2022 / Drawing game / 2-4 players
**
Extrapolating preliminary lines and shapes into pictures isn't the most fun drawing game in our repertoire. We only tried it once.
Monday, 21 September 2026
Saturday, 19 September 2026
Alrightgames: Gloom of Kilforth – Encounters
Gloom of Kilforth: Encounters
2018 / Roleplaying card/board game expansion / 1-4 players
****
Loads more cards to extend the life of your cards-based sagas, plus new character options, some of which (Halfling and Druid) have joined my daughter's favourites in our tamer take on the game. I thought I'd have to do without until a bundle showed up on eBay at a tempting price, so I traded in the old set and got more optimised upgrades than were advertised or really desired...
Thursday, 17 September 2026
Alrightgames: Star Realms – Stellar Allies
2018 / Deckbuilding card game expansion pack / 2-4 players
****
Oh, look, it's the missing combinations from the United dual-faction sets, which they cheekily made a Kickstarter exclusive you couldn't buy from shops. I didn't expect to ever have these until an eBay seller accepted my insultingly low offer for their unwanted Kickstarter bundle that must have been sitting around for the best part of a decade, so this rarity worked out as one of my cheapest Star Realms purchases ever. The lesson is, just be patient and tight and everything works out in the end.
Hm? Oh, yeah, the cards are pretty good. More of the same.
Tuesday, 15 September 2026
Alrightreads: If You Live on Fear Street, These Are the People You Could Meet
1995 / Audiobook / 165 pages
**
The original hardly stood out, and this even more forgettable continuation is only justified by the comic potential of young readers hoping for a story about some kind of evil poo.
1995 / Audiobook / 146 pages
**
Similar to the last ski break one I read, but with a dumber resolution.
1995 / Audiobook / 147 pages
**
Another guilty secret, another credulity-stretching denouement, but some good tension along the way.
1995 / Ebook / 148 pages
**
If they'd had ChatGPT in 1995.
1995 / Audiobook / 150 pages
****
This seemed like it was going to be lighter fantasy fluff, but it didn't take long to pull out a bloody twist. This series doesn't have the highest hit rate, but this is another one I'll be able to recommend to my daughter unironically one day, depending on her squeamishness.
Sunday, 13 September 2026
Workreads I
Secretly reading ebooks on my phone while colleagues probably assume I'm doomscrolling social media like a normal person.
Alex Horne, Birdwatchingwatching
1998 / Ebook / 271 pages
Robin Stoate and Andrew Shail, Back to the Future
John Cavanagh, Pink Floyd's The Piper at the Gates of Dawn
2009 / Ebook / 384 pages
****
Littler Alex Horne embarks on a Hawks/Gorman/Wallace-esque kerrazy kwest for a year. I do like these silly things, though, and the enthusiasm and callbacks kept me hooked. It would also have been very educational about birds if I thought I was going to retain any of it.
Dean Wesley Smith and Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine – The Captain's Table – The Mist
***
Maybe it was bad reviews that had always put me off from trying my preferred DS9 flavour of this nicely themed crossover series I'd enjoyed at the time and since, or maybe it was the off-model Sisko likeness that extends to such basic errors as the wormhole leading to the Delta Quadrant rather than the Gamma Quadrant, et al. A forgettably generic tale, not improved by the frequent, annoying interruptions, but it was still a nice return trip.
2019 / Ebook / 96 pages
****
Stuffy academic revelations on genre and context that enhanced my appreciation even further.
2003 / Ebook / 136 pages
***
Informative if bland background notes.
Friday, 11 September 2026
Alrightgames: Pulp Invasion! X1
2021 / Bag building card game expansion / 1 player
**
Resold
An essential expansion if you want to convert the doomed solo mission into a competitive space duel, but it offers very little for players who aren't interested in doing that. It came with my second-hand base game, but it wasn't worth keeping for a few extra cards.
Wednesday, 9 September 2026
Alrightgames: Pulp Invasion!
2020 / Bag-building card game / 1 player
***
Resold
It wasn't my first cubes-based solo space game, but it was my first bag-building game, and this novelty and the vintage space art persuaded me to keep coming back for more punishment for a while. I liked how it all worked, but less that there didn't seem to be any possibility of winning without investing in expansions that retroactively balance the difficulty, which is a bit cheeky.
Monday, 7 September 2026
Alrightgames: Star Trek Star Realms – Borg Invasion (DIY)
Star Trek: Star Realms – Borg – Invasion (DIY Solo Mode)
2025 / Deckbuilding card game variant / 1 player
***
As a straight-up reskin of Star Realms for Star Trek fans who'll only play a game about battling spaceships if it's clumsily pasted over with pictures of the specific spaceships they're already familiar with, I had no interest in the pointless spin-off – until they released an expansion with some unique elements that were easy (if quite fiddly) to mock up using the standard sets.
Getting to play as the Borg and assimilating your friends and family could be fun, but the solo mode felt like more hassle than it was worth compared to the alternatives (even if I wasn't substituting spare authority trackers and non-ship/base trade cards for the components), and even a bit annoying. The drones are basically Fluxx zombies, but even less amusing.
Saturday, 5 September 2026
Alrightgames: Basic Fantasy Adventure – Temple of the Moon (Adapted)
2015 / Roleplaying game adventure / 2+ players
****
A creepy church and its cursed basement were supposed to test our patience and stretch our session length a little, but the fearless/foolish young hero made such a racket that the slimy and spooky baddies came to us and saved us the hassle of exploring. That also gave me an idea for the convenient resolution I hadn't worked out ahead of time.
Thursday, 3 September 2026
Babyliography CCLIII
Becca Heddle, Oxford Reading Tree: Explore with Biff, Chip and Kipper – At Sunset
2018 / Library book / 12 pages
**
Not getting around to any of her more appealing summer library books to get her final reading challenge sticker because she was too busy with her own Baby-Sitters Club non-library books (which she reckons don't count), I suggested looking for the shortest read possible while also checking off some non-fiction learning at the same time, and this was our almost insultingly simple solution. Just get it bloody done. I'm confident I'm giving the right lessons.
2023 / Paperback / 160 pages
***
The squabbles are predictably repetitive now, but she enjoyed the change of scenery.
2019 / Library book / 176 pages
**
The first one we tried didn't even make sense and it was downhill from there.
2023 / Paperback / 160 pages
***
Like Karen's Roller Skates, but with more of the leg and the usual Claudia melodrama.
2024 / Paperback / 160 pages
**
Summer reading wrapped up with our favourite subject: American sports! Come on you reds, etc!!!
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