Tuesday, November 12, 2024

Wormy

We purchased this prototype of a Wormy collection creator Dave Trampier put together back in the 1980s to generate interest in a collected books of the strips. Unfortunately, the collection never saw publication but we purchased the mock up and will have it in the store for you to look through for the remainder of 2024

 

Saturday, November 9, 2024

D&D 2E

 We picked up some more AD&D 2e  as well as some decades old Palladium Books supplements for the Palladium RPG. More expensive  Items are  in our ebay store while books priced $30 or less are on the shelf in the used game section.


Thursday, November 7, 2024

Magic Foundations


 Magic Foundations pre-releases start tomorrow Everything but Singles and pre-release kits are available at 10 a.m. with the first pre-release at 5:30. Entry fee is $45. We will not offer pre-release kits for at home pre-release until after 1 p.m. on Sunday

Tuesday, November 5, 2024

Acme Comic Novelty Library


 Readers of independent comics from the late 1990s may remember Chris Ware's Acme Novelty Library, featuring Jimmy Corrigan, the Smartest Kid In the World and Quimby the Mouse, among other Ware works. One notable feature was Ware printing the individual issues in different sizes. This set collects the first three volumes of the series but in a standard size.

Wednesday, October 30, 2024

Commander Deck Reprint Schedule

 Here is the approximate schedule of Commander Deck  reprints.



Sunday, October 27, 2024

Asmodee and MAPP

 

One thing I have always found annoying s companies saying they take violations of street date and MAP violations seriously but never show any evidence of it.  Legend Story Studies publishes a list of retail stores that have been suspended, for unnamed reasons, from selling the company’s Flesh and Blood card game and participating in organized play events which indicates the company takes seriously violations of  its posted rules by  retailers selling the game. Meanwhile, companies such as Wizards of the Coast, The Pokemon Company and Konami says they take seriously and enforce their policies regarding breaking street dates and violating MAP, stores that report violations never see any apparent results from any reports made. Wizards of the Coast has stated a number of times the company welcomes reports of street date violations but does not comment on them and Asmodee NA states specifically in its MAP policy (Section 2:10) that:

“ANA refuses to engage in any communication with Resellers regarding whether a competing Reseller’s advertised pricing behavior is consistent with the ANA MAP Policy. ANA assumes sole responsibility for monitoring and enforcing the MAP Policy and will not discuss such activities with any Reseller, except for the limited purposes of discussing an individual Reseller’s own advertised pricing behavior or penalties relating to the same.”

Saturday, October 26, 2024

Disney Lorcana and Melee

 The store hosted a Disney Lorcana Shimmering Skies Store Championship earlier this month and the turnout provided yet more evidence that the once hot game is cooling off dramatically. Whereas for our first Store Championship we had people driving 2 to 3 hours to get here and easily an hour for our second one, this event struggled to fill the required 8 seats. All the players were locals that played in our regular weekly league which was certainly good but not even all of them showed up to play, meaning we had to readjust the Melee tournament software to account for the fewer numbers than expected. We managed to do it but we have found that Melee’s tournament software does not make anything easy.

Wednesday, October 23, 2024

Hako Onna


 Hako Onna (The Woman in the Box) is based on a Japanese ghost story. One of the players is the Hako Onna who tries to hide from the other players, until she gets hungry, then she starts hunting the other players. Meanwhile the other players just want to escape the mansion before they fall victim to the Hako Onna. 3-5 players and plays in about 90 minutes

Tuesday, October 22, 2024

Cookbooks


 In the flood of themed cookbooks getting released, we got in the Brigerton Cookbook today, as well as a restock of the Stardew Valley cookbook. We still have copies of the Critical Role and Dungeons and Dragons cookbooks as well.

Sunday, October 20, 2024

Haunted Carbondale Tour

 This Friday is our final scheduled Haunted Carbondale tour of the season, though you can always schedule one as long as you have at least 4 people and your schedule meets with Scott's. 

On October 11ths tour, we had two interesting incidents happen. During the tour itself, we were in the Main Street office when we heard 3 light knocks that sounded as if they came from the front door, though the people on the tour though they sounded as if they came from a table in the office.

the other incident took place on Sunday afternoon. I was putting away Saluki flags from Homecoming weekend. I was in the freight shipping section of the old train depot and I heard what sounded like two women talking to each other in the southern section of the depot. I could not make out what they said and the conversation only lasted a few seconds. I took a look around inside and outside but did not see anyone but, if they were outside, they could have quickly walked away.

Friday, October 18, 2024

Duskmourn Nightmare Bundle

 For $89.99 this is a pretty good deal. You get 2 Duskmourn collector boosters, a $60 to $70 value, 6 Duskmourn Play boosters, a $30 value, 20 foil full art land cards and 2 of 6 promotional cards only available in the Bundle.  As of this writing, We only have 6 of these left. The major problem is that the box is not a typical Bundle box as opening it damages the box so that it cannot be used for card storage.

Wednesday, October 16, 2024

Biff Bam Boom Comics

 In case you want to take a look and support small press publishers, take a look at Biff Bam Boom Comics. We met them at Archon and brought in a selection of their comics which we have on the Local Authors shelf and hope to have in the store sometime,

Saturday, October 12, 2024

Pokeween

 Come into the store and spend $25 on Pkemon and, while quantities last, get a Pokeween card with a promo pack, sticker, and promo Pokemon card.

Thursday, October 10, 2024

Lorcana Store Championship

 
We will host the Lorcana Store Championship for Shimmering Skies this Saturday at 1 p.m. Winner will receive a Shimmering skies championship playmat and alternate art card, 2nd place with receive the second place playmat and card, 3rd through 8th will receive the card, Players will play 4 rounds, then cut to top 4 or 8 depending on the number of players

Tuesday, October 8, 2024

Scenario Kits

 We have started making scenario kits for RPGs starting with D&D 5e. each Kit comes with a short scenario, goo9 for 1-3 hours of play and miniatures to set up the encounter,  Our first one is on the shelf and only costs $29.99

Thursday, October 3, 2024

Archon

 The Store will set up at Archon SF convention in Collinsville Il this weekend. If you are in the area or attending the Convention, stop by and say hello. and mention this blog post for a free die.

Thursday, September 26, 2024

Duskmourn

 Duskmourn singles go on sale Sept. 27, along with our remaining pre-release kits at $39.99. Will not buy or trade for Duskmourn until Oct. 11 so as to give prices time to settle down.

Wednesday, September 25, 2024

Character Dice

 We managed to restock the character dice sets from Beadle and Grimm's . Out of stock for months, we have all of the D&D character classes but expect to sell out of them fairly quickly.

Saturday, September 21, 2024

Duskmourn

 We will have the team tournament/two headed giant tournament for Duskmourn tomorrow at 1 pm. After that, our remaining pre-release kits will be available for at-home tournaments.  We do ask that you give us your name or Wizards email so that we can register "tickets" with WOTC for them.

Thursday, September 19, 2024

Duskmourn


 Duskmourn pre-release starts this weekend, well Friday Sept 20th at 10 am. You will be able to purchase boosters, booster boxes Bundles and Commander Decks starting tomorrow. While quantities last, purchase a booster box of Play or Commander boosters and get both the promo card and a Collector booster. Pre-release is at 5:30 Friday, then another at 5:30 on Saturday and a two headed giant at 1 p.m. on Sunday. Each pre-release costs $45 .

Tuesday, September 17, 2024

Indiana Jones RPG


 Longtime gamers may remember the Indiana Jones RPG from TSR, published in the mid 1980s. It only lasted a couple of years. The problem with the game is that Indy is the best designed character and all other characters, even PCs are not as good as he was so everyone wanted to play an Indy Jones type character.

Sunday, September 15, 2024

Being John Malkovich

If you are a subscriber to the store email newsletter (and you can do so here), you have the opportunity to win two tickets to this Friday's showing of the film at the Varsity Center for the Arts.


Thursday, September 12, 2024

Stellar Crown

 Pokemon Stellar Crown releases tomorrow, Sept 12, We have Elite Trainer Kits, booster packs, booster boxes and 3 pack bundles available and will have Pokemon play sessions from 11 to 1 on Saturday.

Wednesday, September 11, 2024

Revenant Society

 We got in the Revenant Society RPG today. The concept is that player characters are dead, deceased, kaput, etcetera in Paris during the 1910s or New York during the 1920s. The catch is, they cannot move on until they figure out who killed them and why. Uses the Apocalypse RPG system and only $49.99 for a beautiful hard cover book.

Sunday, September 8, 2024

Mystery Dice

 We now stock three different types of Mystery Dice. We have an inexpensive set from Foam Brain at $12, another set from Sirius Dice that includes a dice bag and ability coin for $25 and one that comes in a storage box from Black Oak Workshop for $29.99

Monday, September 2, 2024

Horror Comics

With Creepshow, Ice Cream Man,  Epitaphs from the Abyss, Séance in the Asylum and Hello Darkness, we are seeing a renaissance of the horror anthology comic  first popularized by EC comics back in the 1950s, though. None of them seem as gleefully horrific as Vault of Horror and Shock Suspense Stories.

Saturday, August 31, 2024

Kid's Magic and Pokemon

We already have Pokemon running from 11 to 1 but no one shows up so we are going to push it a bit more. Come in and play and get a Pokemon Prize Pack, then get a promo card for each game you win.

Similarly, come in and play Magic from 1 to 3 and get a Play booster for doing so, then get 1 promo card for each game you win.

Both of these leagues are for players 16 and younger.

Tuesday, August 27, 2024

Fibonachos

 Fibonachos is a trick taking card game with trump based on the Fibonacci sequence. Play takes place over three rounds. Players score by taking tricks, winning the round and scoring the Spicy Card for that round. Cards in the Fibonacci sequence 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, and 13 become trump cards when the second of that card gets played during the round. 2-5 players, 30 minutes. now in the game library.

Saturday, August 24, 2024

Flip 7

 Flip 7 is a card game originally released back in 1994. Player flip over cards and score points based on the number of the card shown on the flipped card. However, if you flip over a second card with the same number, you lose the points you accumulated that turn. The more points the card is worth, the greater the quantity of that card in the deck. Good for ages 8 and up as it teaches number recognition and plays in about 20 minutes.

Friday, August 23, 2024

Commander Party

 Anyone who comes in and Plays commander this Sunday will receive, while quantities last, a set of Bloomburrow stickers and a Heriloom Blade card.  Remember, there is no charge to play in the Sunday afternoon Commander games.

Thursday, August 22, 2024

Standard Rotation

 The following sets rotated out of standard with the release of Bloomburrow


Innistrad: Midnight Hunt

Innistrad: Crimson Vow

Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty

Streets of New Capenna


These sets are currently included in Standard Format

Dominaria United

The Brothers' War

Phyrexia: All Will Be One

March of the Machine

March of the Machine: The Aftermath

Wilds of Eldraine

The Lost Caverns of Ixalan

Murdrers at Karlov Manor

Outlaws of Thunder Junction

Bloomburrow


From August 2 through 31, players who participate in up to four in-store Standard events at participating WPN locations will receive one reward in Arena per event played. Players must participate in each event using their Wizards Account that is connected to Magic: The Gathering Arena in regions where Magic: The Gathering Arena is supported.


Once they're registered in an eligible in-store event with their Wizards Accounts, players will be set to earn the following rewards based on the number of events they participate in:


After the first event: one Random Rare card reward

After the second event: one Random Rare card reward

After the third event: one Bloomburrow pack and Ral, Crackling Wit card style

After the fourth event: one Bloomburrow Mythic pack

Wednesday, August 21, 2024

Gnome Hollow

 Gnome Hollow was one of the hottest games at gencon, promoted heavily by the balloon gnomes and gnome house on display. The balloon gnomes actually wandered the convention where they could reasonably go.

Gnome Hollow is a tile laying game, with elements of both Carcassonne and Takenoko . Players lay tiles in order to build and expand and move gnomes around the garden to collect wildflowers, sell mushrooms and use signpost actions. Harvesting mushrooms allows the player to activate bonuses and collect treasures.

Cost is $49.99. For 2-4 players, taking 45 to an hour to play.

Friday, August 16, 2024

Free Stuff (with Purchase)

 Stop in this weekend and spend $25 on Magic and get a promotional Poison Tracker. Spend $10 on Pokemon and get an Oddish card. Spend $25 and get the Oddish Card and a Pokemon promo pack.

Thursday, August 15, 2024

Gift Bags

 Just a reminder, if you are purchasing a gift here, we do offer free gift bags with your purchase. Just ask and we will be glad to put your purchase in one.

Saturday, August 10, 2024

$99.99 Sale

 Until 8:45 tonight, we have a selection of booster boxes of Magic, Disney Lorcana and Pokemon for sale for $99.99

Friday, August 9, 2024

Sale

 August 10, we will have a select assortment of Magic, Pokemon and Disney Lorcana booster boxes at $124.99 each. We will also have some Pokemon and Magic promotional items we will give away with $10 and $25 purchase.

Tuesday, August 6, 2024

Boomburrow restocks

 Should be getting in restocks of Bloomburrow Commander decks, bundles and play boosters later this week. Still have singles in the display case too.

Saturday, August 3, 2024

Bloomburrow

 We now have Bloomburrow singles in the display case and commons in a box up by the cash register. Still a decent selection of singles and we have Collector boosters in stock as well.

Saturday, July 27, 2024

Comics Value

 If you are looking to sell comics, be aware that condition dictates much of how much a comic is worth. chipping of the spine, those little creases along the stapled edge, drops the value of a comic significantly. Grading, or "slabbing" a comic can increase its value tenfold, as someone independently has said this is the condition of the comic on a 0 to 10 scale. Note that grading does not automatically set a price for a comic. That is determined by how much collectors are willing to pay for it.

these days, collectors primarily look for what are called "key issues", books containing the first appearance of a character or a major event in the character storyline, usually a death such as that of Robin or Gwen Stacy. The first appearance of Deadpool, in issue #98 of The New Mutants, sells for anywhere from $200 (ungraded) to $900 (graded and signed).

Friday, July 19, 2024

Bloomburrow

 We will host a pre-release for the Bloomburrow Magic set the weekend of July 26.  Prepayment ends the 24 of July and the first tournament starts at 5:30 on the 26th. A second one starts at 5:30 on the 27 and we will host a Two-headed Giant at 1 p.m. on the 28th.

Thursday, July 18, 2024

One Piece

 Well, we have had people asking for the One Piece Trading card game for months and finally our suppliers managed to get us some. Hope the local demand is still out there. We also received a large restock of D&D Player character miniatures.

Wednesday, July 17, 2024

DCC Day

 DCC Dungeon Crawl Classics Day is this Saturday. Come in and you may pick up not only this year's DCC Adventure Pack but, while they last, a copy of last year's as well. We only have a limited number of last year's Packs though so get them while they are here.

We also have the limited edition DCC foil hardcover adventure and the 2024 DCC adventure as well as  a few copies of Tales from the Smoking Wyrm, but you have to pay for them.

Sunday, July 14, 2024

Yu Gi Oh Premier Events

 The store did not get offered a premiere event for The Infinite Rebellion because we lost OTS Standing. Stores have to run at least 1 tournament of 4 players a month to retain standing and we have only had one tournament fire this year.

Wednesday, July 10, 2024

Skaventide

 The 5th edition boxed set for Age of Sigmar, Skaventide, releases this Saturday. While quantities last, purchase a set and receive a limited edition journal with the two-tailed comet on the cover.

Saturday, July 6, 2024

Murder Mystery Games

 We just bought over a dozen murder mystery games and added them to the used section. Prices on most of these are $9.99 and $14.99, though we do have one set of three games for $69.99. Playable by 1 to 6 people, these have been played but all of the components were put back in their envelopes.

Wednesday, July 3, 2024

Declaration of Independence

 Store Staff and members of the Carbondale Chamber of Commerce will read the Declaration of Independence tomorrow starting at 11 a.m.  You can watch on the store Facebook page or even come to the store and watch live.

Tuesday, July 2, 2024

Love Your Local Game Store

 Starting July 5, Buy 3 packs of Modern Horizons 3 Play Boosters (or 1 Collector booster) and get a full art textless Sakura-tribe Elder. Limit one per customer per day.

Thursday, June 27, 2024

Commander Pride Event

 On Sunday July 30th, the store will host a Magic Commander play event. All commanders will have the Keyword "Partner" and all players will receive, while quantities last, a limited edition Chandra holofoil print.

Wednesday, June 26, 2024

Cookbooks

 We have been surprised at how well themed cookbooks have sold in the store, well except for the Manga Cookbook, which has sat on the shelf for years. We restock the D&D and Critical Role cookbooks regularly and have had to restock the Stardew Valley cookbook 3 times in the past month.

Thursday, June 20, 2024

Free RPG Day

 Free RPG Day is this Saturday. You receive 2 free items for coming in, 1 for wearing a Castle Perilous shirt, one for showing your Preferred Customer Card, 1 for each 2 stamps you earn on a Castle Card and one if you show us a copy of the store enewsletter on your mobile device.

In addition, we will have a selection of limited edition items. You may select one of each for each $100 you spend on RPGs and RPG related items.

Wednesday, June 19, 2024

D&D 2024

 Here is a look at what to expect from Dungeons and Dragons for the rest of the year. The article does exclude the Infinite Staircase book, which should ship in early July

Sunday, June 16, 2024

GW Shipping

 

Although we have not had a similar problem with  Games Workshop shipments, it appears that other stores getting way too many cartons for a simple shipment. Not only do shipments take one to three weeks to arrive, but when they do, they arrive in multiple boxes, even though they are invoiced on the same order. One store even reported that its shipment had been broken up into shipments of one item per box, meaning that a 20 item shipment arrived packed in twenty different boxes. I certainly hope this is just a glitch in the system and is not going to become the norm or that someone at Games Workshop looks at their shipping process and reduces the number of packages per order. Shipping charges generally accrue per item. Currently orders from Games Workshop and Penguin Random House ship free so I hate to see the companies paying extra to ship products to stores in multiple products when it certainly is not necessary. Companies that charge freight on shipments that fall below a certain amount, such as Alliance, Southern Hobby and Diamond (though I have seen some pretty egregious examples of Diamond overpacking orders of single items) generally pack shipments as efficiently as possible.

Saturday, June 15, 2024

Shipping Cartons

 

I wonder if there is a sale on shipping carts or some of our suppliers have managed to find a really cheap source for them.  Our weekly orders from Penguin Random House typically arrive packed in half a dozen or more cardboard mailers and one cardboard box. This even happens with shipments of our weekly FOC orders. We put in one to 4 orders a week including the FOC order and receive an armload of boxes, sometimes only containing one comic and the packing slips do indicate that these multi-shipment orders do contain our FOC order, split up into several different boxes.

Friday, June 14, 2024

NPR on Magic

 NPR, surprisingly, has a long column looking at Modern Horizon's 3. Over 1000 card treatments in the total set and the writer is concerned about the power of the set. OTJ games could take 30 minutes or more but a game with Modern Horizons 3 could get decided in the first few turns.

Wednesday, June 12, 2024

Gen Con Trivia

 With GenCon coming soon. Pop Insider has published  48 bits of trivia about the history of D&D and GenCon

Sunday, June 9, 2024

Cranial Ram Banned

 Even before it was released,  WOTC has banned Cranial Ram in Pauper. Too many cheap artifacts in pauper makes the card too powerful.  Why no one figured this out in playtesting is a mystery.

Monday, June 3, 2024

Privateer Press

 Steamforged Games announced today the company has acquired the rights to the Iron Kingdoms IP from Privateer Press. this includes the Warmachine miniatures game, Iron Kingdoms RPG line, P3 paint line and accessories as well as the novels. Warmachine did quite well from from its launch in 2003 until about 2013, then interest died off drastically, both locally and nationwide. I hope Steamforged manages to revitalize the game lines but it is very hard to do so once a game tapers off.

Saturday, June 1, 2024

Modern Horizons 3 Pre-release

 We will only run 1 pre-release event for Modern Horizons 3 on Friday night, June 7 at 5:30.  Entry fee is $60. We will provide door prizes and pizza.

Wednesday, May 29, 2024

Tables

 Just a reminder that our tables are open and empty all afternoon. with summer here and no or fewer classes, now is a great time to get some extra table top play in.

Tuesday, May 28, 2024

Marvel and DC Comics for this Week

 Here are the Marvel and DC Comics releasing this week. 

Avengers: Twilight #6

Black Panther: Blood Hunt #1

Edge of Spider-Verse #4

Hellverine #1

Jackpot and Black Cat #3

Midnight Sons: Blood Hunt #1

Night Thrasher #4

Rise of the Powers of X #5

Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver #4

Spider-Boy #7

Spider-Punk: Arms Race #4

Star Wars: Jango Fett #3

Star Wars: Darth Maul, Black White and Red #2

Ultimate Spider-Man #5

Wolverine #50

X-Men: The Wedding Special 2024 #1


Batman: Dark Age #3

Batman: The Brave and the Bold #13

DC Pride 2024

Detective Comics #1085

The Flash #9

Green Arrow #12

Harley Quinn #40

The Penguin #10

Power Girl #9

Primer #3

Sunday, May 26, 2024

Memorial Day Sale

 On Memorial Day, we will have an assortment of Magic, Pokemon, Yu gi Oh and Lorcana booster boxes on the table in the game library. Lorcana and Pokemon booster boxes will be $99.99, Yu Gi Oh boxes are $49.99 and March of the Machine Epilogue Boxes will also be $49.99

Saturday, May 25, 2024

Memorial Day

 since we have had a few people ask, we will be open regular hours on Memorial Day. Stop by after you attend the Carbondale Memorial Day celebration

Wednesday, May 22, 2024

Facsimile comics

 Both Marvel and DC are reprinting a number of their classic comics, such as the first issue of a notable comic or the first apearance of a character, though why Marvel decided the first appearance of the Puma, a second tier Spider Man foe, deserves a reprint is beyond me. Currnetly, both companies are reprinting their first maxi-series:  DC's Crisis on Infinite Earths and Marvel its Secret Wars. One thing I have noticed is that Marvel reprints their books on the slick coated paper used by today's books while DC is using the news print on which comics were commonly printed during that era.

Tuesday, May 21, 2024

Yu Gi Oh Rarity 2 Collection

 The Yu Gi Oh Rarity 2 Collection arrives and goes on sale tomorrow. $9.99 a pack with the Rarity 2 tournament this Sunday at 1 p.m. $5 entry fee with 2 OTS packs per round won and a playmat to the winner.

Sunday, May 19, 2024

Family Vacation Night

 The store will be at Family Vacation Night in Murphysboro tomorrow night from 5;30 to 7:30.  Stop by our table and pick up a free comic and Pokemon Prize pack and sign up for our email list.

Saturday, May 18, 2024

Twilight Masquerade

 Pokemon Twilight Masquerade releases this Monday, 5/20. We still have the Build and Battle Pre-release kits and if you purchase one today or tomorrow, you get 3 booster packs along with it. Starting Monday, the kits come without any extra booster packs.

Thursday, May 16, 2024

Games Workshop

 We have 8 copies of White Dwarf #500 available for the shelf on Friday. Also releasing are the Grombrindal White Dwarf figure, stats for which are in White Dwarf #500 and the Darkfire miniatures game, which is based on the 40K video game.

Wednesday, May 15, 2024

Disney Lorcana

 The fourth Chapter for Disney Lorcana arrives on Friday.  We will have booster boxes for $179.99, booster packs for $7.99, starter decks for $24.99 and Illumineer's Troves and Quests for $89.99 each.

Monday, May 13, 2024

Yu Gi Oh Tournaments

 We currently run 1 Yu Gi Oh tournament a month, the last Sunday of the month at 1 p.m.  We would gladly run it at another time, as long as it does not conflict with our other events, if it would draw attendance. If you are a local Yu gi Oh Player, please let us know when you would like to see tournaments.

Saturday, May 11, 2024

Pokemon Twilight Masquerade

 The pre-release for Pokemon Twilight Masquerade is this weekend. Purchase a pre-release kit for $35 and get 3 additional booster packs free.

Wednesday, May 8, 2024

Kevin Boerwinkle


 We do not get a lot of game authors or designers in the store, so it is a real treat when one stops by. Kevin Boerwinkle wrote a number of sourcebooks and adventures for 7th Sea and Swashbuckling Adventures back in the early 00s. He was on a roadtrip from the southeastern US to Overland Park KS and his route and Google brought him close enough to the store that he stopped off for a bit and even found one of his books in the used games section.

Monday, May 6, 2024

Vecna Eve of Ruin.

 Vecna Eve of Ruin goes on sale tomorrow. If you pre-ordered a copy, we have it on hold for you, otherwise stop by and pick one up.

Sunday, May 5, 2024

40K Trades

 We are not taking trades on Warhammer 40K, Age of Sigmar or Fantasy Battle earlier than the current edition as there is little edition by players in older edition products. Nor will will take figures out of the box. We will gladly purchase or offer store credit for figures still in shrinkwrapped boxes or open boxes as long as they are still on the sprue. Unfortunately, we have had very little interest in loose figures and no good way to store them as bitz.

Thursday, May 2, 2024

Free Comic Book Day

 Come in on Saturday for Free Comic Book Day. Get two comics just for coming in and two more if you come in costume. We will have a list of other ways you can get additional free comics as well.

Thursday, April 25, 2024

Storyteller's Thesaurus

 If you like writing fantasy and/ or science fiction, you should take a look at the Storytellers Thesaurus and Storytellers Dictionary. Both of them are books designed to help fantasy and SF writers looking for the perfect words.

Thursday, April 18, 2024

Legacy of Destruction

 We will host the Legacy of Destruction premiere Yu Gi Oh event this Saturday starting at 10 a.m. We would like to host tournaments but no one has shown up for the last three. If you want us to host tournaments, you need to let us know when and make sure they do not conflict with other events.

Wednesday, April 17, 2024

WotC CEO Resigns

 The CEO of Wizards announced her resignation today, effective April 26. No indication as to why. Aside from March of the Machines:  Aftermath, the company has done extremely well with only that one misfire on her watch

Tuesday, April 16, 2024

new Comics

 Our UPSe shipment was delayed about 4 hours but we did get new comics out and in people's hold files. Took a while but they got done. Also receiving FCBD books for May the Fourth.

Monday, April 15, 2024

Outlaws of Thunder Junction

 Light turnout for single player pre-release events this weekend on Friday and Saturday, with only 5 players in each event. Rather surprisingly, Sunday's 2 headed giant had the strongest turnout, with 4 teams playing. Cowboy attire was best represented on Saturday, with 3 players coming in Western garb.

We still have plenty of product for OOTJ, although we will not be putting out singles until this Friday

Friday, April 12, 2024

Cryptid books

 Surprisingly or maybe not, we have sold through books on cryptids with surprising regularity. Maybe it is the haunts of the Big Muddy Monster located only 7 miles away. Of course, as with many bipedal cryptids in the US, the BMM only made one appearance 50 years ago and has milked that one appearance for attention for decades.

Thursday, April 11, 2024

Something Is Killing the Children

 got in a big collection of Something is Killing the Children back issues which are now bundled in the back issue room, except for the more expensive ones, which are currently behind the counter until we process them and a 4th print of #1 , which is up on Ebay. Stop by and take a look at them and other back issues when you get a chance.

Wednesday, April 10, 2024

Free Comic Book Day

 so far we have Dane Johns, Isaac Hicks, Roman Rathert and the irrepressible Brian Morris as well as the Southern Illinois Ghostbusters and Hutchinson Motorsports appearing here for Free Comic Book Day. We hope to have the Southern Illinois Roller Gremlins and Humane Society of Southern Illinois as well.

Tuesday, April 9, 2024

Outlaws Pre-release

 We are lining up some pretty nice prizes for the drawings at this weekend's pre-releases:  limited edition Magic poster, foil promo packs and an oversized Resplendent Angel card

Monday, April 8, 2024

Dark Tower

 Thinking about electronic games from the last century reminded me of probably the most storied of them, Dark Tower. It sold for about $40 back in 1981, which was quite a high price for that time. Over the next 30 years, complete working copies of the game got very hard to find with working ones selling for over $500. Resurrection Games reproduced the game a few years ago and even that version is selling for $220-$300.

Saturday, April 6, 2024

Omega Virus

 Picked up a working copy of Milton Bradley's Omega Virus talking electronic game. Electronic talking games were very popular during the 1990s, with Dark Tower the most sought after, still commanding a price close to $400 for a working copy. Omega Virus was available at the 1992 Gencon and I remember seeing dozens of people walking the halls of the building with a copy of the game. It was the first mass market game I recall seeing a publisher bring to Gencon.

Thursday, April 4, 2024

Pokemon


 New Pokemon releasing tomorrow. We have limited quantities of the IONO Premium Tournament Collection and the GrafaiaiEX box.

Friday, March 29, 2024

Outlaws at Thunder Junction

 Pre-release weekend for Outlaws at Thunder Junction is April 12. We will have pre-release events at 5:30 on the 12th, 1 p.m. on the 13 and a 2-headed Giant at 1 p.m.   Each event costs $45, although if you prepay for 4 kits by the 7, they cost $35 each. A single kit paid for by the 7th costs $40.

Wednesday, March 27, 2024

Modern Horizons 3

 

We have been checking the prices for Magic the Gathering Modern Horizons 3, releasing this summer, skipping over Outlaws of Thunder Junction, which, surprisingly, at least to me, has far more interest among our customers than Murders at Karlov Manor (We still have difficulty explaining just what Murders at Karlov Manor:  Clue Edition is.  “Where is the board” is the most common question.).  However, since Thunder Junction has prices close to those of Murders of Karlov Manor, I wanted look at the pricing for Modern Horizons 3, to see how it compared with the jaw dropping pricing for last summer’s Commander Masters. Although the prices for Modern Horizons 3 are high, at least compared to a current set of Magic such as Murders at Karlov Manor, they pale In comparison to the prices Wizards of the Coast charged for Commander Masters. T

he store will be able to sell a Modern Horizons 3 Play booster for under $15 and still make a pretty good profit, whereas Commander Masters boosters, both draft and set, still must sell for over $20 apiece to make a marginal profit. Even the Modern Horizons 3 Collector boosters will sell for a reasonable price, at least if one considers the price of a Lord of the Rings Collector booster reasonable.  After looking at the pricing for Bundles and Commander Decks, it appears prices for Bundles and Commander Decks have shot upwards, with keystone pricing for Bundles a bit over $100 and keystone for Modern Horizon 3 Commander Decks a whopping 40% up over the Commander Masters’ Commander Decks. If you want to keystone pre-release kit pricing, )yes, there will be a Modern Horizons 3 pre-release), stores are looking at right around $70. For a pre-release event, that is pricy. Unless pre-order demand spikes sharply, the store will likely take its normal number of Bundles but cut back significantly on Commander Decks and pre-releases there was already significant price resistance to the pricing on Commander Masters Commander Decks.

Tuesday, March 26, 2024

HeroScape this summer

 

We have been looking forward to the re-release of HeroScape, this time from Renagade Studios, who have happily gotten the rights to most of WotC’s boardgame catalog, allowing them to get games like Axis and Allies and Robo Rally back into print (See “Heroscape 2024 Product Release Calendar”). Unfortunately, Renegade, for whatever reason, has decided to release 2 different versions of the game, a Standard unpainted version which will go into distribution and a Premium Painted version available directly from the company for an extra $100. Unfortunately the first time Heroscape released, very few people bought it as a game. Customers bought it for the miniatures and terrain, both of which were painted, which was comparatively unusual for the time. I remember a number of buyers added the figures to their collections for use in various fantasy and SF roleplaying games while Battletech players, especially, glommed onto the terrain because it fit the scale of Battletech perfectly, allowing them, and other miniatures players, to create elevation in a way that flat hex maps did not. HeroScape Sets were a great deal for miniatures players 20 years ago. I will be interested to see how players respond to the new sets, especially the unpainted and more common version.

Saturday, March 23, 2024

Disney Lorcana

 Ravensburger announced a 2 week embargo on online sales of Disney Lorcana starting with Ursula's Return. The game arrives in stores on May 17th with no sales online until May 31. Stores may list the game online and take pre-orders and prepayment and can let customers pick up the game after paying for it on the website but cannot ship mail orders until the 31st. 

Thursday, March 21, 2024

Early Release for D&D

 Wotc Announced this week that it would restart early release for D&D books, beginning with Vecna:  Eve of Ruin. Vecna releases officially on May 21 but WPN stores, such as us, will have the book on sale on May 7th.

Wednesday, March 13, 2024

National Pi Day

 For March 14 (3.14  Get it?) you will get a promo card with purchase of $25 of either Pokemon or Magic and 10% off on Math Fluxx. We will also have a limited amount of free pie available as well.

Saturday, March 9, 2024

Fallout Sellout

 We got in one booster box of Fallout Collector boosters and, even with limiting it to 2 boosters per person, we sold out in less than a day. According to our supplier, this is the first Magic set in years they needed to allocate. I hope there may be a second printing of the collector boosters but, based on past experience, I doubt it.

Thursday, March 7, 2024

Fallout

 Universes Beyond Fallout goes on sale tomorrow. Wal-mart broke street date on Commander Decks, releasing them on Wednesday. We only have a few boosters for the set and are limiting them to 2 per customer.

Wednesday, March 6, 2024

Will Eisner Week

 Will Eisner Week is celebrated is year to remember Will Eisner, considered the creator of the graphic novel, essentially a book length original comic book. Books such as Gender Queer, Ducks and My Favorite Thing is Monsters can be classified as graphic novels, since they are written and drawing as a self contained whole. Eisner Award winners such as Saga, Bone, Monstress and even Maus could be classified as trade paperbacks, since they were originally released as comic books, or in the case of Maus as part of a comic anthology, before getting collected into book form

Tuesday, March 5, 2024

Magic Store Championships

 Due to request from several Magic players, we have moved the date of the Murders at Karlov Manor Store Championships from Saturday at 1 p.m. We have moved the Fallout event to Sunday Commander at 3 p.m.

Monday, March 4, 2024

Carpets

 Don't be surprised if the carpets feel a bit damp tomorrow. We had our semi-annual shampooing of them Monday night and it can take a day or so for them to fully dry.

Thursday, February 29, 2024

Will Eisner Week

 March 1 through 7th is Will Eisner Week. Will Eisner, creator of the Spirit, is widely considered the father of the graphic novel, which is generally defined as a book length comic book, while a trade paperback is a collection of several individual comic issues which form a complete story arc. 

To celebrate, we are offering a 10% discount on all graphic novels and trade paperbacks, both used and new, through March 7th. Castle Cards may be applied to your purchase, as well as your Preferred Customer Discount.

Tuesday, February 27, 2024

The Dyatlov Pass incident

 Always thought this would make a good storyline for a Call of Cthulhu scenario. Something prosaic like an avalanche was probably the cause but encountering some of Lovecraft's creatures would be possible, especially in a frozen remote area like the Urals

Thursday, February 22, 2024

ConCave

 The store will set up at ConCave in Bowling Green Ky this weekend. If you are at the convention or in the area, stop by and say Hi.  Show us this post and score a free die.

Wednesday, February 21, 2024

Lorcana League Play

 We will continue the stopgape league through the end of Februrary, then start the season 3 league on the first Wednesday in March.

Monday, February 19, 2024

Lorcana Chapter 3

 We expect to receive Lorcana Chapter 3 Into the Inklands this Friday, Feb. 23.  Unless someone cancels their pre-orders, we will have boosters and decks for the shelf but no Troves or Gift sets. It will be interesting to see how much demand there is for this set as online prices have dropped significantly for booster boxes.

Friday, February 16, 2024

Birthday Party

 The back game room will be closed from 1 to 5 tomorrow for a birthday party. Birthday Party? Yes, we will host birtday parties for you fociues aroeund D&D, Miniatures painting, Magic the Gathering , Pokemon or superheroes. Room rental runs $200 for up to 8 people with us assisting in set up and clean up, as well as running events if you so choose.

Thursday, February 15, 2024

D&D Releases for 2024

 We finally received details on the D&D releases for this year.

Vecna:  Eve of  Ruin releases May 21. It is a adventure taking players across the entire D&D multiverse

The Making of Original Dungeons and Dragons releases June 18 and covers the history of the devlopment of original D&D during the 1970s

Quests from the Infinite Staircase, a collection of original A&D 1st edition adventures updated for 5 the edition. The adventures range from levels 1 through 3.

Player's Handbook 2024, a revised version of the 5E Players Handbook releases Sept. 17, although I would bet we will see copies for sale at GenCon

Dungeon Master's Guide 2024 will release November 12th. 

The updated Monster Manual will release Feb 18 of 2025.

Alternate covers will be available for Quests from the Infinite Staircase and Vecna:  Eve of Ruin.  No word on the others yet.

Tuesday, February 13, 2024

34th Anniversary Celebration

 We will host our 34th anniversary celebration  this Sunday fromnoon to 6 with our $1000 drawing at 4:30.  OUr guests will include Cape girardeau Author Breanna Bright, local Artist Isaac Hicks, rune Reader Rachael Smith and Tarot Reader Amelia Methana.  Spend $10 with any of them and get an extra ticket for the drawing.

Thursday, February 8, 2024

Murders at Karlov Manor

 all of our instock Murders at Karlov Manor go on sale tomorrow. However, we will not be taking any trades on cards for the set until the 23  as we figure it takes about 2 weeks for card prices to settle. A YuGi Oh ! card from Phantom Nightmare that was $80 on Wednesday has dropped to $70 a day later. We do not want to take cards only to find they have dropped in value by 10 to 20% within a few days.

Tuesday, February 6, 2024

Quarter Century Secret Rare

We opened a box of Yu Gi Oh Phantom Nightmare booster packs today and pulled this Quarter Century Secret Rare card, whcih is currently selling online for between $325 and $350. A change I have noticed in these packs is the abscence of rare cards. There are Secret Rares, Ultimate Rares but the old style Rare cards, which just had the name of the card in foil, have vanished.

 

Thursday, February 1, 2024

Magic

 Following up from the previous post, the 1 deck and 2 boosters sat on the edge of the cash wrap for about 3 months until Gencon. Magic blew up at the 1993 Gencon with people playing the game anyplace they could find a flat surface. The first person to visit the store after Gencon snapped up our Magic and asked for more, setting off an unfulfillable demand that lasted until after Fallen Empires.

Monday, January 29, 2024

Metazoo shutters

 Maker of the Metazoo TCG has abruptly shut down. The company got a lot of attention during the early years of its 4 years run with 1st edition boxes selling for hundreds of dollars. Last summer they were touting the acquisition of the Hello Kitty license and were offering a premium bundle with a MSRP of $150. Then on Black Friday weekend, the company sold those bundles for $30, really undercutting the distributors that bought into the product

Apparently, it has been at least six months since the company has fulfilled any pre-orders placed through its website. So much for its hopes of becoming the next Pokemon

Sunday, January 28, 2024

Magic

 As long as I am reminising, when Magic the Gathering first came out, our sales representative for our supplier could not explain what it was.  "Well, it's this card game and you buy decks and booster packs for it and construct a deck from them."  This was before anyone had any idea about what a booster pack was or what "Construct a deck" meant. As the encouragement of our supplier, we brought in 1 deck of Alpha and 2 booster packs. Not boxes, packs. And they sat there. And we almost forgot about them.

Saturday, January 27, 2024

D&D at WalMart

Dungeons and Dragons may seem mainstream today but it was also suprisingly widely accepted in the early 1980s. When I worked for Wal-Mart in the early 1980s, I had played D&D and AD&D in college but got rid of all my materials when I relocated. That didn't last very long of course and within a year after going to work at Wal-mart, I started playing again. However, was mildly sprised to find Wal-mart stocking the basic D&D boxed sets in the toy department. Never saw any books or modules, likely because the buyers could not figure out what they were but boxed sets were close enough to board games that the buyer could at least approximate them.

Thursday, January 25, 2024

Murders at Karlov Manors

 Here is a breakdown of where to find what cards in Murders at Karlov Manor.  Melik, Refoged Researcher; Tomik, Wielder of Law; and Voja, Jaws of the Conclave will only be found in pre-release kits and cannot be used during pre-release events, although they are legal in other tournaments than the pre-release

Tuesday, January 23, 2024

Ravnica Remastered

 We and disribution are sold out of Collector boosters for this set. We only have about a dozen Draft booster packs left and are not sure if we will be able to restock when we sell out of them.

Monday, January 22, 2024

Bloom off Lorcana

 

It looks as if the bloom is off the Disney Lorcana rose. Restocks of Chapter 2 Rise of the Floodborn boosters hit store shelves this week and, based on the price drop for booster boxes online, some people ordered way too many of them. Prices for sealed booster boxes are hovering in the range of $140 to $150 per box with Chapter One booster boxes selling slightly higher at about $160. We will have to see if the trend continues with the Chapter Three Into the Inklands set. From the pricing I am seeing for pre-orders of Into the Inklands, it appears this pricing trend for Disney Lorcana will continue. We are going to see pricing significantly above Ravensburger’s MSRP for the initial release of a set followed by a drop of 40% in prices upon the receipt of a subsequent release of the set. Since we only see Troves and Gift Sets at the initial release, we are still seeing them selling for significantly above MSRP, but not decks and booster boxes.

Friday, January 19, 2024

Pre-order Declines

 

. I have noticed , and have seen confirming comments from other stores, a noticeable drop-off in preorders of booster boxes, especially draft. Our pre-orders on draft boxes have dropped to nil and our pre-orders on set and collector boosters of new sets of Magic the Gathering have dropped by 80%. I am not sure how much essentially making pre-release weekend into release weekend has to do with this, but it does not appear to have helped. Online sellers cutting the price on booster boxes to $10 to $20 over costs does not help, although, since most online sells appear to adhere to the restriction that they cannot sell until the official release date, that does give brick and mortar stores a bit of a leg up. I am not sure if a week’s delay in receiving product outweighs the extra $40 to $80 the customer pays instore for a booster box. I have read of some stores eschewing the sale of booster boxes altogether, preferring to sell Magic by the pack, which offers a better margin, albeit with a bit more labor and smaller sales. A few stores have even said they opted to drop Magic and other TCGs altogether, preferring to shift their focus to other non-collectible games that generally require much less effort to sell.. if you are going to sell TCGs, and make that your focus, you must invest in a decent singles selection, play space and organized play, all of which cost extra money. Magic has gone through a slump like this before. Of course, there were not so many variations of Magic  for retailers to consider.

Tuesday, January 16, 2024

Star Wars Pre-release Kit

 

The store received a pre-release kit from Fantasy Flight Games for the company’s upcoming release of its Star Wars Unlimited Collectable Card Game. The kit comes with a poster, a window cling and a couple of sign up sheets for those interested in the game to leave their contact information. Foregoing my doubts regarding the viability of the game, there are a few problems with the materials I would like to point out. Before diving into those though, I do want to mention that I wish other companies would provide materials to stores sufficiently far in advance that we can use them to promote the game. That being said:

1.       Window Cling—the provided window cling is about 18’ by 12” which is a bit big to affix to any in-store glass surfaces. It is designed so that the back of the cling, rather than the front, adheres to the window. The only glass found in most stores are the front windows, maybe the door and display cases inside the premises. No store is going to want to put the cling on the front of a display case, as that obscures the view of the items inside, rather defeating the purpose of a display case. A front window or door would be a perfect place to display the cling, save for the fact that the back side is the side designed to adhere to the glass, meaning it would have to go on the outside of the door or window, where the weather will likely pull it off in a few hours, leaving it lying on the sidewalk or street. Designing it so that the front of the image clings to the window means stores can place it on the inside of the glass, keeping it on display longer.

2.       Promotional Poster—While I am a big fan of promotional posters, I am an even bigger fan of well designed promotional posters (See “A Tale of Two Posters”) which the one for Star Wars Unlimited is not. First, the poster gives the viewer no indication as to what it is promoting. It features artwork, not photos mind you but artwork of the three iconic Star Wars heroes:  Luke, Leia and Han. So far, so good. Anyone who has paid attention to pop culture over the past 50 years should recognize them, although it seems to me a photo of them would be even more recognizable. Maybe the actors or studio would not include actual character photos with the license (This happened at least once before. When Thunder Mountain Games released the Highlander Trading Card Game lo these many years ago, they could not get the rights from Sean Connor to put a photo of his character, Juan Sánchez Villa-Lobos Ramírez, on a card, so Thunder Mountain Games just used a black silhouette instead of a photo, along with the name and card effects). That is a minor caveat though. My major problem with the poster is that it tells me nothing about the product. A customer glancing at it has no idea what Star Wars Unlimited is. No mention of a collectible card game, no pictures of cards, not even a QR code an interested customer could use to find out more. Is Star Wars Unlimited a boardgame, video game, RPG, comic, graphic novel, Funko POP line? A poster is a great opportunity to sell your product or at least generate interest in it, but it has to give the customer some indication as to why they should be interested.

Maybe we will get a second promotional kit with some materials further helping to develop interest in the product prior to the release. I hope so as I would like to see the game do well.

Monday, January 15, 2024

Open Today

We are open today and will make the back room available should you need a warm place to sit or a place to recharge your phone.

Friday, January 12, 2024

Carbondale Eclipse Card

 In case you want to get an early start on your upcoming Eclipse festivities, we have a free "Carbondale Eclipse" Cards Against Humanity card. Just stop in and ask for one.

Wednesday, January 10, 2024

Ravnica Remastered

 We have had a few people call inquiring about pre-release events for Ravnica Remastered. There was no official pre-release for the set, as it is not a set in STandard roatation. What happened was that Wizards Premiums stores, as one of the benefits of that status, got their boxes in a week before the general release and were able to sell and run events the weekend of Jan 5th. 

We will have our draft and collector boosters in this Friday and will run a draft on Saturday the 13th at 1 p.m.

Thursday, January 4, 2024

Player Materials

 I really hope WotC decides to publish more player focused materials for D&D this year. Of the four releases in 2023, only Glory of the Giants and Planescape had any player character materials. Players still bought the books but it seems a shame to shell out the $60 for a book with only a fraction of the book aimed at players, which make up the far larger segment of the market

Wednesday, January 3, 2024

Deck of Many Things

 We will recieve the alterative cover of the Deck of Many Things this Friday and should have them available for purchase at 10 a.m. The regular cover, for whatever reason, has been delayed.

Monday, January 1, 2024

Internet Sales Growth Continues

 

1.       When I questioned my marketing students this past semester as to what percentage of retail sales currently occurred online, their guesses ranged from 25% to 70%. The actual figure, as of 2022, was 14% but it ticked up sharply this year, reaching 14%, with online holiday sales seeing an increase of some 58% on the Saturday before Christmas over the same day 2022. Concurrent with, or in response to, this I expect to see even more stores moving to the retailtainment model, not only selling games but offering more events beyond the card tournaments that are a fixture now. More stores will incorporate parties and food service into their model, even offering alcohol sales and consumption when local laws allow.