#Cheapass Games

[arielluva]

9 year old me shouldve been investing in pokemon cartridges instead of playing animal jam.. god damn <- guy who just looked at listings online

[adr1025]

[sillyandquiteawkward]

yeah actually why didnt anyone want to sleep in the conversation pit in the tulpar. guess the medical mattresses Were more comfy than the couch? was the couch so worn down over the years theres barely any cushion left in the cushions? were they rock hard? being the cheapass company, pony express wouldnt bother to get a new couch over the years so that could make sense. and the mattresses have the plus for being mattresses, as well as probably being rarely used due to pony express dinging the crew for using the ship's supplies.

the only other thing couldve been the tv screen was just that awful to have blaring at you so close. but of course curlys fine with having a sunset burned into his retna ig? but also im sure they were used to it at least a little being as they live a whole year with it at a time. swanseas bed being the closest to the screen is probably more about his snoring than anything else (and even then he starts sleeping in front of utility without anything to cushion him except a chair later on. in the dark. ignoring things.)

pretty sure we only ever see someone (anya and curly) sit on the couch once, but the board game set up makes it seem like some ppl are sitting on the floor for that, swansea and daisuke being the seated players, and anya and jimmy being floor sitters. daisuke sits on one of the chairs, but not the main couch (this is probably just so the player can See and notice him over the banister). and later swansea prefers to sit on the floor than on the sofa or one of the chairs nearby after destroying the screen.

[atticsandwich]

man.... and i was sooo excited for whatvwas to come after this season too. though it started off kind of slow and we couldn't really tell where it was going, the shift of focus to raphael's inner turmoil pointed to a future possibility that involved the exposition of the rest of the side characters. we could've had a plotpoint revolving mephisto confronting his bubbling doubts about the demon nobility, a plotpoint revolving the otherworld with thirteen and the reapers — which we still barely know anything about, by the way. the fact that nightbringer just kinda got tossed to the side and never got brought up after returning to the present, the cheapass reunion-but-not-really scene that just kinda retconned the whole ordeal that led to him following mc to the past in the first place....

anyways. i understand that they're TECHNICALLY not announcing an eos, but the fact that they're halting content updates is kinda... the same thing? yeah the game app still exists, but you can only do so much with reruns and whatnot. their extremely vague descriptions of "new content" feels very exclusive, especially when it comes to in-person events. yeah they go to anime expo but that's just for fans living in the states. gating it to just japan events also then further alienates the rest of the fanbase. sure, they could do something like expanding the anime, or the radio show, or whatever, but part of the charm with playing the game was that YOU were a part of it. YOU made choices. it felt like you were experiencing the story alongside them, which, frankly, something like an animated series i doubt could fully encapsulate.

sorry for the rant again. still devastated!! at least im off work now. i've been saving sooo much devil points and energy in the hopes of maybe. one day. a mephisto event (delusional) and i personally wanted to rank first on that. but now it's just. eh. idek what to do with my 3.5k points and almost 600 d-energy. whatever!!! complaining about this feels like theeeee most nothingburger thing ever but like. i really do love obey me. i had such high hopes and held on to hoping and being patient and voicing my concerns whenever they put out a survey. but i guess all that effort was wasted.

[greatrunner]

Wow... okay, then

"There was thirteen of them and one of me" a more serious reading of Beni's "There’s only one of you and fifteen of me".

Francis going out like a chump is fittingly abrupt. He thought he was the final boss ☠️🤡

Armond ran a troupe of two faced snitches, and was surprised that one of them snitched on him.

Daniel went out poking the bear with the stick. Now he's wearing sunglasses at night.

Only ten million dollars? Louis you cheapass.

Anything that paints Lestat as other than malicious and self serving makes me sus, but it's also Armond doing underhanded shit, so, it like... [shrug] y'all are awful, and I guess Louis like him some garbage men.

Lestat doesn't seem to be all there toward the end.

Him getting stuck with a 30 something having an undead life crisis who looks at him like an annoying grandparent is, again, fitting

Why didn't you save your daughter, man???? I'm so fucking angry at you dumbasses!!!

lmao the vampires telepathically rage tweeting

"I am the danger."

If I can say anything about Jacob Anderson, it's that his performance in this show alone, when contrasted to what he was given to do in something like Game of Thrones, is what you miss when the industry intentionally undermines Black artists.

Like, dude is absolutely fire in this show. And for the most part, the people he worked with knew that.

[thefaultinoursprinkles]

the fallout show is actually pretty enjoyable. maybe because I’m obsessed with the world and love the new perspective. and yes the props look like they’re from Amazon and the humor is a little “Reddit” for lack of a better term, but the plastic-y look and cringy humor matches the vibe of the games to be quite honest.

with the props/sets though it’s interesting, like they all have this cheapass look but also it’s clear a lot of care and detail were put into the set pieces/costuming, so it gives the vibe of like a YouTube skit where everything is super cheap but you’re like “wow this looks really good considering what they had to work with” except that this show had a fucking $153 million budget so it’s like. come on man.

I DO think that the sets are amazing, for the most part, even if the costuming and props leave something to be desired. like it’s clear that’s where most of the budget went.

I also appreciate that basically the whole cast is unknowns or up-and-comers rather than the marvel-starwars-disney Big Names Only casting that seems to be the only way mainstream media is cast. so that’s cool, I always love the potential for new talent to cut their teeth and get their big break. plus I hate seeing the same shitty fucking actors over and over again. if they’re good idc but like Scarlett Johansson or Jermey renner just suck. like they are not even good at the craft. even like Chris whatever the fuck who plays Thor has some genuine talent and can be enjoyable to watch, but so many of them are just so baaaddd.

the soundtrack is great, honestly, all the picks are bangers & I love the Johnny cash & I actually love the choice to use sound effects from the games in the sound mixing. it’s very fun. like again, cheesy, but it’s a cool design choice.

and like ultimately, that doesn’t really impact my enjoyment of it. all in all it’s so far above my expectations. I’ve been dreading it since it was announced bc I love fallout as a “mythos” (basically) and I did not think a nostalgia-bait fan service big budget mainstream major release could ever have any redeeming qualities so the fact that it’s “fun to watch” and “has a plot” is pretty neat.

also one of the brotherhood people is a they/them which I thought was neat. as of yet they have not gendered them at all like no “brother” or “girl” or “man” or “he/she” it’s been exclusively they/them or their name.

oh! speaking of the brotherhood, I like how they are portrayed. like they are fucked up clutists with a self righteous god complex and I think they’ve really shown that, rather than the brotherhood fanboys ‘fascism is awesome’ characterization that you see in the fandom. the main brotherhood guy having to deal with his idealistic idea of what the brotherhood “should” be versus what it is is intriguing and I’m excited to see more. also very excited to see more prewar stuff.

And so far my biggest complaint so far is the weird ass ghoul. like they make this big deal about him basically being a corpse and he looks like some dude got a bad sunburn. like with all the gore and horror elements I wish they would have made the ghoul look more.. you know.. like a ghoul.

[ao3cassandraic]

15, 26 and 35 for the ask game 💜

15. If you could be besties with anyone from the Good Omens universe, who would it be?

Agnes. Absolutely positively Agnes Nutter. The badassest of all GO badasses. The kind of badass Crowley can only wish he were.

This bad bitch can make a plan and carry it out and help people and take a village full of assholes with her when she goes. Gotta love that energy.

26. Do you need an Eccles cake right now?

I DO, OH LORD, I DO! PLEASE, I AM BEGGING YOU HERE!

My fridge died yesterday -- like, completely non-functional dead-as-a-doornail this-is-an-ex-fridge. So I spent last night ordering a new one, and this morning going out for ice and filling coolers with what was still salvageable and then the fridge turned itself back on temporarily (Crowley, is that you?) so I froze every freezy-pak I have in the house (a lot, actually, when I was infusing antibiotics last fall every weekly shipment came with a freezy-pak) for when the ice melts and dealt with all the freezer stuff that thawed out (my compost pile is happy today) and I'm so glad I'm vegetarian because at least I did not have to deal with meat going off.

Theoretically I'm on vacation. Theoretically.

I can afford this -- I'm even replacing my cheapass janky gas range with an induction range while I'm at it -- so nobody worry about me. But damn, I sure could go for an Eccles cake.

35. On a scale of 1 to 666, how bad is your GO brainrot?

Uff da. Pretty bad. Somewhere around 500, I think.

[reddeliciousauce]

1, 2, 17, 20

1. Favorite toy? Any specific reason or are they just attached?

cheapass pez dispenser from a dollar store that had the head of some mangled cartoon character think it was meant to be a simpson from the yellow skin or whatever didnt even have any pez for it i just flicked the stupid head up and down and bit on it

2. Did they have a lot of toys? Were they the kind of kid that wanted a lot of toys?

had a bunch of ironic cheapo bullshit from bro or dirk when wed head out on the town and saw knockoffs we just had to steal OR buy if it was a dollar which score

17. How did they play as a kid? Did they like playing with their toys or did they prefer imaginary friends? Did they like to play pirates? House? Pokemon? Warrior cats?

i scratched records watched tv and bothered dirk when he played video games or tinkered with shit mostly

other than that i dunno bro didnt like a lotta noise

20. What kind of toys did they gravitate towards? Stuffed animals, trucks, action figures, dolls?

again knockoffs and useless bullshit is key here i had refined taste for terrible garbage

misprints are gold star worthy

[the-grand-av3]

Okay, now that you've played DDLC., you need to play cooking companions

(basic run down. There are four Ukrainian refugees in your home, who barely have enough food. After a bit, the cabin floods in. Someone has to go out to find food. The first one to leave is Mariah, the sweetest and youngest of the group, in which you wake up the next morning with a slab of meat. Then theres Anatoly, an absolute airhead who acts like a nerd. Then again, you wake up with meat. Eventually, Karin, a crazy red haired woman, cuts off the limbs of Gregor, basically a giant teddy bear. She reveals that she knew she was eating the others, and was absolutely addicted to it. In the end, you lock her in the basement, eventually going down and killing her. Oh yea. Theres talking vegetables too)

Woah

Cooking companions? Count me--

NO YOU'LL BE TOO GOOD

this isnt cooking mama--

NO HES GONNA WIN NO SWEAT

Awh.

GTFO

its okay al you wouldn’t’ve liked it much anyway

wait no you would have loved it wanna know what it's about

Mhm?

*whisper whisper*

Oh! Sounds fun!

yeah but watch them they think its cooking mama

So~ who are we mating with?~

GETTING CLOSE WITH

Same thing :(

I say

Anatoly

Cus when shit goes down and they hate each other I have someone who knows their shit

Okay~ Pick the little twinky guy~

i woulda picked karin but okay

What why

Cus she wants her to peg her~

sure man

NOOO MARIAH DONT GO

MY POOKIE NOOOOOOO

</3

rip lmao

YOU HEARTLESS CREATURE KEYS

I am emotionally injured and will never recover from this

MARIAHHHHHHHH

I like these vegetables

I don't:( They’re scary :((

No theyre not

Yeah huh

Nuh uh

Gtfo

I OWN THE PC YOU GTFO

:(

ladies ladies settle down

NO. ANATOLY. NO. DONT YOU FUCKING DARE

ANATOLY MY TWINK NOOOO

ANATOLY YOU DUMB WHORE

JFOCEIOFDKDKCIEJGJQJFIAMDKQKDEKSKFKEMFKE

wtf

So whose left

The souls of mariah and anatoly

vegetables

karin and gregor

Okay we're gonna go kiss karins ass

That I can do~

OH SHIT SHES MAKING US EAT GREGOR

CAN WE KILL HIM?? JFC PUT HIM OUT OF HIS SUFFERING

FUCK MAN EWW

ALASTOR DOES THIS SHIT ALL DAY??

everyday

KARIN WHEN I GET MY HANDS ON YOU

ON SIGHT BITCH

FUCKCOAJFIS WHY IS THE BASEMEMT SK SCARY

IM ABOUT TO PISS MY OWN ASS

FKCOSJCJSKFJE FUCK THESE CHEAPASS HUMPSCARES GET KARIN

HUMPSCARES?

YOU KNEW WHAT I MEANT

*AGGRESSIVE PANTING*

Oh my god

Never again why would you recommend a game like that

Im scared now

I think i pissed or came I can't tell

Let me smell

Piss

Oh

Hello! I return with some sandwiches for the group!

NO GET THAT SHIT AWAY FROM ME

YOU SICKO

...?

[drowningworms]

I actually went to Gobblers Knob in Punxsutawney and was close enough to see the no shadow for myself before the drunk guys in top hats told us what they saw.

I experienced the whole frigid, boring, tedious, painful, boring, long, standing room only for 6 hours of physical hell, low rent, cheapass, tacky, corny, tawdry, obnoxious, fucking dry event for you.

It involved security pat downs for liquor on every man woman and child to keep out liquor. Weed was illegal by community consent thanks to Reagan. It was 10 degrees and dark in the dead of a Pennsylvania Winter. And there was absolutely no entertainment for hours till it got daylight. Then this local DJ comes on to entertain the out of towners. He's horrible.

Remember that we are the cash cow for this little group of local good old boys and their buddies. And for the entire town. And they treat us like shit. Just penned us up and hit us for cash money at every turn. This was 1998, so that wasn't unusual everyone outside major businesses required cash. I'm dead sure they have those little credit card scanners everywhere now. They milked us for everything they could think of.

And it was so fucking cold. You don't understand cold until you know standing huddled still in the dark cold. Most people never really experience cold. Insulation is really fucking good now. I overpaid so much when goose down jackets got sorta affordable. They were like miracles to me. I would have given anything for such a miraculous jacket then. I had to make do with layers of insulated flannels and long underwear. I did have true winter underwear from my Boy Scout days so I was a good bit less cold than my buddies who didn't know how to layer.

Most people only experience shoveling snow cold. Maybe skiing cold. A few hunting cold. (Real damn cold) And a mighty few who have lived in it for days just sitting around camping in tents with nice sleeping bags and a big fire to warm us. In teens or subzero temps. I have. You have to dig deep and layer well. And just accept being cold every single minute of your life outside of your sleeping bag.

So we were doing hunter cold. This was Western Pennsylvania. Everyone knew how to do hunter cold. My buddies were all suburban kids. I told them how to dress. A few listened.

3+ hours of my best friends in the world talking shit to AC/DC and Ace of Base or whatever was the thing.

That night we started at like 3am and drove a few hours of dark Pennsylvania highway. Just darkness, trees, and sky. I can't remember if the stars were out. Something about those Appalachian Forest highways just are monotonous in a weird way.

Those road trips are always fun. I strongly suggest. Even if you have to brave the Appalachian Static.

Anyway we arrive at Punxsutawney. It is in the middle of nowhere. Just another isolated abandoned steel town. They have a bit of a real downtown that most of these towns utterly lack. Often it's a gas station and a Dollar General and a bunch of run down houses with a school 40 minutes away it shares with the other rundown towns.

But Punxsutawney has a nice little town of happy people because of Phil and our fascination with this thing.

So of course there is not parking for 30,000 people. In a town of 5,000. So they rope off some field frozen solid and park us all charging Disney parking fees.

They subcontract school buses to haul people from the parking lot to the main event. The bus drivers are the first line of defense against alcohol and drugs.

Security is the second. Compete with pat downs and local cops along with PA Troopers with drug dogs and quotas to meet. No spoiling the fun with chemical enhancement!

Then you walk for fucking ever. Slowly. Going to the Knob.

It is deadly cold. And it begins to dawn on you what you are in for in this grassy pen with nothing but a porta potty or two for entertainment.

Look at all that fun!

This was before phones people. My friends and I were super studious and none of us owned any kind of video game. No handheld games. Maybe you thought to bring a newspaper or book. I think I brought a book. I'm sure at least one of them brought engineering notes to study. Most just talk and bitch about the cold.

Cold in the dark is different from cold in the light. It is so much deeper without the solar radiation slightly warming your surface and your spirits.

Then the dawn brings light and a little warmth and hope.

Then the dawn brings the DJ.

Small town DJs are interesting critters. They are small town famous and often they are unique personalities that can be really entertaining. At least between songs and commercials. Some of them are pretty amazing like Nipsey, Jen, and Earl in Harrisburg/Hershey/Lancaster/Lebanon area back when it was even more podunk backwater.

It was 1998 and this guy showed up.

So this small town guy is used to entertaining local venues with his shtick that everyone knows and loves with his slightly out of date look and inside local jokes.

Today he has 2 hours of just him on a stage in front of 30,000 pissed off college students who were expecting a lot more entertainment and maybe some food or drinks and tired & grumpy rural folk hoping to get in a little fun and excitement before going to work. At least half the crowd had found a way to sneak in a flask or something. So people were unruly.

And we just watch the poor guy spend 2 hours fighting for his life up there feeling bad for him trying to entertain us while hosting his fun little morning show for his listeners who are probably loving it all.

He got heckled. Badly. This was 25 years ago and we weren't very nice.

After 2 hours of this entertainment. The main event started.

My heroes arrived on the scene.

They have been partying all night long. In a nice warm place with warm food, comfy chairs/couches, running water, and a ton of alcohol. They are all drunk as skunks. The all come up on stage, wave and whip up the crowd, pull out their buddy, give him some scritches and lift him up to the crowd like he's the new Lion King, and then examine his shadow, make their proclamation, smile and wave, go back to their party, and count their money.

This is the highlight of the entire event. The peak of excitement. The best it got for the whole day.

Then they shoved the DJ back on stage, the national media and anyone with connections left, and the rest of us were kept penned up for another hour or 2 till it was our turn to take a school bus back to our frozen car, a 3+ hour drive through winter highways to get back in time for afternoon classes.

It was so much fun.

[ladyosen]

Personal

It's been forever since I've done anything like this and I look at my dw entry I made in 2012 and wow. I mean I'm in a better place moneywise at least, though I could be more responsible, but I got to get back on track with a lot of things.

But some goals and thoughts.

1. I really need to improve my eating. It's like the biggest part of the puzzle for me. I have a bad habit of snacking on junky food out of boredom. Also stopping at places on the way to or from work and getting a lot of junky food. I need to stop that and also do better with my meals. I think I want to have a goal of having at least one veggie/fruit-laden meal. Like a smoothie, salad or soup or something else that is plant-heavy.

2. getting more consistent with fitness which is hard because of all the pain issues I have in my foot, back and hips. I've been working with this mobility app, so I'm hoping that will help. And I'm thinking about getting a Switch so I can play games like Ring Fit Adventure, but in the mean time, I'm working on doing some small exercise videos to get into the habit.

3. Want to keep up with my writing consistently. I'm also working on mirroring stuff here and at squidgeworld (would love suggestions though). It's hard because some of the ao3/otw stuff demotivated me bad, but I don't want to give up either

4. I also want to write an original thing, because I've been reading too many bad transmigration novels and the like. But I want to research more.

5. I also want to I don't know, take up painting. I saw a good post on twitter about having a hobby that doesn't involve screens which resonated with me a lot and like... I think something artsy like that would be good. I experimented with a cheapass pour painting kit I won at our work holiday party and it didn't go well but I also want to keep trying because colors! There's also all these fun youtube tutorials I want to do though I realize that is slightly against the no screens things lmao, but the spirit is there.

6. Also want to catch up with reading both books and manga, because there is a whole world out there. And I was a big reader as a child.

7. Getting into a good groove with rp while not being anxious about being slow. I want to just... hold myself to my own standards I guess.

8. Also less mindless reading gossip sites. I have a bad habit of just clicking and scrolling for hours, sometimes obessively and it's stressful for me. I've lost so much of my life doing this. I hate it.

9. Also this is hard but I want to be more honest about my likes and that. I have a bad habit of holding back, which ties in with my shyness about chatting with people, but I want to be more honest, though that might be baby steps.

And honestly, this all feels cathartic to write out.

cross posted to dreamwidth

[alljamesbondgames]

Before I Kill You, Mr Bond…

Original Release: 1996

Developer: James Ernest

Publisher: Cheapass Games

Platform: Board Game

This is an unlicensed James Bond-inspired card game from Cheapass Games. In this, each player is taking on the role of a supervillain, trying to capture spies in their evil lairs.

Each turn you draw a card and can improve your lair, and then play a spy card to attack an opponent’s (or your own lair). You can play a spy from your hand, or one from an opponent’s hand (the backs of the spy are different) and risk not knowing the value of the spy.

If the spy is a higher value than the lair, the lair is discarded. You don’t score any points for this, you just mess up your opponent. If the spy is lower value than the lair, then the owner of the lair has two options: kill or taunt.

If you kill a spy, you score points equal to the value of the spy. You can taunt by playing a “Doubler” card, saying “Before I Kill You, [Name]” and reading out the card. The card has a letter in the corner and if another player plays the second card with this letter, the Spy escapes and you lose your lair (and all the points), but if you’re successful, you double the points of the spy. You can play additional Doubler card, however, you run the risk of losing all the points with each additional one.

It’s a fun, silly game, but also quite flawed. The only incentive to attack opponents is to potentially stop them from getting points, which makes it too risky to play unknown cards from other players.

Danjaq got wind of this game and ordered Cheapass Games to remove any reference to “Bond” and was relaunched as James Ernest’s Totally Renamed Spy Game before being revised as “Before I Kill You, Mister Spy…”. The newest version fixes some of the issues, such as being able to play lair cards face down or stealing lair cards from your opponents, giving you an incentive to attack.

[geekandsundry]

https://geekandsundry.com/10-fantastic-two-player-board-games-better-than-chocolate-roses-valentines-day/

I’ll be the first to admit that I’m probably one of the least romantic people you’ll meet. I think flowers are impractical (all they do is sit in water and die) and my favorite box of chocolate is one whose box can be easily repurposed to be a quickly crafted dice tray or wet ...

[cleverrobespierrette]

This week (April 8-12, 2019), the Cheapass crew is visiting with Greater Than Games, streaming vintage Cheapass Games like Lord of the Fries and Give Me the Brain. Tune in between 11am and 5pm Central Time to catch some of it live, or replay the videos later - they’ll be available on the Greater Than Games channel, and maybe even edited later! :D And don’t miss the campaign for “Cheapass Games in Black and White: A Retrospective” - a lovely big brick of a book covering the history of Cheapass games and the development and rules of the 100+ games published during their 20 odd years of publishing. 

[atomic-two-sheds]

Reminds me vaguely of Diceland from Cheapass Games.

Really wish I hadn't lost all my pieces for that.

Tactical combat oriented tabletop RPG where you paint a little picture of your character onto a billiards ball and use a billiards table with various obstacles set up on it as the battlemap. Repositioning and melee attacks are performed by striking your own ball with the cue, while ranged attacks use a cue ball; in either case, the ball played must strike the target for the attack to connect.

[puzzlenation]

The greatest gift exchange there never was...

The greatest gift exchange there never was…

It’s Christmas Eve, so hopefully you’ve perused our Holiday Puzzly Gift Guide and completed all your shopping in a timely and not-at-stress-inducing, hair-tearing-out manner. But if not, fear not! Some of the puzzliest and cleverest people in the artistic, board game, and puzzle communities may have just come up with the perfect last-minute solution for you. You’re probably familiar with the…