Designer: Sengoku Ichiro (千石 一郎)
Publisher: 数寄ゲームズ (Suki Games)
Players: 3
Playing Time: 20-30 minutes
Times Played: 3 on purchased physical copies; a few more times with a Google Sheets mock-up
I’m going to talk below about the many ways I love Encyclopaedist and its tragic flaws, of which there are many. Some of them are in the game’s conceit: it is three-player only; some of them are in the components: you’ll exhaust the provided post-it notes after only a few games; some of them are in the game’s potential as a commercial product: you can mock it up with three pieces of string and a pad of post-it notes; some of them are in the mechanics, ….well, we’ll get into those.
But I love the game.
In short, each player will have a category (such as “things that can be sharp” or “one syllable words”), and, variously, the players will attempt to guess words in the different intersectives of the venn diagram created by three brightly colored ropes.
Three Games I Travel With
Today I wanted to talk about the games that make up my sort of “go bag.” If I’m headed somewhere, that isn’t intended to be a “game night”, say, maybe a birthday party or a get together because some folks from out of town are in for the weekend, what I bring.
In this case, the three titles I want to talk about are, well, usually in the arm rest/center console of my car, so there’s no need to pack or remember to bring them.
As I’ve grown older, what I pack has shifted. I rarely, for instance, bring them out unprompted or even bring up that I brought something. I’m growing more comfortable with simply conversing, not ludologically evangelizing, and acknowledging that some folks don’t have much interest in playing a game.
I think that’s part of why party games don’t make the cut. My personality wouldn’t feel comfortable derailing a night of other types of interaction with a game as the centerpiece.
So I drift to card games: something a few of us can unobtrusively entertain ourselves with, while others go about enjoying each other’s company in their own way. If, these games of ours come up in the course of conversation, and if, someone else seems intrigued, we’ll do it. Otherwise, I’m content to let them ride along with me in the car until the moment arises.
Anyway, these are the games.
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