Wednesday, December 12, 2007

Board Games Are the New Video Games

Quite literally, actually.

Gamasutra is just one to pick up on the emerging trend that people want a social online experience. Single-player games are an aberration (I think Raph Koster said this first).

Look for more board and card games to come to your consoles and computer systems in the coming years.

Dan Vierria of The Statesman.com uses the Magical Phrase of Cluelessness as the title of his article: Board Games Are Making a Comeback. Yes, they are, and they have been every year for over ten years.

Wits and Wagers gets more press, this time from the Washington Post.

Another instance where Games Matter: the New York Times story of how letting inmates play poker is leading to the capture of wanted criminals.

Here's a site that sells nothing but play money from board games.

If you didn't just get enough games from me, Ludic Infinity is running a puzzle contest with a prize of Hollywood Blockbuster.

Go was just an event at the Southeast Asian Games, making it more likely to get into the Olympics at some point.

And an Israeli just won the Grand Worlds Magic final. Here is a play by play of the finals.

Gone Gaming has given over to me the Board Game Internet Awards to do with as I will. I think it's better when a bunch of people run the awards, however, so I'm planning on moving it to Board Game News. It should start Real Soon Now.

Yehuda

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Yehuda,

"Single-player games are an aberration"

Couldn't agree more - Not to blow my own trumpet but this was written a couple of years ago, though only published recently due to the somewhat relaxed pace of academic process:

http://cybertext.hum.jyu.fi/index.php?browsebook=6

Yehuda Berlinger said...

Thanks Stewart. Your article looks interesting.

Raph has always had issues with single-player games and used this exact phrase at a conference in 2006.

Yehuda

Dave The Game said...

They covered the Gamasutra on Joystiq, and all the comments were variations of "when is there going to be Monopoly?" and "boardgame are boring".

At least there was one person requesting Ticket to Ride...

Anonymous said...

I think I remember the quote you're referring to. Is this it?

"I have to believe that the solitary nature of most computer games is a temporary aberration, a consequence of the technology, and that as networks spread and their bandwidth increases, the historical norm will reassert itself."

It comes from Greg Costikyan's article, "I Have No Words, and I Must Design" which is available at www.costik.com/nowords.html.

Costikyan also has another excellent article that's related to board games and video game designers: Don't be a Vididiot - http://www.costik.com/vidiot.html

Yehuda Berlinger said...

Actually, I was referring to this:

http://www.kimpallister.com/2006/02/churchill-club-panel.html

Yehuda