This week’s News Collider brings you further proof that playing board and card games are good for your mental health, we have more details over the book and movie board game tie-ins to look forward to over the next two years and a very unfortunate story for fans of The Lord of the Rings: The One Ring.
Aconyte releases details on their first titles
Aconyte, the book publishing arm of board game titan, Asmodee has revealed the titles that will make up their opening gambit. All of these are pieces of fiction based upon their games catalogue. Arkham Horror: Wrath of N’Kai and Legend of the Five Rings: Curse of Honour will be released in May, penned by Black Library authors Josh Reynolds and David Annandale respectively. Pandemic: Patient Zero, by Amanda Bridgeman follows in June along with Descent: Journeys in the Dark: The Doom of Fallowhearth by Robbie MacNiven.
There’s more Arkham Horror and Legend of the Five Rings books planned for later in 2020, alongside the recently announced Marvel superhero books, but for me, I’m most interested in Pandemic: Patient Zero.
Study shows that playing boardgames keeps you mentally fit in old age
A recent study from Edinburgh University has found further evidence that supports the theory that playing games are very good for your mental health. The study looked measured memory, problem-solving skills, thinking speed and general thinking ability in 1000 people aged seventy. The participants repeated these tests every three years for the next nine years. Researchers used statistical models to analyse the relationship between playing non-digital games and their thinking skills.
Professor Ian Deary, Director of the University of Edinburgh's Centre for Cognitive Ageing and Cognitive Epidemiology (CCACE), said:
"We and others are narrowing down the sorts of activities that might help to keep people sharp in older age. In our Lothian sample, it's not just general intellectual and social activity, it seems; it is something in this group of games that has this small but detectable association with better cognitive ageing. It'd be good to find out if some of these games are more potent than others.”
D&D Movie to focus on Forgotten Realms and the Eye of Vecna
It’s been 4 months since word broke about the directors of the up-and-coming D&D movie, so it’s only fitting as 2019 draws to a close we get some more. We now know that the Eye of Vecna, one of the most powerful artefacts in D&D lore will play a central role to the plot of the movie but we also now know some more details about the characters involved in the movie too. The band of adventures will be led by the flaming sword-wielding Raven Hightower, a Dragonborn, Hack Korroway, Olivan Trickfoot a gnome thief and a mysterious masked warrior Alyssa Steelsong. Bad guys include a drow Razer Holbar, Damala the tiefling and a brutish warrior known only as “The Beast”
Further to this, the dragon Palarndusk will feature prominently in the plot too and creators are searching for a male to voice the CGI beast...one website claims that Zac Efron is even being considered.
As always we’d love to hear your thoughts on this project and when we hear anything more you’ll be sure to find it in your weekly News Collider.
Lord of the Rings RPG contract dispute
Shortly before the release of The One Ring second edition was due for release, Cubicle 7, the publishers shelved the project, cancelling all pre-orders. Despite the project being completely written and edited, Cubicle 7 have taken the difficult decision to cancel the release due to a dispute with co-publisher, and license holder, Sophisticated Games.
Cubicle 7 will cease selling the One Ring and all supplements in the first half of 2020 and the existing, eight-year-old edition will be the only one available for the foreseeable future. Anyone that pre-order the second edition has already been offered a full refund or a 125% refund of store credit.
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