OGN's Game of the Year Watch

A lot of games feel fun for one night and then vanish into the shelf. We wanted to figure out the opposite: the board games that keep tugging at your brain weeks later, the ones you actually want to play again instead of just admiring the box.

We start by debriefing what we played recently, including Harvest and why its planting and harvesting rhythm feels so satisfying even when you get absolutely thwomped. Clayton breaks down quick hitters like Excalibur, Pick A Pepper, Tag Team, and Mind Bug, then we spend real time on Hanami, the gorgeous Keymaster Games take on Reiner Knizia’s Samurai. The production is deluxe, but the hook is the same classic tension: surround spaces, win majorities, and watch a simple tile placement turn into sharp area control decisions in about 30 minutes.

Then Travis brings in newer plays like Solstis and a first pass at Container before we geek out over dnup (Down Up), a small-box card shedding game from the designer of Scout that adds nasty interaction, clever flipping values, and that “one more round” feeling. From there, we hit our midyear “new to us in 2026” rankings, with standouts like Gazebo, Old King’s Crown, Layers, and more, plus a quick over-the-fence check-in on shows, reading, and a wild World Cup moment.

If you like board game reviews, top three lists, and practical “should we play this again?” talk, subscribe, share the episode with your game group, and leave a review so more people can find us.

Transcript

Welcome And Housekeeping

SPEAKER_02 0:15

Welcome to the Operation Game Night Podcast. We're back and we're better than ever. I'm your host, Travis Smith. Joining me as always, my co-host, Clayton Gable. Clay, how are you doing?

SPEAKER_00 0:26

I'm doing good, Travis. I'm a little uh I'm a little upset about my lighting situation here. I feel like you know the shadows just aren't cast in the right places, but you know, you'll carry this podcast for good look. So I guess I don't have to worry too much.

SPEAKER_02 0:42

Uh well, the last time we recorded was the first time I had ever tried out my new setup in my new place. And throughout the episode, I just got sweatier and sweatier, and my face got more and more red. I walked out of the room and Rachel goes, like, are you okay? Were you like doing push-ups in there? Like, what's going on in there? And uh, so if you are a viewer of this podcast on YouTube, uh, I'm I apologize for my appearance. We're trying something new today. We are running the fan in the background. Hopefully, it's not too distracting.

SPEAKER_00 1:12

I don't hear it, and it was probably my fault because I was getting you all hot and bothered talking about that marathon of games uh last week. So that's I'll take some blame. That was true.

SPEAKER_02 1:23

Speaking of YouTube, if you are watching on YouTube, go ahead and give us a subscribe. Uh, follow us on Instagram at Operation Game My Podcast, and uh leave us a review if you already follow us, because we would appreciate some feedback. And thank you to those that have been with us since the beginning. We appreciate you. And if you're new, keep on keeping on, keep le keep listening, subscribe, don't miss another episode ever again. Join us on this journey.

SPEAKER_00 1:48

Yeah, we're only gonna get better, I think.

SPEAKER_02 1:52

All right, so good episode today. We're gonna we're now halfway through uh 2026. Can you believe it?

SPEAKER_00 2:00

Can't believe it. No, not at all.

SPEAKER_02 2:03

Uh, and we're gonna kind of do a quick top three games that are new to us in 2026, games that we have experienced for the first time that are kind of sticking with us. Uh, that's our special operation for the day. But first, we're gonna debrief some games, and then after our special operation, we will go over the fence

Recent Plays And Quick Takeaways

SPEAKER_02 2:20

and talk about what we have been doing outside of board gaming. So, Clay, what did you play this week? Tell me about it.

SPEAKER_00 2:26

Okay, so I'm gonna hit you with a few just wham bam, what I played this week, and then I'll save the the key feature debrief of my uh of my place for the week. So this week I had the chance. So a lot of this we talked about a lot of games last week. So some of this is gonna be redundant this episode. So I will try to bring fresh light to uh the games I'm talking about two weeks in a row here. But we played Harvest on Tuesday. Oh, yeah. I talked about that last week as being one that I played one time and it was it was on the borderline of getting that special forces tier. Uh played it again, just two players. So the time before I played it with three. Okay. So this time we played it two players, and two players introduces, you know, a typical bot player that just spot blocking. Yeah, spot blocking, which was fairly easy to integrate into the game. I don't have any complaints about that. And it moved along quite nicely at two. I think we were able to knock out a game of harvest in like you know 45 minutes with the two of us. And I did explore some new strategies. I think I said last time that I felt like I I had just been gearing up for one giant harvest turn the whole game. Like I wasn't turning over my crop fields very often. So I made a point to this game try and do that um a little more frequently. So I think the first round I even harvested a little bit. It did not pan out, Mary. Mary, Mary spanked me uh handedly in harvest. But again, I really enjoyed my second play of harvest, just getting into that rhythmic flow of you know, planting, tending, harvesting. And you know, the different player powers do add a nice little touch. They're asymmetric enough to just give you something to consider leaning into a little bit. I think this last time I had the one that made it, I think you can build buildings for free. Oh, yeah, which was nice. So yeah, we'll keep coming back to Harvest because Mary likes it too. So that makes it a uh an instant win for me.

SPEAKER_02 4:39

Well, I'm the wrong person to ask about that game because I don't think I've ever won. I love it and I love playing it, and I have played a bunch of that game online on BGA, but I don't think I've won a single game. In fact, after we talked about it last week, I was like, man, I'm itching to play some harvest now. So I booted it up on BGA, played against two other people. I think it was a three-player game, and I just got oh, I just got thwomped so bad. Like they had double my score. I also did a big build-up to the harvest at the end. I don't know what the real strategy is. Maybe I can do some research and figure out what the meta is, but I man, I suck at that game so bad, but I love it.

SPEAKER_00 5:20

Yeah, that's all that's a sign of a good game when you can suck at it and still have a great time just going through the motions. Yeah. Do you want to you want me to do my whole thing or do you want to like chair?

SPEAKER_02 5:32

Yeah, keep going, keep it rolling. Oh, let's do it.

SPEAKER_00 5:34

Then on Friday, played X Excalibur again. This is that Roxley game. It's just like you have a bunch of chips. I guess it could have been cards, but it's chips. And you start out, somebody has Excalibur, somebody has a cursed sword, and you are spending the whole game just kind of manipulating who has what chips, trying to figure out who has Excalibur now. Maybe Excalibur went back to the middle pile of chips, and then at some point the game ends when one of the sections of Avalon gets depleted, and you see who had Excalibur, who had the cursed sword. And maybe even like me in this last game, you had the Squire Sword, which allows you to win if Excalibur is to your left or right. I can't remember which one it is, but whichever one it was, I had it. So I shared the victory in um Excalibur winning. Yeah, I I just really like this for a 20-minute game. Um, there's so many different chip types that all have different abilities. You're like you get Arthur, and you can say, All right, everybody, if you have a sword, you have to hold them out in your hands face down, and then I get to take them all or something. There's just a lot of different fun ways to manipulate the way the chips are flowing. And yeah, I'll I'll keep bringing this one out. Yeah, I like that one a lot. Um, next up we have what did I play next, Travis? I think next was Pick a Pepper. Oh, okay. So this was a random buy I bought at uh Barnes and Noble a while back. This has actually been sitting on my shelf of opportunities for some time, and Isaac wanted to play a game with me, so I was like, you know what, this is a good chance. Isaac's a trooper, he'll he'll saddle up for anything. So I uh I pulled out Pick a Pepper. This is like a fun little shedding game. Uh, I don't I didn't realize that, but it's did I say it's Wolfgang Kramer? Yeah. Okay. Well, I'm saying it again because that's a design pedigree right there.

SPEAKER_01 7:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:40

And you know, it's it's a game where you're collecting different types of peppers, and it kind of has this fun aspect where you kind of build your hand of cards. So the first part, you're kind of bidding for turn order to draft these lots of different peppers.

SPEAKER_01 7:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:59

And then after you know, everybody has played all their cards, you are left with all the peppers that you drafted in the first phase, and then these hot sauces get added. And so you can shed your cards to get different hot sauces. So the hot sauce will say, like, you need seven of the same type of pepper to grab this hot sauce, or five of the same type of pepper. So you're playing cards to shed them and grab the hot sauce, or if you don't quite have the sets you need yet, you can still keep building your ingredient stack by grabbing different lots of cards. So it was a fun little um tempo to the game of deciding when to grab more peppers and add them to my ingredient stack, and then when do I have the sets required to grab the hot sauces? Yeah, I I I'll definitely be looking to play that one again. I like shedding games, it's fun trying to get rid of cards.

SPEAKER_02 8:51

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 8:52

And yeah, and this does it in a different way where you're getting rid of bigger sets of cards to get bigger point value hot sauces versus just trying to be the first one to lose all your um cards. Love it. Next, I played tag team with Isaac as well, my little gaming buddy. Uh, yeah, tag team's great. If you haven't played this one, it plays in like 15 minutes. You just get two different characters, they have different abilities. You make a little deck up of both their cards, and then you just kind of play I declare war with the other player, and each round you get to add one more card to your little uh stack of cards, and you can decide where it goes in turn order. It you know, I I don't ever really think about it that hard, but I'm sure if you were really try-hardening it, I'm playing with a seven-year-old, so we just kind of flip the cards over. Oh crap, look, it looks like you hit me. Oh, that's that's too bad. Um, and then somebody dies and you win. So uh played some more tag team, and then the last game before I get to the the big one I'm excited about was Mind Bug. I played this one with Mason. Um, it's the Richard Garfield game, kind of like a light magic the gathering, I guess you could call it. It just comes in a box and there's a whole bunch of monsters. You deal out 10 cards to each player, and the shtick of the game is that all the cards have these crazy awesome abilities. So when you play them out, you have two chances per game to just steal that person's card. If Mason plays a card and it looks like it would be really sweet, I can just mind bug it and now it's my card, and then Mason goes again. Um, so yeah, the turns are very simple. You either play a card or you attack with a monster, and then they have your typical like card game type abilities where they can be poisonous or tough, or they have frenzy where they can attack twice per turn. And the goal is to just get your opponent's life down to zero. So another quick 15-minute two-player game that I definitely recommend checking it out if you like that kind of dueling game. Um, it's light, interesting, and Garfield's the king, man. Like he he does this stuff in his sleep.

SPEAKER_02 11:11

Yeah, yeah. I I think I've played Mind Bug before, it's pretty cool.

SPEAKER_00 11:14

Yeah, I like it.

SPEAKER_02 11:16

All right, it's a great like small box, travel, take it wherever.

SPEAKER_00 11:20

Absolutely, love that. And they've come out with like a zillion different versions of it now.

SPEAKER_02 11:25

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_00 11:26

So, yeah, so that I think they did like a mind bug King of Tokyo crossover at one point. They have yeah, they have a bunch of different expansions and add-ins to it, so it's a cool game. But thanks to Mike, our good friend Mike at the Meeple That Loses, whatever he calls himself now.

Hanami Deluxe And Knizia Magic

SPEAKER_00 11:46

Um we uh so I have samurai, it's right behind me. Reiner Kenitsa game. I probably from like '98, '99. Yeah. I could have looked it up if I was a better, uh, a better journalist, but I didn't. So Samurai was a game I bought. Man, I just saw it used at Petri's, and I got it because it had Kenitsa's name on the box. Played it once, thought it was cool. I I really enjoyed it, but it just hasn't got played since that one time a few years ago. And I think you know, people are a little intimidated by that box. It kind of looks like a whole thing, you know. It's got it looks uh, whatever a Japanese warrior is called, they're on there looking like they want to take things over.

SPEAKER_02 12:33

Whatever they're called. Yeah, if only they were called samurai. Dude, oh my god. Incredible. Wow, wow.

SPEAKER_00 12:42

Uh like like and follow, please. Um, yeah. I was too that was too easy. Dang. Okay, so it's got this mean mugging samurai on on the box. It pe people think it's a more weighty game than it is, I think. So I tried to push it on people for a while. Yeah, it and you'd pull out it and people are like, nah. But I kept it around because it's Kenizia, and it like this copy, I've it was going for like $200 for this old school like samurai version from back in the day, and it's awesome. It's got like these, I don't know what they're made of, but they're really feel-goody pieces that you're trying to get. But yeah, the meeple that loses, he tells me, Have you seen this new Kenizia game, Nami? And I said, Yeah, Mike, it's just samurai. I don't need that because I already have samurai. And then it was like a little worm in my ear, and I couldn't get it out of my head. I was like, Well, uh Key Master did just impress me with Harvest, and I do love Parks and Caper Europe. So maybe, maybe Key Master did something cool with samurai. Maybe I should check this out. And I was like, you know what? I I did all this justifying to myself because why would I buy the exact same game again? And I was like, if you haven't seen Hanami, Travis, maybe you can pull it up. But yeah, it is a beautiful looking box, it's got this flower on it. I was like, you know what? The people I play games with now, they would they would play this because of the way it looks. It's just a a beautiful pink box. And so I bought it, I bought the deluxe edition, it came and Mary and I played this sucker um just last night. And let me tell you, it did not disappoint in any way. Uh the production, let's just start there because that's the only real difference, is top of the line. I mean, the I just felt from the box cover to every component I touched was all so harmoniously integrated. Like it just felt like you were in this aesthetic that I just loved. It was beautiful. Um, the deluxe version, which I think goes for $70, has like wooden hexes that you're putting out. Uh, and those felt great. And then it has these big chunky wooden celebration tokens that you're trying to collect. So I don't even know what the theme is here, honestly. I swear, like, I know in Samurai you were like whatever those warriors are, uh, trying to take over villages or paddy fields or something. Um, but in this game, they've said something about there being parks, and you're like trying to experience the parks in some type of way, and there's lanterns and sticky rice and uh I don't whatever the other thing is, flowers of some sort. So, yeah, the theme has kind of been lost on me, but it doesn't matter because the aesthetic is so good. Um, in this game and in Samurai, basically what you're doing is you have these tiles that are yours, they're in your color, and they have different symbols on that relate to these different victory point tokens. So the flowers, the sticky rice, and the lanterns. And there's scattered across this map that you're playing on, there's different parks that have maybe one, two, or three of these, like they're called celebration tokens. So I'm gonna say that there's celebration tokens spread across the map, and you're placing your tiles out adjacent to these celebration tokens. And when a park is completely surrounded by tiles, yours and somebody else's, you score it. And whoever had the highest strength of that type of symbol around it gets that celebration token. They put it behind their screen. At the end of the game, if you had so there's basically only three points in the game. There's three different celebration token types, and at the end, if you have the most of a single type, you get like the big chunky point that says, I was the Lantern King, I get the Lantern King point. Um, same with the flour and the sticky rice. So, yeah, all that sounds pretty simple, but there's you know, tiles that are wild, so you put them, you know, they contribute to all three types of celebration tokens. You have these fast tiles that have like a whatever those fast trains in Japan are called. Travis, you probably know you're muted, but I will assume you said the correct bullet trains. Bullet trains. Yes, they have they have the bullet train symbol on. And if you have the bullet train tiles, instead of just placing one tile per turn, you can place as many bullet trains. So you might be able to completely surround something in one turn if you get enough of those uh behind your screen. And then you have boat tiles that can actually go outside the land mass, and they can contribute to like the majority scoring if you have it adjacent to something. So again, like Kenitzia does, it is super simple gameplay. On your turn, you play a tile, and then you draw back up to five. Like that's pretty much it, with the exception of dealing with some of the some of the special tile actions, but it's really not that much. And honestly, at two players, this felt a lot like Iliad. Okay. Instead of like, you know, waiting for a column or row to be finished to score, you yeah, wait for something to be surrounded and then you score it. And just like an Iliad, you know, you had ones that were worth five, you had ones that are worth four. So everybody has like a lantern tile that's worth four, and one that's worth one, and one that's worth two. And so, you know, you're trying to figure out where you want to put those in different park areas, like, oh man, it's so good. I can't wait to I can't wait to play this again.

SPEAKER_02 19:08

That's great. It's kind of it sounds like it almost shares a little bit of DNA with like rebirth, or is that just the tile placement that's giving me those vibes?

SPEAKER_00 19:19

Yeah, I mean, I could see that, you know. I mean, a a lot of Kenizia games have a similar DNA that runs through it, right? Like it's kind of kind of similar to your castle majority concepts and in rebirth. But yeah, I mean, with this production, I hope this game reaches a ton of people because I think it's just it's another example of Kenitsia at his best. Absolutely, that sounds awesome. I want to give that a shot. Yeah, key master did not disappoint.

SPEAKER_02 19:49

They they're kind of a sleeper, like nobody throws out key master when they talk about some of the best productions, but they always put so much love into the games that they do put out, and it's not like a ton, it's not like every month or whatever, like all play, but man, they just like slow drip, awesome games. It isn't harvest also key master, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:08

Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Yeah, that's what I mean. I'm like, they they do not have a huge catalog, but what they do do, they do good. They do good.

SPEAKER_02 20:17

How dare you say do do on a podcast? But well, is that the last game you had?

SPEAKER_00 20:22

That's the last game I had. Please tell me something about what you've been playing. I just labbed forever again.

Solstice And A First Look

SPEAKER_02 20:27

So I I'm gonna give a cursory kind of overview because I only played these two once, but I played Solstice by Mr. Bruno Cathala, which is a game about placing tiles in order up a mountain so that your character can venture up this mountain and achieve their adulthood. It's kind of like based in old folklore and uh civilizations, where on the summer solstice to become an adult, I think it's to become a man, but you know, inclusion and all that to become an adult, you climb the mountain up on the summer solstice and you meet these like guiding spirits, and so you're placing tiles that form this mountain to work your way up, earning stars by meeting spirits and lighting campfires along the way. So you and the person that you're playing with are kind of building this mountain together, and you're trying to create the path that ends up with the most amount of stars, which are the point at the end of the game. I don't want to like get super deep into it because I have only played it once and it I want to like play it a couple more times. Maybe I'll do like more of a deep dive into actual decisions that you're making. Uh, but that one's pretty cool. And Bruno Cathala is always a special designer that I appreciate.

SPEAKER_00 21:42

Yeah, it's fun having those people like you've been you when once you've been around long enough that you just like you see their name on a box and you're like the hell with it. I'm I'll try it.

SPEAKER_02 21:51

Yeah, it's crazy. Like, I yeah, and to be fair, I did not buy this one at a local game store, I bought it on Amazon, on Amazon Prime Day. I know, I know, I did it. Uh, but for some reason, Amazon was like, hey, you're a nerd. Here's a board game that you might like that's on sale. And it was like I think I got it for like less than 10 bucks or something. It was and it's a 2025 release. Dang. Yeah, it's pretty new. And it's it's a small box Bruno Cathala tile laying game. It's just pretty cool. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 22:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:23

So maybe I'll uh play it a couple more times and get back to you on actual thoughts. But um played that one. Okay. I took a topical run at container, which is a whole place to do publication, and a market manipulation game. I do. Wow. And uh man, that is like logistics and market manish manipulation, the board game. You are building factories and warehouses and ports, and you are shipping containers from your factories and ports to other destinations, and you have a couple of ships, and every time you want to move the ship, it needs to go out to sea and then to port. So it takes like two turns to get it where it's going. You have like a central bank that you can do deals with and like exchange goods, and you have a container island where you kind of store containers for in-game storing. There's a lot going on. I am not gonna do it justice here, but I gave it a shot. It's crazy. Maybe I'll come back to that one later because it's like you can just do the logistics itself, is kind of like um, what's that like Egypt game where you're sailing the ships to the different ports, you're stacking the blocks up? Emotep. Emotep. I was gonna say Amon Raw, but emotep. Yeah, it's kind of like that, it feels a little like that. But the blocks that you're loading on are containers created by the other players, and you cannot buy and ship your own containers. There's a whole thing going on, man. There's like money changing hands all over the place. It's crazy. I'm gonna come back to it. I know it's like number eight on the hotness right now, and I don't want to miss the window, but I also want to do it justice because there's a lot going on in this game, and I think it's pretty cool. Uh, it's currently sitting at like 8.0 on BGG for a rating.

SPEAKER_01 24:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:10

Um, it says the weight is three. I think once you get the handle on how the money flows around the table and how the shipping works, I think it becomes a lot easier to navigate, but I'm not there right now. I just kind of gave it a cursory run, and uh I want to come back to that one for sure.

Down Up As A Scout Successor

SPEAKER_02 24:30

But the game that I do want to talk about is Down Up, also called Dun Up by the uh by our friends at uh the decision space podcast.

SPEAKER_00 24:45

Oh yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:46

Uh so down up is designed by Kay Kino. Kajino.

SPEAKER_00 24:54

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 24:55

Does that ring a bell?

SPEAKER_00 24:57

That rings a bell. That rings a bell. They they designed Scout.

SPEAKER_02 25:00

They did design. He yeah, he designed Scout. Uh, and this game is a iteration on Scout, and I will credit the decision space podcast for giving me some of the verbiage for this uh rundown because they did a great breakdown of how we got to this game and some of the decisions that you make in this game, which is freaking phenomenal. Those guys are awesome. Thank you for thank you for being our friends. We love you.

SPEAKER_00 25:25

Um, but their words are amazing, they yeah, put language to board games in a way that I could only ever dream of.

SPEAKER_02 25:32

Yeah, and they they never fail. So uh this is a new game by the designer of Scout, and it's very similar to Scout in that it is a card shedding game, and you have cards that are taken into your hand that have two values on them, much like Scout, where you can flip the cards. You cannot rearrange your hand, much like Scout, but you're trying to shed all the cards in your hand as fast as possible. The mechanic for doing that is playing a single, a double, a triple, a quadruple, uh tuple, like you're just trying to put sets down and make those sets last long enough to work around the table and back to you. If I place two twos on the table, that's great. I got them out of my hand. Somebody places a three, like two threes next, like a set of threes, those twos that I played previously come back to my hand because my hand was beat. But but when they come back to my hand, they flip over and they are now worth the opposite value, the uh like their secondary value that was on the card. Um, so that's pretty cool. That's kind of like a little bit like fruit fight, a little bit like scout. Um the cool thing about this game is that if somebody has a you know four eights out there, they are only playing against the quadruple sets. So I can if I have a single card and nobody else has singles out there, I can play that single card and like you have this freedom of action to put those cards down. You just hope that nobody plays something better by the time it comes back around to you, or you take that card back into your hand. So your actions that you're taking on your turn are you're playing cards, you're adding cards to a set that somebody already has down on the table. So if they have two threes out there, like a set of threes, and I have a three in my hand, I can add it to their hand. So now they have three threes in front of them. But if somebody plays a triple set before it gets back to them, they have to take my card that I added back into their hand. So you're like clogging up people's decks by forcing them to take cards later on.

SPEAKER_00 27:48

Wait, say that again. You can add your own cards to somebody else's played scene.

SPEAKER_02 27:53

Yes, yes. So, like let's say I have a three that's left in my hand, and somebody has a set of two threes out there, and I don't know, a bunch of other cards, whatever. Let's say that there's another single that's better than the three that I have, and I cannot play that three to beat the eight, the ten, whatever it is. Yeah, I can take that three and I can add it to the set of threes that somebody else has in front of them. So now they have three threes instead of two threes. Now, if somebody beats that triple set, like if somebody plays three, a set of three fives or whatever, the person that played the threes, including my three that I added, has to take that whole set back into their hands.

SPEAKER_00 28:37

Okay, here's probably a overly in the weeds rules question, but it just came to my mind. So could you still do that maneuver of adding your three to the two threes if there was already a triple out there that was better than three threes?

SPEAKER_02 28:54

No, you cannot. So it has to like be the best one out there at the moment that you add it to a hand.

SPEAKER_00 28:59

Okay, that's beautiful.

SPEAKER_02 29:01

So you're playing cards, you're adding cards to somebody else's, you are taking cards, like picking cards up that are already out there, but you have to flip them over to their secondary value, or the last last but not least, you can't do anything else. You can flip your entire hand over and play your secondary values, and it's a card shedding game. It's like I would love to know what the weight on Scout is. I I honestly don't know off the top of my head, but this is rocking a weight of 1.44, and I think it's like just one step simpler than Scout because Scout has like the whole timing of like Scout and show, you're playing runs, you're playing sets, you're playing a bunch of different types of hands. Yeah, this one is very simple in that it's just sets that you're playing and not runs like you would see in Scout.

SPEAKER_00 29:51

Yeah, I do like when it's just just sets. Yeah, that that for whatever reason, and Paul, God bless his soul, he gave us a good way to remember it on the decision space episode. But I it for whatever reason, it always is like, what does a run be to set? Like you know, which one? Um, but yeah, this I think this is definitely uh I don't I would say scout's probably closer to a two on the weight, but yeah, no, this sounds sweet.

SPEAKER_02 30:20

Yeah, it's great. Um, I would probably recommend this to anybody that likes these types of card shedding games. Um, and I on the on the decision space podcast, I think they said that like if this one would have come out first, scout would not have like blown up the same way it did. And I tend to agree with that. Um, I also think that Scout came out in a moment that like shocked kind of everyone about how popular it got and how big it blew up overnight. Yeah, um, like that everyone had played Scout that year, it was crazy. Uh, this game, now that people have tried this kind of formula before, it doesn't seem as novel, but man, I I freaking love this game, I think it's so cool. Um, I have played probably 15 games, it's on BGA. If you want to try it out, we should get a game going because it's excellent. I think you'll love it. Even on BGA, the implementation is great.

SPEAKER_00 31:17

So, you who have you been playing games with, by the way? Rachel, yeah, just old Rachel. Yeah, is that okay? Yeah, I played. I was just curious, like, if it because it I I wouldn't think it's best at two, but it's not, it's not the best at two.

SPEAKER_02 31:35

This one uh is way better when you can put a little pressure on because when you play at two players, it feels like a very like tit for tat shedding game. Um this one shines at more players. I've been playing a lot of BGA on this one. This one is a great implementation online, um, and I am really enjoying it. But I think this is a game that you could teach and play with anyone. I think it's I think it's really smart. I think it's if you like Scout, you're gonna love this. It's super cheap, it's in a small box. Uh plus I forgot to mention the whole goal of the game. The whole goal of the game is to spell out down up D N U P, which is the title of the game. Uh, they are little cardboard cutouts that look like D's and N's or U's or Ps. And if you shed your entire hand first, you automatically get two letters, and if you shed your hand second in the round, you get one letter towards spelling out down up. And the first person to get get basically four wins or four points wins the game.

SPEAKER_00 32:38

Man, yeah, I I know I'm gonna love this because I was in love with scout for a while, and but then jungo's kind of been my next one, which jungle kind of takes the element of scout of keeping your uh cards in the same order, yeah. And it adds that piece, but simplifies it, and this takes the two-sided cards and kind of simplifies it a little bit. Yeah, so that's a neat little trilogy to think about. I think Jungo is probably the easiest of the three, uh, being from Happy Camper. I love that game. Um, and I love Scout. So it just stands to reason. I will love this. It's tough out there to compete in the shedding world these days. So hopefully, old Wolfgang and Pick a Pepper get a chance to see the table again because there's a lot, there's a lot competing.

SPEAKER_02 33:31

Yeah, the good thing is, like you said, they're all typically in small boxes that can stick around forever, and you can always just shake things up, pull out an old one. Absolutely, man. Okay, I beat that one to death. I don't know. I'm starting the game.

SPEAKER_00 33:47

They talked about it for an hour on on decision space, so I think your five minutes is reasonable. Maybe we should just do a like uh decision space after party listen. Like, you know how they they have like the Game of Thrones podcast where it's just people that watched Game of Thrones talking about Game of Thrones. We should just listen to this decision space, and then every week we put out our our episode. Yeah, I really liked when Paul said this. Yeah, one thing about yeah, they've been on a roll lately.

SPEAKER_02 34:22

I've been so into them. So oh my god, if you're not following them and you're listening to this, uh well, this is like baby's first podcast. That's like Intense Designer podcast, but I love it. They're so small.

SPEAKER_00 34:35

I hate to tell you it's out there because you probably won't come back here, but they're they're they're they're the real deal.

SPEAKER_02 34:41

Yeah, all right. Are we ready to hit the special operation for the day? Let's do it.

Midyear New To Us Honorable Mentions

SPEAKER_02 34:47

The mission objective. Uh, so we're halfway through the calendar year, and we are going to talk best new to us games for 2026. So it doesn't have to be a new game from this year, but do you have any uh admiral what do you want to say? Honorable mentions. Honorable mentions before we get to like top three.

SPEAKER_00 35:11

Man, I could go on, I could go on for days just for context. I just pulled up BG stats. Oh, I'm shouting out everything today. All right, BG stats, love BG stats. I've played 54 new to me games so far this year.

SPEAKER_02 35:24

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 35:24

So got a few. It's pretty good. If I had to say honorable mentions, I think I'm gonna go with the magenta line. Pretty much that that whole card game line. I like Fruit Fight. I've liked the um, it's called I'm Out. I talked about it on an episode a while ago. Duo. I played that, it's cool. So that whole line has been nice, especially in this era where card games, small bot small card games seem to be what get hits the table a lot more often these days. So I will give that a honorable mention. And I think perhaps. Yeah, I think that might be the end of my honorable mentions. Oh, take time. Take time will get an honorable mention.

SPEAKER_02 36:15

Hmm. Yeah, that one like conjure list big time.

SPEAKER_00 36:20

Yeah, yeah. So uh and moon colony bloodbath. All right, you better cut me off here soon because the more I keep looking at this list, I'm just gonna be uh shouting out.

SPEAKER_02 36:33

So uh since we're only doing top three, I do have a couple of uh honorable mentions. I want to keep on say admirable mentions, honorable mentions, yeah. Um right now I'm sitting at 35 new games to me this year.

SPEAKER_00 36:49

Okay, not quite as good as me, but no, it's not, but I've also been moving and stuff.

SPEAKER_02 36:55

There's there's stuff going on over here, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:57

Yeah, as you're aware of. Whatever.

SPEAKER_02 36:59

So my honorable mentions. Uh, I want to hit up gazebo. I I really have been loving that game. That one is really cool and super cute, and I love the components and the production is really nice. Uh, wondrous creatures. Amanda turned me on to this one, and we put it online. The worker placement kind of dragon catching creature catching game. That one's pretty cool, and I think it's a sleeper hit. I really appreciate Amanda showing me, first off, and playing with us online. Took a while to get it, but the second we finished that first game, I was like, there's something here. Like, I need to dive into this and figure out how to actually play this game. And I've played probably let's see, I played four more games of that. And uh, yeah, that one's kind of sticking with me a little bit. I I like the worker placement that it's not like singular spots, like the angles of everything matter. So there's a little bit of a spatial puzzle there, and the way that you place your creatures depends on like the amount that you have to pay to earn those benefits and all that good stuff. There's like an engine builder within this worker placement game that I really like. Yeah, um, Clayton, I tried Magic the Gathering. That's gonna be on my honorable mentions. I tried it, I did it. Uh wow. Uh I applaud you, sir. I tried it. Uh it's cool. I I I'm like just I'm still intimidated. Like, I've played a couple games of it, and I'm still intimidated by how deep this rabbit hole goes and how deep the strategies go. People have like min-maxed their decks to to death, but I did get I did go out and I got the the Marvel Spider-Man magic set, which is pretty sweet. Oh my god, it's only a matter of time till I lose you completely.

SPEAKER_00 38:46

So I'm cherishing every episode we have.

SPEAKER_02 38:48

I'm gonna be debriefing Magic the Gathering every single uh day. Can I get can I include uh Dungeons and Dragons in my honorable mentions? I think so, man. Yeah, uh I second that there's no rules to this. Dungeons and Dragons, freaking sweet. We played a whole campaign, it was great. We played it with our friends. Your brother-in-law, yes, uh, was our DM, and he was great. Uh man, what a cool experience to run through our very first Dungeons and Dragons campaign together.

SPEAKER_00 39:20

Yeah, no, that was awesome. Honorable mention for me, too.

SPEAKER_02 39:23

Yes, it was so so fun. I love it. I could go on on and on. Uh oh man, I don't even know.

SPEAKER_00 39:31

Uh I got another honorable mention. Yeah, hit me. Uh gotcha pawn trick. Okay, yeah. Yes, that that cute little trick taker with the little coin slot in the box. I think it's so interesting how they incorporated set collection into that trick taking game. I have a blast with that, and the art and production only make it all the more fun to pull out um for your trick-taking buddies.

SPEAKER_02 40:01

Uh, next is crits and tricks. Really enjoying that one. I like the Dungeons and Dragons flavor on a trick-taking game, use of dice to like change the value on the cards that you're playing. Uh, the suits are Dungeons and Dragons classes, and you're changing up your strategy uh and playing uh effects that kind of change the way that you play that hand uh with their special abilities. I really like crits and tricks.

SPEAKER_00 40:30

Uh I got another honorable mention. Please. Because as I'm looking at my list here, I'm realizing that there's more than three. I there's like yeah, so I'm I'm gonna have to let go of some that I thought were top three. Um Cozy Stickerville. Cozy Stickerville was one that shined bright, and it might have got top three if my children hadn't abandoned me. We got through we rallied through like the first six chapters of this like 10-chapter campaign, and then it started getting hard to get them back. They're like, uh, I don't want to play that, I don't want to play that. I was still loving it. I was like, you know, hey, come on, guys, let's play, let's play, let's play. And eventually I coerced them enough over a couple months to get to like chapter eight. So, and that's like three months ago when we finished chapter eight, and I haven't got them to play the final two chapters. So the fact that it fell off for them kind of leaves me a little sour because I was enjoying it, and the thought of hopping back in it now after being away from it for so long. Like this is honestly a game you could finish in a weekend if you wanted to.

SPEAKER_01 41:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:43

Um, so to go this long without playing it, it's like uh it's kind of fallen from glory, but it it was a great ride while it uh while we were hot and heavy with it. Yeah, that's a shame. Yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_02 41:57

Are we ready to do top three? Uh, I think so. Something also I'm gonna put down up on my uh honorary honorable mentions, not admirable mentions, honorable mentions, because I am really freaking loving that game. Yeah, and it's due to me.

SPEAKER_00 42:12

Yeah, that's great.

SPEAKER_02 42:14

Hit me with your number three.

Top Three New To Us Games

SPEAKER_00 42:18

I'm gonna go with uh Layers.

SPEAKER_02 42:21

Okay, yep.

SPEAKER_00 42:23

Layers was in the top top spot last week. Special forces. I have very much enjoyed opening everything in the adventures pack, and I enjoy the gameplay. It is battleship done right. Not long ago, I had to get on Gamesy Moss Pod and talk about why Battleship was the worst, and and I meant every word of it. I do not like Battleship at all, but this is so much more fun uh building your dungeon and you know, setting monsters out, setting your traps, trying to create some interesting puzzle for them to navigate on their way through, and then deciding how you want to traverse through their dungeon and you know which turn to take. And just every turn, you're just you don't really know what's around the corner, and you know, the things that get added throughout the expansions just make it all the more interesting. So Layers is definitely a top three game so far this year for me.

SPEAKER_02 43:23

Love it. Yeah, my number three is small fjords. Oh now, this there's not a lot, not a ton going on in this game, uh, but I really enjoyed it. I think it's got all the right type of flavor of through the desert and blue lagoon and that style of game where you're building routes through terrain, um, but you are basically placing tiles out to build a small fjord, and then you go about uh placing your huts as you place these different land tiles. You make this beautiful little island, and then It's a fjord, not an island, but you're making a fjord. And then the next round, when you turn it around, you're placing kind of routes to connect the different areas and uh score some points. Really, really enjoying that one. I think that one will travel with me for a long time because it's a small box game with a lot going on. I saw somebody else playing it online, it might have been TIFF, and I'm glad to see that this game is getting played by others because it's such a nice design.

SPEAKER_00 44:30

That's awesome. Yeah, I you've you've talked about this plenty, so I think it's high time I give it a good look. Um, and maybe consider picking it up for myself.

SPEAKER_02 44:43

There's a trilogy of small box games, and I literally just got through small fjords and I didn't even try the other two because we just played that the whole time. Dang, yeah. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 44:53

Okay, this is tough. I I I think I botched this whole list, so I'm gonna have a I'm gonna have a lot of redactions after this. Um number two, I'm going with Harvest. I talked about it up front. Uh, this just came to me in the past month, and I am very impressed. I like I've been falling out of love with any Euroe type games, and this made me feel like maybe there is a part of my soul that can still do this. Uh, so thank you. Thank you, Key Master and Harvest, for you making farming cool again.

SPEAKER_02 45:36

Making farming cool again.

SPEAKER_00 45:38

Yeah, love it.

SPEAKER_02 45:39

That's right. My number two is Regicide Legacy. Oh, uh, this is more regicide, but with extra steps. They have like ways that you can improve your deck over time. It's meant to be played as a campaign game. There's a lot going on in this box, and it's kind of been tickling my brain a little bit because I didn't get all the way through the campaign, and I sure would love to. So I might just start all over and give it another run because regicide legacy continues to uh be one of my larger regrets that I have not uh dived deeper into it. Speaking of deeper regrets, uh deep regrets is another honorable mention for me.

SPEAKER_00 46:20

That one's up there.

SPEAKER_02 46:21

Man, I really enjoyed that one.

SPEAKER_00 46:23

Yeah, that's great. Wow. I yeah, I regicide's so cool. I can only imagine what cool features they add in a legacy version version of it.

SPEAKER_02 46:34

So yeah, I it's kind of a shame that it's a little expensive, like they might have overproduced, but man, there's a lot in that box.

SPEAKER_00 46:42

Yeah, that's cool. All right, my number one is gazebo by Ryan or Kenizia. It is my most played new to me game this year. I've got 10 plays of that. Um, Mary is always down to play gazebo, and I'm really good at it. You know, I make the best, I make the best nooks, and I claim all the patios, and I just I love I love when games don't have points. Yeah. And this game is just like get your freaking little gazebos out there, get them out there, get them out there. You do it first, you win, and the dominoes feel nice. You have the upgraded dominoes, yeah. Yeah, they feel nice. I hate the freaking cloth mat, but yeah, but I will tolerate it because it is such a good design by Reiner Kenizia. And I think did Nick at Bitewing Games say that like this is the game like Kanizia is most was most pumped about in recent years, like it might be. Yeah, I think he said this is like one of his favorite designs that he made. So it it's cool, it lives up to it. And I didn't have it last week in my tier ranking in Special Forces because that was just like my excitement level about the game at the moment, yeah. But this has been this is tried and true now after 10 plays and over the course of pretty much since January. Um, and it has not fallen in my esteem at all. So gazebo gets the number one spot.

SPEAKER_02 48:28

That one's awesome. My number one, I went from like kind of lightest to heaviest. My number one is Old King's Crown. This game is like has been such a brain worm for me. Like, I have been thinking about this game since I tried it. I don't know, it's probably January that I tried it. There's so much going on this game with the auctions and the bluffing and the uh even the solo mode has the automaton that lies to you and stuff. Like, there's some seriously cool stuff going on in this game, and I'm not gonna do it justice in this brief little like ranking, yeah. But that game is so freaking cool, and like the variable player powers and the and the you know your home base that you can upgrade, and you're upgrading your character and the different things that they can do, and like man, old King's Crown is freaking sweet, and I love a game that keeps time by the seasons, and man, I yeah, I think about that game a lot, and I keep seeing people playing it online. And every time I do, I'm like, man, I gotta pull that I gotta pull that game out because it's so good.

SPEAKER_00 49:38

Listen, I had a chance to FaceTime with the big guy. What? Uh yesterday, his wife was up here and he called, so I took the big guy being Jared for those that are listening to our long lost uh tripod. Um he said that he seems serious about coming to PAX East. So if you can make it happen, Travis, I think we have a chance if the three of us could sit down and maybe we get you know a mic or a TIF or somebody to fill out our old King's Crown table. I think that could be a pivotal gaming experience for me. That would be incredible to cap off 2026.

SPEAKER_02 50:19

Incredible, yeah. And what a way to capstone, yeah. What a way to capstone the year and ring in 2027.

SPEAKER_01 50:27

Yeah, dang.

SPEAKER_02 50:28

Oh man, get me all fired up here. I'm fired up that you talked to Jared. I'm fired up, yeah. You go to PAX East. Yeah, yeah, let's figure that out.

SPEAKER_00 50:37

Let's make it happen. Okay, well, now I gotta do a couple a couple reverse on honorable mentions.

SPEAKER_02 50:45

I admirable mentions, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 50:48

Admirable mentions. I thought all these were gonna be in my top three, but then they weren't. Um big top, yep, uh, the Taiki Shinzawa auction game from All Play. Super clever, super cool. I want to play that more. And these ones only don't get top three because I've only played them once. So the other the other ones I played more than once, so I feel confident. Um, but big top and hanami, which I just spoke about today, are two that I think given more plays could have reached into the top three. Okay, so there you go.

SPEAKER_02 51:26

Man, I really want to play Hanami now. That sounds excellent. It's so good, especially hearing that it's good at two players. Like, that has a high likelihood of getting played around here if it's good at two players.

SPEAKER_00 51:36

And we played it at two players in maybe 30 minutes. It almost was quicker than gazebo.

SPEAKER_02 51:42

Excellent. I love that.

SPEAKER_00 51:43

Yes, I highly encourage you to get it. Rachel will see that beautiful cover and she'll be like, This is this is great.

SPEAKER_02 51:52

And Reiner Kenizia, the one designer that she actually knows.

SPEAKER_00 51:56

Does she like Kenitzia? Like, is that a selling point for her?

SPEAKER_02 52:00

I think I think she'll like put a little extra like emphasis on it, or a little, yeah, she'll put a little weight behind her judgment um when you know making her verdict whether or not uh she likes a game. And I think it tips the scales just a bit if it's Ryan or Kenizia, but I don't think she's going all in.

SPEAKER_00 52:17

That's good. Okay, fair enough. Fair enough.

SPEAKER_02 52:21

Okay, you ready to go over the fence?

Over The Fence Life Updates

SPEAKER_02 52:24

Let's go over. Talk to me about what you've been doing outside of board gaming and outside of talking to Jared, because I'm gonna get jealous.

SPEAKER_00 52:32

I'm sorry, I didn't I didn't want to have to tell you about that, but I did want to I did want to emphasize the importance of us getting to PAX East. Yeah, so uh outside of board gaming, I did uh support my brother-in-law. Uh last it was probably a lot darker in here. He helped me, he's an electrician, and when I say helped me, he did. He did, and I was there. He put in some real recessed lighting in here. So now it's not just reliant on a tiny little corner lamp and my stupid ring light. Um, but yeah, that's why I'm all wound up about lighting. This added a new dynamic with the overhead lights in now. But man, it was I learned so much from people that are good at doing things because he was just in here drilling holes in the roof and you know rewiring switches and running new wire from two to fro. And I was like, Um, can I get you your tape measure? What do you need? Uh and it was it was fun. He knocked it all out in like two hours. He's a freaking rock star. So yeah, I got light in here, and I need to you know figure out how to deal with that as a podcaster, but that was exciting. Um, another exciting thing. Uh so I started watching a new show last night called Hacks. Hacks with an axe hacks, it's on HBO. Yes, Adri recommended this, and it it's good so far. It's kind of about this old timer comedian who has a show in Vegas, and then this, like, I don't know, kind of our our age group girl that was a writer, and she gets canceled and she can't find work, so she gets kind of assigned to be this older comedian stars writer, and it's just kind of dealing with their relationship. I've only seen two episodes, but I'm intrigued. I want to keep watching it, and I and I started watching that love story show about it's on Hulu, I think. It's about John F. Kennedy Jr. Oh and Bit Bissett or whatever her name is.

SPEAKER_01 54:54

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 54:56

Yeah, that's gonna be sad. Spoilers, yeah. I know, I know, yeah. That's kind of tough to watch knowing how it all unfolds, but yeah, so that's what I've been uh into. About you.

SPEAKER_02 55:13

Well, speaking of knowing how it all unfolds, House of Dragon is back, baby.

SPEAKER_00 55:17

Oh, I've been watching that too.

SPEAKER_02 55:19

Oh, nope. This is this is my time. It's so good.

SPEAKER_00 55:22

All right, go ahead.

SPEAKER_02 55:23

The first couple episodes seemed like they probably could have been tacked on to the end of the last season, but uh man, lots lots happening this season, and it just gets better and better. New episode tonight, right after we record. Can't wait to watch it. I'm all in on House of Dragon once again. It's planned for five seasons. Did you know that? Is this three? This is three. Wow, they got so much to do.

SPEAKER_00 55:47

I can't really let this thing breathe.

SPEAKER_02 55:49

Yeah, I mean, yeah, they're certainly doing that, that's for sure. Um, and the book is like, I don't know, it's a long book, but it's not five seasons worth of books, so I don't I'm curious to know what they do. So you've read the book. I have. It's called Fire and Blood.

SPEAKER_00 56:06

Man, yeah. I do you like this series better than Game of Thrones?

SPEAKER_02 56:12

Um it's hard to separate my opinions of Game of Thrones from the way that they took the show after they got past the books. How about that? Okay, they're taking they're certainly taking some liberties with um how they portray the characters in House of Dragon. Yeah, um, and I think that the changes they made are interesting. Um, a little bit is like Hollywood, a little bit is um making the characters more appealing to the general viewership from the way that they are described in the books. Um, like the Targaryens are not all of them are beautiful, let's put it that way. And um that all the characters in this show are really good looking, all of them.

SPEAKER_00 56:59

I don't know. Uh Amund is kind of maybe it's his personality that just makes him so disgusting.

SPEAKER_02 57:08

Amund the king.

SPEAKER_00 57:11

Well, Aegon's the king, right? Yes, I guess.

SPEAKER_02 57:14

Oh, you're talking about Amund. Dude, he's he's a good looking dude. Are you kidding me? You think he's good looking? I wish I could have a chin like that. These guys got a chin.

SPEAKER_00 57:25

I mean, that's a long chin. I it's too long. I don't think anybody needs that long of a chin, Travis.

SPEAKER_02 57:30

He lifts up his eye patch, it's all like blue and starry in there. Yeah, it's pretty cool.

SPEAKER_00 57:34

Oh, you fall in love with that, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 57:36

That's how he hypnotizes you, anyways. Uh yeah, they're taking their liberties as they do with every TV show, but um really enjoying that. Another thing that I've been doing is reading like crazy. Speaking of our 2026 yearn review, yeah, I've probably read I've probably read 26 books this year uh that were not for school. Read uh like with your read read or audiobooked.

SPEAKER_00 58:02

Okay, all right.

SPEAKER_02 58:03

I just want to be clear because uh I was gonna I'm impressed with 26 either way, but mix of digital, audiobook, and um physical, but yeah, I've been like tearing through books. Dungeon Carl Crawl Dungeon Crawler Carl continues to shine. Uh, have not read the latest one yet, but I'm on um the one I don't need the uh Bedlam Bride or whatever. It's basically like what if this Dungeon Crawl turned into Pokemon and he's like collecting cards and like fighting monsters against yeah, it's it gets crazy and it's great, and I'm loving that. I think it's so cool. Um and right now my long read for the moment is Lonesome Dove. And Lonesome Dove is uh a book by Larry McMurdy, and it's about a group of cowboys that take a hurt head of bun, like a thousand head of cattle from Texas up to um Montana. And this book is long, man. It's freaking long. Um I have I'm doing a mix of reading it and audiobook, which you can do like Kindle and Audible talk to each other. So if I listen to it, I can pick right back up and read it on a Kindle, and then vice versa, I can switch back and it'll be right where I left off, audiobook-wise, which is really cool. That's um kind of working through it at my leisure. But I got the kind of wild hair to revisit the Lonesome Dove TV show, which came out like in the 90s and it won a bunch of awards. Um, and I thought I was pretty far in the book. I'm like on chapter 40, maybe, and the very first episode of the show, it like caught up to where I'm at in the book. So yeah, that's crazy. So I I thought I was gonna take a break and kind of catch up with the show to where I was at in the book. It took all of one episode, and so I might have to take a break from the show and continue reading the book. But it's really great. I love it, it's so good. Yeah, um, working my way through that one, and then alternately, that's my kind of pleasure book. I'm also reading 1776, um, which is a kind of study of the you know American independence from Britain, and that is very dry, but it's well written and well researched, and um, that's by McC McCullough. McCullough. I can't remember what his first name is, David McCullough. Yeah, he's he won the Pulitzer Prize for this book, so it's pretty good. It's well researched. Um, enjoying that one, and then afterwards, my kind of uh second long read for the year. I might delay this one a bit, but to close out 2026, I want to finish We the People by Jill Poe. Give me a sec. I gotta read, I gotta make sure I don't screw this up.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:06

Make me feel like a freaking Neanderthal.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:09

Why?

SPEAKER_00 1:01:10

Because I don't I don't read smart books like that.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:14

We the We the People by Jill Lepore. Laporte, L-E-P-O-R-E. It's also a very long book, but it's about the U.S. Constitution, how it came to be, how it was written, and why it is so difficult to change in today's day and age. So um, yeah, that's gonna be my like America 250 read, that and 1776.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:35

Are you like gonna pursue a career in politics after your time in the military? Why are you brushing up on the constitution?

SPEAKER_02 1:01:41

And so 250 years ago, Clayton, uh America uh declared independence from Britain. I remember yeah, many people buy the t-shirt from Target, and I don't want to do that. I'd like to uh read some books about how that came to be.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:59

You do the homework. You know what I did to celebrate?

SPEAKER_02 1:02:02

You held a sparkler.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:04

No, I watched Hamilton.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:06

Hell yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:07

Okay, that's right, that's right. Patriotic, yes, that's as patriotic as I got. I was like, you know what? That's that's the most I know about our uh the Revolutionary War.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:18

So uh speaking of Patriots and American history, are you watching Larry David's new show on HBO? I didn't even know there was one. It's like life, Larry, and the pursuit of happiness or something. Wow, there's two episodes right now. The second, the end of the second episode is so funny. Like I was cracking up. You're gonna I I think you'll get a kick out of it. It's just Larry David being himself through history, basically. That's awesome. I will that's that's your homework this week. Okay, watch those episodes and then the new one that comes out on Tuesdays, I think, and then we gotta catch up and talk about it.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:52

I'll report back next week. I'll report back next week. And you know what? I just reminded me about Dungeon Crawler Carl. Okay, because now I have about a 50-minute commute each way. Okay, whereas before I only had a five-minute commute to work. So I think it's about high time I pick back up Dungeon Crawler Carl in my audiobook. Um, I was like maybe five or six hours in. Yeah, um, so I think I'm gonna do that too.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:19

Those audiobooks are so good. Jeff Hayes is a freaking magician, man. Like, yeah, if you listen to it, you would be convinced that there's like seven different people in the room at once, all talking to one another. But Jeff Hayes does every single voice. Wait, he does, he does every single voice, it's incredible.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:36

Like he does Princess Donut or whatever her name is.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:38

He does Princess Donut, he does Zev, he does all those people. You're probably not to Zev yet, but like no, he does every he does Mordecai, he does every single character. Wow, it's incredible. That's crazy. Okay, you should watch a video of him doing the voices and like changing rapidly. It's it's pretty incredible.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:57

Yeah, man. You you were like on the wave of dungeon crawler carl, like the front wave of it because you talked about it, and then the next thing I knew, it's like Barnes and Noble. I go in there, there's like a whole Dungeon Crawler Carl, like yeah, fan section. I'd never even heard of this thing before.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:13

Yeah. Um, here's a cool thing that I learned about Dungeon Crawler Carl. The whole series, when you go to Barnes and Noble, it all has like very bright, vibrant colors on the on the book sleeves, yeah, book jackets. When you line them up on a shelf and you put a black black light on them, they all shine very brightly, except for the one where he gets a secret notebook that he's not allowed to tell anybody about. It's kind of like um prisoner, not prisoner, uh chamber of secrets. Like he has a book that's secret that only he needs to know about. Yeah. Uh that is the only book jacket that does not light up under black light. Interesting. Okay, but uh yeah, lots of dungeon crawler Carl to come. Uh, they have a new TV show with Amazon, I think. We'll see. Uh, and then they have um a new unstoppable dungeon crawler board game. John Declare. Yeah, I'm gonna play some unstoppable. I have I have unstoppable. I opened the box and unpacked it and then you know had to pack it back up again. But I'm I'm gonna play some of that. I'm gonna report back.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:21

Report back.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:22

I'm gonna do that. You

World Cup Chaos And One Red Card

SPEAKER_02 1:05:24

do that. You've been watching World Cup.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:27

Okay. I'm sorry. The uh the most soccer I can watch is in Ted Lasso.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:32

Um that's well, here's here's the uh World Cup moment or minute for the podcast. Last night Switzerland played Argentina. Everyone in the stands, like 20,000 people all wear wearing messy jerseys. They are all cheering for Argentina, Argentina, Swiss player gets a yellow card early on because they are playing aggressive ball. Then later on, yellow card is given to an Argentinian player because the same player that got the yellow card earlier for Switzerland kind of flopped, like majorly flopped.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:05

The rule is when you take a yellow card away, like you do a review or whatever, you take that yellow card away, it automatically transfers to the other person involved in the altercation. So now this Swiss player ends up with two yellow cards, resulting in the red card. They're playing man down for like the last half hour of uh regular time, then they play a full half hour of extra time, and they held on to the vet till the very end before the wheels fell off. So Argentini Argentina advances, and world cup drama just gets better and better every day. Go soccer, go soccer.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:47

Sorry, did we do it? I think we did it.

Wrap Up And Where To Follow

SPEAKER_00 1:06:51

All right, we're back, we're we're long-winded. We are yeah, given the you can't shut us up.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:57

No, they're gonna they're gonna say this is too much. Like go back to 20 minutes. This is this is too much. We've heard enough. Um, as always, you can follow us on Instagram and YouTube and Spotify and you uh Apple Podcasts, wherever you get your podcast, please give us a like, give us a follow, give us a subscription, and get leave us a review if you have not done so. I have been Travis, he has been Clayton Gable. This has been the Operation Game Night Podcast, and we are out.