(Photo by David Wyngard)
Welcome to this little series of mine, where I will go over some newly discovered hobbies or interests of mine and talk about them, how I discovered it, when I tried it, and what I think of it. Today we are going to be talking about Tabletop gaming, whether it is cards, boards or even just sheets of paper (and a lot of admin work), I would love to expand my newly found interest and try out some new games with my friends and family.
In terms of how I discovered the world of tabletop gaming, it all started with a YouTube channel called ‘No Rolls Barred’ a board game channel by the people who make the ‘Wrestletalk’ YouTube channel, a cool crossover of one world I love into a world I didn’t even really knew existed. I saw that these guys were making this channel and I was immediately interested, after all I had followed these guys for a while, and they could make a channel about watching paint dry and I’d probably still be interested. This was during lockdown as well so I and many others suddenly had a lot more time to be able to pick up and try new hobbies. Lots of cool and different ways to play and interact with people, ways that weren’t just playing the same games on PlayStation over and over again. In order to try and cure some boredom over lockdown, I tried new online games with my friends or family (a lot of them drinking related for some reason) and that seemed to pass the time quite well, allowing socialisation whilst focusing on a set of objectives and rules at the same time. Standard stuff. We seemed to enjoy these times, a break from sitting alone and wondering when the world would be fixed. These games would tend to be quick ones like Codenames or Spyfall, working together in teams to try and either elicit information or detect a social outsider, fun times where your communication skills are tested and you laugh as you figure out just how your friends and family’s brains operate.
So, I decided for Christmas 2021 it was time to get a physical board game and try playing it with my family. Now this was no easy task. I had to do extensive research and scheming in order to pick the perfect game. Something short and sweet, something not too complex, something replayable. After hours of checking top 10 lists about the perfect family games to introduce non players into the hobby, I stumbled upon what I thought would be the best shot at getting a good game session from the family, Wavelength. A cooperative game about getting your team to put a point on the wheel at specific point. Sounds easy right? The catch is that you have a scale, and you can only use words to try and get your team to get to the specific point. For example, the scale could be worst food to best food. If the point was midway, I would say Marmite to try and guide the team there. The closer the team put the needle to the specific point, the more points they score. First to 10 points wins. I placed the order and awaited Christmas Day and Boxing Day, a mixture of excitement and nervousness set over me as the day drew closer, all eyes on me as the beacon of entertainment for the days ahead. The day arrives. Showtime. I unwrap the box to see the most beautiful artwork for a game I have seen and crack it open to see how to set it up. The game can be played straight out of the box, coming with a wheel, visor, some cards, and some tokens. After setting it up and giving the wheel a whirl for myself, it was time to play the game. I sat my family down and tried to explain the rules as simply as humanly possible in order to avoid the dreaded response of ‘I have no idea what I’m doing!’, or ‘This is WAYYY too complicated!’, or perhaps ‘shall we just play Uno instead?’. I was determined. The first few rounds were shaky, a mixture of not fully listening to the rules and wanting to spin the wheel really fast had me on red alert. The game was on the verge of ruin. But I pulled it back. A few good clues that got everyone talking and thinking followed by a stream of correct answers and cheers, with just the right number of wrong answers and hysterics upon realising the clues given were completely obscene. The rounds went quickly, and the games kept going and going. ‘One more go.’ ‘Go on let’s do another.’ ‘Can I go next?’. I felt like a king. The game was a smashing success, and ever since then it has had me itching to find the next game, I can bring home and give a go. An experience truly like no other. If you would like to try Wavelength or other board games for free, there is a really cool website called BoardGameArena.com where you can sign up and play loads of cool games for no cost at all, and if you like them, you can always buy the physical copies to support the industry. Something I can definitely see myself doing in the future again.
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