February 19, 2017: Munchkin, Zombie Dice, And Toys In NYC

As we reported yesterday, New York Toy Fair is happening right now, and our team is in place and sitting in on more meetings than we should try to attempt at a single show. Now, we're not talking Gen Con levels of meetings, where Ross and I often have three dozen scheduled meetings each, but there are still more meetings per day at Toy Fair than I'd personally like to see on the calendar. (Hey, we may have a blast working on games, but those long days grow exhausting by the second or third day.)

Our big assignment on Friday was the construction of the Steve Jackson Games display case. This year, I sat down and put together a quick video showing everyone not at the show a peek at what's inside the case. You can go to YouTube and watch to find something new for Zombie Dice, see some new Munchkin, and check out some of last year's new games – including Batman: The Animated Series Dice Game and Simon's Cat Card Game – on display at this year's New York Toy Fair.

On a non-work note, I managed to make my way down to Grand Central on Friday at 5:30 in the morning, with a 1983 Radio Shack battery-operated toy in my bag, to shoot video of the toy inside Grand Central. This is a toy I photographed and reviewed last year, and the video has fewer clips of the toy in action than I would have liked. The problem with this plan came down to noise; you see, those early eighties battery-operated toys aren't exactly quiet, and the grinding of the gears echoed a lot more in Grand Central than I was expecting. When you come up from being on your hands and knees playing with a toy to find police around you, maybe it is time to stop sending the little toy crawling across the floors of a very public space . . .

-- Phil Reed