Think While You Have Fun!: Yahtzee

Since writing an overview of poker for the uninitiated, I have noticed how commonplace it is to find someone who has not played the traditional board games that populated my youth. But I think everyone is familiar with Yahtzee.

Origins and Comparisons

The official game began as an activity aboard a Canadian couple’s yacht in 1954 (dubbed “the yacht game” and later amended to Yahtzee). They soon asked their friend Edwin Lowe (a toy enterpriser) to make some sets of the game that they could use as gifts. Lowe agreed, in exchange for the rights to the game. By 1956, Yahtzee was being marketed as a thinking-man’s dice game.

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The Purity of Poker

Sure, video games and various electronic diversions are available now. Who would want to find a pack of playing cards and start up a poker game when you can flip out your cell phone and play video space poker?

I suppose I would. Poker is a lost skill. People my age spent twenty years learning exactly how to manipulate Tetris blocks, where the best place to shoot a zombie is (the head), and the insanely complicated rules of the Pokemon card game. Those same people never learned how to play poker in any form. If you are one, please follow my drift here; “Poker Face” is not just a pop song.

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Beware the Grand Puzzle Master: My Life With Puzzles

You may not know this by looking at me but I love me some puzzles. I’m talking literal puzzles here by the way, not like word puzzles or mind puzzles or something. Physical “connect one piece to another” puzzles usually sprawled over a foldout card table for a month or more. Why do I love puzzles? Because they’re so simple, yet they’ve done a lot over the years to throw some curve balls my way. Want to hear more? Of course, because what else are we gonna talk about? E3? I don’t think so! Read more

Apples to Apples, Dust to Dust: An Apples to Apples Retrospective

For a while in high school I had friends that became obsessed with the game Apples to Apples. It was the only game anyone would bring to parties anymore and the only game people would specifically ask for at said parties. In fact, people would plan parties around playing this game. So for me, I was hesitant to enjoy this game, assuming it was a fad. But was it? It still sells well to this very day. Let’s learn more. Read more

Just Don’t Panic: A Retrospective on Catch Phrase

I’m a fan of good party games. You’ve caught on to this already being the intellectual readers that you are. I’m ready to talk about yet another fantastic game to break out when friends and family come to visit. Time for Catch Phrase.

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Things and Stuff: A Review of The Game of Things

I’ll be downright honest here and let you in on a little secret: Before I got The Game Of Things for Christmas I had never heard of it before. Does that make me a bad person? Probably not. What it did manage to do is make me feel kind of stupid since there’s a pretty decent game here for parties with the right group of people. Let’s get into this review then.

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