Guilty Houston 2015 & Guilty Monaco 1955 Review

Escape from New York Review

An off-again on-again hobby of mine is thinking about board game design. I’ve only been playing board games since about 2020. Game reviewing seemed like a good way to deepen my understanding of what makes a good game. Now I’ve got a few reviews under my belt but I have yet to be able to extract any principles of fun.

The game review is about identifying what I like and don’t like, and even that is a challenge sometimes. What writing a review does do, however, is force me to practice conciseness and accuracy in descriptive sentences; it’s a useful skill for a fiction writer who leans toward choosing words for their mood and tone.

I have found this book helpful (and it has a spectacular title, using a phrase I’ve said more than a few times when playing a new game), but I haven’t cracked the code yet: You Said This Would Be Fun: What makes a game good and how to make a good game (no Bookshop link, alas).