources. The Art of Manliness blog has a posting on how to decorate a Man Room. I had such a room in Maryland and we do have a study/Man Room/spare bedroom in this house. I left behind some of the better decorations, i.e. my collection of weapons. Now in storage is a small crossbow from Assisi, a patu/wahaika from New Zealand, nunchucks from San Francisco's Chinatown, and many others. We figured weapons probably were problematic to bring into a foreign country. Being prepared for the zombie apocalypse is not an acceptable excuse according to customs. The extra bookshelves are coming and some spare desks, along with the computer equipment and paraphernalia. Soon I will podcast again!

The other decorating tips were from The Dice Tower, a podcast about board games and card games, but especially the people who play them. Episode 218 was about what makes the perfect gaming room. We don't have a dedicated gaming room, but it is fun to imagine. They had a lot of recommendations about support equipment, like having spare tables for drinks and snacks and having supplies to fix and/or supplement game contents (extra dice, tokens, etc.). I'm inspired to adapt such advice if I can. Also, they recommended a spare refrigerator to spare the family fridge from raids by visiting gamers. It's a great idea if we had a spare room or start a gaming group. We can dream, can't we?

At any rate, we should have a very busy and very satisfying day tomorrow. Wish us luck and swift unpacking!!