Do You Want to Play a Game? – Stress Relief WYE Style

MC 0:12

Alri ght, we've we've spent a few episodes talking about some fairly heady stuff right? We got a couple of money stuff in there we talked about the coronavirus with kill a lot of people.

HM 0:55

We talk a lot about about financial health and physical health and today w e're going to talk about mental health. So we've brought in a special guest Dr. No, I'm just kidding. We don't have a special guest in here I know a lot of you were like we're going to talk about PTSD again. kind of know a little bit Sure. We're talking about games. Yeah, we I should I should say we we have benefited from your love of games.

MC 1:24

Well, you know that I've had the recent obsession with games.

HM 1:28

Okay. You say recent I was on my Facebook memories earlier today and they're some old Munchkin games.

MC 1:33

That's true. That is that is true.

HM 1:37

I look back on it and you know, we were getting to these newer games that we're going to talk about here in a little bit and and I go back to thinking there were some dark times and game night...

MC 1:48

Provided relief.

HM 1:50

Absolutely. Something so easy as a round of hearts. Not even a game of hearts.

MC 1:56

Yeah, we started playing hearts again. I'm really loving that.

HM 2:02

It can be just as simple as that and just reaching out to somebody and like hey let's let's dive into this other universe for a minute. Yeah, let's leave everything else behind Let's leave Let's leave all the promotion stuff and the school stuff and the kids and this and that the other and the next thing you know it's an hour and a half later and you're having a spirited discussion about whether or not you can use the elf sword against a dwarf.

MC 2:23

Wait, what are these boots of butt kicking? Is that applicable in this scenario? Because I very much want the boots of butt kicking.

HM 2:31

So today on WYE radio, what's the emergency? We need some time off? Yeah, and we need something to fill it with. And we always talk about books and movies and plays and stuff that we're doing.

MC 2:41

Projects around the house.

HM 2:43

All good stuff, don't get me wrong. But there's something just as powerful as that within an arm's reach. And that is a simple board game. Yeah, battleship, be it. backgammon the wife and I used to play backgammon on Sundays when I worked days at the QI office. Sunday was a bottle of wine and backgammon, and she would destroy me all the time.

MC 3:03

I haven't played backgammon in quite some time. But I do play a game on a backgammon board called Acey Deucey. And I have played that game, as long as I can remember it to this day, every year that my dad and I take our trips together. I bring because I've inherited our backgammon board, and we play Acey Deucey this year, I couldn't win any game we play. We played like seven different games. Yeah, I even brought flux. I thought he will never understand this game. Beat the bejesus out of me.

HM 3:34

It's interesting. Our very first camping trip together our daughters on their own invented a game. Do you remember this game? I don't. It was called beers. Oh, no. And the idea was there. They were three, two or three, and they're in the campsite and they're picking up the bottle caps out of the dirt. They're putting them on the table and spinning them across the table and going, "Beers!"

MC 4:00

Whoever got closer to the edge won beers. "Daddy, I won beers!" Me, too, honey.

HM 4:09

But one of the interesting things is because the wife and I have this backgammon history and it's kind of built into this, that's something that we share. We have this little, this little memory of playing backgammon in all these different exotic places that we've gone. So, you know, I don't just remember going to the Mayan ruins. I remember playing backgammon on the beach with the wife. I remember playing backgammon on the ship as we were going up the Mississippi River, and all these different places. But that game comes back to it. So every time we open up the board, my brain is reminded of all these Happy, happy memories that I have. And that's powerful.

MC 4:47

Where did backgammon start with you and the wife or was it a thing you got from your parents?

HM 4:55

It was it was probably one of my grandparents that originally introduced it to me because setting up the board and then understanding how the pieces move. Playing backgammon with the wife probably wasn't until we started having kids or no it was before we started having kids when we bought our first house okay i think is when it first started but it was just kind of a "we can't afford to do anything else". That was one of the other things you know was free on a Sunday night Yeah.

MC 5:18

Do you know how much a backgammon board costs? lIke $15 or $20?

HM 5:33

Order one off the internet for 30 bucks make it a nice set the wife and I were even talking about because what we do when we go on trips is the first thing we do when we get on a ship for a cruise is we go and check the backgammon. Do they have good backgammon boards? We'll check out a board and we will chase the buy one get one free rum and cokes around the ship with our backgammon board.

MC 5:36

That's the way to go right there.

HM 5:56

And that's just something that we do. We'll sit on the back deck and do stuff or we'll sit at home and we'll talk about or we'll go to the winery with a backgammon board. And it just helps us pass the time. Because this little bit of conflict that the game creates competition...

MC 6:12

Healthy competition...

HM 6:14

Healthy competition. So it creates this little conflict that lets us work through our internal conflicts without actually going to work and saying something that will get us fired. Right. So, so that's what we've got. Do you have something like that? With the wife you mentioned Acey Deucey with your dad.

MC 6:32

I grew up playing games with with my dad and my mom, and you brought up hearts earlier. I remember being a kid with hands so small, I couldn't hold all the cards. I watched them play hearts for a good solid couple of years. Trying to understand the strategies behind it and what why do I want to shoot the moon? That doesn't make any sense?

HM 6:52

Yeah, the moon has been nice to me.

MC 6:55

It lights my way at night. It's pretty but learning How to play that. And just the time with family is what I remember most I remember being in a camper like a cab over camper like in a pickup truck. Yeah, right. With my mom and dad. We were in Yellowstone, I think it was. And it was starting to snow and it was my 10th birthday and we were playing hearts when I was 10. I've been playing hearts for 37 years. And I absolutely love that game. The strategy. It's fun. It's there's, there's no lives at stake. It's not cutthroat, but it can be if you want it to be. And the same is very true with the different kinds of games we've gotten to recently. We have recently tried to do more cooperative games where all of you are working together. I don't play Munchkin with MCLet number three because I'm pretty sure she would stab me with something

HM 8:03

Possibly. But it 's interesting you bring up the cooperative gaming because this thing I don't remember as a child. You know I grew up on monopoly and sorry where you literally try to screw them over to win. And then the wife gets us this game maybe you've heard about it it's about where you you land in this

MC 8:24

It's a tax game isn't it?

HM 8:25

No, no. You think it is. You land in this place and if it takes everybody too long to get somewhere you all die

MC 8:34

Oh the forbidden whatever.

HM 8:38

Forbidden Island

MC 8:38

Yeah, Forbidden Island. We have actually now have Forbidden Desert and we have forbidden Island. We got that for Christmas. So the kids love it.

HM 8:47

Let me go back to forbidden Island. If you guys haven't seen this game, go to your local game shop. I would I would encourage you number one. You know, we talked about getting a nice backgammon board on the web sites, whatever. Before you guys do that. I want you to go and find your local game shop. Because somewhere in your community is a guy that knows everything about every single game ever made, oh yeah, in that shop,and they are an amazing resource.

MC 8:48

And they will talk to you about it forever.

HM 9:09

And you need to talk to them about it forever. Because if you start talking to them about what your kids ages are and their interests and what you like to do and how much time you have to play a game during the week, they will get you the perfect game. I remember we went to a game shop and they recommended this game. And the wife got it and we played it. And it was so much fun.

MC 9:26

It really is a lot of fun.

HM 9:27

It wasn't I'm going to beat you it was Hey, everybody, let's all work together. What can I do to help everyone get to where we're going? And at first I thought you know, this is the kinder gentler gaming community. This isn't d&d where you know I'm killing some orc was something but no, we'll talk about that in a minute. It was such a welcome challenge to try to do what I needed to do. And what someone else needed to go. And the game is not easy.

MC 9:53

How often have you won that game?

HM 9:55

Maybe half the time.

MC 9:57

I was going to say maybe 25% of the time. When we've played, yeah, every time we've played forbidden desert, we've all died. But we have a great time. That sounds weird.

HM 10:10

We had a such a great time dying together.

MC 10:12

Yes, exactly.

HM 10:13

A family that dies together grows together.

MC 10:17

I don't think that's the way it works.

HM 10:18

As long as it's a board game.

MC 10:21

Okay, that's fair enough. Yeah, that's fair.

HM 10:22

So forbidden Island forbidden desert. I think there's forbidden sky, which sounds fascinating.

MC 10:27

That one is the most expensive of the three. I want to say they've won. They've won some serious awards for game design.

HM 10:35

This is non-traditional game design. Yeah, the great thing is, is it's card based, so you can make it more complicated by how you arrange the cards. So yeah, it's almost like a tarot card layout. Yeah, if you don't understand if you haven't played the game before, but when you go to your local game shop, you are going to see forbidden Island, forbidden desert, you're going to see all these different variations. You're gonna think, oh, the guys like this one.

MC 10:57

I think forbidden Island is the least expensive. I want to say it's less than 20 bucks. It's like 16 bucks, maybe something like that. It's not bad at all. No, it's not bad at all. I will tell you I am guilty of going to the game store and be like, I want to support small business. I'll you know, this is great. And then I look at a game that I want in. Dude, it's $20 cheaper on Amazon.

HM 11:17

The trick is and here's the other thing, guys, you're going to go in and you're going to ask for a game recommendation, they're going to give it to you. And it might be more than you're willing to spend. But guess what, there's something else in the store that you might need that you might want that you might want to play with. So MC let's talk about just basic deck card games. Okay, I've played Oh, you mentioned you mentioned flux. Yeah, earlier, flux is a very straightforward turn based game.

MC 11:44

I don't know that I would say it as straightforward because the rules change. Literally on the fly every single turn.

HM 11:52

This is a game that you play cards that now say oh, you draw four cards and keep three or you draw two cards and keep one but the fun thing is that they're themed. So we've got I've got Firefly Fluxx.

MC 12:04

Yep. I've got Batman.

HM 12:06

Batman.You have Rick and Morty?

MC 12:09

No, I have Rick and Morty Munchkin.

HM 12:12

That's right. Yeah. So flux is a fun simple card game you can get at the local game store to just kind of give you an introduction to it. That's the third time we've mentioned Munchkin. So I think we kind of have to dive into Munchkin.

MC 12:25

Munchkin is a card game. Yep. And the goal of the game is to get to level 10. And I can't remember their their tagline. It's something like, kick open the door, kill the monster, steal the treasure,

HM 12:39

If I remember correctly, those are the actual orders of what you do.

MC 12:43

Yes, yeah. But here's the thing. Like you and I will play with the wives. So there's four of us and your frickin wife wins almost every time. I've bought...you guys haven't bought any Munchkins, right?

HM 12:56

I bought you Munchkin

MC 12:59

I have like seven different versions of Munchkin. And we'll just pepper different ones and every once in a while and it doesn't matter which one we play your your wife tends to win. And I don't mind losing because it's so much fun, but we've had some...how can I say this intense disagreements?

HM 13:19

Intense disagreements! What is the thing I say more often than not?

MC 13:23

"We've never played like this!" So that's the beauty of Munchkin is you get you get to argue the rules becaus e there's a very specific part of the rules that says you will follow the rules unless there is a card contradicts it. And if there's any disagreement, the owner of the game has final say.

HM 13:41

yeah, or whoever's loudest, I think is actually in the rules.

MC 13:44

That might be in one of the iteration.

HM 13:45

Yeah, but this game, for those of you that don't know it is kind of like a very stripped down card version of Dungeons and Dragons.

MC 13:55

It's a mockumentary.

HM 13:56

Yeah, you've got your basic character. You can add weapons, you can add modifications just make them all hard you draw you fight monsters to win to go up levels.

MC 14:06

But you can screw the other people you're playing with.

HM 14:09

That is called being Munckingly.

MC 14:12

As Muckingly as you can be if you can go out of your way to stop somebody from getting what they want? This is not this is not a family game. This is not a family game. Unless you do not like your family at all.

HM 14:27

Yeah, and I think we've only played with the adults we haven't had the kids play.

Oh, god no. Are you insane? Absolutely not. No, I it's it's that's that's why we have opted for cooperative games. It is a much better thing for families. We've we've played the island ones we talked about. We've also done pandemic is another cooperative game. Which, ironically, is, is is a lot of fun. It's a lot you're trying to stop the corona virus from spreading all over the world. Yep, that's a really entertaining game.

I just want to put out there that real quick Munchkin. Steve Jackson put this game together is genius, the illustrations genius and the different things that are in there we started playing correct me if I'm wrong the first iteration of Munchkin that we play is the original. No, no, it was Muchkin Axe Cop.

MC 15:00

That is correct.

HM 15:16

And we played it simply because it was Axe Cop. Yeah. And it was all about a cop doing weird stuff if the cards had this this minor kind of law enforcement theme to it.

MC 15:25

Yeah, I couldn't turn it down.

HM 15:27

It was things like you have a plus two battle chicken.

MC 15:31

Then there's chicken on your head.

HM 15:33

Yeah. No, I had mine counts his head gear minus one chicken on your head. Yeah. You know, that's, that's just an absolute blast playing.

MC 15:41

So we've started getting into a little more convoluted games .

HM 15:46

I was going to say elaborate but convoluted is definitely better.

MC 15:49

They're both pretty applicable.

So then the games we've discussed so far are quick kind of Wham BAM games now. A good game of Muncking is three, four hours.

If you really want if you want to go epic Munchkin unless Kim is playing, you can go to level 20. We've played games we've played. We haven't done epic Munchkin before, but we've played games where it lasts for we've played for a good three or four hours.

HM 16:13

We've done a clock.

MC 16:14

Yeah, whoever, whoever's ahead, it's 1130.

HM 16:17

It's 1130. At night, the kids are, are screaming and crying. No, no, I'm at level nine. You just want to win. We've never played we've never played like this.

MC 16:27

But you can do the epic thing where you go to level 20. And I would say that's more for college folks who have no kids. Nothing else to do. Yeah, you got nothing but time. It's not necessarily a quick game. The other ones that forbidden Islands and the pandemics those can last about an hour, hour and a half ish maybe.

HM 16:47

And yeah, and it's good fun. And before we get into the more convoluted games, let me go back to one more board game. I've had a lot of fun with that Ticket to Ride. And I know y'all Okay, you're not the biggest fan of this one.

MC 16:56

I haven't cracked the code on it.

HM 16:58

Yeah, so Ticket to Ride Pretty much...

MC 17:00

Although I did win one time.

HM 17:01

Yeah, that didn't count. We've never played like this. Ticket to Ride is a board game. Pretty much what you're doing is you're you're building trains. Yeah coast to coast from from place to place and one of my favorite places to build a train to is Duluth, Duluth. Yeah, not the hoovy Province, which includes the city of Wuhan. No, nope, not gonna do it. I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna do it not gonna do. But tickets, right as a lot of fun and some of these games. Yeah, there you go. Damn it. Some of these games allow you to kind of kind of mix around. And that's a great thing about these board games and these card games as you go online to find out how to play and somebody has, oh, I have a variant. Would you like to play my variant? Oh, yes, I will.

MC 17:42

Okay, alright.

HM 17:44

So looking through it stuff like that can be a lot of fun, but then really go to that local game shop. Tell them what you're interested in, tell them what games you like. And they will lead you to a new game you want to play. One of the other ones board games that I really liked. It takes a little bit of time to get used to Catan.

MC 17:59

Yeah. We've gotten into that one lately as well and it is fun.

HM 18:04

Just thinking about playing these games? I'm so relaxed right now.

MC 18:08

That's amazing. It really is.

HM 18:09

I mean, you can take here's the thing, guys, you can take an hour and you can stare at the TV at some crap show. They got this new station 19 on. Like there's like two or three fire based shows going on right now.

MC 18:22

No, I don't watch your stupid shows.

HM 18:23

Neither do I. You can sit for an hour and watch a show or you can sit for an hour and play a game. Yeah. And you're talking as a family, you're interacting as a family. Maybe you're playing Monopoly, and somebody's gonna win and everybody else is going to lose. Okay, those are the rules of the game.

MC 18:37

You're playing life lessons, you know when this is the way life is.

HM 18:41

Yeah, maybe you're playing a cooperative game. Or maybe you're playing one of the more convoluted games the MC is found like Aftermath.

MC 18:47

Oh, dude,

HM 18:48

you brought us into play and just walking up to the table. When you're like I have a new game the wife and I were like, nope, nope, no, no, no, no, no.

MC 19:00

How many little figurines do you need?

HM 19:02

Right? I mean, there were about there were about three dozen little figurines what six or seven different decks of cards of different sizes? Oh, yeah, a book on the front. It's like nine different dials. Yeah. And then a few hours into the game where I don't know what's going on no idea what I'm doing. We don't know if we're having any fun and then the next day MCs like watch this video we've been playing wrong.

MC 19:27

I found a video.

HM 19:29

Yeah, it was still so much fun.

MC 19:31

I went on YouTube, and I found a guy that did a game walkthrough and he played a couple of the missions it's, it's it takes its post apocalyptic all the humans are gone and you play either a mouse, a gerbil, a hamster, and maybe another mouse.

HM 19:47

Now I've read this book. Yeah,

MC 19:48

yeah, yeah. And Animal Farm is amazing. Yeah. And you've got to do all these things. And the way that it's an adventure book, so it comes in a book and you lay the book open and each different pages of Different map and there's different there's cards that you have to play it is very involved. Yeah. And the reason that I that I got it is I saw a another YouTube video because I'm starting to get into some pretty intense games. And I was looking at somebody you know, top 10 of 2019. And both these guys mentioned this particular game and I was drawn to the artwork of the game

HM 20:21

Oh, the artwork is amazing.

MC 20:22

It's incredible. I thought, Man that that looks pretty cool. So I started appreciate. I was looking at some reviews. I'm like, This game looks pretty sick. So I waited a couple of weeks, saved up a little bit of money and bought is a good word. Oh, yeah, it's it's amazing. So the night before, if you'll recall, we came over to your place and we started trying our hand at Dnd.

We did. I've never been a DnD guy.

HM 20:50

MC was our first dm or dungeon master.

MC 20:54

I've never played...I'm a 47 year old man. I've never played that before in my life.

HM 20:58

So what we did was we pretty much went on to a website that lets you quick create characters. Yep, yep. And we just jumped in MC kind of had a preset scenario that he was going to run a preset campaign. And he dropped us in there and it was me and the wives. And we just stumbled into this thing both wives like we don't know what's going on. And 10 year old me so do i 10 year old me is Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god. Yeah,

MC 21:23

you were the only one at the table who never played the damn thing. But

HM 21:25

yeah, and even then I'm looking at my character like, this isn't. This isn't my character I don't understand. And the funny thing was a week before that. You had mentioned wanting to pick up d&d and I thought Yes, I think I still have my dad's d&d books from when I was a kid. I climbed up in the attic and I found them two the original books from '79 and tucked into one of them. 10 year old me made a character nice, and I'm pretty sure I check the rules. I have to play that character. I get actual campaigns highlighted that I like it. But this was just, well, two hours.

MC 21:58

We did we did a couple hours and I was very feeling really overwhelmed? Because the Wife is like, "How do I do a spell?" And I'm like, "I haven't gotten to the part of the chapter yet."

HM 22:06

It was not easy, but it would. It was so much fun to be able to, to go through that experience and turn the rest of the world off. And all the sudden we were worried about the white dragon and whether or not wives can cast their spells or not. And, and we turned around at one point, I remember we were like, are we are we gonna go in the spa?

MC 22:29

It was getting late.

HM 22:30

We did. What do we do? Of course, we did hearts.

MC 22:32

We played hearts in the spa, which is pretty awesome. So that was the impetus to me, like, you know, I'm going to buy this other game. And then when you guys showed up, and saw it spread, it literally took up our entire frickin dining room table. And we played it extremely wrong, and I will encourage you play it wrong. Who cares? Yeah, enjoy yourselves. And now that we've seen that I've seen at least three different videos on how to play the game. Now. I'm really jacked to play the game. Now I've got the rules down a little bit better obviously than I did before

HM 23:03

Yeah, there's there's there's always a tech that can help us play the games, right so we can go online and we can look at end hands or we can go online and look up how to play Aftermath or what's the best strategy for hearts. But there's something to be said about. Hey guys, let's turn off all the screens. Yep, let's all face each other. And let's do something together. Yeah, and that that that melts away stress better than anything I can think of now, if you're gonna try to play hearts against like your ex wife and her new boyfriend.

MC 23:08

Oh, don't do that.

HM 23:27

That maybe not the best thing, Sarge.

MC 23:38

Now you wouldn't do that you definitely want to play Munchkin with them.

HM 23:43

That should actually be required True or false? True.

So guys, I want to know what your favorite game is. What is it that you that you go into to kind of get away from the world is something straightforward like checkers backgammon? Is it something more complicated like chess, are you playing A very convoluted board game I want to know hit me up Justin@wyeradio.com

MC 24:05

And of course you can always find us at wyeradio.com you know what else you can find at wyeradio.com? Well, only if you listen to the show...BOLO.

HM 24:21

That's what I'm talking about. All right, what's your BOLO?

The Wife 24:24

Oh, well lately I've been watching Outlander with Mrs. HM. And we have been aging right before our very eyes knitting and watching Outlander and watching these beautiful men in kilts that, you know, not as pretty as our husbands in kilts...

HM 24:41

Two things I want to bring up number one thank you for appreciating kilt culture. Number two, where did you come from? Where's Jason?

The Wife 24:48

Oh, well, you know, the whole show that you just did about games and things like that. We build that into our problem solving. We just rock paper scissors and he lost Have to go pick up the eighth grade dancers.

HM 25:02

so there's an actual Freakonomics episode about the best way to play rock paper scissors. I don't know. Did you know this? I'm pointing at the wife off camera. Yeah, no, you didn't know this. There's actually so you must have listened to the episode because apparently you won.

The Wife 25:16

Oh, well yeah, it's all about the odds, especially when he throws on three instead of waiting after three. I know what he's gonna do.

HM 25:26

So that's an interesting thing. You got to know the house rules, right? You gotta know Is it 123 or 123 shoot? That's right.

The Wife 25:31

Yeah. 123 shoot.

HM 25:33

Yep. And that's another important thing when you go to somebody else's house to play a game you know the house rules and you got to find out ahead of time Okay. Are we playing with waterproof cards when we play hearts in the in the spa?

The Wife 25:44

That was a good night.

HM 25:45

Wasn't that a good night?. Yeah. And my bolo I don't I don't have anything for bolo. Right now.

The Wife 25:52

Seriously, you give me a hard time about having a bolo?

HM 25:54

No,no. No discoveries coming back. Yes, for Season The wife is off of microphone and camera holding wine and just being like you're watching TV actually 12 year old me 10 year old me earlier was playing d&d with some beautiful women and happy about it a 12 year old me is excited that the wife is enjoying enterprise and we're on season four it's almost finished she's having a great time watching it but it's it's one of those shows that you can put on put the kids to bed come back sit down on the couch 10 minutes later and still catch up on the storyline.

The Wife 26:26

Oh, I thought you were gonna say, "And fall asleep." cuz no that's what I do after I put the kids to bed

HM 26:38

So apparently when I'm at work the two of you sit down and watch Outlander that's just sitting there drinking wine watching Outlander.

The Wife 26:44

It's a wonderful thing. And and yes, and we're knitting we're sure. Knitting knitting.

HM 26:50

What are you knitting?

The Wife 26:52

Right now? I'm making a slouchy hat for MC.

HM 26:57

Does he know about it?

The Wife 26:58

He does. Just because I'm kind of excited about it, because this is my first slouchy hat.

HM 27:03

This is going to air a little bit later than right now. So if you want to make it for him, and then he'll forget because he's a cop and they have like memories like Etch-a-sketches and I'll shake him later, he'll forget. He'll be like, Who are you? And then we can go play a card game that can beat him. Because we have never played like this before.

The Wife 27:22

Every time

HM 27:24

and I mentioned that earlier. So until next time, Justin show the happy medic. And

The Wife 27:29

Katie with Katie can help organizing.

HM 27:32

That's right. This show is organized. Thank you, Katie.

For my buddy MC from MC PD studios

The Wife 27:38

Look at my hair. It's so beautiful.

HM 27:40

Oh, my. It's like he's here with us. That was amazing. Until next time, guys, if you had a question for us go to wyeradio.com. Over on the right hand side is the blue button for the speak pipe. You can send us a question. Until then be safe. And if you're knitting in a warm house with your feet up, you're watching some kilts. There's a good chance you're with the wives.

The Wife 28:01

Lucky you

HM 28:02

Be safe. Cheers.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai