Board Games Killed the Video Star!

    JIM REED

 It's been said many times. Growing up, I played a ton of standard boardgames. However, video games were my true first love. One of my best Christmas memories was 83 (or around there) when I received my Atari 2600. Ever since I have pretty much owned every gaming system that came out. Yes, even the turbographix-16, the Jaguar, the Lynx, And the best system ever, the Dreamcast. Currently, I do not own a ps3, just a Xbox 360 and Wii.
     I also play and have played plenty of PC games. The late 80's were dominated by PC gaming and every last dollar of my paper route money went to Sierra. ( I think I learned all my sex education from Leisure Suit Larry)

     Obviously, a few years back, when I stumbled into this wonderful world of board gaming, time had to be found to play. Something had to take a hit to free some space in my schedule. One big thing that changed was television and movies. I was never a big channel surfer anyway, but my family and I did have our "must watch" shows. I may of had 10 or so where today I only have three or four, and with DVR, it's way more flexible than it was 5 years Ago. I don't care that I'm not watching as much TV. I'm actually glad about it.

     That freed up some time but not much, so other than sleeping, the next thing to take a hit had to be my video gaming, and although I didn't notice this much at first, now I see, that board gaming has just about eliminated my video gaming.

     Just a few years back, I would spend countless hours, and nights, climbing the online ladder boards and fragging friends and foes on games such as Halo, Gears of War, Call of Duty, Unreal Championship, Rainbow Six, Ghost Recon, and the list goes on and on and on. Offline, I would be hacking through multiple rpgs such as Oblivion, Dragon Age, Mass Effect, KTOR, and more, as well playing multiple sports, racing, and action titles.

     As I started playing more and more table top games, the first thing I noticed that went, were the first person shooters. I barley touched Halo 3 multi player, I never got into Gears 2, I stopped playing Unreal and Rainbow Six games. I did enjoy COD Modern Warfare but never got into World at War or MW2. I did play these games but only the single player story lines. Playing online requires a lot of time and practice if you want the game to be fun and not frustrating, and it was time I just didn't have anymore.

     Thankfully, a year ago (or more now), two games came out that I absolutely loved! Red Dead Redemption and Fallout 3! Fallout 3 is a single player only post-apocalyptic rpg. I sunk days of my life into this awesome title and still go back occasionally to finish up some DLC (down loadable content) missions. Red Dead Redemption is more an action adventure set in the wild west. (I love the wild west!) This game actually put a pause in my board gaming for a time. It does have some multi-player content and I did play some of the co-op multi player quite a bit and a bunch of the free roam online stuff.  These games pretty much faded out though near the end of last year though. I never did finish the Undead Nightmare for RDR.

     Over the past year, my desire to pick up and play new titles has drastically dropped. I have yet to play Mass Effect 2, Dragon Age 2, or Assassin's Creed Brotherhood (even though I own it!). I tried to get into Fallout Vegas but just couldn't. We picked up the Kinect at Christmas with a few games and even that hasn't been played much the past few months.

     But let me tell you what! You should have seen the look on my face last week when my wife called to tell me that a Funagain Games box was on my front porch. It took every thing I had to keep from leaving work early. Every Tuesday now is open game night at my house flip flopped with rpg night (currently Deadlands Reloaded. (did I say I loved the wild west?) Every forth Sunday is Pathfinder.

     A few nights ago, I turned on my Xbox and...well, I'm sure this has happened to everyone...I felt like playing something, but nothing I had I felt like playing. I dug through 40-50 game boxes, scrolled through dozens of down loadable games and nearly a hundred demos, and nothing. I started a bunch of games but quickly stopped. Man, what I wouldn't have done to set up and play a game of Stone Age or Puzzle Strike at that moment.

     Board gaming has killed my video gaming, and almost, I don't really care. I'm loving the hobby, as much as I ever loved video games. I'm much more involved in it, with podcasting, conventions, and blogging. But, at times, I miss it. I have a really good friend who is an avid video gamer. (seriously, he needs intervention!) He spends 95% of his free time console gaming. We don't talk much anymore because I'm not as caught up and consumed by the hobby any more. Back in January, he did come over and spend two days and we vegged and played the whole time. It was great!

     I'm not going into why I prefer board gaming over video games. That would be another long blog. But I do! Is there any games I'm excited about? Oh yeah! 11/11/11- Skyrim, Elder Scrolls V! Eventually, I will play more; Crisis 2, Gears 3, Rage, and more.

     Now, are there any board games I'm excited about? Oh yeah! Too many to list here! And lets not forget this, I'm still excited to play almost all the board games I already own! (One of the major reasons I love them more than video games.) But as I said, that... would be another blog.