Robert StartPlayer

More reasons i love being in Italy. The size of the vegetables. Yogurt comes in Stracciatella flavour. And an entire too shelf of a supermarket is just different varieties of pesto and pasta sauces. Ill be having pistacchio pesto tonight!

Good work. The problem of scammers is a grave situation.

I am so happy with this ending the #TheTraitors

Ive played so many social deciction hames and the classic Diplomacy over the years and this weirdly upside down honest moral victory is so lovely to see.

Depends what social media comments you read!

What worries me is the public/faithful perception of morality. If i play a game and get a secret card that says have more red cubes than other players then I’m not a bad person. I hare the hate people try to cast traitors as ‘bad people’. They are just playing the hand they get.

The title is an italian phrase which directly translates as ‘into the mouth of the wolf’. But really means ‘good luck’ in same way in English uses ‘break a leg’. So a push your luck game about the stone age domestication of wolves to dogs needs a players to put there hand in a wolfs mouth right?!

I’m working on ‘In Bocca Al Lupo’, a kids push your luck game.

The game needed a bag to be a wolf. So I ordered a large soft you wolf and my mum did some sewing magic so this wolf now functions as bag you pull tokens from its mouth.

I will be spending most of #Airecon carrying this with me.

“You are marvellous” “and you are amazing” With ‘bear’ and ‘panda’ emphasised

“Types of legume” Lentichie = lentils Lenti - slow (adj, plural) Veloci - fast (adj, plural) So in English maybe “Slow…lentils” “fast…lentils”

This translates well into English. Octopus - “Do you want to navigate the internet on my phone?” Fish - “no thank you” Octopus - “how come?” Fish - “because i am scare of The Net” “La rete” means ‘the net’ in a physical sense but also internet, similar to english, Italians explains to me that this is a ‘boomer’ term and not really used anymore

Mild swearing… Tooth brush “i have a crap job” Toilet roll “and you say that to me”

Ive now been learning Italian for about 18 months. Im mostly practising listening skill at the moment as that seems weakest skill.

But I’m very happy when i saw this joke book at the airport that i was able to understand much of the word play inside. Explanation in alt text.

I met a friend in Rome from a language exchange app and visited the museum on musical instruments.

Here are some photos in case anyone needs to see a piano cross with a harp, or a bassoon that looks like a dragon.

Im back from Italy, 8th visit in the last 12 months! This time i visited Viterbo which had very Knightmare type vibes walking around.

Playing Brass: Birmingham is how everyone spends New Years Eve right? #boardgames

Is this likely the only date or should i wait for somewhere further North?

Ive passed my Italian exam i took in October! I now have CILS A2!

If your unfamiliar with CEF levels, A2 means pre intermediate/good beginier. So i know enough to get around and have single conversations but I’m not good enough to live there.

Ive not made these in a while but @nigella.bsky.social triple chocolate buckwheat cookies are always delicious and quick to make. Its good to have to a quick and simple #GlutenFree recipe in the repertoire.

Im finally trying to learn boardgames vocab in Italian.

In English we ‘draw a card’. In Italian “Pesco una carta” or “i fish a card”

Suddenly the name of the game ‘Go Fish’ makes much more sense.

Whilst a die is nice for a product does it need to be for play test. Im currently doing a thing with sort of custom dice but iterating with tokens in a bag. The same probably much quicker to switch things around for iterations.

Ive just baked this amazing #glutenFree quiche that looks exactly like picture in book. Im normally critical of my own work but these really was amazing.

As I’ve had coeliac diagnosis almost 3 years I’ve got the hand of much of baking now.

This probably isn’t exactly what you mean but I’ve lost count of how many time i come last in my own playtest!

I love it when someone comes along and tried something very different. In my playtest group now we often asked people to play in particular ways to see what breaks.

After many attempts and recipe tweaks i think I’ve perfected Caccio E Pepe.

Im using pecorino and not any oil or butter. So hopefully this is authentic and wont upset and italians.

Penso che sia squisito!

Played Pictogether. Because at 1 am at a games event on day 3 is the perfect time for this yes?! #boardgames

Played The Beeching Axe. I really need to find time to pitch this and do work i need too. Finding games design time is to tricky sadly. #boardgames

I gave Sideeal Confluence ago. It was OK but very long. It like Century Spice Road as a trading game and way to many special rules i dont need to follow! #boardgames

Played Splendour. One of the games i lose online a lot. I really should look at why i do so badly in this game! Still a good gateway game. #boardgames

Today i played Caylus 1303. I still love this game and how it took an great okd game and added a bit of modern polish to it. We were surprisingly nice to each other. #boardgames

Played Galactic Cruise. I only gor two things wrong in the the rules explainasion……

I really like this but my forgoting of two key rules did break it a bit. Learning game for people etc #boardgames

Played The Little Prince. A simple game that has far more decisions than it should do. #boardgames

Played Torres. The SdJ winner from 2000. I really enjoyed this. I think theres only maybe 5 SdJ winners ive not played. I often wonder if anyone would design things like this now. #boardgames

Learnt Wine Cellar. A very quick card drafting game which through up some interesting decisions. As with any bidding game sometimes your just going to get things you don’t want but shorty enough that it wasn’t an issue. #boardgames

More #boardgames played ar top secret games con…

I learnt Compile. Apparently this is has been selling out but left me abit flat. A bit to ‘play card and do some text’ for my tastes.

Its very old now so no idea if in print. One person described it as traffic jam the game