Too Much Awesome

-Republished with permission from Linus & Bubba Books. As a child, part of the Christmas ritual for me and my siblings was snuggling up with the basket of Christmas books that came out with the decorations every year. The illustrations were so vivid, the books always smelled a little bit like cinnamon from being in [...]

It’s easy to buy video games for the people on your Christmas list, but you can get a lot more for a lot less if you look beyond the television.

Stuck with family this weekend? Just clear off the table when you’re done eating and play a game and all will be good.

Stocks may rise and fall, but one thing you can always count on is licensed Star Wars merchandise. A lot of it is good, but some of it bad, even the old stuff.

Gimmicks and fads in games will come and go. The best games are always the simple ones. They’re ones that are easy to start but hard to quit while still challenging you. Waterworks is a card game that walks the line between gimmick and classic…the real problem is, you’ve probably never heard of it.

I loved playing Monopoly when I was a kid. I liked all the money and little houses, but when I couldn’t convince my family to sit through hours of dice rolling, the game of Life was the next best thing.

I’m a sucker for things you can make with household materials. Cardboard, paper, rubberbands, whatever…if it’s cheap and available, I’ll try to make something out of it. Why spend money on something when you can get it for free? And origami fits the bill wonderfully.

Sometimes the coolest properties get the strangest merchandise. I went through a phase as a kid where board games became extremely engaging for me, some of which didn’t even require another person to play with. I’d set up Monopoly and just play around with the pieces for the heck of it, and everyone is familiar [...]

You’ve probably heard that Angry Birds will soon to be a board game. I’m not sure how well cute birds flying through the air will work on your dining room table, but Angry Birds is far from the first video game to become a board game. One person’s trash… My childhood was filled with board [...]

It all started so simply. I was browsing the board game isle of my local Fred Meyers last week when I stumbled on a blast from my past. Just seeing it immediately got my mind to start moving, which is odd because as a kid, it barely made me think at all. Milton Bradley pioneered [...]