My Favorite Gaming Podcasts

I'm a very odd bird. Why? Well it's not because I squawk and peck at my dinner. No, no, no. Rather, it's because unlike most people, my iPod Touch contains very little in the way of actual music. Instead, it's bursting at its electronic seams with podcasts. More specifically, it's loaded with podcasts about gaming (board games and miniature wargaming). Yeah, go ahead and think it. I suppose that I'm truly a geek.

Over the last 5+ years, I've listened to more gaming-related podcasts than I care to count. Heck, I have well over 500 gaming podcasts currently stored in my iTunes library. There's such a wide selection of shows to listen to. 

The vast majority of the podcasts that I listen to cater to hobby board game enthusiasts. There are also a couple of good shows geared towards miniatures wargames. As mini-gaming is my favorite hobby of the moment, I wish there were more podcasts on this subject. But since wargaming with miniatures is such a visual hobby, that probably goes a long way towards explaining the lack of audio-shows that discuss this form of gaming.  

You might be wondering, which podcasts have become my absolute favorites? Well, let's start with the cream of the crop. These shows have stood the test of time, and are still as interesting and informative today as they were when I first started listening to them several years ago. 

The Dice Tower -- I listen to a dozen different podcasts on a fairly regular basis. When faced with the inevitable question of "what shall I listen to tonight?" as I scroll through my iPod playlist, my first choice is always the Dice Tower. This well-produced, 60-90 minute variety show is chock full of interesting segments that never drag on too long. In addition to the weekly insights provided by co-hosts Tom Vasel and Eric Summerer, there are a host of other contributors (Moritz, Geoff, Mark, Sam, Joe, Giles, Mary, Ryan, Dexter & The Chief, etc.) so you're guaranteed to get a smattering of opinions on just about every type of board game imaginable. The Top-10 Lists, a staple of the podcast, are always fun and have caused me to buy more board games over the past few years than I care to admit! But the Dice Tower truly shines because Tom Vasel, tireless game evangelist, is the Energizer Bunny of gamers. He just keeps going and going, enthusiastically playing and reviewing games, and sharing his vast knowledge of board games with anyone that crosses his path. I find that my tastes in board games often mirror Tom's more closely than any other podcaster out there, so I'm always keen on hearing about new games that he adores. 

Meeples & Miniatures -- Without a doubt, Meeples & Miniatures is simply the best podcast about miniature wargaming in existence. As an American wargamer, it took me a few espisodes to get used to the thick British accent emanating from the mouth of host Neil Shuck. I've grown to love it now, and Neil seems like an affable chap and TRUE wargamer. What I mean by TRUE is that his interests lie all over the map. Neil enjoys exploring new rules and checking out the latest shiny figures, and he owns more minis than he'll ever actually have the time to paint. Plus, he's not just focused on the mainstream games and models (e.g. Warhammer and DBA) that every wargamer already knows about. He explores the true depth of this great hobby with an honest and thought-provoking perspective. And his "View from the Veranda" chats with Henry Hyde of Battlegames magazine are always highly entertaining.  

The Spiel -- Interestingly enough, I first discovered this podcast by way of The Dice Tower, as Tom Vasel said it was one of his favorites to listen to. Co-hosts Stephen Conway and Dave Coleson have a love of games that's truly infectious. Their exhaustive game reviews are the best in the business, but their varied segments (Back-shelf Spotlight, Truckloads of Goober, and Game Sommelier) are really what makes this podcast shine. They also do a superb job breaking their podcast into easily searchable segments, so you can skip around if desired. Recently, the show lengths are creeping up and over the 2-hour mark, which is overly long in my opinion, but that hasn't stopped me from listening. Spiel on guys!

Game On! with Cody & John -- This podcast hasn't been around as long as the previous three, but recently reached the 50-episode mark and shows no signs of slowing down. Self-proclaimed "regular guys" Cody Jones and John Richard pull you into their conversations as if you were a friend sitting in their living-room chatting about games. Amazingly, Cody sounds eerily like my childhood next-door neighbor (Mike Rajnik) and even tosses out similar witty remarks. It's kinda freaky, but it also pulled me in to listen to the show more closely from the beginning. One great thing about the show is that it's an easy listen, and never drones on too long, falling into that 60-90 minute listening sweet-spot more often than not. I really like the new, free-wheeling conversation format that Cody & John have switched to, and I hope they stick with that as it helps differentiate them from my other favorite gaming podcasts.  

There are also several gaming-related shows that haven't been on the podcast scene for 5 years, but are definitely worth your listening time. If I had to choose a "best of the rest", it would include these podcasts:

Gameopolis -- Episode #1 of this podcast got me hooked because these guys went "old school" and listed several old classics among their favorite games of all time. It's refreshing to see gamers who aren't purely smitten by "the cult of the new" when it comes to tabletop games. Their regular "dusty old box" segment is a real treat. Another big plus is that Mark and Jeff don't take themselves too seriously and come across as down-to-earth guys who would be fun to game with. I also love that they keep their main shows around 60 minutes in length, and supplement those with shorter "game session reports". The session reports give you the feel of how a particular game plays without the hosts needing to spend 30 minutes on a boring, blow-by-blow rules regurgitation. Well done guys; looking forward to future episodes.  

D6 Generation -- I'm torn between loving this show and hating it. Why? On the one hand, it's really well-produced, colorful, often hilarious and thought-provoking, and nobody does in-depth game reviews any better than the D6G gang (Russ, Craig, and Raef). Craig Gallant really cracks me up. I admire the fact that these guys are unabashed mini-gamers and lovers of Ameritrash games; they speak to my tastes more often than not. What bugs me about the D6G is the length of the shows. They're too friggin long. Who has the time to sit down and listen to a 3 or 4 hour show? Not me. So far too often, the podcast sits on my playlist untouched, until I can miraculously find a free night to hide from my wife and listen to a whole show. Less is sometimes more guys.  

Noisemaker -- Of all the gaming podcasts that I regularly listen to, this one is the most "home-spun labor of love" of the batch. While the show lacks the production values of the Dice Tower or Spiel or D6G, it makes up for that with truly interesting content. Bert's love of miniature wargaming shines through. He's a do-it yourselfer and willingly shares his ideas about rules design, particularly his own home-made rules. I really enjoy when Bert voices his likes/dislikes about various mass-market rules systems. Always insightful, enlightening, and never boring, Noisemaker is highly recommended if you're a wargamer who likes to dabble in all aspects of the hobby. 

So tabletop gamers, why not do yourself a favor and take some time to check out these great podcasts? I'm sure you'll learn a thing or two about games that you never knew before, and will gather some great tips on games worth playing and adding to your collection.  

Boardgame Ramblings

What's currently on my board-gaming radar?

BGG Census

If you haven't taken a look at it yet, surf on over to BoardGameGeek and take a look at the 2009 Census Poll created by LankyEngineer. It's pretty interesting. Anyone who has been gaming for a long time or visiting BGG for years won't be the least bit surprised by certain outcomes (such as 95% of the respondents being Male, over 90% of the folks liking Euro games, 75% of the gamers being college educated, and the most popular beverage consumed while gaming being Beer at 41%).

But there were some really interesting results, at least in my view. Did you know that the prime age range for boardgamers was 31 to 40? I was shocked to see how few people under the age of 25 responded to the census. I grew up on boardgames, playing a LOT of them in my teen and college years. Perhaps today's youngsters focus on video games and RPGs to the exclusion of boardgames, and then discover them once they're more established in life? Or perhaps young people don't like Euro games, which is undoubtedly a strong focus of people who frequent the BGG website?

I also found it interesting to see the precipitous drop-off of boardgamers once you hit age 46 (which I'll be hitting next year!), and especially once you reach age 51. Obviously, lack of free time is an issue for everyone as they get older, especially for mid-lifers who are often juggling the demands of wife, kids, job, and general home tasks. Some of us have too many other competing hobbies (such as fantasy baseball, miniature wargaming, and painting for me). But still, why should you stop having fun just because your hair is turning gray?

It was also eye-opening to see the number of people who shared the same profession that I do. Almost 25% of respondents listed Computer Science (IT) as their profession.

There's probably 3 major reasons for this. First, computer folks are THINKERS and ANALYZERS by nature. Most boardgames (especially medium/heavy Euros, wargames, and meatier Ameritrash games) are "thinker" oriented activities. Secondly, computer people spend so much time on the computer, it's refreshing to get away from their machines and play non-digital games. It's our chance to be touchy feely and grab tangible game pieces instead of just pushing bytes around with our minds. Third, computer folks often work in semi-isolation. Sure, there are design meetings to participate in and think-sessions, but activities like programming are pretty much a solitary pursuit. Playing boardgames enables you to interact socially with your friends and share in group-based fun. So I guess when all is said and done, boardgames fulfill some very human needs that our computers don't!

Another surprising tidbit in the 2009 Census was that half of the respondents don't go to any game conventions during the year. These are serious gamer geeks, and half of them don't travel to those heavenly meccas of Geekdom? Shocking! I must admit that I don't really go to conventions to PLAY games all that much. I go to BUY STUFF and to GET INSPIRED by seeing all the cool stuff in one centralized place. You also meet some nice people along the way, which is a major bonus. So if you're one of those folks who has never attended a game convention, I strongly encourage you to try it, at least once. Check out the National Gamers Guild for a list of major conventions across the USA.


Summer Boardgaming

The 1st Quarter of every year is usually a "dead period" for me with regards to boardgames. I'm always crazy-busy with preseason fantasy baseball stuff, working on updates to my Rhino Baseball software, and organizing league events and prepping for my HARL baseball draft. Plus, I generally spend more of my time involved in miniature wargaming than boardgaming, so any free time for tabletop gaming during the early part of the year is allotted to my tiny tin men. I usually take a trip down to Lancaster PA for Cold Wars in March to get my early-year miniatures fix and spend some birthday money that's been quietly sitting around since January.

Once summer rolls around, I try to get my gamer friends to play some boardgames with me. Finding mutually agreeable weekend gaming dates for a bunch of 40-somethings, many of them with small kids, is often akin to herding cats. But I try to do my best.

Recently, I've acquired a bunch of new boardgames to add to my over-large collection. Truthfully, buying more new games is NOT a practical thing for me. I've already got more games on my closet shelves than I can possibly play over the next 4 years. But there's such an addictive quality to getting new games. Every once and awhile, you need a fix!

To support "my habit", I got the following new games and expansions over the past 2 months:

1. Fire and Axe


2. Age of Conan


3. Shadows Over Camelot: Merlin's Company (expansion)


4. Cutthroat Caverns: Relics & Ruins (expansion)


5. Dragon's Gold


6. Cave Troll


7. Dungeon Twister: Forces of Darkness (expansion)

Four of these are completely new games to me, while the others are expansions to some of my favorite games of all time. You can probably tell from this list that I absolutely LOVE fantasy, adventure, and war/combat themes in my games. The game styles run the gamut from co-op to negotiation to conquest to strategic-thinking to beer & pretzels madness. I tend to shy away from rules-complex and ultra-long games, because if I desire to go that particular route then I'd much rather play a miniatures wargame instead. Sorry BGG geeks!

Hopefully, I can get many of these games to the table this summer. Plus, I have a bunch of unplayed Euro gems I want to play as well (Big City, El Grande, Aladdin's Dragons, Wallenstein). Wish me luck!


Culling My Collection

Despite my recent game purchasing spree, I've resigned myself to whittling down my boardgame collection to 40 or 50 or so great games. This summer I'm hoping to sell off games that I simply don't forsee playing anytime soon or perhaps ever again. Can you say eBay?

When you have over 150 games, you start to get irrationally attached to them. I played countless games of Strat-O-Matic Hockey and Sports Illustrated Baseball when I was growing up, and I'm pretty sure I'll never play them again. But due to the fondness I have for those games, it's difficult to part with them. Sentimentality is often a hard thing to break.

I was enamored by the cool bits of Doom and Tide of Iron, and the good reviews many people had of them, but they remain in their shrink-wrap, unplayed. Sometimes, games just don't scratch enough of your personal itch. I'll usually always choose a fantasy game over a sci-fi title. Dragons, orcs, and wizards trump space marines and aliens for me. Thus, Doom has languished despite the fact that it was one of my top-3 favorite video games of all time and I loved the theme. Tide of Iron has remain unplayed because I'm more interested in ancient and medieval warfare provided by games such as Hammer of the Scots or Hannibal: Rome vs. Carthage.

There are plenty of games in my collection like that; interesting, well-designed games, but games that haven't lit my personal passion enough to get them to the gaming-table ahead of other more enticing titles.

Game length is also a factor. I sold off Arkham Horror awhile ago after it languished on my shelf for 3 years. Sacrilege! Maybe. I was VERY enamored with the theme. Who doesn't enjoy running away from tentacled monstrosities and trying to avoid getting their brains turned into mint jelly? But getting that type of game (complex rules with 4+ hour playing time) to the table with my particular game group proved to be highly daunting.

So I'm going to have to make some tough decisions. Sticking with only 40 or 50 games seems like a prudent and practical idea. But can I really break my addiction? That will be the true test.


Shout Outs

Just a couple of quick shout-outs to some new gaming related blogs, podcasts, and news that I've come across recently...

For some informative video reviews of boardgames, including the weirdly captivating time-lapse game session videos, check out Josh Jenkins's blog called the Non-Stop Tabletop.

If you're a game addict but want to try and save money, check out A Year of Frugal Gaming blog. It's especially useful for miniatures enthusiasts. Some recent articles of keen interest were one on stripping paint off of plastic minis, and a nice article on scratch terrain building.

For those of you into JRR Tolkien's Middle Earth, bookmark this page which points to Fantasy Flight Games upcoming release of their massive Middle Earth Quest boardgame. It sounds pretty neat. I'm curious just how well a LOTR game that doesn't feature Frodo, Sam, Gandalf, Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli, and Gollum will really do. Removing the key characters that we all know and love from the world of Middle Earth would seem to suck a huge part of life out of that storybook world. We shall see...

I'm a huge podcast listener. I've got over 400 shows loaded into iTunes. For a long-time, my top-3 favorite game-related podcasts have been The Dice Tower (with Tom Vasel), The Spiel (with Stephen Conway & Dave Coleson), and Meeples & Miniatures (with Neil Schuck).
There are several other excellent podcasts, but none that have consistently measured up to the stellar quality of these 3 shows....until now.

One of my new favorites is the terrific podcast put out by Cody Jones and John Richard entitled Game On! with Cody and John. These guys bring a hefty enthusiasm to gaming, do some excellent in-depth reviews, aren't afraid to share their honest opinions, and are the type of gamers who don't take themselves too seriously (my kind of guys!). Plus, they love baseball! How friggin cool is that! Give them a listen today!

Another fantastic podcast is The D6 Generation (with Russ Wakelin, Craig Gallant, and Raef Granger). Perhaps the funniest podcast of the bunch and the most Ameritrash focused (as these guys truly love fantasy/sci-fi games, miniatures, and beer & pretzels boardgames). Nobody goes as in-depth on a single game as these guys do. If you can't make a decision on whether to buy or pass on a particular new game after hearing this trio talk about it, then you've probably had your brain eaten by zombies. The only negative about the show is that it's too damn long, often running over 3 hours. It's not something you can listen to in one, or even two sittings unless you have lots of free time on your hands. But hey, it's their show and they can do whatever they think is best! Still, it comes highly recommended.

And lastly... give the Noisemaker miniatures podcast a listen. Bert is the type of enthusiastic old-school minis gamer that gives the hobby a good name. This isn't a flashy show with high production values. Rather, it's just good, honest CONTENT with a focus on FUN. I find the podcast to be a source of inspiring ideas and useful opinions. Check it out.

Until next time.... SEVY out!