Broken Meeple Podcast - Episode 114- What Gets Me Excited?

0:00 You're listening to the Broken Mele Show, a podcast that speaks passionately about board games for the benefit of those who play them. My name's Luke Hector, best known for the Broken Mele YouTube channel, and I'm an everyday gamer just like you. And I'll be talking about reviews, top 10s, and just about anything that connects me to board games, as long as I have a tea or coffee in hand, that is. So, grab a cup, relax, and enjoy. And remember, it's only a game. Hi everyone, welcome to another Broken Meleool podcast. I'm Luke and this is episode 114. Now I'm curious how the microphone is going to pick up the sound on this episode because I'm trying something different. Uh friend of mine who's a bit of an audio file. um you know, one of the free people who in the world who has that much of a problem with the audio is sort of helping me try to figure out if I can actually do a setup where I could do playthroughs, you know, like the ones above the table. So, I've got literally I've got a scaffolding thing, you know, the Nshape thing above my desk right now. You can't see it, but it's there. And we're trying to figure out if we could make it work.

1:08 And with his help, possibly. But he does have a few ideas for me to look into. And I'm not I'm a little bit uh not not against but little afraid of trying new tech or trying unusual tech when it comes to things like uh audio mixing and stuff like that. So I don't want anything too complicated. But he's going to show me some stuff, show me how simple it can be and you know we'll see if I can be convinced one way or the other. Although one thing that I will be um trying out is the camera that I use over there for my actual videos. the shotgun mic is a bit on the low side. So, I am kind of thinking, all right, maybe I need to, you know, get a longer shotgun pointing out for it because the problem is that my mouth is too far away from the microphone to pick it up at a decent volume. So, post-prouction can sometimes distort the sound. So, I think he's going to lend me one of his like longer shotgun mics to see how that works. And if necessary, that means I will upgrade to a longer shotgun mic in the future. As long as it can mount to the camera, I'm happy. So, yeah, there's a few little things behind the scenes. I mean, nothing immediate, but uh you know, it's kind of weird having the scaffolding literally sitting over me as I'm playing um Captain's Chair at the moment. Wh Where's the Where's the box?

2:20 Here we go. Yep. Finally got myself a copy of Star Trek Captain's Chair. We've started to see some stock in the UK. Accidentally bought it twice. Um I bought it with uh you know, Kender had it in stock. I didn't expect them to get it in stock, so I got it from them. But I'd also grabbed it from Thirsty Meeples thinking that the stock was going to be like non-existent everywhere. So, I kind of panic bought it. So, now I got two copies of it. So, uh assuming that I decide to keep it, uh there will be at least one copy going. But, uh you know, I certainly don't intend to keep two of them. But I will be doing a full review on that one. So, that is, you know, an unpaid, unsponsored review. That is literally just me grabbing it as somebody who enjoyed the Imperium game, but had reservations about some bits of it. I'm very curious to see how Star Trek Captain's Chair works out for me.

3:06 And I've already played a few games. I got free games under my belt using the cadet solo mode where you don't have an AI or anything to try and get to grasp of the rules because it is a bit of a mission to get everything down, but it's not as bad as Imperium was. So, there is some um improvements there, you know, mainly because the rule book's a lot better. But yeah, I'm I'm having fun with it so far. I can't really say much more than that obviously because I want to do a detailed review after the expo. So, it will probably be the first main review I do after the expo. But, yeah, I want to give this one the beans and give it a fair review and see what it's like and, you know, see what it how it compares to Imperium, how it, you know, does it stand on its own two feet? Does it replace Imperium? You know, I mean, I know uh Paul Grogan, I think, has gone on record saying that he gifted away his copy of Imperium and now only plays Captain's Chair. I don't know. I'm I'm seeing the similarities. Yes, of course, it is based on the same system, but there are some differences and there are some advantages and disadvantages. the both copies I am seeing. So that question is kind of in flux. But uh it'll be an interesting one to answer.

4:09 Uh mainly though um in terms of the sound of this episode, the microphone I use for this podcast is now in a different position because normally I have it low down and pointing upwards at me because it doesn't block the screen or anything. Well again said friend came in and said that's a stupid way of doing it. Why are you doing it that way? And now it's it's still on the same like magic arm but it's actually pointing down. So, it's just out of shot of the camera webcam, but now I'm pretty much looking directly at it. So, the laptop screen is half covered by a microphone and you know the microphone is here literally out of shot. It is a cardioid microphone actually. No, is it a cardioid? I don't think it's a cardioid. I think it's a um what you call it on the directional one or something. So, I don't know. I'm curious to see how this works. But hopefully this will not muck up the sound in post-prouction. This is basically trying it as a, you know, gamble. So hopefully it'll work and by all means, uh, you know, like I say, fingers crossed. E, so other than that, not a huge amount to update on. I'll be at the expo next weekend. So Thursday to Sunday will be expo time and that's going to be good fun. So look forward to seeing a bunch of you there. I will be helping out on the Drander Games booth uh for the duration for half the duration. So yeah, I think uh Friday morning uh Saturday I think it's no I think it's Friday afternoon, Saturday morning and no no Friday morning, Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning.

5:33 Yeah, that's the um rotors I've got. I'm teaching a game called Jackpot which I need to get into the rule book online and actually start uh you know properly learning it because uh practice what you preach. I give um demoers a hard time for not getting the rules down ahead of time. Well, case in point, I better do it myself. You know, practice what you preach. But the thing is is that this game is only being like announced at the expo. So, I haven't got a copy of it. I have to basically just go from a pre-production rule book. So, that'll be interesting. But, it's supposedly a deck builder where you are trying to get the best like most amount of points by creating a slot machine. So, a deck builder where you try to get like three in a row via slot machines. I mean, that as a theme that is very unique and different. So, color me intrigued. But, uh, I'll be curious to see how that goes. But, that is all I'm demoing the whole weekend. So, I won't be doing Galactic Cruise or Navororea or any of those ones like I thought I might be.

6:28 Although, to be honest, maybe that's a good thing because I don't want to be too biased, you know, when I'm teaching stuff like, you know, Norea Galactic Cruise because I already like the games. But also, Galactic Cruise requires quite a hefty teach. So, you know what? If somebody else wants to their vocal cords teaching Galactic Cruise, I'm not going to complain. jackpot by cons by comparison will be a lot kinder to my voice. So yeah, that should be pretty sweet. But yeah, I'm looking forward to that. There are a good bunch of people and uh yeah, looking forward to the expo, which like I say, I wasn't a couple of months ago. So uh it's good that that spark has rekindled a little bit. I think partially because I am helping out demoing, but also just because hey, it's a convention. Why not? Anyway, so uh yeah, not much else to say. I mean, the channel has been going fine. So, let me bring that up. In fact, uh, hang on. Bear with me a second.

7:18 Right, that's better. I realized I hadn't actually shared the screen originally, so I had to sort that out in the background. But yeah, channel's good. Not much to say really. We're nearly up to 26,000 subscribers, so thank you very much. And recent content has been a little bit sparse cuz honestly, I got no games to review. You know, it's a quiet period, you I mean, I know other channels are pumping out games, but these are games that I've never heard of or barely, you know, they're like, "What? Are these are the big hotness to talk about at the moment, you know?" So, there's a few like that, but Captain's Chair I'll sort out after the expo. But, I was able to do a top 10. Top 10 games I warmed up to, which has proved nice and popular. So, thank you very much. And I had a few games to review from career board games, so I just did them as a compilation video. So, by all means, thanks for watching that. But yeah, not a lot of new stuff since the last podcast. And to be honest, videos are going to be a little bit sparse for the next week or so because of the expo. So, I will try to get the top 10 tiny games reviewed and sorry, it's already in the editing room.

8:13 I will get it fully edited and release the top 10 tiny games list before I go to the expo. Okay, so that is a guarantee. I will make certain that happens, but you know, subject to it issues. But otherwise, uh, the videos will basically be on hiatus for while I'm at the expo. And then I'll try and do Captain's Chair when I get back or some other brief review. And then because there won't be a podcast next week because this is a fortnightly thing, the next podcast will be the Sunday after the expo. And that is the episode where I will talk in detail about my experiences at the expo. So that will be like the games expo review episode, shall we say? Other than that, yeah, not a lot of content. All right, so let's just talk about some games I've played. Let's talk briefly about a nice one so far. So, I've not the biggest fan of roll and rights and flip and rights and stuff, as you know, so they tend to get a little bit on the oh god, yet another one. But people kept telling me to play a game called Free Sisters. Free Sisters is kind of like a farm. It's not really a farming game per se. It's it's more like a gardening game. So, you've got a backyard garden full of corn, beans, and pumpkins, and you can get different tools and, you know, various little upgrades. And you're basically trying to get victory points in classic roll and write style. I mean, this is very much a roll and right. You roll dice, they go on this action board, and based on what you roll allows you to do various actions, and an AI little pawn thing moves around and possibly fills up. I mean, I'm playing it solo only because yeah, there's no interaction in this game, so you might as well just uh

9:43 well, there's barely any any interaction in this game, so you might as well just play it solo. And yeah, depending on where you roll, the AI will take certain dice and actions from you. So, you've obviously got to plan for that. But for the most part, yeah, you're crossing off segments in your garden to score points for the various veg. You're getting bonuses, which lets you level up these like flower tracks or goods tracks, the fruit markers, you know, that go at different rates and get you different bonuses. honey. There's a honey track at the top. There's the tools which get you special abilities and stuff. So, it's like your typical roll and right, but I have now played a couple of games of it. And yeah, you know what? This actually isn't a bad roll and right. This is definitely up there on one of my kind of more preferred ones. I've not played it with like any expansion at the moment. I mean, I don't recognize this middle board here. I think it's a weather thing. I think that's maybe the advanced mode. But I've just played the normal mode. Two sheets of paper, which yes, I know people might be thinking, "Well, hang on. Hrien's wall had that, but Hrien's wall was a lot more cluttered than this mess. Okay. Yeah, sorry, wrong word. Is much more of a cluttered mess than these two sheets are in terms of where things are. It didn't take me very long to learn this one and get the ropes as to what was going on. But yeah, it's a pretty nice, decently produced game and I quite like it. You've got a good amount of variety in how you can approach each game and there is a good tactical element to, you know, what you do with the dice actions and how you roll them. So, I found this one to be a good, pleasant, solo experience. So, I'm going to hang on to this one. I recommend giving it a try if you are a fan of the roll and write genre. If you're not, I don't think this is only going to convert you into rolling

11:15 rights, but I think the theme helps with this one as well. It's a nice pleasant theme about gardening. You know, it's not, you know, generic like an industry style game and it's not, you know, weird themes that don't make sense with um well, I mean, no theme really makes sense with a roll, right? probably unfair, but I don't know. Like I say, nature and gardening. It's weird. I like these sort of themes in games. But I am not a greenfingered person. I mean, I hate having to deal with my current garden, which is barely even a garden. It's literally just a path in a lawn, and I can't even be bothered to deal with that. I have to get somebody in to cut the lawn every now and again. It's just gardens for me are a waste of space. You know, they look good, and if you maintain a great one, they are nice to look at, but I've got no care about sitting in the garden doing nothing. I'd rather just go into the hills and do a hike, you know, go walk in the South Downs or the hills, mountains and stuff, you know, go to see the proper nature and the effort having to maintain one and make sure the flowers don't die and all this stuff. It's just h it's not for me. You know, if I meet somebody who's a garden freak, then fine, the garden is their domain. Kitchen is my domain. But yeah. Yeah, this is a decent solid roll and right. Not often I say that about rolling rights, but I was quite impressed with just how smooth this one played out. It didn't feel it felt like you could do a lot. Felt like there was some good combo turns you could have, but it also felt streamlined. It didn't feel too hard to figure out what to do and, you know, too. It's thinky without being too thinky. It's it's that sort of weird description, but yeah, I enjoyed it. So, three sisters. Nice one. Now,

12:48 let's go in the opposite direction to a game which oh my word, talk about disappointment. Ice. Now, I need to stress something before I talk about this game. I was playing the first edition of this game. It wasn't my copy, somebody else's copy. And all of us don't particularly like the game. You know, none of us enjoyed it at the time. The person who taught us it was figuring out if they wanted to keep it or not, but even they'd had bad experiences. is and I think it's now solidified the fact that they don't want to keep it anymore. Uh but yeah, we've played the first edition. I am aware that they have made a second edition and are releasing that at some point soon which is supposedly going to fix some of the issues. I don't know how well that will do. I am not that keen to try out honestly because unless you change the fundamentals of the game, I don't think I would still enjoy the second edition. I think I would just like it a bit more. But yeah, suffice to say this game sucked. I hated this one. We all did. It was boring. It was punishing. It was luck driven. And it went on for faking ever. I mean, this is meant to be. It plays like a game with a massive identity crisis. So, it doesn't know whether it wants to be some silly haha in your face, oh, I screwed you over game with take that mechanics and luck aspects of discovery in that.

14:09 Well, no, because it's got those elements, but then it also is meant to be a thinky, meaty Euro game with a decent amount of mechanics, you know, tactical play with how you're going to deal with your actions and set collection and, you know, whether you're going to use artifacts, special abilities, and stuff. And it's like, so which one are you then? Because it tries to do everything. And much like a lot of these things, if you try to please everybody, you don't please anybody. And that's kind of how I felt with this. You know, it's 90 to 120 minutes on the box. If you've got four of you or more, you are lucky to get it done in two hours. I mean, this game took us the most of the night to do it. I mean, the teach the setup and and then getting it played and packed. I mean, it took us the whole gaming night. This took us over 3 hours to play. It was ridiculous. And it and I think it was only accelerated by the fact that I desperately tried to rush the game end, you know, the game end trigger of having something at the bottom exposed, you know, the ice level.

15:10 And I thought, you know what, I don't care if I win or not. I just need this to end. And I think everybody else needs to end because, you know, the one guy pretty much rage quit during the scoring where he had to head off, but he'd already quit during the game in the sense of, yeah, this game is bad and we were discussing the bad points of it. So, I was actually kind of enjoying the fact that somebody else was imploding more than I was cuz normally I'm the one who goes like, you know, rage mode, rant mode when I go on this channel and talk about games. I don't tend to go into that mode when I'm playing the game because, you know, that's not really uh courteous to the person teaching you. Although, in this case, they didn't really care. But, it was just kind of amusing to be on the other end watching somebody else go into a rant explosion mode. It just feels good. But, man, oh god, hated this. So, what are the problem? Well, well, first of all, what is the context of the game? Cuz I haven't even explained that. Basically, you're archaeologist. You're on this board that's multi-layered, and the production quality is fine, but I wouldn't say it was stellar. Although, I do like this board that's got multi-layered tiles that you dig through. And the idea is is that you dig through the surface, you dig to multiple layers, and you're trying to collect artifact tiles. These artifact tiles are set collection for objectives, for points. And the artifacts, if you get so many of them, can give you a special ability that can trigger as a one-off.

16:23 So, it's basically that, but you have a person and you know, little archaeologists who I like to call little marshmallow men because they are basically shaped like the marshmallow men out of Ghostbusters. And the the idea is is that you collect these together and you spend certain amount of action points on a day and you take it in turns to spend action points to do stuff like dig or move or get more objectives and the like. But there's a decent amount of screwage. I mean, there are ways that you can just get something before somebody else does. But also, some of the tiles that you get at the top, the snow tiles, they've got special abilities on them that you can trade in the tile for. Some of them are inconsequential and useless. Some of them are downright broken powerful and useful, and some of them just outright screw over opponents, and there's nothing you can do to defend yourself from them. So, you've got a random aspect there. But here's the other thing. When you dig down, you also don't know what artifacts are down there until you dig. So, if your your objectives tell you that you're hunting for blues and yellows and for example, and you dig down and all you find is reds and greens or something, it's like, well, screw it right. I've wasted half my time digging down and I can't find artifacts to do with my objectives. And if you don't get the objectives in this game, you actually lose the points. So, it's similar to Ticket to Ride. I don't know if it's the exact same negative that you get, but you suffer if you don't complete the objective. So, you've got this punishing aspect there as well as people screwing you over. And sometimes you might be screwed over just by turn

17:53 order. I had a situation where literally I could not dig ever because if I dig like for two to three turns, I wasn't allowed to dig because if I did, then whatever I dig for could just simply be nicked by somebody who was close to me at the time. So, I had to basically forfeit a turn to do something mostly useless to try and skip the turn order, but it didn't really make a huge amount of difference. So, that didn't really feel particularly great. But the AP nature of this game, oh my god, because it's tactical. You can't play this as a strategy game because there's too much luck, too much take that. So, it's tactical, which means you got to think on your turn. And when you're doing something with action points in a game with tactical aspects, the AP factor goes off the frigin scale. People will take forever to think about what they need to do for a turn because it's so paramount because somebody can steal what you're just going for and that completely undoes the last couple of turns that you had. So you can't just play it, you know, casually like a game with luck and, you know, take that mechanic should be played because it's too important what you do in a meaty euro game with mechanics that's two hours plus long to deal with. So this is what I mean about the identity crisis.

19:06 It's just it doesn't know what it wants to be. Quick little drink. Voice is going already. But so you know on top of that was it the objectives? They're not particularly interesting. I mean, they're mostly just collect a set of colors or a set of shapes. But again, if the um if you've got an objective that says get three different shapes on the tiles, you don't know what the shape is until you excavate the tile. You get a bunch of tiles and they're all the same shape. Well, that's you screwed. You have no way to tell if it's the right one before you get it. So, I say, you've got luck of the abilities that you draw, some of which are more powerful than others. You've got the starting player powers, which are clearly not balanced. I mean, I had one that allowed me to use an artifact ability during my turn. It was this one, the incandescent. It was okay, but still only semi useful. Other people had stuff that allowed them to do like quicker movement or ease your archaeologist grabbing. That is so paramount to the game that that's easily better. But then saying that, one person, and you can tell that this game, I think it wasn't originally designed to be five players. Yes, you can play it with five, but it says best at free, and I would agree that's probably the case.

20:12 But I bet you this game was not designed with five in mind until people did the classic I want five players on my Kickstarter. You know, it's like, you know, because I for some reason decided that I want to play in groups of five. But, you know, the problem with this is that when you have like the player powers, you can see the player powers. They're not necessarily the well balanced. I mean, you know, Stonemire, eat your heart out here. But you can tell when they bolted on the fifth player because the player powers range from like this works, but it's a little bit more powerful than that one, but it's a normal mechanic. That's a normal mechanic. This is a normal mechanic. One power the o the host had is literally, and I kid you not, when you excavate an artifact tile, guess what shape it's got on it out of three choices, right? And if you get it right, you get two victory points. That is literally the player power is a slot machine. It's a loot box slot machine for a player power in a game with a decent amount of luck and take that elements but with 2 and 1/2 hours plus on the game runtime. Who the hell designed that player power and green lit that is garbage. You know, any play testing anywhere would have revealed that that power is stupid. I mean, it either does nothing for you or it can single-handedly win you the game.

21:30 But what on earth has that got to do with archaeology? Like guessing and getting victory points. It's it is stupid as a power. And I mean the the rule book itself is not particularly clear. The reference aid sort of misses out little key details that you need to know about certain rules. I mean it's it's not a bad reference aid, but there are certain key bits that is like kind of I wish I knew that on the aid to be honest. the movement system with how the like the system where you spread out archaeologists after you excavate the tile and that is quite clunky. It's difficult to it's not intuitive. It It's just a mess. And I'm sure it was produced nicely in that. Although I hear this one had problems because they basically overreached themselves. So they like tried to make a game that costs more than they thought it was going to. So, they clearly spent way too much time thinking about how to get the gimmick done, which honestly that gimmick dies out pretty quickly while you're playing it because you're playing it for so damn long. And they didn't think enough about actually developing the game mechanics, you know? I mean, they're making a second edition for a reason. And it's not just production costs. They're making it to fix the problems that this game had. So, I really did not like this. I mean, somebody hated it more than I did, frankly. But, you know, if I was to give Free Sisters something like an eight out of 10 and say that's actually a great game. This one, uh, this is three, maybe even a two, I really did not enjoy this game. You know, there's very little about it that I could say in the first edition was that redeemable. It really just seemed to, you know, it it tried to

23:02 be everything and messed itself over in the process. You know, it it I just couldn't really think of anything that was done well. I mean, the excavating part is fine, but that gimmick wears off. Other than that, nothing else is produced to that high a level. It's pretty standard component quality, and all the rules in it, like the mechanics and the objectives and player powers and all that stuff have all got problems with them. So, nothing is done completely well. So, this one was just basically a failure. And I was looking forward to trying this one. But noticing that it never hit retail and people stopped talking about it the second it fulfilled and you know it never really got much buzz after that. It's like h I have suspicions as to whether this was just hyped up in the previews and then turned out to be not that great. And lo and behold, second edition I think I'm right. So yeah, maybe the second edition fixes a bunch of this stuff. I don't know. But for first edition play, this was ironically for a game called Ice Hot Garbage. Right. Okay, let's get on to the uh main episode in general. Let's see if we can use up another half hour for this. I'm going to try and be realistic with the fact that my podcast take a while now, but I'll have to see how my voice glass anyway. But basically, I've got a couple of ideas in the run for what I fancy doing for top topics. Uh, somebody suggested on Patreon to do a quick run through of the BGG top 100 and just give my quick thoughts on each one. That does sound

24:33 cool, but I think I'm going to save that for an episode in its own right rather than do it as a podcast because I think that's popular enough that I would just do it as an episode. Sit on my laptop, go through the list, and just give some quicky thoughts. So, I'll probably do that at some point after the expo or maybe before. We'll see. Nah, let's not stress myself out too much after the expo. But uh you know I've got to do the Tiny Games top 10 first and that takes a while to edit in itself. But uh yeah, I digress. But the other topic that um has been suggested on my patreons is what influences me to buy a game. So you know I've been doing this for quite a while and there's definitely you know a bit of jadedness that goes into like some games that I won. There's definitely appreciation for certain other mechanics and themes and designers and publishers, you know, both high and low in that regard. And it's it there's definitely changes into how I approach wanting to grab a new game. And it's difficult to get excited by games now. I mean, every time you see me talk about conventions or the anticipated games, I find it very difficult to find a bunch of stuff that I'm excited about because I've reviewed a lot of games. I've played a lot of games. There's only so much you can do to suddenly catch my interest and there's a lot of repetition in the industry. There's a lot of blatant cash grabbing. I mean, I'm sorry if you're going to claim that we needed Everddale Farshore or Dune um Dune Imperium Uprising and stuff like that. You know, if you're going to say that those were

26:04 necessary games and not cash grabs, you're deluded. I'm sorry. That's I'm sorry. I cannot agree that those were not cash grabs. But, you know, with with the rest of, you know, games in general, you know, what is it that gets me interested? So, no particular order, I'm just going to go over a few uh points and just give my thoughts. So, first off, theme. So, theme is probably up there as a big contender for getting me interested in a game. So, you know, I mentioned Star Trek Captain's Chair a second ago. So, you know, that one is likely to get my interest because I do like Star Trek. Now, I am not a Treky, you know, by any means. I mean, call blime me. You watch the Paul Grogan's playthroughs and stuff. There are some Trek nerds out there on his channel, you know, who know way too much law, you know. I mean, I played, you know, the first two games of the Star Trek game I played. I played um if I can grab the playerboards. Here we go. Playerboards.

27:00 So, you know, some of these people I recognize. Where are the others? Um, here we go. So, basically, first game I played, of course, Jeanluke Bquard because he is, in my opinion, MVP of the entire Star Trek franchise. So, he's the beginner deck in this. He's the easier deck to play. Um, but he's a good fun deck still. I love John Lard. I like Next Generation. I have I mean, it's my history. I have watched all of Next Generation. I've watched all of Voyager and I've watched most of Discovery. Although, to be honest, I got bored with Discovery at about season four. So, and Discovery didn't really get that good until season two. Season two and three were probably my highlights for Discovery. Season 1 was pretty trash, and four and five just got repetitive. It just span its wheels. So, I kind of gave up at that point. But yeah, for me, Star Trek for me is basically Next Generation and Voyager. I've not watched Deep Space 9. I've not watched the the originals. I refused to watch Enterprise. That looks really boring. Um I've not I tried to watch Star Trek Lower Decks, but I didn't find it funny.

28:00 You know, I watched three episodes of it and I was expecting to be laughing out loud and I laughed at one joke. Literally, I didn't even smirk at other jokes. There was just one joke that made me laugh and it was a it was a like a throwaway line joke. the the one of the guys, one of the nerd the nerdy black guy, I forget what his name is, but he basically the the slightly the synthetic black guy. I forget what he is, but he he goes into a simulation to try and do like the captain's training and he uh like you know fails it completely mucks up in the first bit and the computer afterwards says like you know casualty rate 112% and he like turns in like wait how did I kill more than the whole crew? You know, that lie just made me laugh. Like, it made me laugh hard and that's the only bit I laughed at. But it's still gone on for a lot of series and some people watch it. So, should I give Lower Dex another chance? I don't know.

28:49 I like the voice actor. Um, not the actress. I don't particularly like her. I think she's obnoxious and annoying. But, um, I quite like the I forget his name. Is it Quaid? Something Quaid? Is it Dennis Quaid? No, it's not Dennis Quaid. That's someone else. Um, something Quaid. But, you know, the guy who's in The Boys, you know, I like him. And to be fair, when the that's the other series I've watched actually that reminds me, not the boys, but the uh Star Trek um Strange New Worlds with Pike. Pike I I really think is a really cool character. I like Spock and I like those characters. And yeah, they did a crossover with Lower Dex in there. And that episode was fine. A bit cheesy, but I liked Quaid's acting in that, not the annoying other voice actress. Could blame me. I was talking about my liking of the games. I've just gone on a Star Trek rank. Oh god, maybe I'm more into it than I thought. I don't know. But as I say, there's a lot of nerds out there. I'm still a casual viewer by comparison, but this is maybe this is illustrating my point. Theme theme's a big deal because I like Imperium. Imperium has civilization style themes even though I'm not a massive history nut, but that's enough to get me interested to try this deck builder. This one, I would have probably passed it up had it used a different IP. You know, Star Star Wars, I would have been like, god, we've seen so many Star Wars stuff now. Star Trek, I'm like, this could work. You could play a different captain of the decks and stuff like that. But if they use some other generic IP, I probably wouldn't go near it or I wouldn't enjoy it as much. So I think definitely the fact that this one is Star Trek themed is having some impact on my enjoyment of it. But then, you know, in contrast, you know, I said I played John Luke Bicard as my first one and really enjoyed it.

30:20 Second one was I didn't play as well and I played this guy called Shran who apparently is from Enterprise. Apparently he's wellknown. I have no idea. But I liked what winding up Trek nerds and David Turkey by calling him a generic blue um generic blue alien dude. So, you know, that always it's always fun to wind up fans at times. Some people do take things way too seriously. But it's yeah, it's a good it's a good game so far. But like I say, theme makes a difference. I mentioned Jackpot as well. This is the one that I will be demoing at here. Now, I don't know if this is a good game mechanically or not um until we get there. And I'm curious as to where Jackpot would be on here because the problem is there's so many games called Jackpot. That's probably the worry I have. This game is going to have a generic name. So, it's not going to uh you know, show up much. I mean, I'm looking down this list and I can't even find it. I'm trying to find a jackpot that's basically coming out in 2025. And Field uh is it called Mega?

31:18 Nope. It can't be Mega Jackpot. It's not called that. I'm pretty positive it's not that one. But that's all the jackpots that are there. So maybe it's not even on Board Game Geek yet. Uh yeah, that's not that's not the one. That's interesting. Yeah, it's not even on Board Game Geek yet. I mean, it is barely like sort of announced, so I guess we'll just uh find it later. But what I'm basically getting at is that that whole theme of having a like a fruit a slot machine with a deck builder is like, okay, that's a little bit different. Haven't really seen that. I mean, yes, there's a lot of jackpot games there, but I think doing it with a deck builder could be a good laugh. And so that theme gets me into it. IPs, Deep Rock Galactic, you know, I'll look at most skirmish dudes on a map game. I'll be like, "Oh, there's another dudes on the map game." Yeah. What a area control is this? Or what, you know, what are we shooting and stuff? But Deep Rock Galactic is based off a video game that I haven't played in ages. I think I've kind of reached my limit to mind. Well, I still love the game, but there's nowhere to progress in it. So, now I'm just going for the motions, and there's other games I'm trying to play like Boulders Gate 3 and that are sucking up my time. Um, but uh yeah. So, you know, but I sunk like 500 600 hours into that game. So, of course, a game based on Deep Rock Galactic is going to get my interest and, you know, that's from an IP perspective, but you know, just interesting themes generally. I mean, let's look at, you know, Marvel Cinematic Universe and all that lot. I'm naturally going to like that sort of thing. Uh, Star Wars and, you know, other IPs, but Earth, Earth, nature, nature games. I really like nature games. So, you know, Earth, I really like Arknova. I really like um, you

32:49 know, what animal games? life of the Amazonia, you know, stuff like that. That sort of theme um gets me interested. Uh let's spirit island kind of similar deal, you know, magic spirits and, you know, of all nature and stuff like that. I mean, that's all pretty cool. Meadow nature themed. Uh what else have we got? Uh looking on the walls, expansion boxes, uh Street Masters, Streets of Rage and all those sort of deals. You know, this is it. It's it's not an IP per se, but it's definitely paying homage to that kind of thing. So that gets my interest. Uh fields of you know the UI Rosenberg farming games. I like farming as a theme. So if a game comes out about farming, I mean Awaken Realms are doing a Grier second edition, you know, proper new edition. And I have problems with a Grillar as a mechanical game. But if they fix some of those mechanics and make it look as gorgeous as they can make it, I might be tempted to get back into a Grier and give it another shot with a new addition of it.

33:41 So theme is definitely something that works. It's got to be up there. If it's not my number one, it's definitely up there as a big contender for this is what's going to get me interested in the game. You feed me generic like, you know, this is a Euro game about building an industry in the 19th century in Birmingham. Yay. Great. Yeah. Wave my little flag. There was much rejoicing. Yay. It's like, you know, some of these themes can be rehashed and they're boring. That's why I'm not a fan of Beige Euros because all the Beige Euros that come out are just so dreary and dull in what their themes are. I mean, you know, on the solo channels, some people talk about a game recently called Men of Fur or something, you know. I mean, if I don't know the history or what the setting is, I wouldn't recognize what that name even means. But then even when I look at the game, it looks beige. The theme's boring. It came out the other one, the same publisher designer did Sabika or something. Again, boring box covers, dull themes, or no theme at all. I mean, it's just the beige Euro Ray Sappa from Delicious Games, the Vladimir Suhi one.

34:46 I mean, that looks dreary and dull. Yeah, these these ones don't excite me. I can't get excited about generic Euro title with beige theme on it. It's like it's impassible. Impossible for me to get excited about those. So, it's definitely a big contender. I'd have to say coffee. I put it in my sort of like container now. I take this to work all the time. I take it to Cafe Nero where free mobile gives me cheap barista coffee each week. So I pretty much live and breathe off this thing now. And certainly you'll see me with it at the expo. But yeah, uh you know, coffee to wake up because I'm doing this quite early in the morning actually. You know, it's 20 10 now. Normally I'd barely be up and ready out of bed or something on a Sunday, but you know, I like to lie in on Sundays, but now I'm getting into the habit of getting up early, so it might give me more editing time. But all right, next up. Mechanics-wise, do mechanics get me that interested? Not terribly. It depends.

35:40 There are some mechanics I like more than others. So, I think this one necessarily doesn't excite me from a, oh, this mechanic's in it. I'm going to love the game with maybe one or two exceptions. Mainly, this will just be a case of this is the mechanic of the game, seen it. And certain mechanics are definitely like that. I mean, if you just tell me it's a set collection game, for crying out loud, set collection is like a common theme in pretty much every game in existence. It's not exactly the selling point of a game. Um, but area control, area control is a mechanic I kind of like the least out of a bunch. I mean, some area control games I like. Chaos in the Old World, not standing in the in the corner over there. And I was interested in the one from the expo that's being demoed. What's it called? The something veil uh sword veil or something. The one that's got the multicolored cards. I mentioned it on the last um UK Games Expo preview episode. So, I forget what it's called.

36:29 Sword Avalon Veil or something. I don't know. That looks interesting. And that's mostly an area control game. So, you know, there are some exceptions. But yeah, you tell me that there's an area control game like a skirmish kill dudes on the map area control game. Chances are I'm just going to whatever. You know, Dudes on the map games. Actually, another one doesn't tend to get me that excited. I mean, I reviewed Apex Legends recently. Now, I reviewed it. It had its good side. It had its bad sides. I don't think it's amazing, but I think it's fine. But was I excited about it? No, not really. I mean, I've seen a lot of these games about here's a bunch of guys in arena shoot each other. You know, they take a lot to learn. They require a lot of investment in time. And so, it's like, is it going to be worth it? But, oh well, you know, let's go into it and find out. And so, you know, the excitement level is difficult to keep high in that respect, despite the fact that I like some of the other games that a publisher or designer may have done.

37:21 Um, uh, but then an a mechanic could get me excited if it's one I really like. Now, co-ops I really like, but the co-op on its own is not going to make me that excited. Yes, some of my favorite games in my top 10 are co-ops, but that's just a coincidence really. But I think unique mechanics could get me excited for a game or ones that aren't used very much. So, I do love deck building, but it's being used a ton. So, yes, this jackpot game is using deck building. Cool. I like the mechanic that helps. But really, it's the theme combined with that that's helping, but the, you know, in terms of like a rarely used mechanic, I keep raving about the Ark Nova one. So, uh, the one that's called the, uh, typewriter mechanic, as I call it. So, Arc Nova has it and uses it, and I've played this game so much lately. I've been playing on the app and on BGA. I swear I'm up to like 150 odd plays or 160 odd plays. It's ridiculous. I am playing the hell out of this game at the moment. I still love it. But you know, Arn Nova has used that typewriter mechanic with the action row and done it well. But it was a new dawn that pioneered it. So, a new dawn civilization, a new dawn. Yeah. So, this was the first game to actually use it.

38:34 And I still hold down that this is a very entertaining game, especially with the expansion. Although, I probably actually say you need the expansion. It's essential that you get it before you play the base game on its own. But, you know, this is a really solid game and it uses that typewriter mechanic with that action row and it did it in a really cool way. So, if some game comes out in the future that says we're using this typewriter mechanic, instantly I'm going to be interested in it because it's something different or something that hasn't been used enough, this has been used twice in games, I am more than happy for a designer to come out and say, "Here's the third one that's using this mechanic." And to bring it back into the limelight. I guarantee first person that comes out and says, "I'm using that mechanic. I'm interested in their game." Probably regardless of who the designer is, honestly. I mean, it could be Rhino Canitzia, it could be Alexander Fister, you know, for all I care, you know, it could be Jamie Stegmire, any one of those three or something that tend to make games that I'm not a huge fan of could make a game with a typewriter mechanic, and I'd probably still be interested to try it out just because of it. So, you know, unique innovation is probably something that would get me pretty excited for a game, but yeah, just the mechanic on its own isn't really enough. It will make me go, okay, I'll probably like it, but unless I'm going to get like, unless I think a game is going to be amazing, it's not really going to get me that excited. If I think a game's going to be, yeah, it's fine, then where's the excitement in that? Okay, what else? Uh, well, let's talk about the obvious next two. Designer and publisher. This rarely

40:06 gets me excited for a game. Certainly, it can get me less excited for a game though because there are obviously some designers and publishers that don't tend to make games that I tend to like. I mean, you know, for example, um I already mentioned like free designers. I mean, Alexander Fister, Rhino Canitia, and you know, Jamie Stegmar are not making games that I tend to go for much at the moment. I mean, yes, I love Great Western Trail New Zealand, but that's kind of like and I liked Broom Service. On top of that, there aren't really a lot of Alexander Fist games that I really got my stock behind. I mean, some of them are okay or fine for a play, but there are some that I particularly dislike. So, obviously, if a game comes out, it's like, "This is the new Alexander Fista game." I'd be like, "Whatever." Um, Rhino Canitio design a million games. He's probably a mathematical genius. Well, not probably. He is a mathematical genius, but um the thing is when you design that many games, you can design a bunch of stinkers as well. And there are definitely way more stinkers I find from him than good ones. I mean, Shellwe, the one that I talked about, those Shell domino type thing from the Korean episode. That game was boring and terrible. I mean, that was a that was a bad game. And that was a Ricio design.

41:11 So, yeah, his name's on the box. Not really going to care. Stefan Feld, actually, I probably should be fair to some of these designers because Stephan Feld is definitely a designer who as nice a chap as he is. Martin Wallace, again, very nice chap. But if those two are designing the game, I'm pretty much not excited for what they design cuz again, they don't tend to make games that I tend to like. It's nothing on the person. It's just their style of game doesn't gel with me. So, it doesn't get me excited for it. But then, you know, designers that I do like don't always make the best games themselves. I mean, everybody puts their foot on every now and again. So, you know, but there are some except there are some that are better than others. Like for example, I make a you know this kind of links to publisher actually Garfield Games. So Garfield Games lately have just been on kind of a roll. They have made a lot of games that I enjoy. So you know the all the Tigress stuff um you know has been great for me. Inventors of the South Tigers, Scholars and Wayfares. In fact I played Scholars the other day actually and again really enjoyed it and I think in the next u month and a half, two months we'll see the expansions for all the Tigris games come out. Cannot wait for those. I mean, those I'm excited for. And I guess that's another thing.

42:21 Yeah. To get excited for a brand new game is harder for me than to get excited for an expansion. It's easy for me to get excited for an expansion because it's taking a game that I already like and hopefully making it better. So, you know, they they announced a SETI. Yeah, the Seti expansion that's coming out later this year, Space Agencies. Well, I mean, we knew it was coming, but of course, I'm excited for that because I love SETI, but it has a couple of problems with it. And if this expansion helps to fix those problems while adding more variety, then of course I'm going to be excited for this one. So expansions are kind of a different kettle of fish in all of themselves. But definitely, yeah, if Garfield Games like comes out with another game, then I'm typically excited to see what it does. To a point though, because even Garfield Games can mess up every now and again. I mean, I did the best and worst of Garfield games on my channel, that video. So, that's a prime example that just because a publisher's name is on the box or designer's name doesn't mean I necessarily get that excited because you set yourself up for more disappointment if you get too excited about everything. This is why I don't buy into the hype train for a lot of games. And, you know, I don't like it where previewers out there who look at Kickstarter games, I hate it when they build up hype for games because it's just an advert and it just it misleads the consumer and I don't like it. It's same goes for content creators who literally only review a, you know, when when you only review a game if you like it, meaning that you have no negatives to say about anything that you look at.

43:46 That doesn't tell me anything useful. It just feels misleading. And so that's why I don't agree with that practice. But it's it's definitely lower on the scale though, I think, cuz Garfield games can make a game I dislike. I mean, I like all their like tril I like their trilogy stuff, though not all of them. Paladins, Explorers. I mentioned that they weren't great, but then I'm not the biggest fan of Garfield's like historical stuff. I found um Ezra and Jeremiah kind of meh. Didn't particularly like Hrien's Wall that much. And they've released a couple more this year. Was it Anarchy, which is the sequel to that one, I think it's meant to be. And Scra or whatever it is. I mean, what's that called? Is it Is it literally called Scraw or something? I don't know. Let's have a look. Scra. Scroll. Scroll. Scrududo. Scrap. No. Scroll. Um Okay, that's not really helping. So, let's have a look at Garville Games. Garfield Games. What is it that they were releasing soon? We got Ezra. Already mentioned that. Yeah, I wasn't the biggest fan of Hadron's Wool.

44:42 Never played Legacy of You. Um, the Circadians First Light and Chaos Order were fine games, but I never found them to be amazing per se, but it doesn't really have the um ancient anthology, is it on it? No, they haven't really got their future stuff on here. Maybe if I go to them on Board Game Geek as a publisher, it will start finding the newest ones. So, here we go. C 110. Oh, here we go. Well, there's the anarchy. And I swear the other one began with S. Let's go to for RS scholarship rights. Ship right ship right. Scar. Here we go. Yeah, Scar Bray. I have no idea what the hell Scar Bray means. Neolithic Northern Scotland. Fill me in if you want. I mean, I'm not a historical expert. I don't know what the hell this is referencing, but, you know, it's a resource management game. I like resource management, so as a uh mechanic, it sounds cool, but the historical theme doesn't really grab me.

45:39 And I've no idea whether I'll like this game or not. Although, I have to admit, those millions of resources do tickle my fancy a bit because I do like it when a game gives you loads of different resources to manage. It's why I like um Aura and Labbora from Urie Rosenberg cuz that one gives you a fuckload of different resources to muck around with. But then the anarchy, this isn't exciting me at all cuz this basically just looks like another complicated like Hron's wall. I mean, look at that. Look at that. I mean, who the hell is playing this game as a fourplayer game? Seriously, it's blatantly going to be multiplayer solitaire, but all this stuff all over your sheets. I mean, I talked about three sisters. That is a much more streamlined use of two sheets than this lot is. But maybe this one is an improvement. I don't know. But certainly I'm not excited to play it, but I will try it. I will try anything once. So, you know, even a publisher and a designer where there's a lot of goodwill from games they've made can mess up. I mentioned Stonemire before.

46:32 You know, Stonemire in the made three games in a row that I loved. Scythe, Wingspan, and Vidiculture. Not in that order, but you know, those three great games. But since Wingspan, which I think was the last one, they haven't made a thing that I've considered to be that great. I mean, the highest mark I've given any other games six since is a six out of 10. And I think that was for um Apiary, but Expeditions boring. Um uh The Pendulum game, terrible. Uh Tapestry, pretty below average, if not terrible. Um you I already mentioned the Apiary. It's above average. It's fine, but it's nothing particularly new or interesting. Uh what's the most recent one they did? Uh oh, well, no, Charter Stone. not a particularly good legacy game either. So, they're not exactly making a lot of stuff that I'm interested in. And I know that Paul Groen, I think, recently showed off the fact that you got something called um the hell was it called? I can't even remember the name of it, but basically they've got this new sandbox style game coming out. And that could be good. I like sandboxy style games, but the thing is is that track record hasn't exactly been great for the last few years.

47:38 Therefore, I'm not exactly um super excited. But, you know, anybody can surprise you because you can have games where a designer, you know, gets it right for you. I mean, I mentioned um Alexander Fister. Yeah, I generally don't tend to go mad for his games, but I love Great Western Trail New Zealand. I love that game. I think it's amazing. Um Stefan Failed. Uh you know, generally don't tend to go for his games, but I thought America was a bit of a laugh. And I remember playing um Cocoapelli, uh that weird card game that he did. I thought that was quite a cool clever little card game. But Cocoa Pell Coco Coelli it sounds like a breakfast cereal. But you know, I enjoyed this one. I thought this was quite a good little game. And when I was introduced to it, they didn't even tell me it was a Stephen Feld game. It didn't even feel like a Stephen Feld game. I thought this was like a Canitzia game. And I thought, okay, I enjoyed this one. Seven out of 10. You know, seven out of 10. A good game. Not something I would normally say about a Stephen Feld game. Um, you know, Civilion, you know, probably five out of 10. And I would give that average. You know, it's it's okay, but it's got some problems. Mostly to do with its length and high luck factor, but it's, you know, some, you know, bad say unfair words. Designers and publishers that I don't like can still get it right. And the opposite is also true. Gamer, you know, designers and publishers that I love can also trip over themselves. It's it's it's part of the reason why I don't necessarily get super excited for a new game just because of the name on the

49:10 box. It's not always a big factor for me. Um, what else could go into it? So, we've done theme mechanics, we got the publisher, we got the designer. Is there anything else about a game that would get me interested? I mean, production quality, no, not really. Production quality obviously would like make a game more fun to play or more interesting to play. I mean, you give me a game with rubbish components, but it's got amazing mechanics, then I'll still enjoy it, but it will damper the experience. But you give me a game that's enjoyable but has really great components and it just elevates the system at the end of the day. I mean, the captain's chair one that I'm playing at the moment, I mean, I'm enjoying the game itself, but if I'm perfectly honest, the component quality is not fantastic and the artwork um it's very inconsistent, mostly bad, but then there are some good bits in it as well, and it's just weird. It's kind of like how ARCs was where Arcs has a particular style of art, but some of it is proper artwork and then all of a sudden on some cards it just goes into scrapbook note paper mode or something. And the same goes for this Star Trek one. You get a couple of pictures which I swear are good enough to be in something like Empires of the Boy by Red Raven Games.

50:18 And then you get boring stuff like this. I mean, yay. That's such a cool card to look at. I mean, in fact, can I find the card I'm on? Nope. It's too far underneath the leaves on there. So, I can't find the card that I said was gorgeous. But unless there's any of them here. Is there anyone here? Nope. But, you know, you look at these you look at these cards for artwork. I mean, this is the sort of stuff that's in Captain's Chair. Okay. So, you got like a okayish alien but on a dull background or something. You've got the ship. Uh where is it? The ship there. So, that's not too bad. It's not too bad artwork for the ship. But then what am I supposed to do with, you know, these? I mean, boring, generic, and so, you know, that obviously deflates a little bit, but it's not the first thing that I'm going to go, "Oh, yeah, I'm not interested in this game because the artwork sucks." It could still be a fun game regardless.

51:10 But that being said, First Bite is with the eye. And, you know, people were discussing this on the solo Facebook group earlier actually about Men the Fur, funny enough. You know, people saying like, why are more people not liking this game? Well, firstly, it didn't have a high print run, but also if you look at the game, it's got a very uninspiring box cover, much like Saber did. The name Men the Fern means absolutely nothing to the casual person unless you know what the hell it's referencing. And when you look at the game itself, it looks beige as all get out. I mean, most of the board is literally beige or yellow anyway. So, nothing about it looks interesting to the eye when you look at it and pick it up off a shelf or whatever. It may be a good fun game. I have no idea. I would like to try it, but I've never heard anybody talk about it outside of solo play. So, that's telling me it's multiplayer solitaire, which again, which actually, well, no, not again, but multiplayer solitaire is actually something that could deflate me off a game. If I think a game is not worth playing with other people and it's only a solo game, then depending on the game, some of them work like that, but there are games I want to play with multiplayer. So, you know, it it that would be a problem. But you know and that's that's the sort of thing you know you look at those games men the fur and saber there is nothing to the eye that would intrigue you into this game unless you literally see the world in beige and trust me I have a friend of mine who I swear sees the world in beige but in terms of the games he likes but you know digress the laugh but it's just like yeah unless you are devoid of seeing color or you know something exciting then I don't know I don't see what in

52:40 those games would make you Oo, excited for this one. Yay, beige Eurom mechanics. It's why, but it's just it it's kind of weird, but yeah, that's that's yeah, bite is with the eye. So, I guess visual appeal. It won't necessarily get me like super excited for a game. Like, oh my god, this has got such excellent production quality. This game is going to be amazing when it comes out, but no, it's definitely going to help. It's not going to deflate it anymore if I see that it's produced well, at least. Um, okay. Anything else? Uh, we've done designer, we've done publisher, theme mechanics. I mean, at this point, you're now going into kind of nitpicky bits. So, you know, length of the game. If I know the game is going to be super long, then, you know, the game better do highly on the other bits I've just mentioned before I'm going to get that excited over it. Uh, that's definitely a factor. Player count. Um, I mean, most games should be two to four, although the two-player modes usually a variant.

53:36 If I see it's got five on the box, that usually means it's not been designed very well with five. it's just to please the people who have extended families and um or uneven gaming groups and it's just yeah I mean that that can you know be a factor but I don't get excited for a game just because it happens to have the right player count settings so that's not really a thing and I mean yeah some of these points kind of are more what deflates me to a game rather than excites me to a game you know there I mean that's the problem you so many games come out and I think the recent like shipping crisis and you know Trump tariffs and all these things that are affecting the industry in a negative way are also kind of doing something that I kind of wanted the industry to do a little bit which is slow the hell down.

54:21 The industry can afford to slow down a bit, not release thousands and thousands and thousands of games every year because we can't physically play them all. You know, back in the day you used to only get like a couple hundred games a year, but people were excited for those. Like people were like, "Oh, this is going to be the games of the year. Let's try it. Now everything just blends into each other and so games get missed out and people sort of go why didn't this one get more love? Because there's like tens of thousands of games every year. It's not impossible to get yourself seen unless you're either very good at social media cough Stonem or your, you know, or your game is just that good. You know, it's it's definitely going to be tricky to get yourself noticed. That's just the way it is. Um, so if the industry does slow down a bit, which I feel like it has done certainly in the last few months. I mean, you know, it's not often I actually run out of games to review even in the quiet months, you know, it's probably a good thing in that respect. I mean, obviously, I wish that companies didn't have to close and people didn't have to lose their jobs, but, you know, that's the negative side of things, but, you know, the industry slowing down a bit is not something unwarranted. Uh, but what else? What else? Now, I mean, that's kind of the summary of it. theme unusual or innovative mechanics and to some extent publisher pedigree will have an impact um like more than others obviously I love expansions but yeah I think the theme and the interesting mechanics are the main thing you know a

55:51 good theme yeah what's the law I used to use um I think it still applies now was it a good yeah a good mechanics will make me enjoy a game a good theme will make come back for the second play. And that's kind of a law I do live by. You can give me a game with half decent mechanics and I'll enjoy it and I'll think it's fine. But if I'm not interested in the theme or if it doesn't really grab me and immerse me into the game, then chances are I might not come back to the second place cuz I'll be like, well, what else is there, you know, or I think, well, I'd rather play this one. But you give me a solid theme. You give me solid mechanics. You give me interesting stuff to do and immerse me into the game like Spirit Island and Deep Rock and Hegemany and Art and Nova and all these other favorite Sentinels of the Multiverse and that. You give me them in combination and I'm going to want to keep coming back to those games over and over and over. And so it works in that regard. But yeah, good theme, interesting mechanics. Like somebody make a third typewriter mechanic game. I would certainly love that right now. Uh, those two are probably the biggest things that get me excited for a game.

56:52 I'm no longer putting too much emphasis on the name on the box, but the name on the box would certainly maybe get me less excited for a game. You know, I'm not going to get too excited for a game just because my favorite publisher or designer makes it, but I'm definitely probably going to be less excited for a game if I know a designer or publisher that I'm not into their games as much is making it. But then I will still try it because I want to be proven wrong. I want to I want to pick up, you know, I I give Stonemar games a hard time. I don't mean to, but you know, it's just, you know, the way it is. Uh, but then there are other people whose games I've not necessarily gravitated towards. Um, you know, like, you know, I mentioned Stephan Feld and Kiti and that David Turxy, you know, David Turzy's games I still really enjoy some of them and some of them I find a bit dull. You know, it really is up and down. But I want to pick up a game by those designers. I want to pick up a Stonemar game. I want to pick up a, you know, a game by somebody I don't normally like and play it and go, "This is fantastic. Well done. Kudos from me. This is the game I'm keeping on the shelf. Well done.

57:58 More like this, please. I want more of that. I would love to get that, you know, and have that be something that I could rave off the mountain tops about at the end of the year, but it just doesn't happen as often as I would like at the moment. That's the thing. So, yeah. Hopefully that's given you a bit of insight to be interested to know what are your thoughts on three sisters. What are your thoughts on Ice? Although to be honest, I've heard a lot of people's thoughts on Ice already. And I get it. Second edition might be a good thing. Maybe you're waiting for the second edition. Don't let my first edition thoughts put you off too much cuz who knows, maybe they have fixed some of the issues. But you can understand why I hate that edition and why I hated that play. But yeah, let me know your thoughts. what gets you excited for a game or what deflates you in terms of a game, you know, or which I suppose what doesn't. I'm more interested in what gets you excited for a game and what you don't care about on a game. Like what is it on a game like on the stuff mentioned that really just could not phase you one way or the other. I mean, that would be quite interesting to know. But I'm going to let it go there. Hopefully, this microphone has picked up the sound nicely. We'll soon find out in post-prouction. But, uh, yeah, take care. I'll see a lot of you at the UK Games Expo. By all means, come up and say hi. Although if I am demoing, bear in mind that I may be in the middle of talking to people and I can't be distracted for too long. So, you know, you'll have to bear that in mind. But I'll be at the Drander Games booth. I think we're pretty much at the front of the hall. I think we literally go in through the door, turn right, and then we're on the left. I think it's literally not difficult to find Drander Games at this expo. I think they're in hall three. Uh I think it's hall three.

59:26 I'm not sure. But like I say, I don't think it's going to be hard to find. Let me put it that way. But otherwise, I'll be wandering around the expo checking out stuff. So, and hanging around in the evenings and just saying hi. I mean, I'm traveling light this time. So, not going to carry a bunch of stuff with me and that. And yeah, I can already hear the kids next doors banging footballs around. The amount of times I've had to kick footballs back over the fence because they just cannot keep them on their side of the fence. Kids, eh, I'm never going to be rid of them, even if I don't want my own. Oh well. Anyway, that's it for me. I'll see you on the next episode of the Broken Me. Remember, it's only a game. Take care. Bye for now. Love you all.