Review - 2023

1st January 2024 (Monday)

Year In Review:
2023 Review

This Year Was… … :

The Year of Incremental Difficulty. It is as if 2022 said "Okay, let’s do that all over again, only this time at +1 difficulty.” So, it was not so much a learning year, it was more akin to solving the same math problems with additional variables. Nevertheless, things are getting harder. Everything from inflation, cost of living, value of other currencies, radical protestations and conspiracy theorists appears to be on the upward tick, with the exception of the number of people masking and the connectivity of my home broadband which appears to have experienced Jupiter-like levels of gravity.

I’m sorry. This was not a 2023 thing, more like a December thing but it really is pissing me off

The debilitating economy aside, my nation is still here, soaking in the sweat inducing tropical humidity and seasonal monsoon rains. PMX, DSAI or Supreme Chancellor Han Solo (if you read the 2022 entry) has managed to hold on to power and is probably the most challenged leader we have had in our nation’s history. I can only imagine that my deluded dreams have come true, that political opponents have decided to let the season carry on rather than continuously calling for overtime (elections) that continuously results in a stalemate and a nonrefundable RM1billion per pop in election costs. I might be feeling my age, but when you’re the PIC of groceries in the household, you do realize that prices of bread, butter, cheese, fruits and basically everything is creeping up at an increasing frequency. Whilst it might not be the overnight hyperinflation of Venezuela, it is still worrying to see the size of my supermarket cart conspicuously dwindle across the years for the same amount of ringgit. Although… the price of cheese has actually come back down, which is a big sigh of relief considering the speed with which Padawanminigeek consumes it.

Yet despite the disillusionment, the focus of the rakyat (people) remains on issues that matter most - public holidays

Now observe Padawan Minigeek in her natural habitat – the bedroom. As she approaches the tween years of training, the Padawan secludes herself in isolation, with only a data pad to while away the time. This Padawan in particular appears to be observing a harsh protein diet and takes inordinately long showers, she claims it is for her health although there is no evidence to support this. In the eyes of her Jedi Master, this Padawan has a streak of vainness unbecoming of a Jedi, being a bit too concerned about her looks and the perception of the passerby. Then again, this Jedi Master is not only male but suffers from the opposite form of vanity – “If I’ve got the goods, I don’t need no looks”. Nevertheless, Padawan Minigeek’s training proceeds apace in academics, gymnastics, melodies and anime consumption although religious studies have met with a fair bit of resistance. On the bright side, the number of fights breaking out in the training facility has dwindled significantly, I suspect this is due to the fact that Padawan Babygeek can now give back as good as he is given and in his older sister’s eyes, is not such a dumb dumb anymore. Her current pet peeve with me is that she is only allowed to read each Harry Potter book at the same age as when I read them, which means she will be 23 years old by the time she finishes it. I tell her that it is because she needs to be older to read the more mature material in the later books, in reality, why should she not go through the same suffering all Potterheads went through in my generation.

Another year for Padawan Minigeek to outgrow the tree I thinks

Padawan Babygeek has forgotten what roses smell like, having seemingly discovered the secret of perpetual motion and at the same time, lost the ability to stop at the same time. We always had this inside joke about Padawan Babygeek, that he is a binary digit, either 1 or 0 (asleep) with no ability of being any decimal in between. As a Jedi Master, I suspect that this is a side effect of too much time with the learning console, not learning but rather consuming videos of screaming YouTubers for some reason. So, when I can, I draw upon my authority as Jedi Master to institute non screen times, more often that not, this tends to result in more boardgaming life lessons. Everybody wins. At the official training academy, Padawan Babygeek is doing well in his lessons, although not up to the standard of mama Jedi Master. The dust-ups have thankfully reduced and are more playing that has gone out of hand, however the inclination to always want to be first (except in academics) still has not gone away. Padawan Babygeek has become famous as the boy with his bag of holding, the enchanted schoolbag that opens to an extradimensional space, except its just a normal schoolbag, being treated as if it were a bag of holding. Effectively what is stuffed in it, never comes out the way it originally looked, and of course you can find food, drink, tools, paper, books and all manner of forgotten knick knacks should you be brave enough to explore its depths.

Padawan Babygeek with his brother from another mother from school

Padawan Minigeek’s boardgame training has hit an all-time low, it turns out that perhaps I taught her a little too well and so she hates to lose more than she loves to win. It was great while it lasted and who knows, she might come back to the table again in the future. In the meantime, Padawan Babygeek has stepped up to the plate to fill the void splendidly. At 23 plays, Padawan Babygeek has graduated to the big time, with games like Seasons, Dwellings of Eldervale, Ark Nova, Lost Ruins of Arnak, Lords of Waterdeep and even one play of Gloomhaven with us. More than just bigger games, Padawan Babygeek has grown patience and appreciation for the process, willing to spend the turn to gain money as opposed to just sticking up the bank previously. Playing with Padawan Babygeek has been a real treat as my number of physical plays with other people has dropped by more than half from the previous year.

This was the one and only time Padawan Minigeek played boardgames with us in 2023

As I moved through different jobs in my life, a curious but consistent thing I noticed was that those at the very top tend to take their meals by themselves. And I understand it a little bit now, it is not simply maintaining impartiality or not giving any impression of favouritism, it is a brief period in time where you can be yourself without any judgment. Anybody who is looked up to, such as teachers, would probably face this predicament, which is why there are reminders to keep our private and teaching life separate. To be honest, I have no problem with the judgment of students, it is swift, honest and very forgiving. So, I take my meals with them and I watch my favourite ball game or read my favourite manga while I do so, and I can do this because with them, I am me.

I hold no wisdom

With all that out of the way let's talk about some boardgame statistics for 2023 using the very handy Board Game Stats app, with a side-by-side comparison to 2022:

2023 v 2022

Seen side by side, there are a few takeaways for me personally. So, the big thing is that the number of plays has fallen, although if you take away UNO and Gloomhaven, the drop is less significant. Interestingly, the calendar distribution is oddly different, I played more games in the holidays of 2022 than 2023 (Jun – Jul, Nov – Dec). It also appears that 7 Wonders and Oriflamme continue to be the favourite staples of my BGA group.

BoardGameArena continues to be my Tuesday night game night. This year was Dr TMYs year in the third season of our boardgame league, taking 3 quarter champions and consequently the season title. Instead, we shall always remember this season as the season “Hardi Throws Title With Own Goal On Last Kick”. With the quarter champion on the line, Hardi is leading and needs Dr TMY to finish at least 3rd. With the option to assassinate Kyle or Dr TMY’s Lord, he picks Kyle, effectively losing the quarter title when it was in his grasp. It’s nights like this that actually make my week and I’m very grateful for it. By the way, we are still looking for a fifth. If you can take heat, give heat and live on that thin line labelled “Frenemies”, send us your CV.

Prepare to be tested

This year was the year of second-hand and discount acquisitions. Out of my 8 new purchases, 6 were bought second-hand or at a discount and 1 was an expansion which as we all know, do not count. I haven’t put anything up for sale recently and I am quite happy with the status of the collection as it is. I think the next time I will have to ask some serious questions about the state of some of my unplayed boardgames will be when Andromeda’s Edge arrives in 2024.

It has been a while so here is a boardgameshelfie of my collection

Boardgames From Last Year's Wishlist:

Only Andromeda’s Edge has made it into the collection from last year’s wishlist. Well "made it" is a relative term seeing as delivery is projected to be in June 2024. Another boardgame that technically came from 2021’s wishlist also made it into the collection – Boonlake. However, initial impressions indicate that Boonlake is a bit too complicated and does overstay it’s welcome. It came 40% off second hand so I couldn’t resist at the time. I will try to get one good session of it in before deciding if it goes the way of Aeon’s End: War Eternal.

Wishlists – keeping your FOMO at bay

Boardgames Added / Dropped / Staying on This Year's Wishlist:

A Feast For Odin available on BGA at the very least

And another year comes and goes with A Feast For Odin staying on the list. I hope I don’t have to wait until 2026 when they release A Feast For Odin X before I get to add this perennial wishlist item to the collection.

Apiary has been receiving strong reviews and is set in space!

Apiary is actually giving me a lot of vibes similar to Andromeda’s Edge minus the space battles. I suspect that Apiary will stay on the wishlist until Andromeda’s Edge fulfils then I will take another look at Apiary, which might be available for cheaper by then as well.

Ezra And Nehemiah

I’m still jonesing for a boardgame that is based on a biblical story. A worker placement game by Garphill Games about rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem looks like just the thing. Still I decided against backing the kickstarter as retail copies of Garphill Games usually arrive earlier than their kickstarter copies in Malaysia. Until next August, I have time to think if this fairly complicated boardgame will get any plays in my collection.

Viscounts Of The West Kingdom Expansions

I suspect this is definitely the FOMO. Whilst base games are quite often restocked in my country, expansions can take years to come to our shores after its initially release. I picked up Viscounts Of The West Kingdom, a 2020 release, just this year. Trying to source the expansions would definitely involve both currency and shipping expenses so I will have to see what’s the best available option other than going straight to Renegade Games Studios which shipped my Paladins Of The West Kingdom expansion out of Greece.

Sleeping Gods OR Near And Far

I loved playing choose your own adventure books as a kid. I had a few from the Lonewolf series (man some of those were hard), nearly all the Fabled Lands books that were printed (these were really brilliant) and I have been looking for a boardgame that comes with great story but hopefully not just entirely about the storyline. Red Raven Games appears to be the answer after I looked at ISS Vanguard, Roll Player Adventures and Clank Legacy. I am torn between the two, but this seems the least likely wishlisted item to be purchased.
So here is the updated wishlist as at the end of 2023.

It is nice to have a healthy wishlist again, to properly go through the plus and minuses of each boardgame before acquisition

Boardgames Added To THE SHELF:

So apart from Andromeda’s Edge & Boonlake, what else did I acquire in 2023? Hint: This was really the year of the bargain hunter.

The Castles Of Burgundy

The Castles Of Burgundy
My first boardgame designed by Stefan Feld! I managed to pick this up brand new at a 25% discount. Of all of Feld’s designs, this seemed to be the most loved. At that price, I figured I could dispose of it easily even if the game doesn’t click with me.

Viscounts Of The West Kingdom

Viscounts Of The West Kingdom
It’s amazing how Garphill Games has managed to create trilogies of boardgames centred around similar mechanics and theme but all with its own identity. I have always wanted to pick up a second boardgame from this publisher and Viscounts seemed a little heavier than Architects. This second hand copy came with the folded space insert meaning it was at a 55% discount, for the price of making a short drive into the next district.

Scout

Scout
This was supposed to be another bargain hunt from the monthly sale on Shopee but it turns out that I ended up paying full price when comparing with other FLGS that had copies in stock. I originally wanted to gift this away for Christmas but decided to add it to the collection in the end.

Ark Nova: Marine Worlds

Ark Nova: Marine Worlds
This is where I give in to my cardinal sin of purchasing expansions for boardgames I hardly play. I blame the completionist in me. All I have to hear are the words “I won’t play the game without this expansion” and it’s add to cart for me. Heck I even pre-ordered this expansion.

Point Salad

Point Salad
I have thoroughly enjoyed the BGA implementation of Point Salad so when a real sale came up this time, I decided to pick both Point Salad and Just One up for my upcoming family holiday on the sea. For both Point Salad and Just One, I managed to get them for a 25% discount.

Just One

Just One
I have never played Just One but have heard good things about it plus it has a slew of honours. Again, managed to get this at a nice discount.

Boardgames NEW to me in 2023:

Online boardgaming continues to introduce me to more new boardgames with a total of 12 boardgames new to me and only 4 of them were actually new to the physical table. As with last year, I will try to be as brief and concise about my experience as I possibly can.

Gizmos:
Just like Space Base, Gizmos was slow to catch on with the group but has now garnered 11 plays across its first year. A major part of its allure is that there does not seem to be a conclusive win strategy and of course this means that it becomes Hardi’s perfect cup of tea, winning 4 of his 7 plays so far this year. This has also translated into a physical copy for one of our group members and his children are also enjoying the game at home.

Pokemon TCG:
I picked up some decks for Padawan Babygeek’s birthday since he is really in Pokemon. We went on a binge of games duelling each other but I won most of the time so Padawan Babygeek’s interest has since waned. Ultimately not as interesting as MTG but if you love the franchise then there certainly is some appeal.

Architects of the West Kingdom:
I have never played Architects of the West Kingdom physically so we learnt it together on BGA with the group. Coming into the game, the only thing I knew was that you could capture the workers of other Players and honestly, we don’t do it too often in our plays. It is a bit like playing chicken, the Player who captures other workers kinda ends up using a turn to take that action whilst the rest of us blitz for the cathedral of building buildings. We are slowly bringing the playing time down bit by bit as we get more experienced with the game.

Architects of the West Kingdom - My favourite action is to raid the tax stand, somehow nobody else seems to see all the money stacked up there.

In The Year Of The Dragon:
Surprisingly, we were taught to play this Feld multipart monstrosity by Hardi, the “it is too complicated, let’s play something else we know”. It makes me wonder who had the patience to teach it to him in the first place. In The Year Of The Dragon, so aptly named, is like fighting a many headed hydra, you chop off one head only for 4 others to reappear and failure to take down the head doesn’t mean the others take a number and wait in line. Failure charges compound interest in this game.

Boonlake:
I haven’t really managed to get a full non-solo play of Boonlake yet. It looks really interesting and fun but I am getting the vibe that the game’s length outlasts the fun. Whilst the action selection mechanic is very novel, the premise of the game is to conquer the wildlands to get to factories that give you resources, making it easier for you to build buildings which give you points to win the game. I think the game would be a bit more interesting if the buildings were not so generic and impotent.

Next Station: Tokyo:
Surprisingly this was easier to understand that Railroad Ink. It still doesn’t make me better at the genre. It does remind me of a complicated version of bingo.

Andromeda’s Edge:
After discovering popsicles, you think “that’s it, my life is set, popsicles will satisfy me forever”, then you try gelato and your universe is blown. That’s what it felt like going from Dwellings of Eldervale to Andromeda’s Edge, on tabletop simulator no less. I felt extremely engaged with my space race, space battles and the engine building is light speed compared to Dwellings of Eldervale. I can hardly wait for the fulfilment in 2024.

Andromeda’s Edge - It already looks great in preproduction

Viscounts Of The West Kingdom:
I played this with my brother and he surprisingly shared my enjoyment of the game. Viscounts of the West Kingdom places more emphasis on townsfolk and using them to gain points via buildings, manuscripts and the castle. Taking on the castle requires some forward planning which I actually miscalculated resulting in a lot of wasted turns and ultimately my very fun loss.

Viscounts Of The West Kingdom - Interacting and moving around the game board was so integral to the game, it was refreshing

The Castles of Burgundy:
As mentioned earlier, my brother who detests all boardgames involving dice, surprisingly pronounced this as a good game. The name of the boardgame is somewhat misleading, as there is only a little portion involving building castles, rather it is more focused around developing the surrounding areas of your castle and making wombo combos as a result. In our game, special building tiles which I ultimately ignored, provided a lot of victory points resulting in the winner.

Fromage:
I tried Fromage on Tabletop Simulator when it was in its kickstarter phase. The mechanics were interesting, each Player is given workers in the shape of a slice of cheese and Player simultaneously place these workers onto their quadrant of the game board. Cleverly, the direction the cheese is facing determines how long the worker is “working” and since the game board spins at the end of every turn, the worker returns to you once it turns back in your direction. Strangely the game is not so much about producing cheese as to serve, display and market them? The overlying theme is a bit lost to me. Ultimately, I did have fun playing Fromage because it was easy to understand and turns flew by quickly but wasn’t very excited by variable powers on offer or the various mini games you need to play to score victory points.

Hadrian’s Wall:
So once again, this is me playing roll / flip / turn and write games without reading the rulebook, assuming that it would be all self-explanatory. I totally did not get this game at all and it was 100% not the fault of the game.

Forest Shuffle:
I wanted to like Forest Shuffle, a card game about building a forest of your own, starting with the trees, then attaching the birds, animals, insects, fungi, ferns and so on to each tree, creating a lively and vibrant forest. But my initial play was disappointing, I suspect because I had a bad draw engine and ran out of cards very frequently. I was also looking for specific cards and couldn’t find them, not knowing how rare those cards were on top of a poor draw engine made the game a bit of a drag.

Challengers!:
This really reminded me of this old card game we called "War". Basically you shuffle a standard poker deck and split the cards into two even piles. Each Player takes one pile and each turn both Players reveal the top card of their deck, the winner takes both cards. The ultimate winner is the Player with the greatest number of cards when the deck is depleted. Except in Challengers!, Players get to adjust their deck after each round, to add new characters / powers / combos to their deck. I didn’t feel that there was enough decision making space to warrant the time spent on it, yet somehow it managed to snag the coveted KdJ award this year.

Challengers! - More like Randomners!

Sea Salt & Paper:
With a quirky origami art style, Sea Salt & Paper is a card game with different sea creatures / boats / peoples interacting with each other. It has this unusual round mechanic where you either decide to play more turns to extend the round or end the round (presumably you do this if you think you are leading). Unfortunately I didn’t really understand how scoring worked and it was quite confusing for me on BGA. I might give it another try after understanding the rules further but this does look to be mainly a 2 Player affair.

Abandon All Artichokes:
We tried this unusual deck culling game to close out the night. So it was late and we were a bit slow on the uptake, so it was a little hard to read the abilities of the cards and build combos. Ultimately the carrots were the best at culling our decks of the no good artichokes.

Closing Thoughts On 2023:

2023 was really one of the level grinding years. More of the same or similar, making better adjustments, setting better things in place but still with the right amount of challenge that makes it worth the while. In the school, I am very glad that we are definitely in a better position than we were in 2022. I am also thankful that we have been blessed to see reward for our best efforts, well do I know the frustration of fruitless endeavours despite giving one’s all.

The Padawans continue to develop into their own persona day by day, solidifying some parts of the characters they will eventually become and discarding other aspects as childish memories. Padawan Minigeek continues to occupy herself with exploring known and unknown worlds through the medium of words and paper. Her secretive phase has become even more pronounced and I know that what she says is often not what she is thinking. She is strongly influenced by my sister and whilst there are some similarities starting to come out, I’m glad Padawan Minigeek has managed to keep her head on straight and at the same time not lose her childish sense of fun & humour that I’ve done my best to instil in both of them. Padawan Babygeek is now not only less emotional, but can maintain the presence of mind to tell you why he is upset. He demonstrates a stronger degree of forward thinking as well as understanding the consequences of actions beforehand. And yet, he continues to leave a trail of debris, rubbish, clothes and personal belongings in his wake, like a Hansel perpetually leaving breadcrumbs in his wake. Based on historical trend, I fear that this may somehow be a character flaw of Padawan Babygeek that was designed to be both infuriatingly annoying and lovable at the same time.

On the boardgaming front, 2023 was a good year but I still wish I could play more physical sessions on a more regular basis. I miss the round the table social banter and comradery that comes with just sitting with friends. Sadly, I suspect that my Gloomhaven party has indeed come to its natural end. I think life just got in the way and to be fair we had an impossibly great run as the SWAGamers. I have started to reset Gloomhaven back to my solo campaign which was also not too far from completion and I just might ask Padawan Babygeek if he would like to join me.

And here is our traditional family picture, although taken very late as one of us was in quarantine right between the Christmas and New Year period.

We hope 2022 was as good to you as it was to us

So what's next in 2024?

Ah, the iffy area of premonition, foretelling and prophecy. It turns out that I am absolutely lousy at it. Let’s go through the list shall we?
Negative student feedback – I did well and so my dread was for nothing. That sounds conceited but I am making a point that I was wrong
UK Games Expo – Have you seen the exchange rate lately? We’re going to Langkawi
Neighbours in our house – Yes but this is sporadic as opposed to all the time, perhaps for the best for our sanity as well. So I got one partially right
Finishing Gloomhaven & Frosthaven - Ha!

Empirical evidence would show that the predictions for 2023 were completely defeated by reality. “A man plans but God directs”, Proverbs 16:9. God never loses. Nevertheless, it is still entertaining at least so I will give it another shot.

I do have a new work challenge in 2024. Completing a two-year textbook in approximately 8 months for an express class of accounting students. It is very kind and surprising that accounting continues to be in demand by those who are studying the sciences, but I realized that to continue a standard paced class for these students would mean four after school classes a week, which would greatly hinder my efficacy in other areas. The challenge would be to maintain a balance between students understanding the material and maintaining speed to finish the material on time.

I have redirected my boardgame con/expo/unplugged energy towards trying to attend a boardgame retreat instead. It is local, more affordable and I get to play boardgames as opposed to buying more. VBS has always been the biggest obstacle due to the clashing schedules but now that VBS is moved to May for 2024, next year is really my chance to do this.

And I WILL finish Gloomhaven in 2024! *fingers crossed*

And for this year’s geeky contribution to the world, voila!

This makes me want to finish FFXII, I have never seen ANY of these

The United Nations has named 2024 as the “International Year of Camelids”. Camelids are basically herbivores with slender necks and long legs such as camels (obviously), llamas, alpacas and so on. As such my wish to everyone for 2024 is that there will always be a reserve hump for any emergency in your lives. Have a good one!

I must find out how the United Nations decides these things.