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A Gaming Life
Bottoscon Spring 2026 Retrospective
It’s June, so it must be time for the 2nd annual Bottoscon Spring convention!
Bottoscon is a convention created and run by (though the running of it is helped by numerous other people as well) Rob Bottos, a great guy who looks out for his friends and fellow gamers.
That’s because last year, when many Canadian gamers did not want to cross the border for American conventions and experience the shitshow that is the US right now, Rob created the first Bottoscon Spring.
This year, he went even further and did a Bottoscon Winter in February, which will also become an annual thing.
This year, Bottoscon Spring was once again held at the Royal City Curling Club in New Westminster, a nice, intimate venue for about 70-80 people to get their game on.
(I didn’t take any venue pictures this year, so these pics are from last year, but the location and layout are the same)
They also have a great bistro that opened up just for us on the weekend (they’re usually closed at this time).
Many thanks to them for that!
Finally, many thanks to Brendan and Michelle for being very cool friends but also for taking care of us, being amazing bartenders and just being all around awesome.
I even got to play some games with them!
It was also good to have a few beers during the weekend.
I know what you’re here for, though.
How were the games?
Surprisingly long!
But also very fun.
Yes, I had a number of long games so the quantity of games wasn’t as high as last year.
Which might make for a shorter post unless I keep blathering on like this.
But the quality was just as good as it always is.
Every game is going to be linked. Some will be to my review if I’ve done one. Others will be to Boardgame Geek.
Either way, if you want more information on it, click on the link.
Any new to me games will have a short description, but the full one will be on this month’s New to Me Games post in early July.
Finally, you can click on any picture (except game cover pictures) and blow it up if you want to see closer.
With that being said, let’s begin!
Read MoreTerror in the Abbey – Final Girl – A Demon in the Shadows Review
Don’t you hate it when you’re just minding your own business, sitting serenely in some kind of religious building, praying and all of that stuff, and then suddenly a demon comes in and possesses you, forcing you to do unspeakable things to all of your companions?
Is that just me?
Maybe it is.
The next Final Girl feature film that I have completed takes that scenario and runs with it, with your two final girl possibilities either being a fellow nun or, perhaps, the church organ player?
Or maybe she runs the church rummage sale?
A Demon in the Shadows was designed Mike Martins with artwork by Lars Krause.
It was published by Van Ryder Games in 2025.
The Series 4 feature films have been adding a bit of complexity to the killer, or sometimes having interesting ways to have to deal with them.
In this one, the demon Berith has possessed the body of a nun, Ursula, and you are having to try and kill him, all while trying to save Ursula.
That’s a lot harder than just wailing away at him/her with a crucifix.
How does this one shake out?
Let’s take a look.
Read MoreReptilian Waves – Surfosaurus MAX Review
In what turned out to be a total coincidence, last week’s Boardgame Geek century post mentioned Surfosaurus MAX and the fact that I wouldn’t mind playing it again and then, four days later, it came out to our Sunday game day!
I asked my friend and he had not seen my post when he decided to bring it.
I love kismet.
But I don’t love that he hadn’t read my post…
I digress.
Surfosaurus MAX is a very quick card game designed by Ikhwan Kwon with artwork by Lisa Goldstein and Matthias Mödl and it plays 2-6 players.
It was published by Loosey Goosey Games in 2023.
This game is, in a way, a semi-cooperative game but in actuality it’s kind of cutthroat if you can get the right cards in your hand.
How does that work?
Let’s take a look.
Read MoreBGG Top Games – 3201 – 3300
A short turnaround time after the last post about this, mainly because that post was late!
We’re actually getting into sections of the Boardgame Geek rankings where there are some good games that don’t deserve to be this far back, and that is the case yet again in this century.
As long as people keep discussing these posts with me (either in the comments section or in other areas, like Discord), I’ll keep pumping these out.
At least until I get to a century where I have literally played nothing!
I did check last week and all the way up to 4000, I have played at least a couple in each century.
So you’re stuck with me now, unless you hit that big gong to make me stop.
We’ll keep the introduction short so I have more time to talk about the actual games, because there are a few I’d like to talk about.
Here’s the century this list is coming from.
Though please remember that these rankings are fluid, almost like my love/hate relationship with chocolate.
They could change!
(I kid…I will always love chocolate).
We’re getting deeper and deeper, but here are the numbers for this century.
In a switch from normal, I’ve actually played 5 of the games but I own 6.
That’s unusual. Usually it’s the other way around.
With all that under our belt, let’s begin!
Read MoreMama, She’s Craaazy – Final Girl – Madness in the Dark Review
(1,000,000 quatloos to whoever gets the title reference)
The Final Girl franchise has been doing a great job of covering different genres of horror movies, even including some that are more science fiction than horror.
With the advent of Madness in the Dark, however, they have moved to covering a film that’s not exactly horror, but instead more psychological suspense (One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest).
The killer in this feature film set is The Ratchet Lady and is clearly inspired by Nurse Ratched from the film, but in the film she’s not a killer, instead being more of an abusive, power-hungry force.
That doesn’t mean she’s not fun as a killer!
Let’s get the credits out of the way first.
Madness in the Dark was designed by A.J. Porfirio with art by Vladyslava Ladkova. It was published by Van Ryder Games in 2023 and is part of the Series 2 slate of feature films.
The Ratchet Lady is a really interesting killer with some cool effects, and Wolfe Asylum is a nice location (well, for playing in, I wouldn’t want to be staying there).
Let’s see what makes this feature film click.
Read MoreBGG Top Games – 3101 – 3200
It’s been over a week since the last Boardgame Geek century post, but last week was pretty full and I didn’t want to oversaturate the market.
I didn’t want my readers to be overwhelmed with awesomness.
But we’re back now, looking at another century of BGG rankings, this one getting further and further into the depths.
We’re below 3100 feet games and counting!
Be careful if you need to come up for air.
This week, we have a bit of a bonanza of played games.
I didn’t say good games, but definitely played games.
And one crime against nature, meaning there’s no way the game should be this low.
My overall stats for this century are six games played and two of those owned (or previously owned).
The list I’m taking these from can be found here, but keep in mind that a lot of things can change if you’re looking at this a year from now.
Or even a week.
Two cases in point!
After doing the last post, I looked ahead to this century and was thrilled that I’d be able to talk about Doomlings (the great evolutionary card game that’s just hilarious) because it was in the 3100s.
Lo and behold, I check back before doing this post, and it’s all the way up to #3008!
Which would have been on the last post.
So just go read the review, because it’s a good one.
The second case in point is also from last time.
9 Lives was at 3100 last time and I predicted that it would fall into this week’s post, but I was going to write about it anyway.
Sure enough, it fell to #3101.
It won’t be on this week’s post. You can read about it on the last one.
I’m still getting good discussions with these posts, so let’s get started!
Read MoreMay 2026 Gaming
May was a busy month!
I mean, not March busy, but definitely better than April busy.
There was a 14-hour boardgame marathon where I ended up playing 8 games a total of 14 times.
Just in one day!
Then a couple of Sundays had multiple short games after playing the main event, which is always fun.
This month, I turned it around by doing the “new to me” post first, but here’s an overview of what actually got played in May.
Overall for May, I played 30 games a total of 44 times.
That’s outrageous!
Of course, Final Girl led the way again, but Sky Team was right behind it.
Here’s the list of games played.
And here it is in grid form.
Many thanks to the incredible Boardgame Stats app for this beautiful summary!
It was a fun month, including a few games that I haven’t played in quite a while.
Let’s get to those highlights.
Read MoreNew to Me – May 2026
There were no conventions attended in May, but there was a 14-hour games marathon where a bunch of games were played.
So I knew this would be a lengthy post!
This month, I actually played more new to me games than I did in March after a 3-day convention, which really surprised me.
Part of that was the marathon (six), but there were also a couple of games days where multiple ones came out.
And even one work lunch!
It is!
Even better for my standing as leader of the Cult of the New to Me, many of them were older.
There were even two which weren’t from this century.
Even the ones from this century, there were games from 2008, 2013, 2017, 2018, and more.
There was a lot of partying going on at cult headquarters.
Don’t worry, I didn’t let them get too out of hand.
So without further ado (all of my ado was destroyed in an airplane crash due to bad dice rolling anyway), let’s begin!
Read MoreCombat Commander – After Action Report – Scenario 108 – In My Time of Dying
In many tactical wargames, especially pitting small units like squads and stuff against each other, smoke becomes very important.
Even more so when there’s a lot of open ground to cover.
Welcome to another tale from the Combat Commander ladder, that monthly tournament run by the arresting Patrick Pence, he of Patrick’s Tactics & Tutorials fame, that lets you play one of the greatest games of all time at least once a month.
Hey, I think I just figured out what “monthly” means!
Of course, you can play more than that, since there are always people looking for a game.
May’s scenario is one of the scenarios from the acclaimed C3i magazine, which takes place just after the Normandy landings and has a force of British troops attempting to advance on the city of Caen, and tasked with degrading a German strongpoint.
This month’s opponent was Doug T, a relative newbie to the ladder and somebody who hasn’t played the game for quite a while.
It was kind of nice being a tutor of sorts.
(Don’t forget that you can click on a picture to blow it up)
The Germans (grey – me) have a bunker set up with a heavy machine gun (HMG), which has to set up first, anywhere within ten hexes of the left side.
I set that up in the far forward position surrounded by hedges.
The British (tan – Doug) then set up on the last column on the right side of the board and have some reinforcement engineers with satchel charges coming out at the first Time trigger.
Finally, the Germans set up the rest of their forces within that same ten-hex field.
The only real special rule is that the HMG is stuck in the bunker. If it’s ever forced to leave (like the unit manning it having to retreat or something), it’s eliminated instead.
There’s also a bunch of German wire and mines blocking things, and two trenches for some of the other guys.
As you can see, I left a couple of gaps but with machine guns covering all of the approaches.
That HMG can see everything.
The only open objective is that if anybody owns all five objectives at a Sudden Death, they win!
Otherwise, only the British have a secret one.
Would Doug be able to advance across the open in front of my HMG at all?
Without smoke?
This game became very hot, in more ways than one (as you will see).
Let’s find out.
Read MoreCombat Commander Tips for Beginners
Those of you who have spent any time following this blog (not just reading a post or two here and there) know that Combat Commander (from GMT Games) is one of my favourite games out there.
I’m even part of a monthly ladder tournament where we get to play once a month, and many people are open to pick-up games here and there.
This means that I’ve played Combat Commander: Europe a total of 56 times and Combat Commander: Pacific a total of 15 times.
So I do know a little bit about the game, but nowhere near as much as a lot of my friends.
While I don’t think I can really write an overall strategy guide, I can suggest some helpful tips for beginners to keep in mind as they are getting their feet wet in this marvelous tactical wargame system.
I’m not going to go into all the rules and how everything works.
If you’re not sure of that, there’s a rulebook as well as a number of video playthroughs that will teach the game.
I’m going to assume you know the basics, things like how you “roll dice”, how you play cards, how many cards you can play on your turn, what a Sniper or Event trigger is, how the game ends, that sort of thing.
Instead, once you have those down, here are some tips to take you to the next level.
Tier 2, you might say.
All of my pictures are going to be from the VASSAL module for the game, which I have used literally every month since July 2021.
Also, most pictures are staged just to illustrate my point.
They are mostly not from games I’ve played and thus some of the setup may not be optimum to actually win the game.
Also, if you want to see my good friend Zilla Blitz and I talk about these in a video, why not do that too!
With that, let’s begin.
Read More