The Crowded Table – Gamers For Cures 2015 Edition!

Greetings, dear readers! It’s been quite awhile since we’ve gathered around The Crowded Table, but thanks as always for stopping in! In this edition, I take a quick look at a few games that we played at The Gamers for Cures 24-hour Marathon at The Gamer’s Armory in Cary, NC. For those not familiar with the marathon and its excellent cause of raising money for The Turner Syndrome Society, check out gamersforcures.com and consider contributing to the cause next year!  Just a small note: Many of these titles are recent Essen releases, but they’ll be headed into U.S. circulation before too long. Antarctica Sometime in the not too distant... Read More

The Crowded Table – Shmoecon Edition!

Hello, dear Shmoes! Some of you that follow @dicehateme on Twitter or listen to The State of Games and The Geek All-Stars podcasts have heard mysterious mentions of Shmoes and Shmoecon over the past few weeks. What exactly is a Shmoe and what does it have to do with a con? Well, a Shmoe is just a regular gamer who wants to play games with other Shmoes – so if you love playing games, you’re already a Shmoe! More specific to our gaming group here in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area, the Shmoes came together for the first official time this past weekend at Shmoecon 0.5. Some Shmoes were invited to a local con while other Shmoes... Read More

The Crowded Table: Fall 2012 Edition

Hello, dear readers, and welcome to another installment of The Crowded Table. Despite all the work that’s been piling up here at Dice Hate Me HQ, we’ve been able to squeeze in a surprising amount of gaming, including one weekend visit by Compounded designer Darrell Louder in which we fit in 23 different titles, all while working on some game design. We didn’t sleep much, but it was worth it. Below you’ll find four games that have graced our table in the past few weeks, a couple of which you’ll probably see pop up again on Dice Hate Me before too long. Enjoy! Star Wars: X-Wing Miniatures Game There were a lot of overly-hyped... Read More

The Crowded Table – Summer 2012 Pre-GenCon Edition

People always seem to regard summer as that lackadaisical time when they can kick back in a hammock with a strong margarita and relax with a good, long book. I don’t know about the rest of you, but with my busy summers, all I want to do is kick those same people out of their hammocks and steal their margaritas just for a moment’s break. This summer is no exception, as we’ve been traveling to and fro constantly from conventions and special gaming events in what seems like an endless procession of mid-week road trips. And I’m about to embark on another of those long side jaunts as I’ll soon be off to Indianapolis to... Read More

The Crowded Table – Spring 2012 Edition

I’m not sure what it is about spring, exactly, but board games tend to multiply in this season like a certain cotton-tailed carrot eater that likes to deliver painted eggs. That usually means that more games start hitting the table and more games need to be reviewed – because hey, it’s what I do, and all of you dear readers deserve it. So let’s ditch the dallying dialogue and hop straight to the heart. Dragon Valley I’ll be completely honest – when designer C.W. Karstens first contacted me about Dragon Valley during its Kickstarter campaign last year, I was a bit trepidatious. The combination of art and main... Read More