I wish Pilotwings 64 was clearer about their criteria for photos. I'd occasionally take one that looked perfect and get a terrible score. Someone has surely figured it out at this point, but it would've been fun to get more active teaching from the game, considering how often it advises you on piloting minutiae. A…

Always upvote Croonchy Stars.

Sidney Purcell and Tom James having dinner together in public seemed way too blatant and dangerous to believe… until I remembered that throwaway comment about how DC types don't go to Annandale. It's the perfect place for them to lie low in public. This season has been great at laying small hints like that throughout…

This weekend I'm playing Codenames, which I bought entirely on recommendation from Gameological folks and CNightwing's article from his Essen field trip. I've played three rounds so far and absolutely love it. It forces you to look at concepts in such a different light, somewhat similarly to Concept (the two games…

Really though, that's a unique challenge for board games. Usually video games with strong thematic content aren't meant for simultaneous multiplayer, but that's the default mode for tabletop. Translating This War of Mine sounds like it paid off in terms of the richness and complexity of the shared experience, but for…

Beyond the rotating leadership structure (which is a great idea that could be applied to a lot of cooperative games), I wonder if the theme doesn't also discourage quarterbacking. Like Samantha said, so many other cooperative games have adventurous goals, like finding lost treasure in Forbidden Island, that jockeying…

It's not getting a lot of coverage since they were released at the same time, but that's actually the plot of the spinoff, Mood.

I wasn't sure there was room for another Sierra adventure parody after Peasant's Quest, but this looks great! Duplicating bad design to make fun of it is always dicey, but this definitely seems short and self-contained enough that it could work.

I will gladly have a conversation about edutainment on here anytime. I'm out and about and can't share thoughts at length, but yes, Eagle Eye Mysteries is a treasure. I was always more partial to the sequel set in London for being sort of a mini-glimpse into being in the grownup world. They get to wear peacoats and…

I had played one 1D game before that wasn't especially fascinating since it was more just a concept, but this one actually sounds independently fun!

Honestly that might've made the discussion a little better. It was a good, reasonably small thread that didn't derail too much. The Keyboard Geniuses comments this week account for an unusually high percentage of the total discussion!

I have no game-related weekend plans, so this is going to be a weird answer… this weekend, I'm not playing Doom.

Piratz really was as bad as everyone suggested. The first time I went, we were in the outdoor section that was decorated with surfboards for some reason. It was completely deserted. The pirate waiter repeatedly made sexual harassment jokes at one of my friends (as in, in addition to sexually harassing her, making…

Thank you for bringing up the uncomfortable racial/ethnic dynamic in the game. I had always been wary about this element of the game, and framing it in the context of cleansing ties it more closely to themes about the police state.

This is the schism upon which the new world religions will be built.

Oof, Gall Spaceport. Crossing the giant fog-filled chasm with the jetpack is a awful.

Have you faced an Asari commando unit before?

That boat really was terrible, but it's also making me remember what I loved about Mario Sunshine, and now I want to play it again.

As frustrating as they were, I enjoyed Web Woods and Toxic Tower because you at least make gradual progress through the levels.

I full-bloodedly love the Myst games for integrating logic puzzles with the lore of the world in a way that elevates both, and on those grounds, the spinoff Uru is the most ambitious adventure game ever created. The scope of the world and its history are dizzying, especially the parts about the egomaniacal Kadish.