SHUX has passed, but the memories have not. Your hosts give a final rundown of some of the goings-on during the august October event. Mark asserts that no one is less competitive than he, no one by a long shot, he is much less competitive than you and if you disagree he will fight you. Unless you are a child or infirm, in which case he will still fight you out of a grudging sense of duty and respect, but he will pull his punches. Some of them. Editorial note: the hosts neglected to repeat that A...
Oct 22, 2019•1 hr 5 min
"You two are idiots." -Quinns We are live (on tape)! With special guest Quintin Smith aka Quinns from Shut Up & Sit Down. Also featuring guest appearances from French Canadian snack cakes, passive aggression, wonderful prizes (none for you, sorry, all gone), and the man who saved your life, Vasili Arkhipov! Also some feedback and noise from the megagame next door. Oh, well. Games Played Last Week: -Irish Gauge 8m34s (Tom Russell, Capstone Games, 2014) -Mandala 10m39s (Trevor Benjamin...
Oct 15, 2019•1 hr 1 min
The saturation point is the point at which you can no longer dissolve a deck of cards into a bottle of water. I am told that in summer, it feels hotter than it is really is because of all the board game particles diffused throughout the air. It gets really hard to breathe sometimes--my cousin nearly choked on a cube, once. The dewpoint, I think, is the temperature at which a full copy of Catan will coalesce out of nowhere. Join us for our podcast about science. AYURIS: Thunderstone Quest 2m22s (...
Oct 01, 2019•55 min
The cube trundles onward, marching inexorably--if haltingly--towards its ultimate destination. It is told it must explore, and so explore it does. The other cube conquers, but that is not this cube's concern. They met once at a party. It seemed nice, but that was long ago, and the cube must explore, not mingle. Sometimes it does not explore; sometimes it scores for some quantity of non-explore things. These things it does not understand, but it knows that points are good, and so it does thos...
Sep 24, 2019•1 hr 4 min
Mark thinks it is colossally unfair that he gets so much flak for speaking French when mediocre game designers get to throw around a word like "tableau." Then again, Mark and Walker can't quite agree on what a tableau constitutes. Mark seems to define it the way that American judge famously defined pornography--he knows it when he sees it--whereas Walker is more conspiratorial about tableaus (Tableaux? Tableausies?), seeing them everywhere and lurking behind every player board or sui...
Sep 17, 2019•58 min
Adorable little pudgy robots soar through a blazing pink sky, stubby arms outstretched as they speed towards their destination--a yellow planet in the distance. "GIVE ME YOAR COOOBS" bellow the aliens upon arrival. "POINTZ 4 COOOOBS." A robot obliges, and a sonorous "cha-ching" resounds through its programming. But the robot is now a drifting derelict, its home ship long gone. It is now doomed to tumble through inky pinkness until its energy reserves burn to nothing. It b...
Sep 10, 2019•1 hr
We return to games of weeks past, for the most part, to see if our initial impressions persist. We were young and foolish in past weeks, of course, whereas now we are older and foolish. Whether our errors mature like fine wine or spoil to the vinegar of harsh insight is up to you. One thing is certain, though--our metaphors certainly aren't getting any sweeter. AYURIS: SEAL Team Flix 2m09s (Pete Ruth & Mark Thomas, WizKids, 2018) Games Played Last Week: -Kobayakawa 5m46s (Jun Sasaki, IEL...
Sep 03, 2019•59 min
The Card Crafting System returns once more, its heaps of mylar inserting into our gaming life. I would say it darkens our door, but the things are mostly transparent, so the idiom doesn't quite fit. One wonders whether and how one could sleeve a Card Crafting game, given that the games largely consist of sleeves already--but once one has witnessed the recursive horror that is sleeve sleeves, you cannot doubt the persistence and ingenuity of the Cult of Sleeves. They will, like life, find a w...
Aug 27, 2019•56 min
There are happy stories. Stories of social serendipity, where you like them and they like you, and all opinions are as one and there is harmony. Where no awkward conversations need be had and no unfortunate lines drawn. Where no one is annoyed, and no one is harassed, and no one must bury their preferences so as to placate another. These are not these stories. AYURIS: Food Chain Magnate 1m37s (Jeroen Doumen & Joris Wiersinga, Splotter Spellen, 2015) Games Played Last Week: -Gugong 3m50s (And...
Aug 20, 2019•52 min
So. Many. Games. Even after careful curation and surgical editing, Mark and Walker talk about thirteen different games they played last week, not even counting the feature game. It was truly a good week. New games! Old games! Co-ops, minis, dexterity, wargames! Come join us at the cornucopia of amusement that is this week's SVWAG. Games Played Last Week: -Beasts of Balance 1m29s (George Buckenham & Alex Fleetwood, Sensible Object, 2016) -Teotihuacan: City of Gods 3m32s (Daniele Tascini, ...
Aug 13, 2019•1 hr 5 min
What is gaming other than an outlet for vicarious experiences and thrills? To enjoy the simulacrum of killing, adventure, high finance, and impressing feudal lords? We can thus assert with great sincerity that ours shall be the very best GenCon coverage, in that we didn't go. Why trust the easily-misled first hand accounts? We know from both philosophy and science that sense data deceives. You can put your faith in our reflections, completely unbiased by any experience. AYURIS: Kemet 1m15s (...
Aug 06, 2019•54 min
Failure can be a fortuitous thing, which is very good for Mark, as he is well accustomed to failure. While this week's review of Pax Renaissance is certainly not on the scale of, say, penicillin, it did give him the opportunity to play one of his top 20 games more. As to whether Walker profited or suffered from this development is a deep and abiding mystery solvable only by listening to this week's episode. Games Played Last Week: -Gaslands 2m29s (Glenn Ford & Mike Hutchinson, Osprey...
Jul 30, 2019•56 min
We can pretend that our adult pastimes are more sophisticated and evolved from the trivialities of mere children, but really, let's admit it--it's all the same. We can't claim any degree of superiority when compared to the antics of ankle-biters. Let's be mature about it and lean into the juvenalia, shall we? My doll is better than your doll. My doll has the Plasmanator Meltotron. You can't hit my doll, it has an invisible everything shield! AYURIS: Keyflower 1m58s (Sebastian...
Jul 23, 2019•1 hr 2 min
"May you get everything you want" is nothing short of a curse, I think, and so this week we curse you with your own desires. You wanted us to play Middara, so we did. You wanted more information about Sol: Last Days of a Star, so we oblige. As you weep, surrounded by the wreckage wrought by your own wishes, don't come to us for solace, for we are but the accomplices of your own self-destruction. Also, if that weren't terrifying enough, intergalactic scorpions! Games Played Last W...
Jul 16, 2019•54 min
Since tableau-building today is very much what auctions were twenty years ago, we take a look at both in this week's episode. The Pax games continue ever onward, even as most of our favourite auction game were published 10+ years ago. Mark resists the urge to go off on a tangent about the Trolley Problem, which allows Walker to resist the urge to send Mark's teeth off on a tangent from his mouth. Compromise. AYURIS: 1m32s Hyperborea (Andrea Chiarvesio & Pierluca Zizzi, Asterion Press...
Jul 09, 2019•55 min
I swear, one dude gets his arm cut off in a cantina and we're still harping on about it forty years later. Have a sense of proportion! I got beat up in high school twenty years ago, but you don't hear me whining. That dude should have done what I did--rounded up a posse and threatened retaliation if any assault persisted. He could have rallied those pushed around by laser sword-wielding hermits and made the galaxy safe for... hold on, I think I just started writing fanfic. Games Played L...
Jul 02, 2019•49 min
Knowing when to give up is a valuable skill. As children we are told to stick with painful and unpleasant things, and while that is often wise, sometimes it just results in more pain. Discerning the difference between choking down one's vegetables--good!--and pursuing a hobby merely for the sake of it--bad!--is a tricky bit of prudence that many adults can't quite seem to get. The notion of an "acquired taste" is somewhat related. Eating chocolate is something you can nail the fi...
Jun 25, 2019•55 min
This is not, strictly speaking, the first foray into gaming that Hellboy has done--not even the first in the miniatures genre. There were some Hellboy Heroclix, but let us speak as adults--that's not really saying much. Everyone has been in Heroclix now. 43% of the human population has been represented as a Heroclix figure at some point. Walker has, like, four different versions (albeit two of those are repaints). I hear the "Raging Fury" Walker figure is banned in most tournament pl...
Jun 18, 2019•58 min
Heroscape! This show has spent far, far too long talking about things that are not Heroscape. Today we attempt to remedy that deficiency by talking about Heroscape, which is a game--nay, an experience--nay, a lifestyle!--worth discussing. It was a wonderful retail oddity, an overproduced and affordable big box beauty. It is why basements were invented. It isn't the greatest game, but it is definitely Heroscape. AYURIS: Lords of Hellas 1m54s (Awam Kwapinski, Awaken Realms, 2018) Games Played ...
Jun 11, 2019•56 min
Do you sometimes feel like having your blind brother hurl spears at you as a party trick? Do you feel the urge to put your hand in a giant wolf's mouth to make your friends feel bad? Do you wish you could ride a chariot pulled by cats for no discernible reason? Do you long to carry on rambling conversations with a severed head? Do you want days of the week to be named after you? Well, this is your episode! Games Played Last Week: -Just One 1m26s (Ludovic Roudy & Bruno Sautter, Repos Prod...
Jun 04, 2019•53 min
Names are powerful. The Spiel des Jahres means "game of the year" simpliciter, but for years we know that the juries have been casting a narrower and narrower net of what games thay would consider. It has become more of a specialized imprint, which is fine--but it's strange that the name still inspires such cachet. Anything with rules in excess of 3 or so pages seems now to be firmly beyond the pale as far as the SdJ is concerned. Ah, well, times change, and we are prone to fits of c...
May 28, 2019•54 min
Credibility, like a butterfly, is a fragile and beautiful thing. Mark is fundamentally opposed to subtlety and ephemeral joy, so he naturally seeks to destroy either whenever he encounters it. When it comes to credibility he does this by routinely making gross over-generalizations. This time he has managed to make an instant replay-esque correction, at least. As for what he does to butterflies, let's just say he manages to make garden parties awkward. Games Played Last Week: -Bios: Megafauna...
May 21, 2019•56 min
Summer is here, friends and neighbours, and with it comes a a thickening of the blood that prompts torpor. We here at SVWAG are part lizard, you see, and so we must budget additional time to sun ourselves and slough off our scales. At any rate, we will be shifting to a summer schedule but still releasing an episode every week--though the magic of segment-swapping. How can such wizardry be true? The secrets are revealed herein! AYURIS: Mage Knight 2m10s (Vlaada Chvatil, WizKids, 2011) Games Playe...
May 14, 2019•57 min
We humble ourselves before you, O merciful audience, so as to lay bare our sins against the gaming world. Granted we toil as rules explainers on the behalf of ungrateful vermin who do not appreciate our labours, but nonetheless we take full responsibility for mildly inconveniencing the filthy ingrates who can't be bothered to read a rulebook. We implore that these monstrously selfish demons might find it in their paltry hearts and feeble minds to grant us a little mercy. We sincerely apologi...
Apr 30, 2019•1 hr 7 min
"Money makes the world go 'round" is a common saying decried by most astronomers and physicists, who instead stubbornly maintain that it is due to some invisible thing that can't even qualify for a credit card. "More money than God" is also a strange phrasing, insofar as I believe the theological consensus (ranging from the Abrahamic faiths all the way to Pastafarianism) is that God does not hold assets in the standard sense. Then again, I've never seen His portfolio....
Apr 23, 2019•1 hr 6 min
We spare you the onomatopoeias this week, as our audio editing software cannot process the brightly-coloured spiky expostulations properly. Walker gets to backpedal at full speed this week, having previously declared his being done with both 1 vs. all games and games with tons of minis. So he surely wouldn't have any enthusiasm for this 1 vs. all minis-heavy game, would he? Could he?! Na na na na na na na na Na na na na na na na na PLASTIC AYURIS: GKR: Heavy Hitters 1m25s (Matt Hyra, Cryptoz...
Apr 16, 2019•1 hr 8 min
Here's the thing, at least as Mark understands it: acquired tastes are weird. Some things are great the first time. Furthermore, some things are easy and great the first time. Take chocolate, for example. Most people start out champs at eating chocolate. Mark tried to get good at something once, but he found out that requires effort. Who has time for ten thousand hours when there's elite-level candy consumption to be had? Walker on the other hand laments Mark's narrow little horizons...
Apr 09, 2019•1 hr 9 min
Today is a telling day in the annals of SVWAG, especially with respect to Mark coming to terms with his own essential wrongness. He gets to partially repent for his tonal excesses with respect to the AYURIS; he gets to mull over painful loves lost in Billionaire Banshee; and he gets to realize that once again that while Walker cares deeply about people, he cares mostly about stuffing his face and listening to loud music. Things get real. AYURIS: Champions of Midgard 1m47s (Ole Steiness, Grey Fox...
Apr 02, 2019•59 min
HATE has landed, and you can't have it. CMON's dalliances with Kickstarter exclusives have been numerous, but now they have their first Kickstarter-exclusive game. We review it not to taunt you with things you can't acquire, but rather to give you the vicarious thrill of someone who can have everything. Let your imagination whisk you away to a universe that is all plastic cannibalistic hardcases! AYURIS: Battlelore 2nd Edition 2m14s (Richard Borg & Robert A. Kouba, FFG, 2013) Gam...
Mar 26, 2019•1 hr 7 min
As my father is wont to say, "Accept credit, pass blame." Actually, no, I said that, and it's my father's fault that I forgot the correct attribution. Is that how that works? At any rate, we here at SVWAG are always happy to claim responsibility for all positive developments. When and if peace breaks out anywhere, we will assert it is our doing based merely on this aside. Such is the power of our episode notes and our self-aggrandizement! AYURIS: The World of SMOG: Rise of Moloch...
Mar 19, 2019•1 hr 17 min
