Age Down Adaptation: Carcassonne

Carcassonne

It's the tile placer game where you, in the most readily available versions make a countryside of towns, fields, roads and monasteries, or rivers, forests and pastures. You place workers and based on the levels of completion, size, ad little symbols on the tiles that make up of each landmark you get points.

I'm not sure if it's the first tile placement game but I’m pretty sure I’d be at least close in claiming that. It's a pretty simple game a great gateway game and in terms of returns on your money, if you buy the big box version it's well worth it.

As an adult it can be a little...bland after awhile but still a great way to get friends who aren't necessarily into games to play.

With that in mind it is absolutely a game that can be played with smaller kids.

At first, with my girls it started out as a puzzle game, and it still is for my youngest. Match the roads, cities, fields, make sure the walls meet up and so on. Gets them to look turn the pieces and make them fit, I believe most puzzles work on hand eye co-ordination and spacial awareness.

My four year old is now able to place her workers, understanding she gets points for a bigger city, and a longer road, she's building on the towns and even trying to surround her monasteries with tiles when she can. I'm scoring but she counts the tiles for me which is working on her numbers.

Next stage is to work on placing workers in fields and understanding how they score for each town they supply. And having her score for her own towns and such.

And as far as the base game goes this is about the sun of the game and it's mechanics. As they're older they'll get to thinking about strategies to maximize their own points, and limit their opponents where possible.

There are expansions, many of them and they all add differing levels to the game, each of which could be used to build on to the game with the kids too, expanding their understanding and their learning with each new set of rules. I've never tried to run more than one expansion at a time but conceivably it can be done and it's sure be an interesting game.

This one is definitely adjustable for the small folk and enjoyable. The game states age 8+ I states that from about 3+ you can start getting your money back out of this one as a family game that the wee ones can grow with and with a big box there's quite a bit of game play before it's gets too same-y or boring for the adults.

Living Card games.

FantasyFlight has a few of them ,and when we bought into one we were very careful about which one.

In fact we own two but the second one will most likely remain in it's 'core' state for a long long time as we barely touch it and the theme isn't one that really drives either of us.

So what are they?

Well first, and foremost, they are money sinks. Like it or not, even preferring the format of them as I do as compared to collectible card games, they will make money magically vanish before you know it was even there.

I wrote a little complain the other day about how I'm always losing and that still holds true, I’m one of these players that can't seem to win on strategy and tactics, I need to buy all the best cards and let them smash a win out for me. That aside I wanted to write about this kind of game form the perspective as a mother.

So the first issue, cost, makes this game (for those responsible with their money) a little prohibitive. There is one thing especially for someone like me that could keep the cost issue in hand.

Proxy cards. The concept that instead of buying all the cool cards to very possibly try them out and find they don't work as you thought they would, one can make the card in question to play in a game.

There are a couple of ways to do this, first being to use the database on cardgamedb.com find the images, print them out and sleeve them for your use. They will look prettier than the even cheaper option, but you will use a bit of ink which I find to be ridiculously priced. Depending on how many cards you do this with buying the card might just be cheaper.

The other way, and one I’m most likely to employ, is to write the info you need and slip that into a card sleeve. It's not pretty, but it would work.

Either way I'm not suggesting playing the whole game like this, if a card works for you, and you plan to continue using it I suggest sourcing the chapter pack it comes in and getting it. Also it's not a bad idea to restrict how many cards you do this with, not hard for a person to make the UBER deck if they don't have to buy ANY of the cards. Personally I do have a deck I’m going to largely proxy but I’ll only play it with my husband who is the one who pays for all card purchases, and the deck I’ll play in public I’ll proxy just the one card, make it easily accessible so I can remove it if the opponent disagrees. All in all this is a way to be able to play cards that are expensive, thus making it a little more accessible to those who need to be cautious with cash flow.
One other way that one can play for free is with a program called OCTGN (i'll find the link and link it asap) It allows you to build decks and ply them on a virtual table what is all manual and rules are enforced by the players.

At this stage he going games/themes at this stage are

• Call of Cthulhu: The Card Game (2008)
• A Game of Thrones: The Card Game (2008)
• Warhammer: Invasion (2009)
• The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game (2011)
• Android: Netrunner (2012)
• Star Wars: The Card Game (2012)

So as far as themes go some are more appropriate than others, my girls watch star wars and if it weren’t for the nazgul they could watch LoTRs, and Netrunner is part of the very cool world of Android. Game of Thrones, perhaps not and Cthulhu is the thing of nightmares.

Meaning that theme needs to be selected carefully, which is pretty much the case with all things media related.

Which brings me to the part of this article that makes these games (although my experience is solely with a Game of Thrones) unlikely to be particularly adaptable for the young'ns.

They are VERY language dependent. Now I can see them as a tool to be used in persuading kids to read to practice reading and so on, but for the pre readers like my wee ones, it's just not practical. I sometimes get my 4 year old to pass me tokens, and explaining the icons to her is a little bit of fun, if all of one icon or crest needs to be knelt then I can get her to do it, which teaches about same/different. But by and large it's just not something they can engage with. Although I’d LOVE someone to tell me I’m wrong.

This would be the first time I’ve written about a game that isn't adaptable, that can't be stretched to encompass the whole family’s enjoyment. But that's ok, they can't all be adjusted, it jut gives them something to work towards something to look forward to.

As for 'I have a five and a three year old my gaming days are over”

Due to the nature of this game it's true it's best played when the kids are asleep, or in the case of today, being babysat so we can attend our local stores 'Living Card Game Weekend' (I'll have photos later). That's not to say they'd be scarred for live if you played a card game in front of them, that assessment comes more from having kids that like to get involved in what mummy and daddy are doing and with this one it's not really possible so I’d rather wait until they're in bed than to be telling hem to wait or to leave us alone.

Now I’m not going to start a blog about 'A Game of Thrones' LCG, I know this is my second entry on the topic and mostly likely there will be one more (LCG entry in general) and that'll be the end of it at least for awhile. I may post photos up of my husband competing in regional, but well he's my man and it's his first competition so I feel that's reasonable.
Also.  I'd LOVE someone to tell me if they can come up with a way my wee ones can participate in this kind of game, i'm always open for ideas.

So to summarize, I’m talking a lot about this game at the moment because I'm playing it a lot.

It's not particularly cost effective although the return can be great. It is addictive however so be aware of that.

Not a game for the whole family this time, but something for the young ones to look forward to when they get a bit older.

Obsessions with playing badly: GoT LCG musings.

An obssesion with something I play badly.

The pitfalls of the collectable and living card game.

15 years ago I played Magic the Gathering with my college friends (grade 11 and 12). The amount of money bot I and my parents sunk into that game was...mind boggling, and even more so with the knowledge that years down the track I would accidental throw all those cards out.

So when the living card game came into our consciousness I was very very cautious about embarking on that journey again, two kids, a mortgage these things make that money pit a dangerous one to teeter on the edge of.

The key difference between the living card game and the collectible card game being that when you buy your add ons you know exactly what you're buying and how it will help your decks. The collectible card game is a blind buy and you may waste $15 or so to get nothing you want which is where the trading come into it.

With that knowledge I thought that buying into the 'Game of Thrones Living Card Game' was a safer venture than Magic turned out to be.

What I didn't take into account was my my lack of ability to play the game with any sort of skill level.

Well no that's a lie no one can play with no skill level, it's more of the fact that my skill level is very low.

As a result after two days of losing games, not a single one out of about 10 games played, I’ve also been looking at what cards come in what add ons (called chapter packs) and where to get them for the cheapest possible, I think I’ve sourced about $150 worth of chapter packs that would make my decks AWESOME!

Then my husband played one of my 'losing' decks...and won.

It's not the decks, it's not the cards

it's me.

And yet I still look, at what I can get to make the deck idiot proof as it seems to need to be.

It's a sad thing really, that I fell into this trap again and nevertheless here I am.

Happy to play and lose and look and plan the expenditure of money that given my apparent lack of skill won't help me out at all.

I have blogs to read on building the best dragon decks, and there's guidelines for the winning Greyjoy decks and I will forever hate playing the Lanisters and any deck that can't win on it's own merit therefore warranting the use of a Valar (even though I run one as part of a working mechanic of a specific deck).

Will I ever get any good at it, well seeing as the more I play the worse I get, probably not, but I’ll keep trying, i'm trying to be smart not so much about the amount of money we sink into it but the rate at which we do it, bills to pay after all. And if there is ever a point at which I’ve sunk enough cash into it that the cards win on their own with very little guidance form me, I’ll be sure to let the internet know.

International Table Top Day 1.5

This entry is essentially me just sharing an experience and speaking of my hopes for future similarly enjoyable experiences.

Our local store registered their event for International Table Top Game but the boxes of swag or loot if you will didn't arrive in time.  So they held their even anyways and when the a fore missing loot arrived they held a second event, smaller in a way.  I say 'in a way' because by all accounts more people showed up for this one than for the first one.
Nevertheless it was lovely to be able to attend this time outside of a passing through to buy a game we'd been wanting for awhile.  Nope this time we were able to stay and play and as a result I got to play '7 Wonders', 'Gloom' and 'Infiltration'.

 My husband got to play 'Game of Thrones: The Card Game" and 'Infiltration'.

  It was lovely to be able to go and enjoy the games with friendly epople in a welcoming friendly environment   I have sung the praises of both our local gamin stores in a recent entry this particular event was held at Area 52.

And i'd be lying if i didn't say that one of the best parts of the event was what we were able to bring home.  We got some bookmarks, three mini expansions for games we already have and two for ones we will be getting soon.

Swag.  Pirate Fluxx card, Gloom Table Top cards, Dixit Card, nuns on the run expansion, Tsuro of teh seas tiles and munchkin bookmarks

Nuns on the Run Expansion (as well as 4 other Mayfair gaems expansions)

Dixit card

Table Top Gloom Cards.  WHEATON!

An enjoyable time was had by all, and the c-ordinator is talking about maybe running a once a month event that is similar to this (no swag of course), and other similar events I've even seen talk of a '7 wonders' competition.  There's things happening here and it's all very exciting.

Age Down Adaptation (ADA): Ticket to Ride

In a previous entry i noted that Ticket to ride is a game that is designed for age 8+ and how I've made variants for my girls so that they can engage with the game before they are within that age bracket.  At 3 and 4 they are desperate to be a part of what we're doing and don't always want special 'kids' games, they want what mummy and daddy are doing.  This is a more in depth break down of the game and how to extend it's game play.
The variants we've created are as follows

To begin with reveal a card, and place your trains on a route of that colour anywhere on the board, of any number of trains, person who runs out of trains first wins.  This teaches Colour recognition, counting, waiting for your turn.

After this and this is where we're at at the moment, we're collecting the right number/colour of cards to make a route before playing the trains.  So if you're wanting to place three green trains down on the board you need to collect three green cards before placing the trains down on the three length route.  We place the cards out as they are in the game, 5 face up, and then the deck next to that.  two cards may be picked up either from the face up cards or the deck or a combination of both or one multi color card from the face up selection, this is exactly as it's played in the full fledged game.  First person to run out of trains wins
Now we're looking at the above benefits of colour recognition  turn taking and such but with the added bonus of working with numbers and some decision making on where to get the cards from.

As the girls get more used to this version, the next stage will be that of pointing out to them two points on the map, for example in our version which is 'Europe' we could point out England and Athens, ad her task is to bet one long consecutive route between the two cities, first to meet their goal, wins.

The difference between the stages are getting less dramatic with each level because we're getting so near the actual game rules now.  Once reading is a factor then they can start taking on tickets and trying to get their goals in secret.

The last stage of it would be introducing the other rules, the ferry locomotives, tunnels, stations etc.


Pulling apart this game like this and offering it to my girls at age appropriate levels extends the use of the game in our house and makes something that they see as mum and dads accessible  making them feel like they're a part of the family.
Some of the stages could be seen as rule learning steps instead of something that needs to be done for a long time, children learn so quickly and if they are in the habit of learning  as most children are the concepts are pretty easy for them to grasp.

Age Down Adaptation (ADA): Pandemic

I'm going to begin by stating we have the original version of Pandemic not the shiny new one.
This is a game o really enjoy.  I've heard a number of comments about this and other co-operative games that are certainly valid but i don't feel that these things in any way diminish my enjoyment of them.
The biggest two concerns I've heard are,
1. they're multi player solitaire games. - It's true they can be played alone, that's part of the beauty of them i think.
2. When there is one player who is stronger in knowledge, and personality they can just direct others around and end up essentially playing the game on their own anyways.  fact is this comes down to the players and epople involved, it's not a fault with the game, that is an issue with the players.  I've never experienced this when I've played ANY co-op game.

But all of that aside there are plenty of blogs and podcasts on this topic  I'm actually writing today about adapting Pandemic for playing with younger children than its recommended 10 up.

I have a four year old
and a three year old.
They are in no way capable of playing this game to it's full potential but they want to play the games we play so we need to turn our mind to how we can do that with them.
In this case it is simply a luck of the draw game.
Each player gets a colour cube
Using only the infection cards each player flips over a card and the 'owner' of the colour card that gets flipped over puts a token on a city of their colour.
This version works on taking turns colour recognition, hand eye co-ordination and acceptable sportsmanship behavior (no gloating when winning no pouting when losing, fun being the aim of the game)

Another level of this, that both my little ones can still do is an added rule that wen you place your cube you must place it on a connecting city (even if it's not of your colour)
Here we have the same lessons as above with the addition of a little strategy (starting in the best place to make sure you're filling your cities not your opponents .  I have also considered this might be a wonderful example of showing how disease can spread in our world.  A lovely demonstration of why people shouldn't go to school/work when sick.  For the younger players this is a chance to speak about the concept of 'to and from' in terms of following paths, origins and destinations.

Next would be to add the pawns, move your pawn 2 times around the board (according to the lines) collecting tokens (just entering the city to collect all tokens, then infect the colour of the card you draw, When the last card is drawn the person with the most tokens wins.
At reading stage it could be that the tokens are placed on the city the name instead of just the colour, this of course adds a geography component to the game.

As they get older the epidemic cards could be added to the game, pawn actions can be increased to 4 but it now takes an action to remove 1 cube back into the dish.  If any one colour dish is empty players lose.  and epidemic cards put the cards from the discard pile back into the draw pile.  This is an idea, and untested as my wee ones are still at the earlier stages of this adaptation, it may be needed in order to make it a little tougher to assign more than one cue per revealed card.

I think from here the full blown game is the next step.

So there are our ideas, both tried and tested and as yet theoretical.
if anyone wants to try any of them and let me know how it played, or any other suggestions i'm open to them and would love to hear them.

KOI April (Kickstarters of Interest)

April Kickstarter

I"m not going to promise i'll do this every month, but i figured i'd give it my best shot.

Kickstarter is a place that gives games a chance to become.

I've done an entry on it already so that's not what this is about.

I browse Kickstarter fairly often wishing i had the money to back the projects that catch my interest.  Maybe you like the look of them and want to back them, maybe you want to just ignore them and think i'm daft for thinking they look interesting.  Up to you.

Tasnia

Tasnia is a resource gathering game that also employs tile laying. Players draw resource cards to form a hand of 6 cards and then they spend these resources (Wood, Stone, Iron, Laborer, Carpenter, Mason, Silver and Gold) to purchase portions of a building. These portions come in the form of tiles that can be used to construct medieval buildings.

(I like tile laying games they usually work well with young kids and this one looks to be good for young kids too.)

The other one i have time to look at today was this one

The Resistance: Coup

In the not too distant future, the government is run for profit by a new “royal class” of multi-national CEOs. Their greed and absolute control of the economy has reduced all but a privileged few to lives of poverty and desperation.Out of the oppressed masses rose The Resistance, an underground organization focused on overthrowing these powerful rulers. The valiant efforts of The Resistance have created discord, intrigue and weakness in the political courts of the noveau royal, bringing the government to brink of collapse.  But for you, a powerful government official, this is your opportunity to manipulate, bribe and bluff your way into absolute power.

To be successful, you must dest

It's an expansion, Here's the base game The Resistance being played on Tabletop 

It looked like an interesting game, although the theme seemed not to really matter much, still looked like fun.

Local Loyalties

It always happens that i have all these great idea for posts and churn them out in quick succession and then i either forget the blog or things peter off to a slow release.
I haven't forgotten the blog, i just got busy.

Today though seems to make sense to make an entry as it is out games night, and also our local games stores 'International Tabletop Day' 1.5 as their special order arrived after the actual event back in March,

So our local games stores they deserve a shout out because they are the primary suppliers of our addiction.

For years, and years there was only the one, and it supported our 'Magic the Gathering' habit 15 years ago.  They knew our names and faces back then we were in so often.  Today we don't play that one but they are our second port of call (our first until earlier this year) for games, card, board and dice.
Area 52
Their official website has announcements and such it isn't terribly interesting to me, I find their facebook page serves my purposes better of keeping informed, keeping communications open which they are very good at responding to messages.  They have a wide range and friendly customer service, if they don't have what you want they'll do their best to source it for you.  They also have quite a lovely loyalty rewards system that we as a family take full advantage of.  They even have a book store downstairs!  i have been known to pay a little extra for books i want in order to get them from there because i support their business  the customer service is wonderful and there's nothing better than knowing you're welcome in a store when ever you enter it.
There are tables upstairs and some out the back used for tabletop war gaming, and many resources for the miniature hobbyists as well (paints, brushes, etc)
But every store has it's cons.
They run a little more expensive than our new alternative.  I usually put that down to the cost of excellent customer service.
The games store is upstairs.  Now while if you know what you want they'd bring it down for you to look at should you be unable to climb the stairs, that's not a lot of help if you just want to browse.  The building is old, probably heritage listed, not a lot they can do about this really.
No online store.  This makes me sad as i'm a serial online shopper.  But the facilities are not available for it here.  They will let you know if they have stock in, and put it aside for you if you communicate with them through facebook which is lovely but they have stated they do not have the resources for an e-store.
As our (until recently) only game store they have been wonderful to us and we will continue to show our loyalty to them, by shopping there and by attending their events such as today's 'International Tabletop Day 1.5'

Our newest addition to the gaming world here in Hobart  The Mad Lounge.
The sell games, but also they have a library for people to go in and make use of.  With tables, nibbles and games, what could be better...well alcohol but understandably he's not licensed.  Go in, pay the fee and play the games.  The fee is reasonable the atmosphere nice and he often runs specials for people to take advantage of.  Membership makes the purchase of games and table time a little bit cheaper and he supports all sorts of games also even having special tables for tabletop war games.
Mad Lounge facbook page is all he has but again very good at using it to communicate with people.
He's new, but it's well worth checking out the property, taking advantage of his facility as he provides something else for people to do in a decidedly uneventful town.  He's usually open late, sometimes insanely so!

These stores are more or less the sole suppliers for our addiction in this house, and as such deserve a shout out.
yes i buy some things online
ad it's well worth noting that that happens only when the cost of a game is considerably lower that way than it would be on the shelf.  Given the weight of many of these games postage will usually double the cost of a game itself and therefore this doesn't happen terribly often.  One notable exception being fantasy flight games can be if you time it correctly acquired on book depository.  free postage means you're only paying for the game itself and as such a game that would be about $100 on the shelf can come in at about $50-$60.  Only Fantasy Flight games though.

So that's my shout out for today, I plan on putting out a 'all ages' game adaptation of 'Ticket to Ride' soon, allowing an 8+ game to be played form 3 years and up, with a couple of different levels to account for growing comprehension.
Stay tuned.

"Hello Sunshine"

I recently watched a Tom Vassel Review on a little kids game called "hello Sunshine"  It's new to the market, about $25 US dollars and it's about having fun and learning prepositions, behind, under, on top of etc.
Here's the review
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UCC2018WCo

and the game on Amazon.com
http://www.amazon.com/Think-Fun-1820-A-Hello-Sunshine/dp/B00B5OOSL2/ref=sr_1_1?s=toys-and-games&ie=UTF8&qid=1365376649&sr=1-1&keywords=Hello+Sunshine

It's  cute little game, for very young kids and a fun want to engage kids in games.  It's active for them while the parents can sit and they run around, or, conversely you can hide the bear and watch them run around looking for it, and then get them to tell you were it was.

Such a simple concept really.
And in my humble opinion, completely not needing $25 our of your pocket.
Most kids, i know mine sure do, have more toys than they ever play with.  we have a box of stuffed toys that they barely touch anymore.
And as a mother who thinks craft is important i have a cupboard full of craft things including coloured card stock, scissors and texters.
Not everyone has these things but even so it ought to cost maybe $10 at the outside to acquire them from a discount store if you don't

At which point it's a simple matter of finding one of the a fore mentioned not played with toys, cutting the card stock into card sized pieces and drawing (albeit in my case with rather rudimentary drawing abilities) the desired locations on the cards.
We had a spare KFC box lying around the house but any box would to or even just a plastic baggy to out the cards in once your done and voila, storage for the exact same game.
In my case free, at the most $10.

A perfect example of the cost of games not always being high, the return being great.  In this case the cost for return wouldn't have been worth it if i'd bought it, because i can have the exact same thing, for free!  I'll admit, it's not As pretty, but it's the running aorund bit that they love not how it looks.

Monopoly

It is arguably one of the worlds most popular games
Everyone knows it, almost every house has a copy of it and if they don't they know someone who does.  There's hardly a ten year old who hasn't played it to some extent.

However i know many an adult who really can not stand it for a number of reasons but aside from being one of them myself, the games history and interpretations are really quite interesting.

I'm not goin to write a big long blog on it myself because others have already written the material, what i'm going to do is accumulate the interesting articles here on one location.
Enjoy

Monopoly is Theft ~ Harpers Magazine
Monopoly for Socialists ~ The Globalist
Monopoly, a Dangerous Game? ~ Planet Money (complete with podcast with economists to listen to)
7 Money lessons from Monopoly ~ Financial Highway
Go Directly to Success:  Monopoly's Lessons ~ Wall Street Journal

Go looking there's heaps out there it's quite interesting

'My Gaming Days are Over?'

TLDR SYNOPSIS:

Gaming is for everyone.
Everyone benefits from it
And while not everyone enjoys games, those that do come in all sages and sizes.
and if you don't want to...say that.


I was in our local gaming store on international gaming day 30.03.13 waiting for my husband to sign up for the Game of Thrones regionals when i overheard a man at the counter who was being encouraged by the stuff to try out some of the games they had set up for the occasion utter these words.
"'I have a 3 and a 5 year old my gaming days are over'"

There i was in the store herding my five year old (she's almost 5) and following my three year old around hearing someone say they'd given up because they had kids.
It made me sad
and it kind of annoyed me.

First of all sad.
Games aren't just for adults, nor are they just for kids, I've mentioned before converting more grown up games to be played with younger people.  There's so much to learn for everyone involved its just so sad someone would give up on the chance to share such wonder with their kids.

What annoyed me later as i thought about it though was it sounds like yet another grown up blaming them giving up on something on their kids.  Sacrifices have to be mad as a parent absolutely  but it'd because you want to do it, not because your kids demand it of you.  And if you give up on a hobby you enjoy because you have kids, that's also your choice.  It's not their fault, it's not on their heads its on yours.
So many people just give up on something they want/enjoy because it just seems too hard, and i have on a number of occasions pulled my husband and myself up on doing exactly that.  But what i find more bothersome is the lack of honesty that it seems to come with.
"It's too expensive
It's too hard
I have kids now i can't do that
it's too complicated to organize a baby sitter"
Here's a thing.  Any hobby can be expensive but it doesn't have to be, i watched a review for a kids game yesterday called "Hello Sunshine"  after watching that i as thinking, ok well neat little idea, that i can replicate here in my home for free or if i wanted to package it up as something new for the girls i could probably do it with about $7.
As for the others, they can sometimes be the truth but they aren't a reason for quitting completely.
In the case of being a part of the board gaming community, our family only started after we had children, and it's done wonders for our family life.
These statements largely reek to me of 'I don't want to' or 'I can't be bothered'
And you know what, that's perfectly acceptable too, why is it in our world 'i don't want to' is so rarely an acceptable answer, so rare that people are constantly making up excuses or blaming someone else for their lack of desire to make it work.

With all that said.
I am a married mother of two girls whos grandparents are not only local but very involved in their lives, we have a support system that allows us to go to gaming nights sans kids.
But our gaming group meets every week and we just can't do that, it's unfair to everyone involved so, we host them here, the kids join in till bed time dinner time happens at bed time and then the adults stay to play.
There's a way, if you want it, there is a way..

Kickstarter

This seems like  good time to mention this as I've just found a project worth backing
Kickstarter
Now there is many a debate as to whether kickstarter is a good thing, giving peoples projects a chance to become available where they might not otherwise do so.  Some say that the publishing companies are just being cheap, not wanting to invest in something they don't know will be successful so they get the general populous to fund it instead.
Whatever you opinion of kickstarter i'm not really wishing to debate it, it has its goods and its bads, i'm writing this because i like the idea of backing peoples artistic contributions to our world, because it's nice to think that games that might not otherwise be made will be made because people helped it happen.  Because as a consumer i like to have a say in what i'm interested in and what i'd like to see become a thing.
I've back one other project that i have not yet received  but it looks like a pretty amazing thing and i'm really looking forward to it being done and delivered.  Having said that there is one big thing that one must understand about kickstarter.
1. pledging doesn't mean paying immediately, you pay ONLY when they project reaches it's end date and only if it received enough promised of support to reach their initial goal.
2. you're paying to help someone make something, because you believe in the project, because you'd like to see it become available.  Sure the backing rewards are great but a project may not offer those, they are still worth supporting.  I have been known to back a project for more than i might normally do in order to get specific backer rewards, but that's not to say i'd not have backed it if those rewards weren't available.
3.  And this is the big one.  There is NO guarantee of receiving your items if there were backer rewards.  There just isn't.  You need to select carefully and be aware that once your money is gone, you may never see any returns for it, such is our world.  It's an exercise in trust as much as it is an exercise in crowd funding.

All of that aside i like to support something every now and again.  I tend to make sure as best I can that the project is legit, like hearing about it from Dice towers Tom Vassel during one of his podcasts, or knowing that it's linked with an already existing item for instance this one
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/maydaygames/walk-the-plank-pirate-card-game-get-bit-prequel
I know that 'Get Bit' is an already existing game, so i am taking it on faith that this projects association with that lends it a reasonable amount of legitimacy.
And here is how i know that 'get bit' is a real thing
http://tabletop.geekandsundry.com/view/zombie-dice-get-bit-tsuro-ryan-higa-freddie-wong-rod-roddenberry-tabletop-e/

I do know several people who have received the products they backed on kickstarter and enjoyed them greatly.  So particularly in the world of games it's a great way to have a say in whats produced and to lend your support for something you believe will be enjoyable and rewarding if it became available to buy off the shelf.  Or in the case of Dice Tower, I use his reviews and podcasts to keep myself informed and to know what games are of internet to me and my family, therefore i felt that it was only fair to back his continuation to provide a service that i use so heavily.

Personaly i have backed, all of which are finished now but just to give you an idea.
The Dice tower season 9
Storm Hollow: The board game
and my husband has backed Mobile frame Zero

Mainstream Games Vs. specialty/designer games or. How we started.

I may not have the language for this one perfectly right for this one but i will explain my meanings.

TLDR SYNOPSIS:
There are more than just the mainstream games available ad if you look harder you may find a world of games that suits you and your needs that those games don't meet.
also
http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-board-games-that-ruined-it-everyone/

The best way for me to discuss this is to explain how we got into gaming.
WE had a cupboard full of the traditional, or mainstream games, you know the games you can buy at target, and KMart, pictionary, scattergories, monopoly, scrabble.  And we played them very occasionally.  We even had a CSI game in our cupboard that we had enjoyed the novelty of but stopped playing some time back.  It just never seemed like something we'd get into heavily, i personally can't ever remember how to play chess much to my husbands chagrin.
Fact is all of those traditional ones can be ad often are by default, monotonous and not particularly fun.
And yet i recognized the education value of games, and i loved the idea o the family interaction time that didn't involve something that needed plugging in or recharging.
We had played and enjoyed a game with a frined of our called Talisman which was a new kind of game for us, fantasy adventure figurines etc.  we even went and bought the modern version of it which we didn't like as much do to the completely PvP (player versus player) nature of it, i much prefer co-op games or PvE (player versus environment).
But we played it occasionally, it ws a long running game also which put us off it.  Very quickly we discovered that it's a roll ad move with no particular goal to it other than to WIN, and like monopoly, it had  limited interest for us, for a game that can run from two to four hours, i found myself becoming decidedly bored.  I don't actually gt bored easily but i believe that when playing a game ALL attention should be on the game, doing anything else is rude to the people playing, and really there was nothing going into the brain when i played this game for more than half an hour.
Needless to say this was a disappointing purchase for us and the games thing went on the back burner again.
I acquired more traditional or mainstream games to play with the girls, hungry hippos, Creationary (this one is awesome), and Uno.  Which they enjoy absolutely.
Whilst on a holiday one year we were in a bookstore that had some specialist game sin it, amongst them a Lord of the rings game and a 'Game of Thrones Game' as a fan of both of these my husband decided we ought to have them, we took them back to our hotel and to our disappointment the Game of Thrones one was a three + player game, and Lord of the rings was...OMG so hard to win with only 2, in fact we never have.
Shelved.
My husband really did enjoy Game of Thrones though so when we could get someone to play we played i, it's not really my kind of game as it's area control and completely adversarial.  So i went looking for something that might interest me, these games certainly implied that there were 'other' games out there that i might like, and the co-op nature of Lord of the Rings said to me that there was certainly that mechanic out there on the market as well.  So i looked.
I found Arkham Horror.
from there it was all uphill, i'd say down hill but to be honest it was fun, easy, and a wonderful new thing for us and downhill sounds do negative.
Arkham was big, complex, co-op hard to win but not impossible and there was quite the community around it on the internet.
From there we found Table Top, the youtube channel for Dicetower and www.boardgamegeek.com
And our local gaming group and it became a hobby that exploded for us, one that has taught our girls a lot already, taught us a lot brought us back together as a couple with a common interest, brought friends closer and helped us make new friends and become a large positive feature on out lives.

So how was this journey in any way a discussion on traditional or mainstream games versus designer or specialty games?
It comes down to being aware of what is out there, everyone knows about Monpoloy but what about Pandemic?   And if you dislike party games like Pictionary and Taboo, that is not the limit of the gaming world, there's so much more if you look further.
On that note the traditional games are perfectly fine, i really quite enjoy taboo myself.

The reason i haven't gone into some of this more deeply is that other have done exactly that.
Here's is an article i found very interesting
http://www.cracked.com/blog/6-board-games-that-ruined-it-everyone/

As a mum 4/4

As part of a 4 part run on how i see board games as a mum

4.  Ease.

Ok well this one doesn't really need a full entry of its own but i said i was going to do it so here it is.
Ease.  I am at my core somewhat lazy, but also when it comes to games a little OCD.
I package and store my games so that they are at their easiest to set up whenever we want to play them.  Games that are said to take half an hour to set up like 'Arkham Horror' take no more than ten minutes for us.

When it comes to playing with the kids, there's more to it than just being lazy, there's attention spans to deal with.  If the game takes too long to set up they will wander off and lose interest, i know this from experience.  In addition, if the game takes too long to set up after one play through...who wants to go through all that again...well the kids do of course they aren't he ones who need to set it up are they.
So when i look at a game i look at the east with which the components are handled, how quickly it goes together, or is set up and whether that time is worth it against the time of game play.
It might seem like a silly little thing but it makes a difference.

The one last thing that doesn't really come under 'ease' but i'm not making a category of its own.  Noise.  I suppose you could say it comes under the ease of tolerance because that's my problem here.  Hungry Hippos, one of the most horrible games ever made, it's noisy, impossible to keep the pieces together and i spend all my time cringing that the hippos will break at being hit so hard.  If the game is loud, i tend to leave it on the shelf these days too.

As a mum 3/4

As part of a four part series

Part 3: age validity/conversion potential

TLDR SYNOPSIS:
Read the box a a guideline, more grown up games can be adapted for younger kids thus extending their life spans within the family.

This is one of my favourite things.
Because while age recommendations on the box are a great guideline, they are not hard and fast rules and with a little imagination many games that are designed for an age range that far exceeds that of your own children can still be enjoyed by everyone.

So first of, age appropriateness  there are many games out there that are great for wee ones, my own girls are 3 and 4 years old we were able to play about 7 different games with them on International Table Top Day.   Jenga becomes a game of who can knock the tower over, and the three year old has trouble understanding why she can't roll both her pigs once she's rolled one of the desired configuration.  But it cane be done with patience ad perseverance.
But it's not just these games that can be played with small kids, Some of the games my husband an I play together can be shared with the children in a more simplified version.
Perfect example, 'Ticket to Ride'
Game play is pretty basic to begin with, collect cards of the right colour, place trains on the board to fulfill the route on your cards.  My 4 year old is just about able to move up to playing the game to its full level.  But until now and while her sister is playing it's been adapted, reveal a card, and place your trains on a route of that colour anywhere on the board, person who runs out of trains first wins.  Colour recognition, counting, waiting for your turn.
Next time we play we may just use the cards to collect the right number/colour of cards to make a route before playing the trains, and build up to playing the game according to all it's rules.  This effectively makes a game that according to the box is for 8+ year olds, easily accessible for a 3 or 4 year old, thus increasing the worth of the item.
There are many such ideas for all sorts of games to be found on www.boardgamegeek.com but these variants aren't particularly hard to devise when you really look at the game itself.

IN\n addition to this in terms of adult games, there are many that are 3-? players.  In a house where the adults like to play games at the end of the a day once the kids are in bed 3 player games are inconvenient.  However, that same site, www.boardgamegeek.com, can be used as a resource to find two player variants for these games, now i'm not saying that these games play at their best like this but sometimes it works out just as well or simply allows you to at least have a go at a game you otherwise would have to wait for others for.

Age appropriateness is variable, and if you can adapt or find an adaptation amongst other gamers then games can become life long memories for yur kids, and yourselves, loved memories.  Not just a shadow of  memory you played as a kid but never play anymore because it's too childlike.

As a mum 2/4

As part of a 4 part run of how being a mother influences how i look at board games.


Part 2: What can be learned.

TLDR SYNOPSIS: There's lots to learn from playing games, physical, mental, social, but one ought to be aware of what is being taught by the games also.

Coincidentally:  This just appeared up through the Dice tower facebook page.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UCC2018WCo&feature=youtu.be

Children learn so many things so quickly, some of it we feed to them deliberately and some they just pick up somehow.  We're all well aware of the rating son movies and TV shows which are all about the potential for children to learn different things from what they see.  This is't about ratings.  This is about recognizing that everything has an education purpose and sometimes you may have to dig to find it but it can be surprising the things we don't think of.
For instance in any game kids can be learning about winning or losing graciously, that the game is the fun part winning isn't everything, about taking turns, waiting, and acceptable social interactions.
There are games that work on hand eye co-ordination, fine motor skills, balance, gross motor skills.
And the more expected, strategic thinking, deductive thinking, number recognition  colour recognition, sequencing, same/different, letter recognition, reading skills resource management, time management, team work.
Sitting down to play a fun game of scrabble has obvious education use ofr kids, what of the game of life, aside form being deathly boring for adults how about the fact that my oldest got to the end of the game with two mothers and a baby and she KNEW that that was ok, even though mummy and daddy's families both consisted of a mum and a dad.
Games can also be a good indication of your childs understandings of the world, where their strengths are and their weaknesses.  For instance, my oldest ha a big heart and understands love is love.  however at this point (she IS only 4) her competitive streak is fairly large so we play and gently remind her that if she's having fun that's the important thing.
The family time games provides is beyond valuable, and the insight to the members of your family and yourself you may gain from playing games is priceless.
They're learning, you're learning, and you're all sharing.

However, every awesome thing has a drawback, and the lessons one takes form a game, or tv show as mentioned about needs to be carefully monitored.
For example, take Monopoly.  A good portion of households will have this game in their cupboards.
Now aside form it helping people in the thinking that board games are actually quite monotonous (face it the roll and move mechanic isn't terribly interesting), consider theories and articles such as this
http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2986/was-monopoly-originally-meant-to-teach-people-about-the-evils-of-capitalism%20%20
A noble lesson, but will kids get it, or will they just decide it's fun to get as much money as possible.  Parents absolutely can guide them through this, talk about it and so on, but i know many a parent who as they got older realized just how pointless and mind numbing the game really is and so I would hazard a generalization here in stating that many a kid will play it on their own or with their friends after the initial being shown how to play.
Games are wonderful for teaching all sorts of things, but those lessons, as with anything that ha inputs into our own minds or the mind of our kids need to be carefully monitored.

As a Mum 1/4

This particular title of mine is possibly the most important one.  I'm a wife, woman, board gamer, geek, whovian, Whedonite...but most importantly I'm a mum.
Which of course mean i approach everything i do with the use of that particular filter first.

So, board games, being a mum applies a few particular aspects to ones view on the world, which isn't to say others do not think of such things, it is simply that these things were less important to ME until i became a mum.
So what are these things?  In terms of board games...
1. cost for return
2. what can be learned
3. age validity/conversion potential
4. ease.

Many things are approached with these things in mind but this is about board games.
So lets look at them, each in thier own entry because i'm long winded and opinionated.

TLDR SYNOPSIS: 
Games are expensive but the time/fun you get out of them make them more cost effective than some other 'main stream' activities.

1. Cost for return.
simple fact, board games/card games are expensive.  It is not uncommon to pay between $80-$100 here in my home town for games.  Of course there are cheaper ones (zombie dice is only $20) and more expensive ($120 for Agricola).  These prices reflect a number of things from components provided, postage the shop had to pay, and even publishing company.
One can expect to pay less for a card game that has only cards provided than for a game that comes with a wide range of wooden meeples or hand painted figurines in it.
Postage is reliant on the weight of these games often and man are some of them heavy, really heavy, which of course means they cost more.
And as for the company that published them, well for instance one of the major game publishers, Fantasy Flight, charges pretty highly for their games, on the flip side, they are pretty much very enjoyable games with great components.
Which brings us to the major reason tat the high prices of games can be overlooked by this single income stay at home mum.   Good games, with pieces made to last, will return to the family over and over again.
Let me explain it this way, taking the kids to the movies, who doesn't like the cinema right?  It's a great family outing.  So a kids movie...1.5 hours?  Maybe 2.  and to get in to see it, about $50 for the whole family on a regular day probably more like $40 on cheap Tuesday.
So for the more complex, more expensive games we're looking at 1.5 - 2 hours play, that's just over 2 games of said game to provide a $120 return in comparison to taking the family to the movies.  For kids games it takes more sessions obviously, 20 minute sessions that's 6 sessions to equal the movie outing.  Luckily, or frustratingly, kids like doing fun things over and over and over and over and over and over...
As a side note i'll also mention games specifically aimed at kids are usually a bit cheaper than $120, I've seen them range form  $10 to about $50.
So the secret is, if the game is to be a good investment.  Play them!  If you play them, have fun, laugh, and be together, the cost is worth it.

All of that said, it is important to make use of review sites and word of mouth in terms of the quality of a game.
www.boardgamegeek.com is a wonderful sight to find reviews, thoughts and potential variants (and issue i'll discuss in blog 3 of this series) of the games you're looking into.  You will not get you money back in fun if the game is bought and sux.