Wishes Come True

Back in January I posted my 2009 gaming wish list. Now it's time to see how many wishes came true.

1. Run games for others, without necessarily organising them.

This happened once in 2009, when I made it to Newcastle for the EGG meeting in August. All I had to do was turn up with a game ready to run. Nice!

2. Organise another Go Play Brisbane

Done. I didn't get around to organising the second one, though, on account of some other commitments. Watch for Go Play Brisbane in 2010.

3. Run indie games at Gen Con Oz

Done, done and done. With a giant d12 on a stick, and tables of gaming goodness, this was the gaming highlight of my year. It was coupled with two good seminars as well, in which the gaming prowess of others came to the fore. Honestly, it makes me feel good to be able to help others find new games or to design their own games.

4. Burning Wheel Campaign

This one didn't happen. However, there are still 7 days left in 2009 for me to at least try Burning Wheel.

5. Try at least 2 new games

Indeed! Poison'd, A Penny For My Thoughts and Zombie Cinema immediately come to mind. I'm glad I tried them. I'm still undecided about buying Penny, but the Aussie dollar is strong at the moment...

So that was my 2009 wishlist, just about wrapped up. It was ambitious and I didn't achieve all of it, but I managed most of it. 2010 has its own wishlist, and you'll just have to wait to find out what it is.

E.G.G. Zombie Cinema

The second game for the EGG day was Zombie Cinema. A lot has already been said and written about the neat packaging of this game (a VHS box) so I'm only going to say that holding it in my hands was a great experience. It's quite the artifact, but I think I had hoped for some more zombies on the cover.

The game itself is clever for a lot of reasons. First, it's easy to learn. I think it only took 5 minutes to explain the rules. Second, it's highly narrative. The words of the narrative determine the rules which are called into play and it's through the narrative that players get involved. The dice and tokens are (principally) a secondary concern, being led by the narrative. Thirdly, it's clever because it blurs the line between the characters and the audience, with decisions to be made at the level of the character and the level of the player/audience.

The simplicity of this game make it a great little pickup game, and a game that I could easily play with non-gamers. I think this one might join my game collection.

Every Gamer? That's me!

I finally managed to reach the Every Gamers Guild meeting. Fantastic! Courtesy of some smarter travel arrangements than my previous failed attempt, I made it there and back in one piece. And because of Nathan Russell, I had a place to stay.

Ostensibly, the reason I went there was to see a local piece of architecture. At Gencon Oz 2008 the Novacastrians raved about it as the shining glory of their town planning. It stood proudly (prodly?) on the shoreline, fully exposed to visitors and locals alike. A quick look below (thanks to a Wikipedia photo file) reveals the artificial construct in question.

But enough dicking around...

The game day itself was fantastic. I think I'll split some detailed thoughts into other posts throughout this week. It started with a game of Spirit Of The Century, a request from Riley. I ran through some ideas from the adventure I'll offer at the indie games on demand tables at Gencon this year. Second was my first game of Zombie Cinema in which I played a Russian housewife. Dodgy accents are fun. The gaming finished with a game of A Penny For My Thoughts, which stirred the same response from me as Grey Ranks.

And of course it was great to catch up with some familiar faces, as well as some new ones. Seems to me that Newcastle is a contender to become the gaming capital of Australia.