Ameritrash...and proud of it!

A term I wasn't familiar with until I started getting heavily into board games is Ameritrash, which refers (disparagingly, as you can probably guess) to games with a strong genre theme (sci-fi, fantasy, zombies, etc.), usually involving individualized characters and a kind of narrative that unfolds during gameplay. Mansions of Madness, for example, would fall into this category. In contrast to Ameritrash games are the more "critically acclaimed" (scare quotes added to be snarky) Eurogames, such as the members of the Catan family and Carcassonne. Eurogames tend to have streamlined rules and very little dice rolling, and focus on competition for resources rather than direct combat. I don't have anything against the Euro style, and I own and enjoy many such games, but I'm kind of getting sick of the board gamers who look down their noses at anything that comes with plastic minis. I've got
Ghostbusters and Zombicide on order, and damn, they both look like a lot of fun. Isn't that the whole point of board games, anyway?

Carcassonne

I got home from work yesterday and Amy told me that she had taught our five-year-old son how to play Carcassonne. (A great game, by the way!) If the little dude is playing Carcassonne, maybe he's ready for Dungeon!