I am constantly amazed by how disciplined I am in my studies. Now that my full time job is studying chinese, i feel too guilty if i do other activities. as such i hardly ever engage in most of my former hobbies. thankfully there are podcasts about the various things i'm interested in. so each week i'll have a few playing in the background so i can at least keep up with my interests.
One podcast i listen to always has a small segment where they talk about the latest and greatest board games. Its probably the one time when I actually stop and focus my attention. It's fascinating to hear how deep, creative, and mature some of these games are. I really had no idea they even existed, while i loved board games when I was young, i never knew that there were games out there that took things even further and/or even more refined.
But it was always a bit sad to hear about these games. i figured there was no place to get them in Taiwan, and even if there was, it would be super expensive for something i'd play maybe once a year. Then a friend found out that there is a store in Taipei that has a lot of games and you go there and basically spend two bucks an hour to play any games you like.
So yesterday I finally went. Walking in the door and seeing that wall of games was amazing. I was like a little kid giggling with joy every time i saw the box for a game that I had heard about and so desperately wanted to play. they had over 300 games to choose from. Since it was just me and my friend, we couldn't play many of the games, but that was ok. They were kind enough to recommend some good two player games and take the time to teach us how to play. We ended up playing two games...
Mr. Jack - a type of mystery deduction game, where one person is the detective and the other is the killer, and the detective has to figure out which of the characters on the board is the killer. It's a bit stacked in favor of the detective, but it was still a blast to play. I stupidly lost because I forgot one of the rules, but i probably would have lost anyway, as it's quite difficult to be the killer.
Formula D - a car racing game. I had wanted to play this because i heard it was a good introduction game to these new brand of board games (trying to find a way to classify games that aren't Monopoly, Clue, or even Chess, etc.). I had a good time and yes i won but just barely, my car almost died.
Afterwards I was still so excited and anxious to go back and play some other games. My friend that I went with found out that there are quite a few places like this around Taipei. I look forward to going again to a place like this with a larger group of people and more time, so we can really get into some of the meatier games!
