My Christmas Wishes in 2021
I believe that those of us who masked and got vaccinated this past year each deserve a Christmas wish of our choice. However, I know that I'm not really qualified to determine the size of the wish that is granted. To that end, I have several wishes, Gaming Santa. They are of varying size, value, and likelihood, and I'm listing them all here. I leave it in your hands to determine which of them I deserve!
- 1. Sleeping Gods Finally Arriving at Miniature Market
- Ok, so, this is a thing that WILL happen. My wish is really more that it finally happens when it's supposed to happen. I pre-ordered this game back in January 2021 because it seems an awesome concept: "In Sleeping Gods, you and up to 3 friends become Captain Sofi Odessa and her crew, lost in a strange world in 1929 on your steamship, the Manticore. You must work together to survive, exploring exotic islands, meeting new characters, and seeking out the totems of the gods so that you can return home.
Sleeping Gods is a campaign game. Each session can last as long as you want. When you are ready to take a break, you mark your progress on a journey log sheet, making it easy to return to the same place in the game the next time you play. You can play solo or with friends throughout your campaign. It's easy to swap players in and out at will. Your goal is to find at least fourteen totems hidden throughout the world. Like reading a book, you'll complete this journey one or two hours at a time, discovering new lands, stories, and challenges along the way.
Sleeping Gods is an atlas game. Each page of the atlas represents only a small portion of the world you can explore. When you reach the edge of a page and you want to continue in the same direction, you simply turn to a new page and sail onward.
Sleeping Gods is a storybook game. Each new location holds wild adventure, hidden treasures, and vivid characters. Your choices affect the characters and the plot of the game, and may help or hinder your chances of getting home!"
Sleeping Gods is a campaign game. Each session can last as long as you want. When you are ready to take a break, you mark your progress on a journey log sheet, making it easy to return to the same place in the game the next time you play. You can play solo or with friends throughout your campaign. It's easy to swap players in and out at will. Your goal is to find at least fourteen totems hidden throughout the world. Like reading a book, you'll complete this journey one or two hours at a time, discovering new lands, stories, and challenges along the way.
Sleeping Gods is an atlas game. Each page of the atlas represents only a small portion of the world you can explore. When you reach the edge of a page and you want to continue in the same direction, you simply turn to a new page and sail onward.
Sleeping Gods is a storybook game. Each new location holds wild adventure, hidden treasures, and vivid characters. Your choices affect the characters and the plot of the game, and may help or hinder your chances of getting home!" - description courtesy of the publisher, Red Raven Games
I mean, how could I not want to play such a game?! Anyway, it was supposed to drop in May or so. I know delays happen, but now it's December, nearly a year after I pre-ordered it and 6 months after I was supposed to receive it, and it still hasn't arrived. Some of you might be saying, "Chris, it's on Amazon, though." Yes. Yes it is. Well, was. Now it's something like $100 to buy because there aren't anymore in stock or something. But my understanding of how this came to be is Amazon basically sniped everyone else by telling Red Raven they'd pay X amount of dollars if they sent all of their copies to Amazon before fulfilling orders to brick and mortar stores. Red Raven agreed because they need to keep their company going, and now here we are. Anyway, yeah, I'm definitely bitter about it. I'm really only angry with Amazon, because that's a bullshit business practice. I'm kind of mad at Red Raven, but if things fell out the way I described above, then I get it. I just don't have to like it. So I should get my copy in the next month or so. I think my most reasonable Christmas wish on this wish is that they actually hit the timing target this time so I don't have to wait any longer before playing it.
- 2. Armada News from AMG
- I believe this to also be a reasonable Christmas wish, though there's less of a guarantee than my first and mildest Christmas wish. That's also partially because the news about Star Wars Armada from Atomic Mass Games could possibly be bad news. I don't think it will be, but there's certainly that possibility. Here's the thing: it was announced around the time Clone Wars factions dropped that control of design and development of Armada was being shifted to AMG. They seemed excited about it and showed the new products a lot of love during one of their online events (even though the ships and upgrade cards had all been developed under FFG). They made two half-hearted attempts at alternate rule Armada events. I'm cool with the idea, but they didn't have any build-up to the announcement, so the attempts fell really flat. It happens, but I didn't love how they tripped up. Then they announced that they wouldn't have any news on Armada for a bit because they really needed to become more familiar with the game before they started putting their own stamp on it.
Cool! I don't love having to wait, but that's just me being impatient. I get that they plan on making some changes, possibly big ones, but they want to take the smart approach by really learning the ins and outs of the game before they just arbitrarily start making changes to the game design or start designing their own ships, squadrons, or upgrades. It has, however, been a minute since they made that announcement. And while I think Armada is generally in a good place from a balance perspective, it would be nice to have new things to which I can look forward. Right now, the thing to which I'm looking forward is Organized Play, and I'll be so very happy to have that back! But at some point, that'll wear off because I'd like to see the new factions catch up to the old ones in terms of options. So making number two on my Christmas wish list: Star Wars Armada news.
- 3. The Return of Gaming Cons
- This one is a bit of a hybrid, because some gaming cons have already returned. I wrote about my experience attending Geekway to the West a little while back and how excellent it was. I'm planning on attending Adepticon in March 2022, and I'm hoping to make it out to the NOVA Open in August or September 2022, whenever it (hopefully) is held. But obviously, that's all tied up with COVID-19 and where we are at that point. Have enough people finally gotten vaccinated that it's safe? Are those cons going to implement strong safety measures like Geekway did, despite the criticism leveled at them for doing so? It's not enough for me that gaming conventions make a comeback; I want them to be made as safe as feasibly possible, and I want to have a good time. It's a lot to ask for, I know. But I still think it is a reasonable wish, and so it lands right in the middle of my list. I want gaming cons to return, but require vaccination cards and masks. I want to attend these cons, and I'm simply not doing it without a mask.
- This one is a bit of a hybrid, because some gaming cons have already returned. I wrote about my experience attending Geekway to the West a little while back and how excellent it was. I'm planning on attending Adepticon in March 2022, and I'm hoping to make it out to the NOVA Open in August or September 2022, whenever it (hopefully) is held. But obviously, that's all tied up with COVID-19 and where we are at that point. Have enough people finally gotten vaccinated that it's safe? Are those cons going to implement strong safety measures like Geekway did, despite the criticism leveled at them for doing so? It's not enough for me that gaming conventions make a comeback; I want them to be made as safe as feasibly possible, and I want to have a good time. It's a lot to ask for, I know. But I still think it is a reasonable wish, and so it lands right in the middle of my list. I want gaming cons to return, but require vaccination cards and masks. I want to attend these cons, and I'm simply not doing it without a mask.
- 4. A Camp Cretaceous Boardgame
- There are a couple of reasons this won't happen. The first is that Camp Cretaceous is an IP someone would need to go through the trouble of obtaining, which means an expense that I'm sure they'd rather not incur while trying to sell an IP to gamers that most of us are unlikely to recognize. The second is that dinosaur games are all the craze right now, so any designers worth their salt are shelving their own ideas for dinosaur games so they don't get lost in all the noise.
All of this is a shame, because Camp Cretaceous is one of the best cartoons being produced right now. There. I said it. I absolutely had my doubts about it because I knew nothing about it. I had Netflix pulled up and my kiddo wanted me to turn it on because it had dinosaurs. It was part of Netflix's "Diversity Collection," so I figured it was just another tokenizing money grab, honestly. But what the heck, right? So I turn it on, and next thing I know, I'm sucked in right along with my son! My wife comes home and chuckles when I tell her what we're watching and that it's a really solid show. But that weekend, I go out to play games, and when I come home, he's playing with toys and now she's watching it! I smile as soon as I walk in the door and she immediately begins defending herself by saying, "What?! It IS really good!" The story and characters are compelling, the action is fun, the development of the characters is actually really well done, and I don't feel like the creators are trying to bop me over the head with "look how diverse our show is!" The characters just sort of happen to be who they are, the cast does stellar work, and I feel as though the way they and the show develops all feels very organic.
I won't lie: the fourth season is rough. It gets a little more real than I anticipated. But overall, the show is excellent, and I waited with bated breath for that fourth season to drop. And the final episode of the season is fantastic.
I want a board game that drops me into that world with those characters, and feels like the show I've come to love.
- There are a couple of reasons this won't happen. The first is that Camp Cretaceous is an IP someone would need to go through the trouble of obtaining, which means an expense that I'm sure they'd rather not incur while trying to sell an IP to gamers that most of us are unlikely to recognize. The second is that dinosaur games are all the craze right now, so any designers worth their salt are shelving their own ideas for dinosaur games so they don't get lost in all the noise.
All of this is a shame, because Camp Cretaceous is one of the best cartoons being produced right now. There. I said it. I absolutely had my doubts about it because I knew nothing about it. I had Netflix pulled up and my kiddo wanted me to turn it on because it had dinosaurs. It was part of Netflix's "Diversity Collection," so I figured it was just another tokenizing money grab, honestly. But what the heck, right? So I turn it on, and next thing I know, I'm sucked in right along with my son! My wife comes home and chuckles when I tell her what we're watching and that it's a really solid show. But that weekend, I go out to play games, and when I come home, he's playing with toys and now she's watching it! I smile as soon as I walk in the door and she immediately begins defending herself by saying, "What?! It IS really good!" The story and characters are compelling, the action is fun, the development of the characters is actually really well done, and I don't feel like the creators are trying to bop me over the head with "look how diverse our show is!" The characters just sort of happen to be who they are, the cast does stellar work, and I feel as though the way they and the show develops all feels very organic.
I won't lie: the fourth season is rough. It gets a little more real than I anticipated. But overall, the show is excellent, and I waited with bated breath for that fourth season to drop. And the final episode of the season is fantastic.
I want a board game that drops me into that world with those characters, and feels like the show I've come to love.
- 5. Asmodee Divests Its Holdings
- This is the Christmas wish that will never happen, but I suspect I'll need to ask for it every single year in spite of the futility. After all, one can always hope for a Christmas miracle...
Asmodee has basically bought up every single game producing company it can ensnare. There's a lot I don't know about the situation, but it seems pretty straightforward in that games are a passion for those who make them, but we want to be paid a living wage for doing the work. It's a lot harder to achieve that end without some bigger parent company looking out for you, and Asmodee sorta kinda does that. I mean, they foot the bill for a lot of stuff and expand capacity for smaller companies. Absolutely. But Asmodee Group is owned by a French investment fund, and their interest isn't really in producing great board games. Beyond that, even if it were, monopolies are not good for any industry. There's no need to break new ground if you're not in competition with someone else. And who is big enough to compete with Asmodee? So I think we see quality of games, components, and service go down. We've absolutely seen a decline in the quality of service we receive from Asmodee because, again, if you're a gamer, where else are you gonna go for your games? Even if we think we're not buying from Asmodee, we might be surprised to discover that is, in fact, precisely where our money is going.
I toyed with my Christmas wish being a change in Asmodee leadership so some folks could come in and right the ship. But as I was writing all of this up, I just didn't think I was wishing hard enough; a change in leadership would not eliminate the monopoly that Asmodee holds in the gaming industry. And in order for the gaming industry to continue truly thriving in its development, that monopoly needs to be sundered. It won't happen, but a man can dream...
- This is the Christmas wish that will never happen, but I suspect I'll need to ask for it every single year in spite of the futility. After all, one can always hope for a Christmas miracle...
Asmodee has basically bought up every single game producing company it can ensnare. There's a lot I don't know about the situation, but it seems pretty straightforward in that games are a passion for those who make them, but we want to be paid a living wage for doing the work. It's a lot harder to achieve that end without some bigger parent company looking out for you, and Asmodee sorta kinda does that. I mean, they foot the bill for a lot of stuff and expand capacity for smaller companies. Absolutely. But Asmodee Group is owned by a French investment fund, and their interest isn't really in producing great board games. Beyond that, even if it were, monopolies are not good for any industry. There's no need to break new ground if you're not in competition with someone else. And who is big enough to compete with Asmodee? So I think we see quality of games, components, and service go down. We've absolutely seen a decline in the quality of service we receive from Asmodee because, again, if you're a gamer, where else are you gonna go for your games? Even if we think we're not buying from Asmodee, we might be surprised to discover that is, in fact, precisely where our money is going.
I toyed with my Christmas wish being a change in Asmodee leadership so some folks could come in and right the ship. But as I was writing all of this up, I just didn't think I was wishing hard enough; a change in leadership would not eliminate the monopoly that Asmodee holds in the gaming industry. And in order for the gaming industry to continue truly thriving in its development, that monopoly needs to be sundered. It won't happen, but a man can dream...
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