I Turned Antique Coins Pink!!!

I feel so foolish!!!

So, I've been getting into board games. And one of the fun things to do with board games is bling them up. Metal coins. Wooden meeple upgrades. Stickers. 3D printed assets or figures. Etc. Etc. Etc. So many possibilities.

Many months ago, as in before the end of last year... :\ ... I got Obsession. A game about Victorian romance. I haven't learned how to play it, but so many people online rave how fun it is. On Board Game Geek the game has an 8.3 rating. That's REALLY high

 

So, before even learning how to play with it I thought it would be nice to upgrade to metal coins. Well, no gaming coins fit, and the set many people buy for this game was sold out. If gaming coins can't be found, why not use authentic British coins instead? Onto Ebay I went, and found pences and shillings. Why not?

The problem with old coins is that they're dirty and smell. Why not clean them?!! (Which all coin collectors shudder at, because that diminishes their value). I found a vinegar and salt technique. The instructions said not to use a glass bowl, as plastic is better. What did I do? Use a glass bowl. And then left the coins in the solution for nearly an hour!!!

They turned pink!!!!!  The sides pressed against the glass were the most pink!!!! I ruined antique coins. Some of theses coins lived through WWII. They survived a World War, amongst other things, and in 2022 I turned them pink! How pathetic is that??!! 

That just made me really depressed, for months, until I watched a Chateau Dairies episode on YT where a jar of three pence coins were found, which are the coins I turned pink.  So I went to Ebay and bought another set.

And I vow never to clean these. Let them be.

Though check out how clean and shiny this 1944 coin is! So pretty.

Oh the stories these coins can tell.

Sarah :0)

(I really need to learn how to play that game... :\ )

(Heh, I honestly have a lot of games I need to learn how to play... ehhhh..... but my shelf of shame is really pretty. Though the games I have sat down to learn have been fun.)

The Game My Family Probably Won't Learn How To Play...

So there's a game that my family probably won't ever learn how to play.  I'm saying "probably" because ya never know, but as it stands no one wants to give it a go.  Why?  Because it's Tesla vs. Edison... and no one wants to play Edison.

Like, literally no one.

We're a pro Nikola Tesla family.

Edison is full of cringe.

In other news I did get to try out two new games on Memorial Day: MegaCity Oceania and Wingspan.  Really cool very different games.  MegaCity is a city building game plus puzzle solving while trying to move the structures without any of them falling.  Wingspan is just a super chill bird game where you collect birds and eggs.  Enjoyed both of them.

I've started collecting board games that have a single player variant.  There's so many now, and some of them have really good reviews, so I'm excited to try them out.  It would be fun to review them and let you know what they are, playing at least five times to get a sense of repeatability and overall enjoyment.  It'll take a little time to work through them, but it will be a fun project.

Hope you're having a great week!

Sarah

Accessories from American Girl's Newest Historical Character: Courtney from 1986

 Courtney is American Girl's latest historical doll, coming to us from 1986.  She's a gamer, loving to spend time at the arcade in the mall, has seen Star Wars dozens of times, loves The Goonies, and is sad when she can't go over to her friends house to play the new Super Mario Brother's game.

With the release of every new character comes the doll, countless clothes, and accessories.  I didn't get the doll or clothes, but I did get four accessory sets and book.

 

The book, front and back.  There's only one book, though there will be a second book, yet to be announced.  Courtney Changes the Game only has 120 pages, which is short compared to Nanea's, Melody, and Maryellen's original first book.  Nanea's first book originally had 216 pages, though there were no pictures, but it was shortened to 144 pages with pictures for a re-release.  That seems the direction American Girl wants to take the books.  I do like the pictures in Courtney Changes the Game, it's just a shame that fleshed out stories will suffer because of it.  There's so much more material in the original American Girl books.

Courtney's Care Bears Sleeping Bag Set: $36

I was quite the Care Bear fan girl growing up.  I had the pajamas, bed comforter, bears, and other odds and ends.  And this sleeping bag looks really, really familiar.  I don't know if it's based off of an actual item from the past, but I swear I had this as a kid.  Such a flashback.

Comparing American Girls Bedtime Bear to World's Smallest Tenderheart Bear, as I've seen many people online mention that they have the World's Smallest Care Bears.  Just showing that there is a size difference between the two, though Care Bears come in many sizes, so it's all good, and World's Smallest has a nice variety.

Courtney's School Supplies: $30

No, these aren't Lisa Frank--that would have been cool--though these seem to be modeled after the popular stationary line.  This comes with a binder, 2 folders, paper, erasers, sticker sheet, pencil case, and pencil's.  I loved me some Lisa Frank in the day, and was obsessed with her dolphin line.  That would have been amazing, but licensing and all that.  I love the pencil case, as I loved this style of case when I was younger.  Brings back so many memories.  Be careful when opening it as the connecting plastic seems fragile and thin.

 Courtney's PAC-MAN Lunch Set: $25.

I love this so much!  On my first day of school, Kindergarten, I had a plastic lunchbox.  Don't remember the character, but light blue box color comes to mind.  And on the first day of school my Mom took me to a corner gas station store and bought me chocolate milk, and then poured it into my thermos.  It's such a nice memory, and I felt super special.

This set comes with a thermos where the lid twists off.  Unfortunately you can't put the food items and thermos in the lunch box at the same time.  Then there's a ham and cheese sandwich, wrapped brownie, cheese puffs, and apple slices.

This was literally my lunch, though with a peanut butter sandwich instead, from elementary through college.  PB sandwich, a Sara Lee snack, Apple or other fruit, and some form of chips (cheese puffs did make it in the lunch a few times).  Our family couldn't afford the hot lunch, so everyday, except for when the cafeteria did that square size pizza, I was a cold lunch girl.  And I can't eat peanut butter sandwiches anymore because of it, except on certain occasions, but it saved me so much money in high school and college.

So much fun!

 

Courtney's Sleepover Accessory Set: $50

This is my favorite set.  The boombox requires 3 AAA batteries.  You can turn the dial and it makes radio sounds.  It comes with 4 mini cassette tapes, and each side plays a song when it's in the machine.  They're original songs, a mix of vocal and instrumental, with an 80's flare.  Think Tiffany not Chicago.  Unfortunately there isn't an AUX hole to connect it with a device, like Nanea's 1940's radio has.  It's fun playing swing music on it.  So I was hoping there was a way to connect a device to the boombox, but there isn't.  Am I the only one who keeps an aux cable at the ready?

There's also a bowl of tortilla chips, a couple fruit punch cans, a doodle book with drawings on every page plus a pen, and a cootie catcher.  The back side of the cootie catcher had the instructions, but I still got confused.  I forgot how to make them!!!!  So I had to look it up on YouTube. -_-;; Heh.

(I somehow got on a YouTube channel that's playing random 80's songs, and Glory of Love from Karate Kid II is playing.  Memories!!  You know, I never saw that movie, but this song got SO MUCH airplay.  We Built This City just came on!  Gah!  I'm losing it!  How can I not dance around!!!??? Best. Song. Ever.)

So tiny.

And just the little pamphlet that came with the sets.

 

Definitely a trip down memory lane.

 

Pokemon in the Real World!!!

Pokemon in the real World.  Just think of it.

Traveling about to catch real Pokemon.

That's what the new Smartphone game, for Android and iPhone, will be like.

Pokemon GO!

And a handy trailer was just unveiled in all its epicness.

You wear this watch like device that vibrates when you get near a Pokemon, and then you catch it, and are able to battle Pokemon with other players.  Sounds cool.  I'm curious to see how it'll actually work.

The game will be free with in-app purchases--you know what that means--and the price for the watch like device hasn't been announced.

I guess this will be a good way to get people moving about while gaming, instead of sitting in front of a computer, T.V., handheld.  That aspect will be fun.

Pokemon GO will be released in 2016.  This is the article I read regarding the announcement: Pokemon GO for iOS and Android brings Pokemon into the real world.

Note 1: I think it's funny that the commercial shows adults in their 20's and 30's, probably because we can afford stuff now, and grew up with Pokemon. (Though I was in late High School when it became super popular.  My siblings lived through the school hype, and I watched the show with them, not really playing the game.)  Still, adults getting excited over Pokemon.

Confession: I'm excited.

Note 2: Those cards pictured at top of this blog post are mine.  No, I never actually learned how to play, I just bought the cards with best of intentions and never got around to it.

I still need to play Alpha Sapphire on my 3DS . . .

Note 3: Can you believe they've been making Pokemon games for 20 years?

How old do you feel?

How old?

Wreck-It Ralph, Movie Review

"I am bad, but that's good.  I will never be good, and that's not bad.  There's no one I'd rather be then me."

Rating: 4 Stars out of 5

Ralph is an 8-bit game villain who has been terrorizing the small towns apartment building for 30 long years, and he's tired of it.  What glory is there in being the bad guy?  No one likes you.  No one ever wants you around.  If you're bad in the game, then you must be bad in your personal life as well, right?  That's what all the other game characters think, and Ralph is tired of being treated as trash, and sleeping on bricks.  Never mind the fact that he's never been invited to a party or eaten cake.  He wants to change this, but will he go "turbo?"

In all honesty I would give this movie a 3.75, but clever fun ideas, and the animated short that takes place before the film, bumps the movie experience to a 4.  Paperman is the animated short, a solid 5 out of 5 stars, and is simply the most brilliant animated short I've ever seen.  I don't want to give any of it away, only that I loved every moment.  I can go on and on about what I think about it, but go see Wreck-it Ralph, and you can judge for yourself what you think of Paperman.  It's so good.

The actual film, Wreck-it Ralph, was very entertaining, and original!  How often do we get anything original out of Hollywood these days?  Um, practically never.  Everything now is a remake, prequel, sequel, or based off of a book.  This movie is none of that, though we do get a lot of video game cameos.     


As reported by Total Film, they asked Disney Producer Clark Spencer how they went about getting all those cameos (and there are a lot . . . it was fun geeking out, recognizing random characters):

"We talked early on about making the film authentic and the only way to do that was to have real game characters in the film as well as the characters we'd created, otherwise it would feel like an artificial environment.  But when you do that, you don't know the reality of what characters you're going to be able to license for the film.  Rich [Moore, director] and I went to E3, and pitched the movie to all the different game companies, talking about the concept.  What was great about that was we developed a one-on-one relationship [with the people at the game companies], and people warmed to the idea.  So they felt like it could be something interesting, but they were still a little skeptical, as they were giving their own creative characters over to Wreck-It Ralph.  And so we said we'd keep them involved in the process, and give them the script pages. We showed them the models, we showed them the early animation tests, and even the final animations.  We brought them along the entire way, and it made companies willing to participate, because they felt like we were going to be true to their characters.  As a result we got pretty much almost anything we wanted, because the companies started feeling the momentum and everybody pretty much said yes to us."

Where the film went wrong with the pacing in the middle act.  The beginning and the end of the movie flows nicely, but the middle dragged on a little, and as much as I like Sugar Rush--a cutesy Japanese style, super Kawaii, go-kart game--there was just a little too much Sugar Rush in the movie.

Overall I found the movie quite fun, and the animation was just brilliant.  I loved all the different styles and details.  For instance the Wreck-it Ralph townspeople are very jumpy in their movements, which is key-frame animation without tweening (thank you Steven for the vocab), representing their 8-bit roots.  I asked Steven why Ralph and Fix-it Felix, Jr. were so smooth compared with the rest of their game, and he said that in animation all key characters, objects, building, etc, are called Hero's (even if you're a villain), and they receive special attention, detail, and time.  

I did enjoy this movie and recommend it, and you get a fantastic animated short in the process.