I’ve been doing the Weekly Challenges. The latest involved an unusual binary encoding and indexing into a multiplication table. (Note that this is open until 5 December 2021.)
2019 fantasy, second of its trilogy. Everleigh Blair killed the usurper and took the throne of Bellona… but her problems are not even slightly over.
I don't generally use maps much when I'm role-playing; my games are fairly fluid, such that it's not very clear where things are going to be happening until the session has started, and exact tactical distances don't matter much. But since the pandemic began, particularly because I can't easily sketch something and hand it round the group, I've been experimenting with something a bit more sophisticated.
1984 drama/black comedy, dir. Joel and Ethan Coen, John Getz, Frances McDormand: IMDb / allmovie. Abby was just planning to leave her husband, but then it all got complicated.
1959 remake of 1950 audio thriller by Francis Durbridge, in 8 parts. A child is kidnapped, her "sitter-in" has vanished and may be responsible, and of course Drugs are lurking in the background.
2021 science fiction, second in a projected series. The huge Teixcalaanli Empire is going to war, thanks largely to the actions of Mahit Dzmare, Ambassador from the independent polity of Lsel Station. But of course a war that might end with extinction that isn't going to stop everyone from playing politics…
I’ve been doing the Weekly Challenges. The latest involved an unusual binary encoding and indexing into a multiplication table. (Note that this is open until 28 November 2021.)
This Meetup-based boardgames group continues at the Marlow Donkey.
2015 fantasy, last of the Katya and Starbride tetralogy. Katya and Starbride are both fighting to depose the Fiend-possessed usurper Roland, but winning that battle won't be the hardest thing either of them has to do.
1984 drama, dir. Wim Wenders, Harry Dean Stanton, Nastassja Kinski: IMDb / allmovie. A man stumbles out of the desert, and collapses. Why was he there? What will he do next?
Second of what I hope will be an ongoing revived series of face-to-face games.
2010 SF/fantasy, sequel to Soul Purpose. Alan Reece has coped with his experiences as the Conduit, a link between this universe and the space outside it, by trying to ignore them. Unfortunately there are things out there that aren't going to ignore him.
I’ve been doing the Weekly Challenges. The latest involved date calculations and numerical decompositions. (Note that this is open until 21 November 2021.)
All right, not actually in the garden now that it's a bit nippy, but in a well-ventilated room with masks…
1993 audio adaptation by Michael Bakewell of Christie's 1969 mystery, in one 90-minute episode. At a Hallowe'en party, a girl says that she once saw a murder, but didn't realise it until later. By the end of the evening she's been drowned in the apple-bobbing tub.
1983 drama/comedy, dir. Bill Forsyth, Peter Riegert, Denis Lawson; IMDb / allmovie. Young privileged man travels from Houston to Charming Rural Land, and learns an Important Lesson about Life.
1981 mystery, first in the Richard Jury series (mostly cosy mystery with police investigator, rather than police procedural). When the second murder happens in the village, the local force calls in Scotland Yard. But several more people will die before it's all resolved.
I’ve been doing the Weekly Challenges. The latest involved date calculations and numerical decompositions. (Note that this is open until 14 November 2021.)
More boardgames played from home (and one face to face).
1982 science fiction horror, dir. John Carpenter, Kurt Russell, Wilford Brimley: IMDb / allmovie. So the antarctic scientists find an alien spaceship in the ice…
I accidentally found out about this group when doing admin on Meetup for the Marlow one, and since I know one of the people involved…
2018 technothriller. Those sneaky Russians have a new terror weapon, and only a pre-emptive attack can prevent World War III.
1951 science fiction, dir. Christian Nyby, Kenneth Tobey, Margaret Sheridan: IMDb / allmovie. So the arctic scientists find an alien spaceship in the ice…
This Meetup-based boardgames group has returned to the Marlow Donkey.
I’ve been doing the Weekly Challenges. The latest involved date calculations and numeric palindromes. (Note that this is open until 7 November 2021.)
So we were just getting started with Star Trek Ascendancy when the pandemic hit… but it finally seemed reasonable to have some people over to play it again.
2020 SF, second of its series. Fergus has got back to his found-family, the Shipmakers of Pluto; but when he goes to Earth to tie off one last bit of unfinished business, things suddenly get desperately complicated again.
More boardgames played from home. Yeah, this is definitely falling off now that actual face-to-face gaming is becoming a possible thing again.
Some trailers I've seen recently, and my thoughts on them. (Links are to youtube. Opinions are thoroughly personal. Since I started doing a film review podcast I hate slightly less of everything, but I hate generic film with nothing to say if anything more than before.)