NASA astronaut Greg Chamitoff and fellow crew are currently on their second game of Chess vs all the mission control centers that support the space station orbiting Earth at around five miles per second.

The centers take turns making moves against Greg as he comes within radio contact with them. Greg already won the first game, and it looks like he’s winning the second, too.

(source, interview, and pictures, NASA source)

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Delray Beach, FL: Several men robbed and one shot during a dominoes game at a warehouse. (source)

Chatanooga, TN: Man is burglarized. The next day he’s playing cards when a stranger comes in and asks to use the phone but then tries to rob him. The robber beats him with a piece of wood, but then runs away without getting anything. (source)

Chicago, IL: Man watching a dice game shot and robbed the winner. (source)

Norwalk, CT: Drunk man repeatedly stabs roomate over a game of dominoes. (source)

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Last year, Mayfair Games, publishers of Settlers of Catan and other games, took advantage of new laws that allowed publishers to dictate to retailers the maximum discount that the retailers could offer for Mayfair’s games. Mayfair told all retailers that the retailers could not discount more than 20% off the retail price or the retailer would no longer receive games from Mayfair. Mayfair’s intention for doing this was to weaken online stores in favor of brick-and-mortar stores, which Mayfair believed were critical in terms of marketing their products to new customers.

At GenCon, VP of Sales Bob Carty claimed to be happy with the results, and promised to enforce the policy even more strictly:

We’ve gone from 113 retailers discounting product in November… when we started releasing Third Edition [of Settlers of Catan]; we now have between six and 11 in any given week. And I think that’s a big step. Six of them are habitual and on the blacklist but they’re still getting product, and we know where, and we’re going to deal with them very shortly.

(source)

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Witch’s Brew is the English name for the card game known in its original German as Wie verhext! The game, which was a 2008 Spiel des Jahres nominee, is now available from retailers in the United States. Witch’s Brew challenges players to collect ingredients, brew potions, steal gold, and cast spells. It uses a role selection mechanic—but one in which the players have the ability to steal roles from each other. Publishers Rio Grande and Alea recommend Witch’s Brew for 3-5 players ages 9 and up. Playing time is approximately 45 minutes.

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Shortcut2Learning has produced a Computer Basics board game.

Roll the die, answer the trivia question, move forward if you’re correct.

Every once in a while, the dice don’t work any more and you have to start the game over.

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In an update to our earlier post on the topic, a brand new teaser trailer has been released for the upcoming Blood Bowl video game:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVCoDXpkbgY]

If that doesn’t have you wanting to pull out your Orcland Raiders, I don’t know what will.  Can’t wait until Christmas to throw down with some Blood Bowl action?  Check out these resources to get your fix:

• Nothing compares with the original game and now that the rules are available as a free download, there’s really no excuse to miss this one.
• Microleague published a DOS-based video game based on Blood Bowl in 1995 (unfortunately, this one is pretty much lost to the ages)
• The best place to play right now (if you absolutely can’t play on the tabletop!) is the FUMBBL online league which uses the JavaBBowl client/server to host games (you can use the JavaBBowl system separately from FUMBBL, but eventually you’ll want a real opponent!)

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Once upon a time, the elders among us sustained their Magic: the Gathering addiction through a PC version of the game and its expansion, Duels of the Planeswalkers.  That particular game was abandoned by the publisher after a few years (and subsequently patched and available for free as Manalink).  Fortunately, Wizards of the Coast has made a deal with Stainless Games to update the older title and make it available on the X-Box Live Arcade.  There aren’t a lot of details about the title at this point (attendees at this year’s PAX conference will have the opportunity to play a demo), but it is scheduled to release in spring of 2009.  Also, we know that the game will retain the single player, player vs player and multi-player modes from the original.  A few questions I’d like to see answered include:

• What card sets will be available?
• Will we be able to buy boosters/sets through the arcade?
• Will we be able to draft?
• What does all this mean for MtG: Online?

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