Games Books

It is amazing how some people look at Japan and see what is not there. For instance, one reviewer on this book said how most "Japanese players never had much real education, as high schools were more like minor leagues, so the player mostly read mangas (comic strips) on bus rides."

Mangas are much more than comic strips. They are books, written by adults largely for an adult audience. Business people with degrees read mangas.

In fact, the ignorance of Japanese culture reflects in many unfortunate incidences between Japanese citizens and American citizens. Mr. Cromartie's slugging of a pitcher more than illustates this point.

Baseball in Japan is brutal. They burn out their pitchers, for instance, rather than rotate them. In this book you'll see that Warren Cromartie started out his first season first as the hero that was going to save his team, then as the first half of the season wore on he was viewed by the press as a bum who wasn't worth the money they paid for him (Japanese players were, and maybe still are, paid very low salaries for the receipts they bring in for their owners). He then became a hero who batted very well on the second half of the season. Did Mr. Cromartie improve his batting? Perhaps. But more than likely by the second half the season the pitchers in Japan had worn out their arms, and could no longer throw as well.

Get this to learn Japanese culture, Japanese baseball, and one man's confusion and eventual acceptance of both.

Cromartie came back to the States and played his last season with the Royals as a pinch hitter/1B and finished the season with a .307 average as a part time player.

Get this book. It's worth it.

Cromartie came back to the States and played his last season with the Royals as a pinch hitter/1B and finished the season with a .307 average as a part time player.

Get this book. It's worth it.

I grew up watching Warren Cromartie play for the Tokyo Yomiuri Giants during the late `80s. Cromartie was one of very few gaijin players who left a great impact, not only by the way he played the game, but also by his cocky attitude and behavior. For the Japanese media who love to stereotype American players as brashly self-arrogant, lazy, and powerful, Cromartie was such a perfect fit. Of course, they would not report on his side of story, this biography may be of a greater interest for those who viewed him as a gaijin those days. To me, the reader may miss the most interesting points if she just reads this book just as an account of "bizarre" experiences that an American went through in one of the most exotic places in the world.

With the presence of such colorful personalities as the manager Sadaharu Oh (whose career homerun record of 868 surpasses the American counterpart), his teammates, and old-fashioned traditionalists who would be labeled downright racists in many other civilized nations, the story never seems to bore the reader.

Unlike many other player biographies ghost written by mediocre sport writers, this is surprisingly an engaging book. Robert Whiting does a great job of incorporating his own views on cultural disparities between Japan and America into Cromartie's endeavor as a gaijin player. Many opinions expressed in the book overlap Whiting's other works on baseball, such as "You Gotta Have Wa" and "The Chrysanthemum and the Bad," but "Slugging It Out in Japan" is probably the most emotionally involved pieces of all.

Bronstein loves chess, not studying this line and that line... Not just memorising and trying to think what is this or what is that... He actually Played the game, he would do moves just to see what would happen... He talks about chess in a way where it makes you wanna play... Not all boring technical stuff that most don't understand but pretend to :)... No he talks about it in his own simple way... Calls people Fox or hedgehogs and explains how the Fox will try something even if it might lose... That is what its all about, tossing it on the line... Not just playing all safe and in worry about losing... Gotta roll the dice and just go for broke... Yes he basically says he tossed the games vs. Bot cuz of pressure and this and that... So he does admit to a shady side of chess... Still he makes it very clear he just loves playing the game... He did not seem to care about all the politics and having that on him... I wish that he would of beat him though, I wish he did not give in... Still when your in his situation thats the only way you can understand... I wonder if Tal had pressure to lose in that first match in 1960... Still lets get back to Bronstein, he played very far into his life... He is almost pure Chess I think, Im not a huge fan of his... Still if you read this book, its hard not to like the guy at least to some degree... I do not agree with him telling people to build a little house and castle early... I think many games are lost cuz people castle wrongly or too early... Still Im free not to agree with him all I wish... This book really is enjoyable just to read, even if you don't go over the games... So throw out that Harry Potter and get a book with a real Sorcerer :)...

If You play with Passion for the game, get this book... This book is not for those that play boring and never take chances... So if your a Fox, pick this up, if your a hedgehog, go play with Sonic :)...

A student could pick no better player to study. No one explains like Bronstein!

A great book. Along with Tal's book, this book belongs in the, "Chess-book Hall of Fame." !

Banzhaf-as is characteristic of him-uses brilliantly practical language. His layout is intelligent and well presented. Each tarot card is summarized in a chart, which appears at the end of each essay, and which has the following layout: Title: Keywords for (the tarot card's name goes here); Categories: Archetype, Task, Goal, Risk, and Feeling in life. As you can see, Banzhaf's focus is always lucid and balanced.

I do wish, however, that Banzhaf had extended his approach to encompass the minor arcana, too. In the minor arcana there is also a feeling of progression, which is not quite so clean and neat as in the major arcana. The minor arcana exposes the many side paths and loopholes, which the hero will meet and be challenged with. One can say, that they express the minute details of the hero's' experience, which I feel could have been quite innovatively placed in this hero's journey. However, my comment is not a criticism. Rather, it is a suggestion, which any tarot reader can meditate on. Since, Banzhaf's has the gift of lucidity and practical focus, I just wish that he had considered a broader and more complex schema.

Overall, I think this book is a well-written addition to any tarot card reader's library, and I do not think that it is too difficult for a beginner. In fact, this book has the uncanny ability to grow with you as you progress in your tarot card understanding, which mimics the "hero's" own growth. Of course, this is whole point. You will come to understand that you are the hero, and that both your paths are alike.

If you are not familiar with the Tarot cards, Banzhaf's book is a good place to begin, especially if you have an interest Western literature, music, and/or the visual arts -- including Medieval and Renaissance paintings, German philosophy, and films by the Fargo Brothers such as "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?"

Banzhaf is a very educated man who has studied religious and/or mythological tales and/or classical stories and appears to have an in-depth knowledge of the religious and/or philosophical nature of humans. He not only interprets key myths and tales, he explains the content of artworks from ancient India, Egypt, Greece, Rome, Italy, and Medieval Europe used to illustrate his text.

Banzhaf uses the Waite and Marseilles decks to illustrate each of the Major Arcana. Although he appreciates much of the content of the Waite deck, he challenges some of the changes Waite made relative to older decks. Banzhaf eschews discussion of the Minor Arcana suggesting these cards are more recent and may be nothing more than playing cards or cards for fortune telling. On the other hand, he views the 22 cards of Major Arcana (the Fool and his 21 stations) as the organizing principle for the classic tale of the hero -- whether Moses or Parzifal, Galahad or Ra, Gilgamesh or Jesus -- and the core story of every human life.

Banzhaf lays out the cards of the Major Aracana sequentially and divides the layout into two major paths -- the path of the daytime sun (active) and the path of the nighttime moon (passive). He suggests that each soul must follow this path to reach paradise, heaven or the spritual world however it is defined. The daytime path has to do with becoming EGO, the worldly individual. The nighttime path is more difficlut and many become snared like the hanged man, slowly twisting in the wind. The nightime path involves the spiritual life where the gate is narrow and the way is hard.

This is a beautiful book, and although I bought the paperback, I plan to purchase the hardcover since I will be referring to the book again..and again. As Banzhaf says, "If we look to the path as a spiral, that gradually leads us to what is Highest, then each turn on this spriral corresponds to one hero's journey. Seen in this manner, as long as we are traveling, we will return to all twenty-one stations over and over, yet--at least we hope--this will always be on a somewhat higher level. At the uppermost point of the path, but really only there, does this last card mean the unity of all things."

This book satisfactorily scratched all those itches, and more. It is a pleasure to read visually and in terms of the thought it provokes. I don't believe anyone could walk away from reading this book without having been enriched in many ways. Its diversity in the cultural, mythological, philosophical, and artistic traditions upon which it draws is enormous. This book could make a fine basis for teaching a university course in a number of disciplines.

I will leave you, gentle Amazon reader, to the wisdom of other reviewers, but I urge your consideration of this book. I believe you will not be sorry.

Enjoy.

One of the most popular Toon campaigns is the Toon Olympics. Those familiar with the Hanna-Barbara Laff-a-Lympics series already have an idea of the premise of Toon Olympics: Bring together many animated characters from various series/genres and have them compete in a number of sporting events. When I first played the Toon Olympics, one player created his own cursed medieval knight character with a sentient sword which didn't always do as he commanded (which he later played in a Sailor Moon RPG campaign I was then running), someone else played a unicorn (who eventually had to drive a car), another played as Lara Croft, and I personally played as A-ko - truly an eclectic bunch!!!

However, anime fans should NOT overlook Toon as a role-playing option. Granted, Toon is not as adaptable to a wide variety of campaigns (for campaign genre/character adaptability, see the Big Eyes Small Mouth second edition sourcebook); however, for a change of pace, Toon can be used to give almost any anime character (pre-existing or original) a chance to be a comedian. For example, when I played in another Toon Olympics as A-ko, I called upon B-ko to fight a Pokémon in my place, with the promise of conceding C-ko to her if she should win (that was funny enough to earn me an extra Plot Point)!!!

Through a series of in-depth interviews, as well as 14 months of personal

observation, she has written the book that defines the major milestone in women's basketball gaining the public's awareness and acceptance. Each of the 12 women on the team as well as their coach are skillfully profiled, and their stories credit, Ms. Corbett, kept the focus on the game. She lets the player's hopes and dreams and divergent personalities emerge through the sport. Of course we get their backgrounds too. We see Sheryl Swoops and her adoring husband, we see the explosive personality of Dawn Staley who likes to make side wagers on everything; we see Rebecca Lobo having trouble keeping up with the training; and Lisa Leslie's love for dressing up. But most of all, we see them play basketball.

In 1995, there wasn't even a basketball league for women. But during the time of their training for the Olympics, the possibility of two different leagues emerged -- the WNBA and the ABL. This was the major source of conflict between the members on the team during the course of the year. They had to put their disagreements aside though, and play basketball.

And that they did. They played and played and played, wining every single one of the games they played during that year. The women's college teams were easy, but they struggled with the team from China and the team from Australia. They constantly traveled, and the fatigue and frustrations of a life on the road was clearly examined.

Now, just a few years after the Olympics we take the WNBA for granted. American women now have an arena to play basketball professionally after college without going to Europe to play. The experiences playing for the European teams were usually unhappy. They were alone in foreign countries with a cultural barrier between themselves and their teammates. They were treated poorly, and sometimes punched and sexually intimated by their male coaches. It was never a pleasant experience.

The women were proud to be on the Olympic team, but the pressure never let up. Each game was a different kind of challenge. I loved the descriptions of the games, and even though I knew the final outcome of each game, found my heart beating during the play by play action. The game became more than just an unidentified player running around the court. It was Sheryl and Teresa and Katrina and Dawn. It was Rebecca and Jennifer and Lisa and Carla. I followed the action. And I was right there on the court with them.

One of the greatest things about this book, too, was how much it stirred me to learn more. My experience with basketball is limited and so I found myself screen. I therefore found myself going outside the confines of the book, asking questions of the basketball experts in my life, and looking up each player on the internet to find out where she is playing now and how she is doing.

I loved this book, carried it everywhere and couldn't put it down. I was right there with the team all the way and shared the very real swells of emotion they were experiencing . I shared the pain of their injuries, the strain of their training, the adrenaline rush during the games. I shared he plays that didn't make it and the plays that did. I heard the roar of the crowd, felt the strain and the pain, and experienced the glory of the victory.

The story of women's basketball is more than the story of this individual Olympic team. it is about the real opportunities that have opened for women in the world of sport. And, as a whole new generation of little girls are growing up with these possibilities now a reality, it is about the future.

Highly highly recommended.