Vancouver and SHUX 2018

Darlene joined me for a trip to Vancouver, British Columbia, last week to enjoy three days of board gaming at Shut Up and Sit Down’s very own, second annual board gaming convention (SHUX ’18).  I only discovered Shut Up and Sit Down and their most excellent and entertaining board gaming content last year.  I’ve since been hooked on their written and video reviews as well as their podcast. They’re also responsible for me being driven to buy a trunk load of additional games over the past year.  (As if my game collection wasn’t large enough already.)

We got to try out a bunch of games I’ve been meaning to check out, meet some new people, get to see Quinns, Paul, Matt and Pip live and even see a little bit more of Vancouver – including tooling around on some electric bikes for a few hours. It was a great trip and great convention, though I wish we had used our time a little more wisely and squeezed in a few more games as well as been prepared for the early closing of the game-lending library.  Also, would’ve been great to participate in one of the day-long megagames (if the convention were longer) or in a more involved version of Two Rooms and A Boom.  We only got to try the basic version with just a couple of people with roles.  We did get to try and got hooked on several great ones: Bunny Kingdom, Mystery of the Temples, Bårenpark, Great Western Trail, Sagrada, and Azul.  Not so great: Crows, Koi and Kodama: The Tree Spirits.  Terrible: Cat Lady, Nefarious.

I also wish I had thought to take pictures of all of the games we tried (and the folks we played with), but click through for the full gallery:

      

Another Pre-Movie Gaming Day

Roland, Clay, Mark, Steven, Troy and I gathered for another gaming day and movie night (Blade Runner 2049) this past Sunday:

  • We managed to escape the singularity after many hilariously haphazard gravitational maneuvers in Gravwell.
  • We cleverly dodged almost certain disaster on K2 by decisively turning away from the mountain entirely.
  • We successfully secured pirate booty aplenty in Libertalia despite the efforts of many mutineers among us.
  • Although many boats were violently smashed by whales, many swimmers torn apart by sharks, and several refugee-laden ships utterly destroyed by sea monsters, a handful of survivors made it to shore to tell the tale of Survive: Escape from Atlantis.

It was indeed a day of many adventures.  (And a good movie, too!)  Thanks, guys!

Click through for the full gallery:

    

Tahoe Gaming Weekend

Darlene and I joined Roland, Charles, Mark, Jon and Steve last weekend in South Lake Tahoe for a couple of fun filled days of gaming – thanks again for hosting, Steve!  We had adventures in Welcome to the Dungeon, Bang! The Dice Game, Sidereal Confluence, Raptor, Crazy Karts, Viva Java, Category 5, Chameleon, Codenames, and Ladies and Gentlemen.  Click through for the gallery:

      

Gaming Day @ Charles’ Place

Finally got to experience a proper run-through of the team-based, submarine hunt “Captain Sonar”  as part of our full day of gaming at Charles’ place with Mark, Jon, Roland, RC, Steve and Stefan.  It was tense and it was a blast!

Roland’s follow-up:

  • Space Cadets: Dice Duel was total mayhem.  Charles, I let you down as captain!
  • “Oh, is that a Category 5?”  Yah, Stefan, go ahead and take that.  Category 5 is such a solid filler game.
  • Sushi Go Party was good, but not sure about how good it really is with 8 players.
  • Steampunk Rally… much mayhem.  Pretty sure I avoided DFL, but not by that much!  I had a great time despite Christopher feeling isolated.  :P
  • Captain Sonar was as good as advertised.  We got to see Charles snap as Captain.  Dunno about the other sub, but on ours Mark did a tremendous jobs as Radio Operator.  Jon and Stefan were a fantastic engineering/first mate duo.
  • SpaceTeam.  Yah…  Sure, we cheated a bit (picking up cards and showing them to ask for tools), but we did eventually win!  In celebration of our victory, I put together a video.  Truly, it was my pleasure…
“Pleasurizers! I need pleasurizers!”

Tahoe Skiing

Here’s a handful of pictures and a video montage from a couple of Tahoe ski trips in March with Darlene and the Outdoor Adventure Club.  Unfortunately, I didn’t catch everyone on camera on these trips.  One weekend was with Greg and Erin but we never caught up with Bruce and Jane on the slopes and the other was with Stéphane, Evan, Richard and Jennifer but you can’t tell that from the photos.  We also met up with Resi and Troy (and baby Aiden!) one day and foolishly I didn’t get a single shot of Aiden ripping up the slopes!  At least I did get a shot of our massive Carcassonne game where we played with four of the major expansions at once.

Click on through for the gallery and video: