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Occasionally, I'll have to take a short leave of absence, so we can justify all the "Ken B.'s Back!" jokes. Hey, what can I say--I'm like that dude in the movie Summer School who gets up for a piss break on the first day of class and isn't seen again until the final exam. Then he ACES it, baby. That's all I'm sayin'. Ready for part 2 of my 2012 gaming review? If you're not by now, you...

Conquere the furious river with swift swimming strokes! mind control bears and bald eagles! Get your fish laid! Wait, what? Come in friend and let me explain...

Have you ever noticed how so many games put the player in the role of a tycoon? It’s one of the oldest settings, going all the way back from Monopoly to classics like Acquire and the 18xx series. It’s a simple concept: the most money wins. In modern designs, it’s more common to represent amassed wealth and power in the form of some kind of victory point, like in Imperial. So the structure changes, the settings shift, but the message is always the same: financial success translates directly to victory. Of course, most of these games aren’t really interested...

As if the sheer, overwhelming power of my writing wasn’t enough to leave you punch-drunk, staggering across the page with confusion, this week I’m going to serve up short reviews of two totally unrelated expansions. First is Power Up for the acclaimed family game of giant monster ultraviolence, King of Tokyo. Second is the Slave I ship for the acclaimed geek’s game of small fighter ultraviolence, X-Wing. So if you own one and not the other, please do skip accordingly. Power Up brings to King of Tokyo exactly the one thing that I always felt was...

What was clearly meant to be a joke now has a pretty audible ring of truth to it. Someone would read a review and respond with something along the lines of, "This game sounds really fun, can't wait to play it on the IOS in a year." And how can we blame that person? We've been spoiled by some really great implementations of some of our favorite games as of late. In a few cases, I've found that I might actually like a few games that I had initially written off (such is the case with...

In Kansas City there’s a restaurant called Swagger, where you can order a sandwich called the “Dead Texan.” This is a burger with bacon, lettuce, mayo, all of the usual suspects. But wait, there’s more! It comes with a fried egg on it, evidently on the assumption that it really needed some more protein. And then, as a sort of practical joke, all of these things are put between not a bun, but two grilled cheese sandwiches. I tell you about this gastronomic monstrosity because this same “more is better” mindset was clearly at work with City of Remnants,...

 Talisman...in spaaaaaaaaace

I like Goblins Inc., but not as much as I want to. As a result it’s difficult to review. On one hand, the rules, the advertising, and the game itself seem are aiming for a specific experience that goes undelivered. On the other, I find myself enjoying what’s there anyway. It’s 75% of the way to amazing, which is pretty good. But man, that last 25%…

Inconveniently Wizards of the Coast decided to release five sets for their modular miniatures game Dungeon Command, and I covered the first four in batches of two. So now we’re left with an odd one. However, the good people at WotC informed me this is the last release currently planned, so it seemed a good idea to cap the whole thing off with a series overview. But first, the new set. It’s called Blood of Gruumsh which, for anyone passingly familiar with the Dungeons & Dragons multiverse in which the games belong, will signal orcs. For...

Civ Lite, defined.