Saturday Morning Friday Blog

Sorry for the next day post, we were exhausted yesterday. Thursday night, we got back to our domicile and played way too much Eschaton (back the Kickstarter here).

After a hearty breakfast of biscuits and gravy (thanks, Jake), we went back to the Con to do more Con things. 

Great games from Friday:

Two Rooms and a boom: this party game is similar to One Night Werewolf in that everyone has a role that everyone else has to figure out. In this game, two groups are trying to discover who is the assassin and who is the president. If the president survives, Blue wins, if not, Red wins. It's a fun game with lots of other win conditions and variables. 10/10 would recommend.

Deathfear: Archon Games has all the great games. In this game, the players are trying to assemble the parts of a demon in order to gain its power and kill their friends. It's a blast and we bought it immediately. 

Epic Roll: this quick, 3-Player game from Summon Entertainment is like a dungeon crawl wherein the players are trying to get through a horde of monsters and be the first to kill the Lich. Maybe 15-20 minutes to play. 

Zombies: another great game from Twilight Creations, in this game, players try to survive a zombie apocalypse by racing to be the first on the helicopter. A mean game that turns friends against one another, Zombies is a lot of fun. The base game will set you back only $30 and there are about 14 expansions that can be combined or played separately, so the game will always stay fresh.

More later: look forward to our reviews of BattleTech by Harebrained Schemes and Giant Killer Robots by Cryptozoic, Evolver, and Weta Workshop, both of which we will be demoing today.

Saturday Morning Friday Blog

Sorry for the next day post, we were exhausted yesterday. Thursday night, we got back to our domicile and played way too much Eschaton (back the Kickstarter here).

After a hearty breakfast of biscuits and gravy (thanks, Jake), we went back to the Con to do more Con things. 

Great games from Friday:

Two Rooms and a boom: this party game is similar to One Night Werewolf in that everyone has a role that everyone else has to figure out. In this game, two groups are trying to discover who is the assassin and who is the president. If the president survives, Blue wins, if not, Red wins. It's a fun game with lots of other win conditions and variables. 10/10 would recommend.

Deathfear: Archon Games has all the great games. In this game, the players are trying to assemble the parts of a demon in order to gain its power and kill their friends. It's a blast and we bought it immediately. 

Epic Roll: this quick, 3-Player game from Summon Entertainment is like a dungeon crawl wherein the players are trying to get through a horde of monsters and be the first to kill the Lich. Maybe 15-20 minutes to play. 

Zombies: another great game from Twilight Creations, in this game, players try to survive a zombie apocalypse by racing to be the first on the helicopter. A mean game that turns friends against one another, Zombies is a lot of fun. The base game will set you back only $30 and there are about 14 expansions that can be combined or played separately, so the game will always stay fresh.

More later: look forward to our reviews of BattleTech by Harebrained Schemes and Giant Killer Robots by Cryptozoic, Evolver, and Weta Workshop, both of which we will be demoing today.

Saturday Morning Friday Blog

Sorry for the next day post, we were exhausted yesterday. Thursday night, we got back to our domicile and played way too much Eschaton (back the Kickstarter here).

After a hearty breakfast of biscuits and gravy (thanks, Jake), we went back to the Con to do more Con things. 

Great games from Friday:

Two Rooms and a boom: this party game is similar to One Night Werewolf in that everyone has a role that everyone else has to figure out. In this game, two groups are trying to discover who is the assassin and who is the president. If the president survives, Blue wins, if not, Red wins. It's a fun game with lots of other win conditions and variables. 10/10 would recommend.

Deathfear: Archon Games has all the great games. In this game, the players are trying to assemble the parts of a demon in order to gain its power and kill their friends. It's a blast and we bought it immediately. 

Epic Roll: this quick, 3-Player game from Summon Entertainment is like a dungeon crawl wherein the players are trying to get through a horde of monsters and be the first to kill the Lich. Maybe 15-20 minutes to play. 

Zombies: another great game from Twilight Creations, in this game, players try to survive a zombie apocalypse by racing to be the first on the helicopter. A mean game that turns friends against one another, Zombies is a lot of fun. The base game will set you back only $30 and there are about 14 expansions that can be combined or played separately, so the game will always stay fresh.

More later: look forward to our reviews of BattleTech by Harebrained Schemes and Giant Killer Robots by Cryptozoic, Evolver, and Weta Workshop, both of which we will be demoing today.

Saturday Morning Friday Blog

Sorry for the next day post, we were exhausted yesterday. Thursday night, we got back to our domicile and played way too much Eschaton (back the Kickstarter here).

After a hearty breakfast of biscuits and gravy (thanks, Jake), we went back to the Con to do more Con things. 

Great games from Friday:

Two Rooms and a boom: this party game is similar to One Night Werewolf in that everyone has a role that everyone else has to figure out. In this game, two groups are trying to discover who is the assassin and who is the president. If the president survives, Blue wins, if not, Red wins. It's a fun game with lots of other win conditions and variables. 10/10 would recommend.

Deathfear: Archon Games has all the great games. In this game, the players are trying to assemble the parts of a demon in order to gain its power and kill their friends. It's a blast and we bought it immediately. 

Epic Roll: this quick, 3-Player game from Summon Entertainment is like a dungeon crawl wherein the players are trying to get through a horde of monsters and be the first to kill the Lich. Maybe 15-20 minutes to play. 

Zombies: another great game from Twilight Creations, in this game, players try to survive a zombie apocalypse by racing to be the first on the helicopter. A mean game that turns friends against one another, Zombies is a lot of fun. The base game will set you back only $30 and there are about 14 expansions that can be combined or played separately, so the game will always stay fresh.

More later: look forward to our reviews of BattleTech by Harebrained Schemes and Giant Killer Robots by Cryptozoic, Evolver, and Weta Workshop, both of which we will be demoing today.

Saturday Morning Friday Blog

Sorry for the next day post, we were exhausted yesterday. Thursday night, we got back to our domicile and played way too much Eschaton (back the Kickstarter here).

After a hearty breakfast of biscuits and gravy (thanks, Jake), we went back to the Con to do more Con things. 

Great games from Friday:

Two Rooms and a boom: this party game is similar to One Night Werewolf in that everyone has a role that everyone else has to figure out. In this game, two groups are trying to discover who is the assassin and who is the president. If the president survives, Blue wins, if not, Red wins. It's a fun game with lots of other win conditions and variables. 10/10 would recommend.

Deathfear: Archon Games has all the great games. In this game, the players are trying to assemble the parts of a demon in order to gain its power and kill their friends. It's a blast and we bought it immediately. 

Epic Roll: this quick, 3-Player game from Summon Entertainment is like a dungeon crawl wherein the players are trying to get through a horde of monsters and be the first to kill the Lich. Maybe 15-20 minutes to play. 

Zombies: another great game from Twilight Creations, in this game, players try to survive a zombie apocalypse by racing to be the first on the helicopter. A mean game that turns friends against one another, Zombies is a lot of fun. The base game will set you back only $30 and there are about 14 expansions that can be combined or played separately, so the game will always stay fresh.

More later: look forward to our reviews of BattleTech by Harebrained Schemes and Giant Killer Robots by Cryptozoic, Evolver, and Weta Workshop, both of which we will be demoing today.

Post Lunch Day 1

After lunch, we swung back into the Convention to play Eschaton, a tremendous game by our friends at Archon Games.

Eschaton is a deck builder and area control game in which the players are cultists attempting to spread their religion before the end of the world/game. We had a load of fun playing it and ended up backing it on their currently running Kickstarter.

We also had an interesting time playing Gauntlet Legends on an arcade game that we found in a hallway. You can see our play-through and a short interview with out man at Harebrained Schemes, Mitch Gitelman, on our Facebook by searching Geek Cast Live.

Gen Con 2016-Morning 1

After a grueling morning of walking around the Con, we're currently refreshing ourselves at the Tilted Kilt.

Notable games this morning:

- Iron & Ale: from our friends at Table Forged, this dwarves drinking game is tons of fun! Check them out and make are you get the expansion and the special Gen Con card!
- Imploding Kittens: the much anticipated expansion to Exploding Kittens is available for pre-order on Amazon, or you can pick it up at Gen Con for just $10.
- Eschaton: the new game from Archon Games, the producers of Geek Cast Favorite--Shindig Machine.

We also stopped by our friends at Harbrained Schemes and Dog Might. More on them this afternoon.

Cartoon Joe's Gen-Con Mostly-Live-Blog!

This year marks the fourth year the Geek Cast Crew will be making the trip down to Indianapolis for the Best Four Days in Gaming™. As Provided in the Press Release:

INDIANAPOLIS (July 8, 2016) Gen Con 2016 will return to the Indiana Convention Center August 4-7 for THE BEST FOUR DAYS IN GAMING™, and current badge sales indicate the show is on-pace for record attendance as well.

Gen Con is the original, longest running, and best-attended gaming convention in the world. Gen Con 2016 will feature more than 15,000 events taking place over the four-day weekend. Last year, Gen Con set an attendance record with more than 61,000 unique attendees coming from all 50 states, every Canadian province, and more than 54 countries. For the first time ever, Gen Con will offer programming in the Lucas Oil Stadium exhibition space. According to tourism group Visit Indy, Gen Con drives more than $67 million in annual activity to the city of Indianapolis. At Gen Con 2016, attendees will have a chance to meet the experts in the gaming industry, play newly released games, and get a sneak peek at the latest developments.

It will be open to the public Thursday, August 4, through Sunday, August 7, 2016. Thursday through Saturday, the Exhibit Hall is open 10 am to 6 pm and Sunday from 10 am to 4 pm. 24-hour gaming takes place at the Indiana Convention Center and at area hotels during the four-day event.
Everyone attending Gen Con must purchase a badge. A badge allows the individual entrance to the show, admittance to the Exhibit Hall, Art Show, Anime events, seminars and any events happening in the public areas that do not require an event ticket.

We will be there all weekend, playing and reviewing games, interviewing friends of the show, and generally Geeking Harder! Cartoon Joe will post updates right here throughout the weekend, and you can look forward to our full take on Gen Con sometime on Saturday at the usual place: gcl.ninja!

Heroes Day

Hello, Internet. Been a while.  Sorry to keep you. Those of us at Geek Cast Live have been doing our best to secure you some fantastic content to listen to on a weekly basis, and well, your eyeballs have been left a little neglected.

Fear not, though! I'm here to rescue you and to tell you a story. Today is June 10.  Perhaps that doesn't mean much to you, but to me and millions of geeks like me (okay, it may only be thousands or tens of thousands, but it's still higher than most of us can count, so shush) today is Nikola Tesla Day. If you need to know why Tesla needs to be celebrated, I'm going to direct you over to The Oatmeal, a fantastic website run by a fantastic human being who happens to also be one of my heroes.

In that particular comic I linked you to, The Oatmeal delineates clearly why it is that Nikola Tesla is the Greatest Geek Who Ever Lived. Yeah, I capitalized it. It's that true.  Basically, Tesla was a man of unparalleled genius who's work went virtually unrecognized during his life.  He was an inventor who created things of such power and beauty that we basically can't replicate much of it to this day.

Today, had he the power of immortality as well as unmatched genius, would have been his 158th birthday.  And today, Tesla Motor Company Founder and CEO Elon Musk decided to celebrate that birthday by donating ONE MILLION DOLLARS to The Tesla Science Center.

Now, in case you're wondering, Tesla Motors is not actually connected to Tesla himself...at least not directly.  However, the motor in their wildly-successful-completely-electric Model S was designed by Nikola Tesla, and they are using his name perfectly legally--and I think--as a perfect homage to a man who was so wonderful his own time was unable to recognize him.

In short, I want to use this post to recognize Nikola Tesla--the future embodied in the past, Matt Inman--the creator of the Oatmeal and an inspiration in his own right, and Elon Musk--a man who, but for his philanthropic enterprises, would be Tony Stark.

I also want to beg you, internet, to please throw a few ducats (if you have such medieval currency laying about) into this fund to support the restoration and rebuilding of the Tesla Science Center at Wardenclyffe. You've probably already supported the indiegogo that put the kettle on the stove, now, let's have some tea.



For more information on any of the topics covered here, please consult these links:

Joe's Someday Mobile

Nikola Tesla Comic

Another Thing The Oatmeal Did That I Really Like And You Should See

A News Article About Elon Musk, Money, and The Oatmeal


As Always, be sure to follow Geek Cast Live on Twitter:

@geekcastjoe
@geekcastry
@geekcastbass
@geekgurljo
@geekgurlles

Check out our website: Geekharder.com

And Listen to our podcast: Geek Cast Live Podcast

Keep Drinking Death Wish Coffee, Fly the Flag, and Geek Harder!

Four Years Later, I'm Still Not Over LOST

*Chshweeaaang* LOST

Those of you who were (let's face it are) fans of the show can probably still hear that hauntingly wonderful gong noise that signaled the beginning of the best hour of your week for 6 years (if you haven't seen it, hop to the bottom for a brief description followed by a spoiler-free #hashtag summary). The adventures of the characters on that mysterious island still haunt my daydreams.  Sometimes, when I'm sitting in traffic, I can hear the sound of the smoke monster.  I like to imagine that it's just around the corner preparing to crush the lousy drivers in front of me that won't just ACCELERATE AT THE DAMN LIGHT.

*sigh*

Anyway, as some of you know, I'm at grad school in Chicago.  I also happen to be unemployed. This means that when I'm not studying (who studies?) or in class (yay learning!) I'm watching Netflix.  If you've been following the podcast, you know that in the last month I've finished Battlestar Galactica, House of Cards, and The West Wing.  Today, for the 20th time, I re-watched J.J. Abrams's TED Talk. This led me to believe that I was finally ready to watch LOST again.  I mean, it's been four years already.  That's four years of new experiences (changing majors, going to Florence, graduating from Purdue) that should have restored my emotional levels to pre-LOST levels, right? RIGHT?

And so, excited, I hopped onto Netflix, clicked the little picture of the LOST DVD art and got ready once again to enjoy the greatest show I've ever seen.  But I made a mistake.  Instead of just starting over, I tried to look for some of my favorite episodes (I've got a paper due tonight, I can't afford to watch 6 seasons of LOST by tomorrow afternoon**), so I started reading the episode descriptions and *Chshweeaaang* every emotion I've ever had for these characters--Desmond, Locke, Benjamin, Sayid, Penny, HUGO!--came roaring back like a tsunami in my heart.  Luckily, I was able to close the browser before my afternoon transformed into a trip to the ice-cream store followed by tears in a dark corner in my apartment.

I'm just not over it.  I love the show. The mystery, the cliffhangers, the characters, the dual-universe thing, Vincent the dog, and Jack closing his eyes as the most perfect TV series I've ever seen comes to an end.  Ugh. So many feels. So little time. Maybe someday I'll be able to return once again to that wonderful Island.  But not yet.

**I've tried this. Watching during every possible waking hour I had it took three weeks to watch all six seasons. Try this at your own risk.


Here's the description I promised earlier
For those of you who haven't seen the show, it's about a group of people who crash land on an island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.  The plan was to go from Australia to California. Instead, they get trapped in an epic battle between two demi-godlike guardians of the island. The themes in the show include the tension between Fate and Free Will, Faith and Reason, and (naturally) Good and Evil. It asks a lot of you, but if you accept the ride, I promise, it's worth every minute.

#HASHTAGSUMMARY
#eyesopened #what  #crashland #pregnantchick #pentracheotomy #thatguysdead #knifeguymrclean #junkiemoth #driveshaft #youareeverybody #others #MICHAEL #waitshespeaksenglish #deadguywalking #islandprovides #polarbears #smokemonster #maninblack #Russeau #sciencenames #island #notpenniesboat #richardhasladyeyes #4815162342 #MisterEkosWackAMoleStick #timetravel #BOOM #alternateverse #Seeyabrotha #HugoRayesEverybody #Iseedeadpeople #Jacob #twobrothers #SmokemonsterLocke #hyrda #darma #swan #fishsong #whydshedieijuststartedtolikeher #poorsayid #miracledoctor #whatsupwiththechurch #Ohigetit #itsametaphorfordeath #epicleftturns #drinkthisbecomelikeme #THEDOGISBACK #eyesclosed


If you liked, hated, or wonder about the show, feel free to share your opinions in the comment section below. 

Be sure to check out our website at geekharder.com.  Listen to my podcast at geekcastlivepodcast.com/podcast.

For more random thoughts be sure to follow me on twitter @geekcastjoe and if you like what I'm doing be sure to check out the other folks at Geek Cast Live: @geekcastlive @geekcastry @geekcastbass @geekgurljo @geekgurlles.

Thanks for reading.