[caption id="attachment_328393" align="alignright" width="263"] Mr. Jackson[/caption]

The Inner Monologue of a Super-Fan

Steve Jackson. {deep breath} This is an interview with Steve Jackson. {fidgets nervously} I am kinda geeking out right now. Collect yourself, David. You can do this. Start by introducing the man. {deep breath}

Wait… Does Steve Jackson need an introduction? I mean, if you speak to the people from my generation of gaming, most assuredly not. But new gamers are discovering these hobbies every day (which means there are 10,000 or so people just discovering him today). Sure, there are going to be those new gamers who started with the insanity that is Munchkin, or who cut their teeth on GURPS—one of the most successful lines of role-playing material ever published—but what about those who do not know Mr. Jackson and his company? I know… I will start by providing two Wikipedia articles: one about the man, and one about his company.

I have gotten to meet Mr. Jackson in person once, at GenCon (he signed my copies of Wizard and Melee). I have had multiple conversations with him online (not that he likely remembers me in any way).…

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[caption id="attachment_328066" align="aligncenter" width="1200"] Good for home, as a filler, or for a game on the go.[/caption]

Cards and Points

If you have read my interview with Earl Patterson, you know how we met. Congress of Gamers has been a fount of good times, good games, and good connections for me ever since I moved to the DMV (the D.C., Maryland, Virginia area). Meeting Mr. Patterson was a joy. The first game we discussed was Make Your Words Count! and it takes very little time to discover that this is his baby.

The game is relatively simple. From a deck of letter cards, players are dealt 5 or 7 cards (decided at the start of the game). They also determine the score goal; recommended is 100 points, but players can decide on a shorter or much longer game if they wish. In the center of the table are Community Vowels, one each of “A”, “E”, ‘I”, “O”, and “U”—these are each worth 0 points and are usable by everyone every round to ensure that there is always something the player can do. Note that there are standard vowel cards in the main deck that are worth 1 point each.

On each player’s turn, they take the letter cards from…

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Once Upon a Time…

Since August of 2023, I would say that an almost disturbing number of my gaming stories have started with the phrase “I was at Congress of Gamers, and…”

This is not a bad thing! From the time my family and I moved from Iowa to Maryland, the three or four sessions of Congress of Gamers each year have been a regular part of our calendar. This is a truly wonderful, small gaming convention.

Well… I was at Congress of Gamers, and relatively early on the first day, I spotted a gentleman setting up his vendor area and the first thing I saw was a vast field of Hot Wheels cars. I figured this could not possibly be what he was here for, so I went closer. Looking over the material he had for sale, I could see he was into Word Games.

[caption id="attachment_328057" align="aligncenter" width="1200"] Make Your Words Count is a great idea and an interesting implementation of the word game.[/caption]

I am no stranger to Word Games, be they on a board (Scrabble, with or without the Monopoly elements), with dice (Boggle), or with Cards (Quiddler). Still, when I looked at this table, it felt like something was different. So, I spoke…

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