Alright, launching into the full con, now. Got my Instagram, calendar, and emails lined up so I can remember everything that happened, and let’s get right into it.

Thursday

So, you know, the con floor gets wild, so I was there pretty early to get a few games that I couldn’t pass up on. One of them was supposed to be Square Enix’s Chocobo game, but they unfortunately didn’t have any in stock. Happens, though I’ve heard a lot about folks getting nasty with booth workers for not having games in stock, which sucks. Immediately hustled to the Oink Games booth for my yearly offering of money in exchange for Whatever Games They Made, which were Nine Tiles Panic, Trick and the Phantom, Mr. Face, and Dual Clash Poker. I think I have November set aside for those reviews? Always love talking about Oink’s titles.

My lunch block was, predictably, filled with meetings, so I talked to Funforge about Namiji, the latest in their Tokaido line. Where the first one saw you sorta walking across Japan, this one is much more fishing-centric. It looked very pleasant, with fewer ways to aggressively block other players than the original Tokaido. Seems like sequel games are starting to heat up a bit, which makes sense, I think. I’ll be interested to see how it looks once all the art is finalized.

Anyways, ran around for a bit (saw Hub Games, publishers of the really awesome-looking MegaCity: Oceania, and got to check out the itten booth) and then got to talk to The OP about their latest titles, which was mostly me making conversation and staring directly at Talisman: Kingdom Hearts. I don’t care if it’s 3 hours long; I’m going to play it. Also got to check out Dungeon Academy from them; it’s a super-nifty roll-and-write. I like what it’s doing and hope to see some expansion content from them. Again, more on that in my review.

A real delightful note was stopping by Greater Than Games to check out Medium. Now, I’ll be real with you, I don’t really enjoy party games that often, mostly because if they’re too good they end up being all that I play and it’s harder to get my other reviewing responsibilities done. So maybe the problem is I love them too much? Who knows. Naturally, this means I’m skeptical about most of them. But Medium was fun. It did the exact thing I love, where you’re excited for someone else doing well, and it’s engaging enough that you’re still talking about the game while the game is going on. To wit, it’s almost a Reverse Just One; your goal is to play a card from your hand, then your partner plays one of theirs. Three, two, one: say a word. If you say the same word you score big! It’s clever and tough, which I really like. The team behind it is also a delight, so, bonus points to them for just being Great. Other highlight, for me, was probably Shobu, from Smirk and Laughter? Really interesting abstract game. Loved trying it at Gen Con; definitely looking forward to playing it more in the future.

After that, though, I grabbed dinner with a few friends, sat down for some more games, and hustled back to my hotel. Friday and Saturday were my busy days, so I wanted to make sure I had saved up enough energy to actually go through with them. I also picked up some pins, which is cool! I hadn’t done any pin collecting at cons before (mostly out of a desire to suppress my Completionist Instincts), so I think I’m not going to start, but it was fun to try.

And, of course, I picked up some review copies:

How was your Thursday? Let me know in the comments!