Even playing Hot Cross Buns on a new instrument brings a feeling of accomplishment.

"You have to get better," friends who play explained to me at the time. "It only starts to get fun once you know what you're doing."

I won $400 over a week on a cruise playing $6 blackjack doing A-5 count. I suspect the shoe was missing 5s.

Certain things can't be rigged in casinos. For example, six sided dice, french-style decks of cards, and roulette wheels have to be fair, even in electronic games. (Not sure if all decks of cards or dice—i.e. could they use a crooked Spanish or Tarot deck, or a d20?) The wheels on a slot machine don't, though, which…

It's never a bad time to link to Every Frame A Painting, but this is a particularly good time.

SNL rejects skits by scheduling them for 12:40.

Since Japan has one of the lowest (reported!) crime rates in the entire world, continuing to fall year after year, food stalls like this still exist.

Usually, they're in the countryside and they usually sell vegetables. Shoppers are supposed to pick out the food they want at the stall, and then leave cash for whatever they purchase at the unattended food stalls.

From bread in a can to crepes, the country is home to an array of unusual vending machines. Vending machines have been used to sell questionable items, like hallucinogens and piracy devices. (Though, the infamous panty vending machines are more fiction than fact.) The vast majority either sell cigarettes or drinks…

Why would you turn off land auctions? That's like turning on Free Parking Jackpot.

Fortune Street came out a little too close to the end of the Wii's lifetime, and at a time when I had a backlog of Wii games and nobody on my friends list to multiplayer against. (And anyone who would have been would also have been in the wrong time zone.) I'd definitely buy a WiiU native version if it came out now.…

• Buy plane

Sixth rule of wargaming: don't eliminate your ride home from the game.

"Third hand that is also a ghost" is basically Fives from Regular Show.

"Sport" and "Sport" in a slightly higher pitch.

Alright, so it's not the hell you were thinking of, with fiery demons and Lucifer himself rocking a 47-string guitar with the best heavy metal on Earth, but it's still a hell of demons and Hall & Oates rocking a 47-string guitar and the best heavy metal on Earth. I know, I know, not your ideal vision of awesome, but…

There's already a game where you fight a land war in Asia.

It was also the kill mechanism in Academy decks, because when you're generating enough blue mana, Stroke of Genius is easier to kill with than Blaze.

Also an obvious choice for DLC or episodic release.

From the DS era, I liked Phantom Thief Rousseau, although it never came out in English. The two mechanics were point and click adventure, and drawing a copy of an image using a reference grid. (Your character does his phantom thievery by disguising himself with hand-drawn masks.)