Let me paint you a picture: one which will likely be horribly familiar for most of you. You’re playing a game - a long game, but a good one. The first two or three hours were utterly fantastic and had everyone buzzing, focused on the table, totally immersed in the experience. The hour after that it became pretty clear who was going to win so, even though the mechanics of the game allowed for someone to come from behind to take the win, everyone eased off a little bit. But it went on: for one reason or another, the lead...

We could have played a Knizia already!

I've made no secret of the fact that I'm a bit of a Tolkien nerd. Not so much of a Tolkien nerd that I have researched extensively what a greater obsessive once described to me as "the external textual history" or to have learned to speak or write in Elvish, but enough of one to know that there's more than one Elvish language, and to be aware that that's not the sort of titbit which goes down well in polite conversation. But here, in the midst of people who pin their fan badges to any number of...

  There's been a lot of talk lately about purchasing embargoes, about playing what we have, and about 'responsible' purchasing.  There's also the current US economic mess to consider.  So what's a gamer to do, when money's tight, shelf space is limited, and you're already drowning in a sea of games?   Trade, baby.  It's all about trading.   ...

The explosion of the game scene on the internet has had a series of unexpected consequences. I’ve discussed one or two of the negative ones in the past but on the whole its been excellent, positive stuff. If you’d have asked me four years ago that I’d play the majority of my games by email and that doing so would open up access for me to a whole new genre of games I’d previously dismissed - wargames - I’d have laughed in your face. The internet means we can often check rules and opinion...