Month: February 2018

Capricon 38

And another year at Cap! I spent a lot of the con with a cold, unfortunately, but it was still fun! Gaming had gaming passports this year, where you had to play one game from each of four different groups. Once you played two, you could put a raffle ticket into any of the standard prize boxes (Star Trek, Doctor Who, Star Wars, Firefly). Once you finished the passport, you got to choose whether to put another ticket into one of those or put a ticket into the grand prize box (large compilation of assorted random cool stuffs). Seven Dragons, Settlers of America, Chemistry Fluxx, and part of Capricon's Wall of Fame

I spent an uncharacteristically small amount of my cash at this con, and my mother spent an uncharacteristically large amount of cash. Maybe there’s a correlation? She got me a nice framed unicorn in Art Show, which I have a matching folder for, and a mandrake root from Bast’s Garden in Dealer’s Hall, because it was cute. The conversation went something like this:

“Would you like a mandrake, dear?”

“Sure.”

(As she’s pulling out her wallet) “Wait, why am I buying this? You have more cash than I do!”

“Because you offered?” (She sighs and buys it anyways)

My voice was coming and going and crackling all weekend, but that didn’t stop me from bidding at Art Auction. What can I say? One of Cheryl’s dragons was going for $26. That’s too low for her stuff – her pieces usually average $50 by the end of Auction, and pretty much all of her work makes it to Auction. Art goes to Auction once it has at least three bids on it in Art Show.

Pretty much, I spent the weekend relaxing, playing games and hanging out with friends.

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Ooga!

Ooga! Ooga Ooga! Sorry, that was caveman speak for “Look, it’s a dinosaur!” I realize, those timelines may or may not accurately line up, but it works out well enough in the kids’ game, Ooga! Ooga

In Ooga, the players are members of a tribe, competing to be the first in hunting the correct dinosaurs for the menu. You are armed with spears (stick with a suction cup), and when the Tribal Chief throws the bones, you go where they lead you. Sometimes, that will be the forests, sometimes the deserts, and sometimes the spewing lava craters. Or, if you are really lucky, they will send you to the grove, where you get to spear… a coconut! Coconuts count as a wild card, standing in for any type of dinosaur.

When you successfully meet the menu criteria, you shout “Ooga!” and take the menu, replacing it. You also take the title of Tribal Chief, meaning you get to throw the bones. This is both good and bad, because while it does give you the time to survey the board before throwing, it also gives you less time to prepare the spear in your hand so that you can stab a dinosaur (Yeah, I know, poor dinos. They just wanted to be friends! Well, except for that T-Rex. He’s trying to eat the rest of them. And I will point out that you rarely see two T-Rexes on one card.)

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HISHE

In the world of obsessive fandom (where I have been stranded for years), sometimes we like to write our own endings for films. Sometimes, it’s because we think that our ending makes more sense, and sometimes it’s just plain funny. HISHE (How It Should Have Ended) uses a combination of both in their videos. I don’t think I need to say this, but I will anyways: these videos contain spoilers, so don’t watch them if you don’t want to know how the film ends.

I first ran into HISHE years ago, when my mother showed me the Frozen HISHE. Since then, I’ve scrolled through on my own, watching as many videos as I could. They’ve created two new places, the Super Café and the Villain Pub. At the end of the video, if the good guys win, they frequently hang out at the Super Café with Superman and Batman.  If the villain wins, they can be seen bragging about it to the others at the Villain Pub. Each of these settings also has their own little compilation of videos, grouping together all of the clips from the previous videos (Super Café 1, Super Café 2, Villain Pub.)

When they’re not busy rewriting stories and pulling running gags (“Because I’m Batman!”), HISHE also does musical parodies. There’s the Sound of Violence (Batman, compilation), Here Comes My Arrow (Yondu, Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2) which is actually the extended version of the one that played in the video, Not Worthy (Thor, compilation), and The 12 Days of Christmas (Villains in Villain Pub, assorted films).

You may have noticed that the videos I linked to have different styles of HISHE logos before them. So far, my favorite is the one that appears in Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2 and Spider-Man Homecoming.

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Guillotine

Off with their heads! No, you don’t get to behead your opponents. Yes, you do get to compete over who can behead the most important people in France. Yes, there are a lot of puns. No, King Louie is only worth 5 points, not 12.Guillotine

In my Social Studies class, we recently had a discussion about the French Revolution, so naturally, when my mother and I were trying to decide what game to play, I suggested Guillotine. Ironically, while I remembered the history behind the game, I didn’t actually remember the mechanics of the game itself. I have, of course, remedied that.

I would call this game straightforward, except the line of people awaiting beheading keeps shuffling… after all, nobody wants to be that one executioner who kills the Hero of the People (Yeah, that’s a card. He’s a -3 pointer, too.) You do, however, want to be the one to kill Marie Antoinette, King Louie, or even just that poor unlucky Cardinal who happened to be in France at the time (the religious figure, not the bird. I’m not even sure if a cardinal is large enough to behead properly in a guillotine. Perhaps a miniature guillotine?).

Anyways, the question becomes, if you don’t want to get stuck with the Martyr, how do you manage to kill somebody else? Well, there’s always the possibility that your designated Martyr Trips (Move any Noble back one space) and you end up with that Unpopular Judge instead, who, while not necessarily the best choice, is worth much more than that Martyr (It’s a matter of -1 point versus 2 points).

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