A friend of ours makes music for kids … and now they have a Kickstarter campaign… you should back them: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1384545463/got-a-minute

The folks at Father Geek have done a review of Code Monkey which is a game designed by friend of Area 42 Games, Mike Young. We have a few copies for sale at our events but you can also check it out on The Game Crafter if you like.

Last Friday, we had our First Annual Area 42 White Elephant Party at our weekly meetup.

It was a very amusing collection of gifts, from a magic staff to a waterfall made from candles. Oh, and a few games were in the mix as well.

Our thanks to all of our loyal friends and customers who made it a rousing success.

From the folks at Area 42 Games, we wish you all the happiest of holiday seasons and hope you have a wonderful New Year.

See you all again in 2012!

John Meagher has narrated a short horror story for Psuedopod this week. Give it a listen if that’s your taste, and drop a comment on the forum!

http://pseudopod.org/2011/11/18/pseudopod-256-repler/

Don’t miss out on our last Super Sale night of the year. For full details and to RSVP, please visit our Meetup.com site!

This weekend was a busy one for Area 42 Games. Friday night we had a game night and a super sale. It was so successful that we will be having another one on November 18th! Then Saturday we met up with a few folks to enjoy the DC Rollergirls at the Dulles Sportsplex. That was a lot of fun and I know at least some of use will be going again.

I also wanted to point people to Dust Jacket Wasteland where Rebecca has put up another book review. This one is of Shadowheart by Tad Williams.

Tales of the Left Hand: Book 3, Sneak Preview

We traveled to TCEP 18 this weekend, a gaming convention in Laurel Maryland, where we found many gamers doing what gamers do best, having fun. We were able to attend Sunday and Monday only (next year we will try to attend the whole event) but even within that time frame we had a blast. Sunday found John Meagher running a GURPS game set in the world of the Tales of the Left Hand. Apparently we were having a lot of fun because occasionally we attracted a crowd of people watching us. Sunday evening many of use played other games including the much played Innovation. Monday morning we got doughnuts (including some to share with the other con goers) and settled in for a day of gaming.

One feature that I was particularly interested in was Craig’s Chaos machine. I could have spent all weekend just playing with that. Sadly I didn’t actually get to add anything to it this time. (Next time… I’m planning ahead)

Area 42 would like to thank BarkingMad.org for hosting a great gaming convention and we hope that it continues for many years to come.

I had the pleasure of finally getting to play a game of Arkham Horror this past Friday. I got to play Finn Edwards, the Bootlegger and started out ready to take on the Forces of Evil ™ with my Ancient Spear and Credit Rating (this will be explained later).

First off, let me clear the air. Upon seeing this game set up, it appeared to be incredibly overwhelming. There are a LOT of pieces. However, I had the luck of playing with several veterans, so things went quite smoothly. Within a turn or two, it was very easy to understand what was going on, and things went very well after that. Do not be discouraged by the supposed complexity of the game. It actually is quite a lot of fun. The rules are well written and were easy to understand and the board has clearly marked instructions for what to do.

Another very important aspect of the game is that it is cooperative. Everyone is working together with the same goal in mind: Don’t let (Insert Elder God Name Here) wake up and eat us all.

Each character has two main stats: Sanity and Stamina. Additionally, characters have access to Skills, Spells, Common Items, Unique Items, and Money. While I’m not going to go into much detail here, all of these are clearly spelled out on cards and very easy to use and/or manage. My Ancient Spear was a Unique Item and my Credit Rating was a Skill.

The goal (as I understood it) is to close a number of Gates (to a variety of Horrible Places ™) before the aforementioned Elder God wakes and eats everyone.

Alas, we were not successful in stopping the Elder God from waking up, however, in a final, cataclysmic battle, one lonely man, Dexter Drake the Magician, managed to survive long enough to defeat Abhoth (the Elder God). The rest of us got eaten.

The game has a number of expansions and is certainly an all-day affair if you decide to play. I enjoyed it immensely and due to the variety of characters, settings, Elder Gods, and other assorted baddies, it is a very different game each and every time you play it.

I give it four tentacles out of four.

Go Pods!

–Larry Wile

Now for the second in our series of How to Play fliers, How to Play – Dixit