Recently, on social media, people posted nine books without explanation of why their selected titles were a good way to get to know that person. I took it steps further by not only listing nine books, but why these nine books are relevant to me.

Apart from books, I thought I should also do a list of nine games. Gaming has been an enormous part of my life. Once again, I took this list several steps further. I started with nine games, but all the additional What Abouts expanded this list so much further. I have expanded my list to nine categories of games, and the most important games of each category.

In no particular order, here are where I stand on nine categories of gaming, and how these are a good introduction to me:

These types of games are sports, but I enjoy these more in a casual setting, not as a league. I love playing minigolf, especially at the ones with the more elaboate holes. I have not bowled in many years, but I enjoy bowling. I took four bowling for the required college classes, triggering a long running joke that I minored in bowling. I enjoy playing casual basketball games, like Around-the-World and HORSE (or PIG). At one job, the break room had a small basketball hoop, and a juggle shot (Dougle Shot) was my signature shot, triggering an outbreak of other players buying Klutz books to learn how to juggle.

I am not much of a sports fan. Apart from riding my bicycle all over the place as a teen, I am not very athletic. I do not follow teams or players. But, I do enjoy watching the more active sports, like basketball, hockey, and football, especially for whoever the local team is, including and especially college teams.

Playing tabletop games with friends and family have been some of the happiest moments of my life. Back in school, my best friend and I had a tradition to start playing Risk after dinner until well after midnight on New Year’s Eve. Throughout the COVID pandemic, my wife and I played Five Crowns remotely via Zoom or Facetime with friends and family. When I started my first post-school job, friends introduced me to Cheapass Games via Kill Doctor Lucky. This introduction started me down the road to forming Pegamoose Games and designing my own games. The early model of Cheapass Games, of borrowing pieces from other games, and This Game is Bonkers!, inspired the creation of my first game, Snipe Hunt.

I have been fascinated with RPGs since a young teen, but I have not played with a group on a campaign until recently. I own the DM and Player Guides. I love the video game RPGs (more on that later). Unfortunately, neither my circle of friends, nor myself, knew how to run a campaign. I was too green and inexperienced to join some of the established groups I encountered. It wasn’t until the last couple of years, my wife and I began playing with some of our closest friends. Soon after, our daughter joined. And, within the past couple of sessions, our son joined, too.

On a side note, I love how in the more recent years, RPGs have really taken off and expanded. I love hearing about local game shops and our library hosting mini-sessions to help get people started playing RPGs.

Of the other types of games requiring a group of people to play in a social setting, I enjoy the creative games, like Pictionary or Cranium. I love other party games, like Charades, Taboo, or Apples to Apples. My wife is more of the gambler between the two of us, by I enjoy the casual play of Pai Gow Poker, where she enjoys hosting Texas Hold ‘Em parties.

For this list, it is also important to include a couple of games I hate to play, and would prefer to sit out. For more on these, please see a couple of other blog in which I trash talk Clue and Rummy.

I feel blessed to have grown up through the dawn and evolution of video games. From the earliest days playing Pong, to Spiderman on the PS5, I have loved emersing myself in video games. In general, my favorites have typically included some element of exploration: Atari Adventure, the mid-series Ultima games (in particular, IV-VI). The latest Zelda games (Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom) I have replayed a few times each. I love spelunking through Minecraft caves (though I prefer the more claustraphobic caves pre-cavernous update). No Man’s Sky and Skyrim are another couple of favorites.

Games on a desktop PC I place in a different category to Video Games, mainly due to having a keyboard. Most of the games I enjoyed on the PC (apart from the Ultima series) fall under the Interactive Fiction sub-category. I remember playing Pirate Cove on our old TRS-80. I have played all the Monkey Island games, except for the latest one that dropped within the last couple of years. My favorite, and one of the most ridiculously difficult ones, was The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy text adventure.

Also, as a teen of the 80s and early 90s, I loved hanging out at the arcade. Mostly, I gravitated towards the pinball machines or Skeetball alleys. When I played arcade games, I favored the sillier ones, like Circus Charlie, Bomb Jack, or Food Fight. In my mid-20s, I figured I must have spent hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars at the arcades in my youth.

This is not even a comprehensive list. These are more of my favorites. There are so many other games I have played. I haven’t even included playing games I have designed or play-tested. With all this gaming in all its various forms, how do I ever get anything done?

What kinds of games do you enjoy?