30 Dec 2023
This is a list of shows that I watched in 2023 that warranted commentary.
This series was so good I watched it twice. If you want some hyperbole, it may be the best Star Wars has ever been. It starts a bit slow, but after 3 episodes it breaks into an unrelenting pace of many different storylines an environments. It’s a heist story, a jailbreak story, a revolution story. It is grounded in a way that has the Star Wars world at its most believable. Also the music is excellent and worth learning more about. In the aftermath of the severely disappointing 2019 film Rise of Skywalker (which is the only main saga film I am content to pretend never happened), Andor was more than a return to form. Andor showed that Star Wars may actually be a environment for good storytelling. I’m eager for more of this, but terrified it won’t be as good as I now know it can be.
Watched on Disney+
I’ve never played The Last of Us video game. I certainly hear it’s good. The show is certainly very good and does not require any familiarity with the game. Where something like The Walking Dead drifts too often into stories of bleak survival, The Last of Us is fundamentally about hope and love and family. Even if (no, especially if) those positives lead to terrible outcomes. I was recommended to listen to the companion podcast, which is not something I would have ever thought to do. It’s a fantastic story of talented creators being incredibly intentional about a loving adaptation, highly recommend.
Watched on HBO
This year our marriage felt solid enough that we had stomach to take on Marriage Story (oof, ain’t that one a gut punch) and Scenes from a Marriage. Both have amazing performances by the actors, and both are excellent (if intense) character stories. The latter explores many facets of a transforming relationship. There’s an odd choice in the production, where each episode starts with a visible transition between the actors on set into the characters in the story. Somehow the performance is so strong that even this intentional breach of the illusion is not enough to reduce its power.
Watched on HBO
I was cynical about this one going in. Amazon Prime is not exactly a bountiful store of quality original content. And a prequel to The Lord of the Rings? After the deeply disappointing The Hobbit film trilogy? Sounds like a soulless cash grab. But I was surprised by how much I enjoyed this show. Telling the story of Sauron’s time, the forming of Mordor, the forging of the rings… yeah, I’m in for that. The younger versions of Galadriel and Durin IV really feel fully realized. There’s plenty of story to tell here, and if the quality keeps up then this is a prequel series I’m in for.
Watched on Amazon Prime
Nathan Felder’s “terrible business ideas” series Nathan for You is something I consider funny. To some… it’s too awkward. The Rehearsal takes that and transcends to another plane of awkwardness. The line between what is real and what is not gets severely blurred. I’d rather not spoil any of it for you. I found it both engaging and hard to watch. Your mileage may vary.
Watched on HBO
This true crime miniseries has many different moods. A romance, a murder mystery, a legal drama… it has a lot of range. I really enjoy a solid limited series (I’m reminded of Sharp Objects and Big Little Lies); something good and complete that doesn’t drag it out. This show confidently tells its story and then ends.
Watched on HBO
And the Rest
Here are some other shows that are worth a little mention.
Maybe Yes
- Hilda: Season 3: This show is a comforting warm bowl of soup. Reliably beautiful, whimsical, and charming. This is the final season apparently (surprise, the last episode is movie-length), and I’ll be sad to see it go but rather it end than trundle on endlessly.
- Succession : Season 4: This show remains a compelling train wreck of extreme nepotism. You still thrash between loathing and rooting for these terribly privileged children. More of the same, but it’s good.
- Crown: Season 6: This show has been very evenly enjoyable. It explores different storylines of the paradox of the British monarchy. Humans raised in an inhuman system, destined to dysfunction but also intertwined with history. The setting is grand but the individual storylines are often incredibly petty, in a way that seems wholly accurate. The last seasons more breached into time that overlaps with my memory, which is an interesting contrast with the generations before. Supposedly this season is the end of the line, even though the real dysfunction marches on, and I’m a bit sad to not have more.
- White Lotus: Season 1 and 2: To me, this show is about people in the hospitality industry dealing with entitled travelers… and then things going terribly wrong. The first season really lands that, and is a wild ride (with a particularly captivating hotel manager). The second season has a bit more sympathetic guests and less interesting hosts, and so doesn’t land quite as well. But I enjoyed both.
- House of the Dragon: Season 1: Given the uneven landing of Game of Thrones’ final season, I had my doubts about this one. But I think it’s good. I like the large multi-generation timeline of it all. Like the Crown… but with dragons.
Maybe
- The Marvelous Ms. Maisel: Season 5: This final season is largely more of the same. Charming, quick-witted, very New York, very Jewish, very period piece. And all of that is a pleasant watch. But it’s time to wrap it up.
- The Witcher: Season 3: Long ago we decided this was a “vibes” show, which is to say don’t think so hard about it and instead focus on the vibe. It’s best when it’s a “monster of the week” serial focusing on Geralt being a gruff monster detective. Sadly the show seems far more focused on big politics that are less interesting than when the show is small.
- The Mandalorian: Season 3: As with the Witcher, this show is best when it focuses on smaller vignettes. Space western bounty hunter, yes please. Big overwrought politics and mythology, no thank you. This third season leans heavily into the larger story, and gets more Star Wars than it should.
- Loki: Season 2: For a show about a god and time travel, this show should be more fun. It’s surprisingly dry. And focuses a lot on the precise rules of time and multiverses that frankly don’t really make sense. The show does have some moments. When Loki finally actually plays around with time travel, it hits. But my least favorite parts of the last season were Kang, and… this season leans heavily on that weak point.
- Ms. Marvel: Season 1: I’ve read the first few books of the Ms. Marvel comics, and was eager to see this live action version. And the first few episodes hit the vibe. Kamala Khan is a kid (and a nerdy fangirl at that), so small stakes work really well here. The second half of the season really muddled things though. Can we please just focus on small human-scale stories?
- Moon Knight: Miniseries: I liked that this didn’t try to fit into a crowded Marvel universe. It was a weird story of multiple personalities and Egyptian mythology. It didn’t really sink in for me; I couldn’t really tell you what it was about. But I appreciated it for trying to be different.
Maybe No
- Hawkeye: Miniseries: I watched this while my family was out of commission sick for a week. And I remember precious little about it. It certainly has very little Hawkeye in it, but maybe that’s okay? I remember it ending with some Scooby-Do quality mooks. Meh. This is not Marvel focusing on doing its best.
- The Wheel of Time: Season 1: I’ve read the first Wheel of Time book, and only that one. It didn’t grip me. The show… yeah kind of the same. I don’t know if I’ve been terrible fair to it; I never gave it a chance to be good. It’s… fine? There’s something about this brand of fantasy that just doesn’t land for me.
- Sex Education: Season 4: The previous seasons of this show have been really amazing; the fourth season… not so much. The characters and setting have turned practically cartoonish. As is, I’d recommend stopping after season 3.
29 Dec 2023
The year 2023 was a return to big events. I attended GenCon and PAX Unplugged (as well as returning to PAX West), all as a normal attendee not trying to exhibit or pitch prototypes. As such I had time to try new games and play with friends at conventions. The following are games I played this year that warranted mentioning.
This game claimed the 2023 Spiel des Jahres (essentially the Game of the Year for board games). What if I told you there was no winning in this game? It’s a solo experience of relaxing and laying down hexes. You can play it with other people (and exclusively, I have), but mechanically the game is no different. Play a hex one at a time, try to score the most points. However, when you beat your score target, or you accomplish something quirky in the game… there are achievements. And those unlock new game components, new ways to score… and fundamentally that’s the drive that will bring you back time and time again. I’ve had a great time sitting down to a game of chill hexes with a loved one. Do recommend.
1-3 players, 30 minutes
This was a delightful GenCon find. A small box of cards with numbers and colors, that’s it. You assemble these cards into a triangle of plumage, where the first (and largest row) is negative points… but every row after is positive points. But you can only use colors that appeared in the previous row. And you can only hold six cards in your hand at once. Inevitably, imperfection and compromise creep in as you race against other players. This game is elegant and portable.
2-6 players, 30 minutes
Quinns was pretty darn excited about Hostage Negotiator, but it sounded like a hard thing to get into. Then I heard that Final Girl is a retheme of that same concept, and it was coming to Kickstarter. Mind you, this a solo game. I’m not so sure about solo games (the main draw of the hobby is playing with friends). But we’re crawling out of the pandemic here, and I went to some weird places. So I pledged for Season 2 of Final Girl. The key to amplifying the experience of this game has been pairing it with the horror movies that inspired each box. It’s a lot more fun to play the Panic from Station 2891 box right after watching The Thing. So Final Girl has turned into a “movie and a game” date night co-op experience; watch the movie, play the movie. The game itself is tense. You’re probably going to fail. But when you succeed and smash the killer… oh yeah it feels good. Suffice to say, I’m in for Season 3’s Kickstarter too, and looking forward to more of this.
1-2 players, 45 minutes
I’ve played so much Clank. The classic, every expansion board for that, the space version, the beginning of the legacy version (really need to get an opportunity to delve back into that…). Obviously I like Clank. Build a deck, don’t be too greedy, don’t be not greedy enough. This latest version, Catacombs, brings a new sense of exploration. Instead of a fixed board, you build it as you go. This means you don’t quite get the sense of place as when holding your breath underwater to get sunken treasure. But running off into the darkness is fun too. And this far into Clank’s evolution… they really have tuned the cards to be fun. I’ve had an above-average amount of fun with this particular brand of Clank.
2-4 players, 60 minutes
This game was so hard to get for so long (Thanks Tom Brewster :/. But it’s great. Make pairs or straights to get cards out of your hand. Empty your hand first and win. But empty your hand too aggressively and you may find yourself unable to play. It feels like a classic timeless card game, and comes in that delightful Oink box size. Portable, easy to teach, satisfying.
2-5 players, 15 minutes
I became wise to this game via the SUSD podcast. It’s a silly thing. A deck of cards with a variety of images on a theme. Try to get people to guess one card in a grid of 16 using only other cards as a clue. Is Poseidon more similar to Athena or Artemis? Is that a comment on the art, or the lore, or… whatever whim of the clue master? Things get extra spicy when you start mixing decks (Is Hagrid similar to a chicken?). This is a great game to pack with you and bust out when you’re waiting for food at a pub. You can play exactly one round in the time it takes the ferry to get from Whidbey to Seattle. Ask me how I know.
2+ players, 10 minutes
I’ve known that this game was a simple delight for a long time. But I resisted buying a copy. The Amigo production is… ugly. I contemplated making my own printing. It’s just a set of 32 cards with numbers on them. There are so many examples of alternate card designs out there. But that time spent pouting over the production was also time not playing it. So I bought an ugly copy. And I’m happy to have it in my collection. Watching players agonize over whether they should take that card (they probably shouldn’t). The hubris of thinking you’ll be able to complete a run and turn the whole thing around. Social strategy emerges from this simple game. I just wish it were a little smaller and a little easier on the eyes.
3-7 players, 20 minutes
This was the year I finally got a Klask board. I’ve played Klask plenty, primarily on a yearly camping trip with friends. This year the Klask board’s owner didn’t bring it, so when later there were stacks of them for purchase at Pax West… and I finally had a home that could handle owning Crokinole and Klask… it was time for my very own. This game is electric. Your pawn is controlled by a magnet underneath the board, and you need to “kick” a ball into the opponent’s goal to score. But the special ingredient is the three “biscuits”; have two of them magnetically attach to your pawn and your opponent scores a point. Thus the game is a balance between trying to score with the ball and trying to not be so frantic that you lose to the biscuits.
2 players, 10 minutes
This game continues to be a favorite for large groups. If you have enough people and the right stable window of time… it’s magic. On the surface it’s just Taboo or Charades or something like that, by having three different rounds of guessing really turns into its own thing. Over those ~40 minutes you will all develop a shared secret language. And you will all laugh. Reliably. Monikers has never failed to pull off its magic trick.
4-16 players, 45 minutes
What a charming game. You roll dice, and you match the pips on the dice with the spots on dogs. Fail to match too many, and you bust. You choose different “tricks” to determine how your roll the dice. It’s simple and the presentation is stinking adorable.
1-4 players, 30 minutes
There’s nothing new about Skull for me in 2023. Well, technically they did have a new pink box release and it allowed me to refresh my copy that was visibly marked in a way that kept it from being playable with six players… but really, this game is old to me. I’ve literally played it 100 times (I keep track of these things). But once again, this was one of my top played games for the year. It’s a perfect game. Bluffing, hubris, laughter with friends.
3-6 players, 15 minutes
I like maps. I like drawing. I like board games. This is a board game about drawing maps. It plays simultaneously, so it scales to any player count. It’s also compact enough to be able to play at a very small table. This is a new addition to my collection, but I’m eager to play more and eager to try out the expansions.
1+ players, 30 minutes
And the Rest
Here are some other games that are still occupying some of my brain space and are worth a little mention. Some may turn into stronger recommendations, but it’s too early to say.
Curiosities
- Dro Polter: In this game you hold a set of varied small objects in your hand (a ring, a shell, a cube, etc.). A card is flipped that shows some number of those objects, and the first person to (without looking) drop exactly those objects scores a point. Each point is bell you have to also hold in your hand… but if you drop a bell you lose it. First to five bells wins. It’s simple giggly fun.
- Rafter Five: Essentially this game is Jenga in an Oink sized box. It’s different of course, with thin cardstock planks holding wooden meeples and treasure chests. Making it more like Men at Work, actually. Regardless, it’s tense silly fun in a small box.
- Trash Talk: In this game you try to map weird dollar store items to a set of words. Does this tiny slinky map to “level” and the little racecar to “happy”, or the other way around? Each time you’re correct, add one weird little item to make the next round more challenging. It’s very much a game of getting into the head of the clue-giver.
- Lacuna: Some games are so simple that they feel like they came from an older time. Place your metal tokens to capture flowers, working towards claiming the majority in each flower suit. It’s a spatial head to head pub game… minus the fact that I wouldn’t want to lay the pretty playmat on a sticky pub table. I was persuaded by Matt Lees’ review to pick this up before playing it (a rarity for me these days), and I think it will work well as an accessible curio for a broad audience.
Let’s Color
- Sagrada Artisans: Sagrada is a game of drafting dice and filling out your stained glass window with them following certain placement rules. Artisans turns that into a coloring book legacy game. When it’s not your turn, you’re coloring your page. It completely takes the sting out of anyone’s turn running long. We’re only a few games into the campaign, but I’m really enjoying the relaxed mutual activity vibe of it.
- Blueprints of Mad King Ludwig: In the theme of “games that let you color and draw” (like Cartographers and Sagrada Artisans), this one is more complicated. Each turn your draft a new room to your growing palace, tracing it onto your piece of velum with colored pencils. The complexity is in the different per-room-type special abilities and scoring criteria. We’ll see with more plays how that holds up (and smooths out), but is undeniable that drawing a palace floorplan is fun.
Good for Kids and Adults
- Castles by the Sea: Build sandcastles with wooden blocks, populate them with your little meeples, and then watch the whole thing get knocked over by a bouncing beach ball. It’s a great theme, and a lovely rendering of that theme in 3D space. The puzzle is in playing off of existing sand blocks to efficiently score shapes. Given that mental spatial manipulation isn’t for everyone, that puzzle may short-circuit some brains. But playing it quick and casual had this one feeling good.
- Wandering Towers: Wizards are racing around a circuit getting lost in towers on their way to the constantly-moving finish line. The theme is weird. The stacking cardboard towers are great. I had more fun playing this with kids and adults than I expected.
- Penny Black: Collect stamps and add them to your collector book in patterns matching your scoring criteria. There’s nothing ground-breaking about how this game plays. But the production will leave a smile on your face. The stamp books are adorable, the tiles are clack-y, and the turn tracker is a rubber stamp. It all feels great, even if the experience is a little on the thin side.
Small Boxes
- Inheritors: In this small box card game you play ascending numbers in colored suits, and your score is the sum of the largest number in each suit. Simple, effective. But then there’s just enough interest in the cycling of cards (discards go into a center market; no number card ever leaves circulation) and some power cards to make it juicy. It has a little bit too much extra fluff, but the core is solid.
- Splendor Duel: Splendor is a modern classic. The Duel version focuses it in on two players and adds a little board to make the gem drafting more interesting. It totally works, and the result is a tuned version of the larger game.
- Radlands: Mad Max as a two player card game. Perhaps your wastelanders are bit too fragile, as the board state can be very dynamic. I’d like to spend more time with this one, more than partially influenced by the absolutely incredible art on these cards.
Main Events
- Art Society: Hang paintings on your wall, matching their frame style but not clashing their contents. Each round the paintings are allocated based on a simultaneous bid (with little paddles!). The presentation is absolutely impeccable. A gorgeous game.
- Meadow: Draft cards and play them in a natural progression, for example from mud fields to worm to bird to wolf. The art is delightful and watching your cards layer is satisfying. If I had to share a complaint it’d be that the point values are maybe too tight, where getting a 2 value instead of 3 value card just twice in the game is probably going to sink you.
- HEAT: Pedal to the Metal: I was told this was the best racing board game… and I can’t really refute that. More than anything I’ve played it captured a sense of speed and risk. Push your deck to its limits and hope that it pays out. I very much enjoyed it, and if I decide to open a slot for a racing game it may replace my critically-beloved-but-no-one-wants-to-play Flamme Rouge.
- Décorum: It’s hard to beat the provided tagline: “a game of passive aggressive cohabitation.” Work together to meet both of your shared goals for home decoration… but without communicating directly. It’s a cute little puzzle that so far lives in the space of enjoyable confusion.
Maybes
- The Hunger: You’re a vampire. Venture out into the forest, feast upon the townsfolk, and get back before sunrise. But if you feast too hard, your engorged vampire might not be able to roll itself back into bed in time. It felt like similar to Clank but with vampires. I’d give it another play.
- Wormholes: I like this game of making wormholes and making planetary deliveries. But after more plays of it it’s become clear that it has a strong runaway leader problem. If someone cracks the code, they’re going to be one or two turns ahead of you and you will never catch up. The number of moves per turn is too tight, and the game is rather short. So I guess I need to only play it with people who suck as much as I do at the puzzle?
28 Dec 2023
Here in 2023, my video game playing has been heavily influenced by two things. The first is playing with my ten-year-old daughter, choosing games that are content-appropriate and within her interests. The second is having an engaged group of friends that are interested in playing games together or apart, but then discussing them afterwards. These both have kept my playing dynamic and social in a way that really has worked for me. The following is a list of video games I played in 2023 (potentially released earlier) that warranted a mention.
This is a classic RPG that feels like it came out of the SNES era, but far more beautiful than those games could ever be. The story managed to keep me on my toes with some unexpected mid-game twists. The turn-based combat with real-time button presses (similar to Paper Mario games) kept things engaging (although by the end I was ready for more mix up in abilities). This game thoroughly captivated me and my ten-year-old daughter until we both separately completed it. Definitely recommended if you have a soft spot for beautiful pixel art RPGs. Good music too.
Played on Xbox GamePass, Switch
This game is not what it seems. The best simplification I can give is that it’s Slay the Spire meets Frog Fractions. As in it’s a digital card game… that does unexpected things that I would never dream of spoiling for you. When I first “beat” the game I then realized I had only completed the first act and that what followed was a big departure from the game I’d been playing to that point. It was… truly a great journey. The game is rated Mature due to some light body horror and language… but also the first act is decidedly creepy. If that’s not your thing, I wouldn’t tell you to power through regardless… but know that this game has many different tones. The creators of this game clearly didn’t give one lick about commercial viability, and I love what they created.
Played on Xbox
I gather this game can be played by yourself, but I haven’t. To me it is a game about exploring an adorable black and white environment alongside my ten-year-old daughter and slathering paint over everything. You solve puzzles with those paint brushes too. They start simple and get increasingly clever. The “boss battles” are particularly varied and creative. In fact, overall the game has quite the build; don’t assume that the early game simplicity holds. This one really grew on me. But the real charm is the way it encourages you to leave your mark on every screen.
Played on Xbox GamePass
Half of this game is running a village sim, managing your growing set of cult followers to ensure they are housed, happy, and being exploited for your cause. The other half is an action game of exploring a dungeon to grow in power before facing a final boss. The first half, the sim, is far more charming and unique. You create your own religion, from doctrines to decorations. Combine that with a disturbingly adorable presentation, and this game leaves an impression.
Played on Xbox
Who needs buttons? All you need to do to play this game is steer. Which makes it playable… anywhere. This is the only game that got any play on my phone. The gameplay is simple: walk around with automatic attacks, collect experience, add or improve weapons, repeat until the screen is pure madness. It’s a simple but very effective formula. I liked it enough to stake out the extremely derivative Extremely Powerful Capybaras at PAX West to get a capybara stuffy (TLDR it’s a cute and capable multiplayer-focused version of the same idea).
Played on Xbox GamePass, Switch, iOS
This story murder mystery adventure sure loves itself some typography. I highly recommend finding the accessibility slider for text size and cranking it to max, just so you can see more of the beautiful script. The game itself is a classic “talk to people and make irreversible decisions via dialog” adventure game, set in a monastic medieval setting. Great artistic style and difficult choices. This game had me setting the controller down so I could take a walk to think through how my murder accusations.
Played on Xbox GamePass
This environmental puzzle game is beautiful, mind-bending, and short. I completed it in only a few sittings, but the entire experience was delightful. Also it has oddly engaging door animations.
Played on Xbox
A classic 2D side-scrolling Mario in the vein of the SNES’ Super Mario world. Instead of the Mushroom Kingdom you’re exploring the Flower Kingdom, and with that comes new environments and enemies. Each level contains a hidden “wonder” effect that changes the rules in unexpected and often hilarious ways. The end result is an inspired but classic feeling Mario adventure.
Played on Switch
The first Diablo was unlike anything I’d ever seen, and I went hard. I played Diablo II a ton between high school and college, this time with friends. I played Diablo III (switching from PC to console too), but it never gripped me. This year Diablo IV managed to bring back a lot of the classic enjoyment of this series (and not just because I could play a necromancer again). This time I went deep with friendly multiplayer, which was a blast. The loot perhaps came too fast, but the fun of hacking alongside friends was undeniable. Many good long evenings… until the grind set in, the level differences became harder, and it all began to feel aimless. I’ll hop in again if the seasonal content calls to me and I can play along with friends, but overall I feel like I had a complete experience.
Played on Xbox
I feel like I should have more to say about this game. It’s more Breath of the Wild. Which is a game beloved by many. I like it plenty. I gather not as much as other folks do… but that’s still quite a bit. For this round, the puzzle powers are much more interesting than in Breath of the Wild. And the game is even bigger, which I didn’t really need but is not unwelcome. As of writing, I haven’t completed Tears of the Kingdom, and it’ll probably take me a long time at this rate. It’s good, it’s big, there’s also a lot of other great stuff to play too.
Played on Switch
And the Rest
Here are some other games that are worth a little mention.
- Beacon Pines: This was an interesting family-friendly diversion. It’s a story adventure game where you learn words that let you go back and fork the timeline to explore alternate outcomes. The interactivity is light. But if you frame it more as an interactive book, it feels better.
- Valheim: All I really want to do is build my Viking house. You can create interesting structures with the building system. But I need to go out into the wilderness and fell more trees and mine more ore… and there are trolls and worse out there. In the end, the loss upon random death and the grind were too harsh. I enjoyed the Viking dollhouse game for a bit but I needed a game that respected my time a bit more.
- Dead Cells: I took a crack at Dead Cells years ago. I’ve heard many sing its praises. This year I took a new and more serious attempt, and I got much deeper. When you hit a state of flow this game’s controls really shine. However too often you’ll have a glorious run turn to ash in mere moments. It turns on a dime, often after you’ve burned a lot of time getting there. The sense of progression is so weak (you unlock more toys… but not anything that literally levels you up) that it feels like you’re spending a lot of time to get nowhere. This game just yells “git gud”, and asks you to try again, but it didn’t feel as worth it as other games where I’ve decided to rise to the challenge.
- Rogue Legacy 2: I only just jumped into this rogue-lite a few days ago. And at first glance, it feels like Dead Cells but with a much more clear sense of progression. It’s obvious to me that I’m making progress. It’s clear to me what I can do and what I will get out of it. It’s an early take, but I’m really enjoying it.
- Monster Sanctuary: Metroidvania Pokémon. Collect creatures, use their powers to traverse to new areas, level them up to win turn-based battles. This game is not short, and never really hits high highs. But it worked as a low-key activity and helped open up my daughter to more turn-based gameplay.