![]() Personally, and I hope others have the same perspective, family gaming is an amazing balm for dealing with stress. The loss of that physical social space should not be the death knell for anyone’s gaming life. We don’t take that job lightly, and that discussion has taken a back seat recently for more important topics such as how we continue to game in a time where social activities are risky and our regular lives are suddenly in flux (not Fluxx…please no). Over at the Board Game Quest Discord Bunker, we have regular arguments about what makes a good game, what games suck, and what games we can agree (rarely) are worthy of perennial praise. Still, others relish the social engagement and conflict in a friendly (I hope) space. Some gravitate to the thematic engagement. Often, even a bad game makes memories.įor all gamers, there are different reasons to play. But, truth be told, what comes out of these experiences is something deeper. The games I bring home personally, and sometimes the games I review, have an impact on my family who often get to be guinea pigs on Tony’s diabolical laboratory of gaming cruelty. My role in the family has often been that of gamer vanguard. So as I’m sitting on the couch watching my son Samir play Breath of the Wild (second playthrough), I’m drawing a mental line from his grandfather’s video game console to his writing game reviews. ![]() Those treasured memories are bittersweet because he died just as my love for games was beginning to blossom. I also remember how he taught me to play Chess. I was born in 1973, and I distinctly remember my dad bringing home a breakout console system with paddles. The first video game consoles hit the market in the 1970s and at that same time, wargaming evolved giving birth to roleplaying through Dungeons & Dragons. It is also times like this that make me acutely aware of my own history with games. This, I hope for most readers, includes tabletop game time. Just as I tell my son that he should put down on paper or video his feelings at this moment for posterity, we should all audit our daily routines to evaluate what matters, how we coordinate it, and what it means to us. With every great crisis, we should take a moment for reflection. The impact of “social distancing,” extraordinary health precautions, and the wave of anxiety around public space closures has come to a head here in the United States as it has already been felt in other countries. the Evil Legion of Dr.As I write this, much of the world is in the grips of dealing with the COVID-19 (aka Coronavirus) pandemic.
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