Game studies

The game studies group meeting went well. My talk was rather unstructured, but hopefully someone got something of it. There were about eight people there, some of which were already quite familiar with board games. Different point of views, though. Petri seems like a fan of American school of board game design, citing games like Fury of Dracula. Satu was interested in board games from more academic point of view; they are a good way to study game mechanics, as the mechanics and rules of the game are transparent and visible. There was lots of interesting discussion.

I took some example games and in the end, gave my Settlers of Catan and Carcassonne on loan. I hope that results in two new converts (and of course their friends who play the games with them).

It was a rather pleasant two hours. The next meeting is in a month and then the discussion will be about classic computer games. My top three? Nethack, Civilization and Tetris.