It’s-a Mario Time! Once again, we’re warping into the world of Mario to celebrate another Mar10 (or "Mario") Day. If all kinds of corporations can milk this property year after year, then why can’t we return to the Mushroom Kingdom for some more tabletop inspiration? This year though, instead of talking about Super Cereal or Mario’s details , why don’t we take a look at a comeback of sorts - Super Mario Bros 2 . The game actually has a complicated history, but don’t you panic, some of the best games do. Starting here might give us a sound footing in this sidescroller, though the plot itself is a bit mysterious, as well. Somewhere in there, we’re sure to find a few gems (or coins) of inspiration. So without any further loading time, let's select our player and start the level. Life is but a dream Unless you're a video game history scholar, the words "Dream Factory: Heart-Pounding Panic" probably don’t mean much to you... at least not in that order. That, ho...

The second of March is important to this blog for a number of reasons. First, and foremost, it marks the beginning of life for Never Say Dice co-founder Bugsy... who happens to share a birthday with the author Dr. Seuss. While his legacy may have seen some controversy over the years, especially these last few, it's spawned another thing important to this blog: Read Across America Week . While that particular holiday week isn’t something we at NSD had in our formative school years, reading is a pursuit that's been important to both of us throughout our lives and continues to be. After all, we couldn’t ask you to read this blog every week, or even have the background in TTRPGs and other games it takes to write this blog if we didn’t support  and appreciate reading  for its own sake. Reading is fun and mental. - A A: I can go anywhere. I can be anything. These lyrics are part of the Reading Rainbow theme song. The show was a way to bring children into the world of reading and a ...

In  tabletop adventures, there are certainly a lot of things for the characters to accomplish. You might be hauling around the magic MacGuffin to finally dump into an active volcano. Maybe you’ve slayed your very first dragon. Or perhaps you took down the enemy base with one critical hit to their thermal exhaust port. What does that mean for those characters' players , though? Did they accomplish something as well? They did have a hand in all of their characters' actions, after all, rolling their luck on the dice (or some other determinator, depending on the game). P layer, you are the reason the character achieved what they did. You deserve your own trophy as well. So what are some common personal accomplishments in  the world of tabletop games? Why do some particular moments stick with us? Finally, what can we, as GMs, do to reward our players, and even ourselves in these momentous occasions? - A A : Potential player accomplishments abound. There are all sorts of firsts out...

Back in olden times (okay, it was just the '80s, but that seems forever ago), when there was such a thing as Saturday morning cartoons, every show seemed to have a message. The show’s message for that week might have been teamwork, safety, honesty or whatever important thing they wanted to jam into our skulls while they brainwashed us into demanding toys. Besides serving as the legally mandated "educational" content to keep these shows from technically being commercials , these messages might have given them some credibility with parents or allowed shows to run mildly violent content as long as the message played well with the censors. No matter the reason, you'll see examples throughout those cartoon televisions blocks, from Jem and The Holograms and G.I. Joe to The Adventures of the Gummi Bears and Snorks . Some were more obvious about it (I’m looking at you Chief Warrant Officer Flint!) while others may have weaved it more into the story. What if we took that sa...

Gaming as a pastime is often a solo venture. You pop in the cartridge, disc, or what have you, take the controller in hand and you’re off into the digital world. Likewise, with TTRPGs, you can find ways to game by yourself (we’ve even written about the very subject.) However, gaming, both digitally and at the tabletop, is often a multi-player pursuit. Modern digital games have even been criticized about not having much, or sometimes any, single-player content. What about when it's just two players though? Even board and card games are usually designed with more than two players in mind, so finding the right thing for you and your significant other can be tough. Before you dive right in to pick something out to play, let's do a broad review of potential options and some things you might consider before making your selections. The Digital World Two player games are not uncommon in the digital realm. This is especially true if you’re into indie games like Journey , Cuphead or It...

"Difficulty" is a word that invariably comes up in discussion of games of any sort. It's a setting in electronic games. It's a skill check in tabletop games. It's the basis for heated arguments about the relationship between creators and players , between accessibility and experience . But, for all of this, can we really define difficulty as it relates to games? It's a term that can mean all kinds of things in all kinds of situations, but, at its core, it's about the way that audiences engage with stories and their stakes. And speaking of stakes... As I've mentioned previously in this blog, I started reading the original Dracula in October out of some lunatic idea of looking at the Castlevania series as an adaptation of the original novel. (Which may still happen someday, who knows what horrors the future will bring.) Life being what it is, it took significantly longer than I'd originally planned and I only finished the book yesterday. While focu...

Choosing who you would defend, or knowing who would have your back when the proverbial dung hits the fan should be pretty easy. When the dice hit the table, who do you want sitting alongside you to help destroy that dragon or make that million-to-one shot against the space station? Your initial reaction might be to name those same people... but is it really going to be those ones you’re already with? We’ve talked before about how you might convince people you know to join a game . For some of us, it really might be the exact same group. For many, however, the answer is probably very different. Why do we pick different people to join us at our tabletops? Have I been gaming with the wrong people? What kind of thought process even goes into deciding who we should game with? These are all very good questions, and this week we’re going to take a look at some potential answers so you can find the right game and the right people. - A A : Choosing your game preferences is a good first step to ...