(Score)Keeping the Flame Alive
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Jamie Ramsey, Assistant Media Director for the Cincinnati Reds, posted his scorecard from 4-17-13 on twitter
There was a great article on MLB.com this week called “Longtime Scorekeepers Keeping the Flame Alive“. In the article, there is a link to Jamie Ramsey’s twitter account. Jamie is the Assistant Director of Media Relations for the Cincinnati Reds and he routinely posts pictures of his personal scorecards for Reds games on his feed.
I’ve posted my personal baseball scorecards on here plenty of times, but I love it when I get to see the scorecards that other people post. To me, it’s almost like peeking in someone’s diary.
A peek at a scorecard by Larry Granillo of Baseball Prospectus
So, on that note, here is a great article Larry Granillo wrote for his wezen-ball column over on Baseball Prospectus, whereupon he discusses how his big brother (that’s me, by the way) taught him how to keep score when he was just a wee tyke: A Peek At My Scorecard
OneForFive.com Facebook Page
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The new oneforfive.com Facebook page is meant to supplement this blog. I often come across items that I know you guys would love to know about, but for one reason or another I can’t post it here on the blog. The Facebook page will hopefully solve that, as well as give us tabletop-sports fanatics a place over there where we can talk about the games, the replays, the victories and frustrations of the quixotic endeavor that is this hobby.
Hope to see you over there, my “friends”!
Basketball Bones: Game Review
Sometimes, I get the feeling that many game publishers just don’t get me. I play tabletop-sports games because I want the drama of an individual contest, the suspense of a season unfolding, the feelings of nostalgia and of getting to hang out with old friends when I rummage through a card set of ballplayers from years gone by – even if that year gone by was just last year – and I want to be the supreme being in charge of it all.
Most tabletop sports games these days, regardless of the sport, will generate statistics accurately enough to recreate a season, but only the best games will give the gamer the opportunity to step through the looking glass and create and inhabit a recreated world. To me, when a game publisher gets it right and releases a game that offers a fun individual game experience with the potential to go as deep into a replay as I’d like, with sturdy and well-designed game components, and that publisher goes on to stay in touch with their customers to further promote and nurture the new game, that’s something to be heralded.
PT Games, Inc. has done a fantastic job with their newest release, Basketball Bones.
BASKETBALL BONES GAME REVIEW:
WHAT IS IT?:
Basketball Bones is a cards & dice basketball simulation game designed for solitaire or two-player play. It is a “full-play game.” That is, every possession, shot, foul, etc. is accounted for through the course of gameplay. This game uses individual player ratings on individual player cards to resolve each action. From the introduction to the rulebook:
Basketball Bones is a tabletop simulation of pro basketball, using four dice, or “bones”. Almost every result can be retrieved from the player cards, with very little consultation of separate charts. Just about anything that can happen in a pro game can happen in Basketball Bones!
WHAT DO YOU GET WHEN YOU BUY IT?:
Read more…
APBA Soccer 2011-12 EPL Card Set
[UPDATE 4-21-13: I look forward to giving this story a happy ending at a later date. According to Delphi Forum user "todddeanmark": John (Herson, President of APBA Games) said they were working on getting replacements for those error team sets and would send out when he had them in hand. As of today, the entirety of the article below is still accurate.]
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I take the responsibility of writing about and reviewing games and products very seriously. Personally, I inform many of my purchasing decisions by reading reviews and opinions made by those who I’ve come to trust. It is the great honor and responsibility of oneforfive.com to be considered one of those trustworthy sources by many in our tabletop-sports community.
2011-12 Van Persie – aesthetically more beautiful than ever, but notice anything missing? No offsides, fouls suffered, or fouls committed. All Arsenal, Man U, and Man City cards are missing these numbers.
I say that in preface to this review of the newest release of APBA Soccer cards – the 2011-12 English Premiere League set – because I need to remind myself of that great responsibility before I get started here. I don’t want to write a bad review of this card set. I’ve said it before, I really love the APBA Soccer game and want it to thrive. I’d hate to set its progress back.
But here’s the thing: despite the cards looking better than ever, despite the clever solution to the problem of Tim Howard’s goal, until the game company reprints the entire Manchester United, Manchester City and Arsenal team cards, this set is unplayable. Don’t buy it yet, because, right now, the 2011-12 APBA Soccer EPL Card Set is a $44.00 paperweight.
These three teams – the three best teams last year – are missing all offsides and foul numbers on their player cards. If you play APBA Baseball, imagine if the three best teams in the baseball set were missing all 13s and 14s on their cards. You just couldn’t play the set at all, could you? That’s the soccer equivalent. All three teams are missing PRNs 47, 48 and 49. Those teams simply can’t be played, and without Man U, Man City or the Gunners, this set is useless.
What’s most disappointing about this mistake from the gameco. is that it was made at all. Another inaccurate release indicates a systemic problem with the release of the soccer sets. Who is proofing these cards? How in the world could this set – released two-thirds of the way into the next season, by the way – have been released with such glaring omissions on the player cards? Why is it that the APBA Soccer community can’t rely on any release to be made in a timely manner with accurate cards? It’s beyond frustrating.
I’ve been putting off writing this article for awhile, because I didn’t want to do it. It felt disloyal to a game that I really love. The fact is, however, that I owe it to you readers to give you the truth about this card set. Hopefully APBA Games makes it right. If those three teams are reprinted soon, and offered free of charge to those who have purchased the set, then this will hopefully end up as water under the bridge. Will the damage be irreparable, however, to the company’s already shaky reputation for the “accuracy” of their soccer cards? Time will tell.
Vin, Chad, and the Sword
graphic by Dale Detwiler, owner of Corndog Cards & Novelties, Austin, TX