July 8, 2020 Reviews Ice Team, chess month It’s the 8th of July baby, you know what THAT means! It’s time for Shut Up & Sit Down’s inaugural Chess Month – a season dedicated to the joy of fantastic two-player games, literally none of which are going to be chess. To kick us off with … Read more
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After talking about it on the podcast a bunch, Tom decided to make himself a nice little video review of Thousand Year Old Vampire, as a treat. Along the way, he learned the challenges of Adobe After Effects (never again) and filming a compelling outro in a room with no discernible features.
Sit back, relax, and be dazzled once again by the tale of Kenneth – a vampire who gives the sound of boiling mud horrifying connotations.
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Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it’s a bird. In fact, it’s all of the birds.
At long last, after a preposterous 7 print runs in 14 months, Shut Up & Sit Down has published a review of Wingspan. It’s the biggest success story that the tabletop scene has seen in a long time. But is it a success story on our tables? Or in our hearts?
Click play, and find out.
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For this week’s Wednesday video, we wanted to offer something a little different.
At SHUX last year Quinns gave a talk on the history of board games. A quick’n’dirty tour of the games of ancient prehistory, all the way through to the invention of cardboard in the 19th century.
We present it today as a reminder that while today’s tabletop scene is overwhelming white, this is a blip in the 8000 year history of the hobby. The earliest known board games are found in Africa. Dice were invented in the Middle East. The first games that tell stories are found in Egypt. Playing cards were conceived in China. Chess came from India, by way of an Islamic Caliphate.
This hobby owes a debt to people of colour that it could never possibly repay. At the very least, we can make sure we don’t forget it.
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Gird your tabletops! Western Empires is the biggest game we’ve ever reviewed in both length and girth. A 9 player, 12 hour game? What could be bigger than that?
We’ll tell you what else. The combined game of Mega Empires, which you’ll be able to play when Eastern Empires releases in the near future. A game that the United Kingdom Department of Bigness and Sizeitude has gone on record as calling “Too Big”.
Also in the video is our new table from Geeknson! In fact, this exact table is on Kickstarter right now. You’ll find Quinns’ thoughts on that (and gaming tables in general) at the 18:04 mark of this video.
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What’s that sound? Oh, it’s just Richard Nixon hurtling towards you at breakneck pace, making sure that you never say another word about his precious Watergates. Don’t trust the press, kids; those things are providing high-quality clean energy to all of America and the stories of ‘walls made of cardboard’ and ‘the electricity just powering a big slush puppy machine’ are completely false. And the boardgame of the same name? Don’t make me laugh.
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This will come as no surprise to anyone who saw the child-like glint in Quinns’ eye during last month’s 1 player print’n’play roundup, but this week, we’d like to present even more nearly-free games for anyone to enjoy during self-isolation.
Included in this roundup are are spritely Agent Decker, the cleanly The Cleaner, the sprawling Sprawlopolis and the startlingly compact Under Falling Skies.
Enjoy, everybody.
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It’s time for us to apologise the only way we know how. By smearing raw egg on Quinns.
If you caught the first instalment of our Solo Special, you’ll remember we didn’t always find 1 player games easy to recommend. But since then, Quinns has disappeared into the wild thicket that is absolutely free print’n’play solitaire games, and we’re not sure he’s coming out.
To get stuck in yourself, we recommend browsing the winners of BGG’s yearly print’n’play solitaire contest: 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014 and 2013.
Godspeed, folks! And do let us know what you find.
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Tom’s been dealing with isolation in the only way that anyone reasonably can: inventing ludicrous stories of wizards and tentacles, and then drawing them onto a fictional map and pretending that everything is totally fine. Find out why 2020 might be the perfect time to revisit The Quiet Year. Oh! And this is Tom’s first solo video – hasn’t he done well? What a nice young man, here’s 50 pence – don’t spend it all in once place.
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WE NEVER THOUGHT IT WOULD COME TO THIS.
After years of ragging on 1 player board games, it’s time for SU&SD to eat crow. It turns out that solitaire games can be fun, if they’re consumed in a rational and safe fashion. We’d wholeheartedly recommend Aerion, Kosmos’ new Adventure Game series, and then also in this video there is The Hunted: Twilight of the U-Boats.
Enjoy, everybody!
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