Icehouse was renamed? Grr. I always wanted that, except I would need many friends to play with and an large amount of money to be able purchase enough pyramid-sections. *sigh*

It's the finding enough friends to play with that's the issue, we find. The pieces didn't really cost that much, but unless the friends in question are also game geeky, no matter what game you want to play, you'll have to start from scratch with explaining the rules. And even then, some of them are kind of fiddly.

I loved Zendo, and we do have all the components needed to play. But it's one of those that's a lot more interesting and fun with more than 2 players.

The Icehouse pieces haven't come out to play for ages; when we do open the LooneyLabs bag, it tends to be for Aquarius, Fluxx, or Q-Turn. And both bff2112 and I are having a serious "must play rail game!" jones, and the monkey is willing to go along to humor us. (The results are often bff2112 and me neck-and-neck, with the monkey way, way in the back, having made foolish rail-building or load-carrying choices early on...)

I only played Icehouse at Endgame, which used to be on Lakeshore near the new TJ -- the owner always had dozens of games out for people to try. It did seem to require a lot of players to be interesting, much like playing Clue with just one opponent is no fun.

Many of the interesting games did require more than two players, but there were some great ones just for two. The problem being that they were specifically for two people (Kupferkessel, Lost Cities, Mystery Rummy, TransAmerica, Schotten Totten) and could not accommodate a third. There are a few games like Samarkand and Ivanhoe that scale well between two and six people, but not many.

Fluxx seemed really neat when it came out, but lost its appeal to me after a while: I really expected a game with fluid rules, rather than a game where the rules shift within a meta-rule structure, where your chance of winning sometimes really is just a chance.

Ooh, rail games. I'd be on the monkey's side of those, having grandiose schemes to move the largest loads, only to find my tracks blocked by a single barrier or not completing the tracks in time. *sigh*

That's where (and when) we got to play Zendo — and the only time we've gotten to play anything with more than 2 people, really.

*narrows eyes speculatively*

I wonder if we were sitting across the table from each other and didn't even know it?

Hmm. If you were at the game nights, it's quite possible. I do recall a couple of couples there, and I was there regularly for about two years.

I would have noticed the hat, though, unless that's a daytime-only thing.

Mutts icon lust.

I subscribed to the email strip, since they don't seem to have an RSS feed. It's one of the few things I missed about not reading the newspaper any more — and now, not a problem!

My stepdad got my mom a huge, hardbound anthology for Crispness. I nearly stole it when I moved to NH. I love that danged strip!