I love The Thing: it’s one of my all-time favorite movies. And I love board games. That said: ehhhh. There’s already a couple of great hidden identity games that are basically The Thing without being named that: Panic Station and Dark Moon being the two stand-outs in my mind. I like the idea, but this game would…

Board games would most assuredly work to bring in younger players, certainly, but I actually don’t believe that they have any strict advantage over just using a RPG. Descent (and it’s cousins Imperial Assault and the other “GM’d dungeon crawls) have a nice visual aspect, but heck, so doesn’t D&D. Arguably, 5th…

Personally, I don’t think you could be any more wrong about Mouse Guard being an intro game to Dungeons and Dragons. If anything, I would suggest D&D as the intro game for RPGs, with Mouse Guard being a follow-up game for those who really want to delve in to free-form narrative more.

I’ve run D&D for more years than…

As someone who ran a campaign of Mouse Guard, I think you’re very correct. The theme, setting and basic rules seem very newbie friendly, but the way the game plays out could be very daunting to newer players. The expectation that you have to fail to grow (a big component in character progression), plus how traits…

I see that people have already mentioned BattleCON and Yomi as already existing awesome card games that emulate 2D fighters, but I’m also going to throw in EXCEED as well. It’s made by Level99 as well (same guys who do BattleCON), and adds supermoves and a really cool power-up mechanic. It should go on any list of…

Okay, pet peeve time:

It’s canon. CANON.

A cannon is a gun you fire at someone, canon is which gun fired at which person.

To call Beasts of War “fans” is a bit of an understatement: they’re one of the best sources for anything tabletop miniatures related, especially stuff that doesn’t normally get a lot of exposure (ie, things not made by Games Workshop). You really should have that last link point to their website (beastsofwar.com)…

Okay, serious talk here: besides playing Optimus, is there ANY reason NOT to just always play GRIMLOCK?! My options are awesome voiced leader-truck, yellow subcompact, nerdy racecar, red racecar and a GODDAMN ROBOT T-REX WITH GIANT WARHAMMER. Yeah, sure... I’ll pick the race car. =D

It looks to me like they’re using his original Generations line toy’s vehicle mode as the model, which means he’s a non-copyright, non-trademark infringing Not-VW-Bug-But-REEEEALLY-Close. Which is fine with me, that toy was awesome.

Church Street Marketplace! VT represent!

It really can’t be understated, though, that while that’s certainly the case, the Enterprise is loaded with people who routinely have to create clever tricks to win. The Enterprise doesn’t just have technology on it’s side: it has a crew of highly trained crew skilled in not only making that technology work, but…

And while looking quite a bit like BFG (awesome) it’s got a ton of it’s own little differences that make it look pretty unique among space combat games. No set weapon ranges, and a focus on EW/ECM plus the fact that it’s based entirely around dropping forces onto a planet (presumably with an added campaign mode…

The core set is $100 MSRP, with the expansions ranging from $15 - $40. We (being the guys at my FLGS and I) had the first wave priced at something like $300 for just one of everything. Wave 2 looks to be an additional $160.

Yeah, seriously, Hybrid Convoy's actually my favorite Optimus toy. Though, I kind of use the term "toy" loosely considering it's more of an adult collector's piece than most of the rest of these. Still, the attention to detail on that thing's awesome from head to toe to trailer. Not only does it come with the…

The wrist blade/gauntlet spikes are silly. They were silly in the 90s and they're still silly now. I get what they're going for, but I can't help but think they went too far in the other direction. More than that, though, I can't help but feel like they're catering to the recent outcry over female character…

That's cool and all, but I'm a little bummed because I really want him to make that The Black Hole remake he was attached to at one point. While Oblivion was a bit flawed, I did like the feel he was trying to create and think he could make a really fantastic version of The Black Hole. It's my favorite of the old…

No, you're definitely right: a good chunk of Valiant's "heroes" are anything but, and it's part of what makes that universe really great for me. However, they do have a BUNCH of characters who, while not quite your Captain Americas or Spider-mans, come close enough in their own way. I'm thinking guys like Archer &…

Wait, are we not going to talk about the awesome cartoon tie-in?! You had to be watching the Marvel Action Hour block of cartoons to ever catch it because it originally ran as a series of approx. 10 minute shorts, but the Robotix cartoon was awesome (just like all the other cartoons produced for that block). Better…

Yep, there sure was. It's how the Season 3 episode "Sic Transit Vir" starts.

I picked up all of the first wave expansions along with the starter, and I can say it's a pretty great set so far. If you're familiar with X-Wing or Star Trek you can jump in pretty easily, though there's some really crucial rules changes for D&D (DDAW?) that are a huge refinement of the FlightPath system from the…