turning back time

Reflecting on this year’s #Netnarr class, I realized that our journey was very different than last year’s in a number of ways. Even though we participated in connected learning, used most of the same tools, and even revisited familiar faces in our studio visits, they were two separate experiences. If I had to describe last year’s class, it would be more “creative”— and by creative, I mean there were more chances for imagination, interpretation, and remix. We had opportunities to write, draw, and imagine an alchemist alter ego.

This year, however, I would categorize it as a class that was “self-aware.” While we did some creative things, the majority of our efforts in class projects all had a level of awareness and reflection. We learned more about digital tracking, and the consequences of our digital footprint & identity. Along with that, when we talked about things such as “redlining” or “empathy games,” we were also really reflecting and becoming aware of the significance of what high-risk areas in Newark mean, or the realities of what it means to live in Syria.

And when we weren’t being “self-aware,” we were dabbling in other digital activities. Having students learn how to make GIFs, cut audio, crop and layer images, use tweetchat, create bots, make memes, and much more, is an important asset to this class. It may seem like we’re having a lot of fun (which we are), but I think learning different digital skills can make all the difference for some of the students as they continue their life in the professional world. You never know when your company may want you to make an image transparent, or more importantly, when they need you to make a funny meme. The daily digital alchemies also offered a window of creative opportunity for the class to have freedom with and flex some of the digital skills they had learned along the way.

For me, though, I think the most informative part of the class were the discussions we had revolving around how our information is being used in digital spaces. Innocently, we enter things into Facebook, YouTube, Tumblr, and so forth— a lot of the times, we do not think twice about entering our name or location, because we naively trust the website we are giving it to, because everyone else is doing it. However, in light of recent events, like Zuckerberg answering questions about Facebook, I think a lot of us are going to look at how we share our digital information differently. We learned about digital tracking from week one, and how our data is used against us for target marketing schemes. I think that’s why I did my e-lit concept piece on thinking about how we use our information online— if we knew what we knew now, I think a lot of us would have used the Internet differently, or at least demanded guidelines at the start of the digital age to how it would affect people later in life.

I would definitely suggest other students to take this class - I think it's a wonderful blend of being informative and artistic. During this semester, there were a lot of things we learned that, moving forward, are important in life - from being self-aware about our online presence, to knowing what a bot really is and how to make one for fun. We also got to put a lot of ourselves and our interests into our projects, while still being relevant to the course - after all, this is our "digital life," and it's important that we know how to take care of it.

MAKE Leaderboard:

TAGs Explorer:

@stryii on the outskirts, but @ketsunya closer to the center... maybe I should turn that bot off? haha.

 Twitter activity:

before

after

BLOG POSTS: http://netnarr.arganee.world/author/haileyjcarone/

TWITTER ACTIVITY: http://daily.arganee.world/hashtags/stryii/

bots the matter with you?

breaking! this past week, it has been reported that yes, bots were on the rise again on twitter... except they weren't russian bots - this was the work of kean students!

and i'll be the first to admit that i think everyone did a great job with living double lives in their own twitter as both a tired, politically distraught student and a persistent, politically distraught bot! the purpose of the bots were to create conversation, but to ask the questions in a believably human-sounding way. the class did a great job of framing their questions and getting a few outsiders to comment! before we set the bots up, though, we did a test on Botometer to see if our twitter accounts were perceived to be people or bots... i wonder if our scores went up?

only 22% a bot 😎@netnarr pic.twitter.com/E0jLGbskZw

— hailey (@stryii) April 10, 2018

Kicking the shit out of the back board on my computer desk because" Dabbing" is bull shit

— wint (@dril) March 17, 2018

also, can you believe that he's not a bot? it's weird.

we also played the bot or not game on www.botpoet.com to get a feel for the potential for generative language for bots and how certain "real life" poetry can come across as robotic, repetitive, or seemingly randomly generated. i also wanted to point out that the bot poetry was a lot more poetic than some of the poems by real poets. in particular, the one bot poem "some men" was the best poem i saw come up by far:

"some men just want to watch the world burn

some men just want to watch the world learn

some men just want breakfast"

- generated by Every Google User using Google Predictive Search 

Close enough pic.twitter.com/Vzf9FStNC6

— hailey (@stryii) April 10, 2018

speaking of generative language & poetry, that leads us to our next and final adventure in #netnarr - electronic literature. i love e-lit, as its very engaging and new way for storytelling to come to life and to evoke new relationships between reader and text. the multimodality of electronic literature creates a new dynamic, and adds depth and color to stories by including audio, visual, video, navigational, interactive, and animated elements to the story that would otherwise be lost in traditional textual stories. additionally, e-lit is not just one thing - it can be many. for example, there's hypertext fiction, generative poetry, interactive fiction, netprovs, fanfiction, online roleplaying, ect. e-lit is only limited by the creator's imagination.

one of my favorites examples of e-lit (specifically generative poetry) is poem.exe, which creates haikues / short poems through randomized images, lines, and juxtapositions that are often beautiful and thought-provoking. the generated juxtaposition especially works with haikus because of the suddenness of subject change, which is important in creating a complex message and image that often stays with the reader long after they have read the poem.

cherry blossoms

and then it moves

— poem.exe (@poem_exe) April 16, 2018

alone

under my clothes 

now a little nap

— poem.exe (@poem_exe) April 14, 2018

blossoms at night

between my hands

thoughts muddled

— poem.exe (@poem_exe) January 15, 2018

buddha law

gravestones

for a hand-picked peach

— poem.exe (@poem_exe) September 3, 2017

can't wait to see what else is in store for us and teaching more people about the wonders of e-lit! super excited.

redlining & remixing

this past week, during our exploration of games, we've focused a lot on the concept of remixing, which is an important element to recognize in such a unique class as this. a few weeks ago, we put questions into the padlet we shared with Maha's students in Egypt; unfortunately, we didn't receive responses, but that didn't stop us! instead, we created the supposed answers to those questions, and put them together to form a mock / imaginary interview, speculating on how the game creators might have answered them. we used audacity while doing so, which involved a lot of recording, splicing, and editing, in order to make it coherent and consequential.

background ambiance courtesy of freesound

i guess for me, it was hard to be 100% direct in answering these questions, namely because they're not mine to answer. i feel like this game prototype specifically was meant for the story to be told by someone from Egypt who experiences gender stereotypes in that culture. while there are similarities between how female and male individuals are expected to behave and perform their gender identity throughout both cultures, it is not even close to being the same story, and that story is not mine to tell or fictionally tell. instead, i tried to speculate as what and how they would answer, but i think i just ended up with more questions! haha.

still, i had fun with it, and i wish we could have heard from Maha's students. until then, i hope they continue with their prototypes - each one has a great story to tell and lesson to teach and would make for great developed empathy games.

our other project we completed last week was also a remix of sorts - we discussed the concept of redlining, and what that means in a geographical space, and how that can translate into a digital space and create analytical, qualitative questions. we took two different images, played with layering, cropping, and finally juxtaposed them together. first, we were told to pick another map of Newark to explore against the redlining zone, and i chose to try and find one of the McDonald's location to take a screenshot of. i couldn't get it to just be all fast food places - google maps was not a fan. however, i feel like the McDonald's locations did raise an interesting speculation and analysis.

in the heart of newark, there are considerably a lot of McDonald's next to each other - reminder, just McDonald's, excluding all the possibilities of fast food locations probably also in close proximity. the heart of newark is not especially rich, and McDonald's provides a cheaper option for people who do not have the income, time, and convenience to spend on healthier choices. it's a quick, inexpensive warm meal, which creates a correlation between poor individuals and poor dietary habits. additionally, it can lead to health complications, which is another problem and financial strain if the person has already found themselves in not the best monetary situation.

again, it's only a speculation, but it's not an uncommon hypothesis we've heard before. below is the map i've created through the image juxtaposition tool in H5P:

with that being said, i'm sure we'll be seeing a lot more of remixing in the world of electronic literature in the coming week! i'm exciting to explore different types of e-lit, as well as different pieces, and create/remix some of our own.

(and yes, i heard that bots were coming back... this should be fun!!!)

to quote a wise man: "@!#?@!"

Last week, we all went way back and explored some pretty ~retro~ games, ranging from the Oregon Trail to Sim City. Among these games, I chose to explore two of them - my first encounter was with Charlie the Duck, which I quickly learned was just a complete rip off of Mario. Not even just the concept - the whole level's layout was ripped from level 1 of the classic Mario game, but just replaced with different images & themes. Instead of tunnels, plumbers, and shells, think ponds, frogs, and giant wasps! Of course, and a duck.

Next, I chose to look at the beloved game Qbert. I've heard of the game, but I've never played it - heck, I don't think I've ever seen it in an arcade before, either, which I find surprising. When I started playing, I'll admit, it was a bit frustrating - nothing was really explained, so it took me a second to figure out the controls and what the heck I was even supposed to be doing. But, as it turned out, the goal was extremely simple - jump on all of the squares so they match the target square, and avoid any snakes or other whimsical shapes trying to kill our poor Qbert.

Using the terminology we learned last week, the best way to describe both games is labeling them as Practice games. The levels don't change, and you have extra lives to try to beat them until you master the elements and challenges presented to you over and over again. The Plan, Practice, and Improvise video by Extra Credits even says that playing Practice games typically breed frustration, as sometimes you'll get stuck on a level and it'll take forever to get past it - I definitely felt like that's what was happening to me after a certain point in Qbert. My highest score was ~3,500! I was happy that I got that far, as it took me what felt like twenty times to even just get past the first level. Similarly, Charlie the Duck seemed easier because I've played the classic Mario games before - you generally know what each element does, and the first level is pretty standard. There was Practice from a different game that was transferred to that one, which is actually kind of cool.

Short story time? Short story time.

Qbert was only sure of two things. One, that he loved his work - jumping on stairs for a living may seem like a chore to some, but it was a passion for him. And two, that he did not. Like. Snakes.

When he first started his job, it seemed pretty easy. Only one side of the stairs needed to be changed, no problem. He'd hop a little here, hop a little there, and bam. Fixed. Good as how the boss wanted it to be. But no one told him about the other... difficulties.

At first it started as small bouncing circles that would follow him. It was annoying, but he worked through it, always keeping a watchful eye over his shoulder. Sometimes it would just be on circle, or two, or three... but, no matter how many, he kept at it.

Then, the job got a bit more difficult. Suddenly, two sides of the stairs needed to be fixed - then three, back to one, and so on and so forth. But, then the real game changer came - him.

It was just a normal day for Qbert. Avoiding a circle here or there, hopping along his merry way, thinking of what would be next. But then, as he was on the very last square of the day, a shadow came from behind and menacingly loomed over him.

Qbert stopped, and looked over his shoulder. "...!@?#@?"

He was face to face with none other than, you guessed it, the Snake. He was about twice Qbert's size, and could jump five times as high, too, it seemed. Qbert took a deep breath, and was going to introduce himself. After all, the Snake didn't look too intimidating - he was just huge, that's all, and had pointed teeth, and... Anyways, he wasn't going to assume anything.

Before Qbert could say anything, the Snake, who had been slightly coiled over, extended his whole body upwards. He was stretched out about his whole length, with his neck craned slightly so that he was looking down at Qbert. Uh oh. Now he looked intimidating.

And, just like that. the Snake jumped up in the air and came crashing down toward Qbert with immense power. Quickly, Qbert bounced out of the way, but the Snake kept following him. Panicked, Qbert looked around at the easiest escape - but there was none. The Snake had him cornered! The Snake prepared himself for another jump, but Qbert, terrified, decided to jump off the stairs completely.

He waited in the darkness until for awhile. When he felt like he wasn't in danger anymore, Qbert hesitantly jumped his way to the top of the stairs again - only to find that all of his hard work had been undone!!!

With a quick glance over his shoulder to check for distractions, Qbert began his work again. He shook his head. Why did the Snake want to do this?

When he was on his last tile, again, the same, coiled shadow loomed over him.

Qbert turned around. "!@#?##" He sighed.

It was going to be a long workday.

yo tony, where'd u get that fresh pepperoni

phew! it's been a long week! and a pretty long checklist, too :P i kid, i kid!

last tuesday was a bit of a technical mess, with our projector dying for good. but, the twitterchat still persisted, and i think we had a great conversation about empathy games - particularly SPENT, Bad News, and Syrian Journey. Our group played SPENT, which I also encountered last year in Networked Narratives. I remember doing infinitely better than I did this time around - I ended up with $23 at the end of the month, no more plasma to donate, and rent was due.

Sometimes no matter what decision you make, even the "right" one, life can come out of nowhere & knock you down. #netnarr

— hailey (@stryii) March 20, 2018

I think, like many working poor, one has to heartbreakingly change their definition of success. #netnarr

— Katherine Marzinsky (@KMarzinsky) March 20, 2018

SPENT really puts you in the shoes of someone else. i think we can all relate to financial struggles and tough choices, but the curves that SPENT throws at you are pretty hard and fast - but hey, sometimes that is someone's life.  empathy games are wonderful means of teaching others, if they have the mindset of wanting to learn - especially when they have correct facts & stats to back up the realistic nature of the game. i mentioned that the ideal formula for an EG is when the game can create a perfect balance of emotional storytelling and objective facts - if the game is solely based on emotion, it might be impossible to suspend our disbelief and immerse ourselves in the story. or, if a game is purely facts and numbers, it can glaze right over people. having a character you can empathize with and go through their story together really drives home the point.

A3:I think the biggest pitfall may be that it is not played. Playing them will force you to consider certain decisions you make as a human being. #netnarr

— Steph Jones (@MrsJayJ) March 20, 2018

I agree with Stephanie here strongly - it's a wonderful point. A lot of what we consider games are ones that really "don't have a higher meaning" to them. Sure, games can be great because they have strategy, wonderful art, or moral lessons - but EG teach real global/nationa/societal issues, and is an outlet to have an experience you might never have in your own lifetime. introducing EG that are both enjoyable to play to the gamer with an emotional reward to children at young ages could do wonderful things for the personal growth of humanity.

speaking of more empathy games! i checked out Marwan and Hoda from Cairo's Survival Game, which focuses on the daily routine and gender expectations & stereotypes shoved onto Egyptian men and women. i thought they did a great job in telling the experience of gender inequality in both the routine for what is expected of men and of women. however, i felt like there was a lot of depth and storytelling for the woman's path - she felt like a fleshed out character that you could empathize with. for the man, while the stereotypes and inequality was technically there, it was not as masterfully woven into the storytelling like the woman. instead, his choices were abrupt, and consequently either got fired from his job or literally died for defying stereotypes. the woman, however, seemed more realistic - i suggested they try to create that same depth and chance for empathy for the man. then again, i have neither experience that they have, as I am a privileged white woman from America - i find it hard to offer more valid critique about any experience, because it is not mine to tell.

moving on! after our twitterchat, we moved on to a lesson in audacity, which i've worked with before. however, when i did do some audio editing a long time ago, i would use Sony Vegas - the same program I would also edit videos with. i thought this was going to be somewhat painless - i was wrong! it took me at least an hour to figure out why i couldn't move my darned audio bites over... even though the sound was paused/stopped, i had to make sure none of the buttons were clicked. i really couldn't believe it took me that long. oops.

but, i eventually got through it! i want to say that, yes, i might have been hungry when i was looking for inspiration. and no, i never did end up ordering pizza. a tragic day for everyone, if i'm being honest (someone create an empathy game out of that, why don't ya?)

if you couldn't tell, i was a little hungry when i was thinking of a concept...

nothing feels better when your project is rendering! takes me back to my video editing days

warning: you may want to order food after listening to this. you have been warned.




it's the only story i know how to tell... audio credits!

• https://freesound.org/people/Robotter112/sounds/418987/ soda
• https://freesound.org/people/benjaminharveydesign/sounds/315920/ dialing
• https://freesound.org/people/esperri/sounds/119133/ clinking
• https://freesound.org/people/Sirderf/sounds/332303/ cheering
• https://freesound.org/people/kwahmah_02/sounds/275072/ doorbell
• https://freesound.org/people/Spleencast/sounds/92901/ restaurant
• https://freesound.org/people/XxBirdoxX/sounds/52293/ stomach growl
• https://freesound.org/people/xtrgamr/sounds/259170/ laughing
• https://freesound.org/people/Kodack/sounds/256311/ munching
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxTdYkx2hQQ music
• https://freesound.org/people/djfroyd/sounds/263993/ ringing

also, if you want to hear a real great song about pizza (and pizza parties), i suggest this.

lastly, as a parting gift, i want to share one of my finest photo manipulation achievements and a culminating statement about games to end the blog. that is all. and i am sorry.

i couldn’t help myself, i’m sorry #dda194 @cookjack125 pic.twitter.com/nZUiXTx0UU

— hailey (@stryii) March 27, 2018

MAY THE BEST ALCHEMIST... WIN!

THREE... TWO... ONE... BEGIN!

what do we want? GAMES. when do we want them? NOW!

that's right! we've moved on from digital art to none other than gaming! while i enjoy games, i never think of myself as a gamer. a lot of the games i play are what i consider "lowkey" - games like Animal Crossing, Civilization, Sims, Pokemon, and so on. they're all games i can play on my own time, and games that usually are less violent and help cultivate more in-game "personal" growth. maybe that sounds pretentious, i'm not too sure - i guess i can't explain my preference in gaming. i don't like battling bosses because it stresses me out (i know, i know - i love Pokemon, but i don't feel like that makes me a hypocrite. something about beating the bosses is way less stressful than, say, Zelda.) Animal Crossing is the exact opposite of all that - there's honestly nothing more therapeutic than standing by the beach in animal crossing at 2 a.m. with the sound on.

with that being said, i do love a lot of card & board games as well. i was introduced to cards at a pretty young age because my grandma loves playing cards, specifically Crazy 8s. to this day, we still play (last week i beat her 20-0 and she threw her cards down and called me a b*tch. it was awesome.) she also taught me Canasta, Hearts, and a bit of Bridge. i also love playing Euchre, and i recently relearned how to play Poker. cards are awesome, 'nuff said, but sometimes you can only do so much with them.

board games, on the other hand, sometimes are more involved. my favorites are Catan, Flux, Parcheesi, Sorry, Scrabble, One Night Ultimate Werewolf, and of course Cards Against Humanity (however, recently i was given What Do You Meme?, which is 100x better, believe it or not). i'm always open to learning new games - i love strategy and games that make me think. i'm excited to be introduced to even more games over the course of this month!

so, what does that make me? i honestly thought i would be a "casual gamer," but i got active gamer instead! but i guess that makes sense. i like playing games when nothing else is happening, or if my friends want to sit down and play a few rounds of something. but if something else is going on, i'm ready to do whatever! i like playing games with friends a lot, but sometimes it's nice to cancel plans with everyone and sit in bed all night playing Pokemon.

also, i like sports too. but not really watching them (except figure skating) - sports are fun when i'm actually doing them, specifically tennis and figure skating. i love the strategy and mind games of tennis, and i love the artistry and athleticism of skating, but i digress.

but, speaking of sports, i found Radiolab's Games podcast a topic of interesting discussion, particularly when they were talking about "play." we also touched on it in our studio visit today with Remi and Keegan, with the conflation and misinterpretation of games and playfulness going hand-in-hand. when we're younger, there's definitely that part of us that is free to be creative and "open-ended" in our play, where there's the liberty of interpretation. however, as we get older, rules start coming into "play," and ideas of right & wrong start curbing some imagination when it comes to the games kids play. there's rules to play freeze tag, as there's rules to many aspects of grown-up life. i guess it's just kids starting to slowly piece together concepts of growing up, or it's just the natural order of civilization. needless to say, incorporating both playfulness & gamification can be beneficial in different settings, like classrooms. it opens itself up to new ways of seeing & exploring the material, and is more encouraging to get students to interact and engage with the subject - the ability to "have fun" with learning, which sometimes get lost, especially as our age goes up. playfulness, as well as games, can lead to a whole new experience and more solid understanding of the material being learned.

also, i wanted to touch on Radiolab's conversation about the underdog v. the expert, and who we like to win. i agree with them when they say we always want the underdog to win - the team, person, even shape, that seems to have the disadvantage, is who we back up and cheer for. however, i also agree with the one person who said he felt the exact opposite - that it's criminal for the expert to not win, and for the underdog to take that title. however, i think it boils down to however deeply we are immersed in the culture of whatever game we are playing. if we know nothing about the game, we want the underdog storyline to happen; but, if you're a big fan of the game, it would be ghastly for some no-name to take a title that you know rightfully should go to the big name.

let me give a great drag race example.

recently, All Stars 3 finished filming, and the winner was crowned. a lot of the fanbase backed Trixie Mattel, a huge fan favorite and, for lack of better words, the underdog. let me add that a lot of the fanbase who supported Trixie winning were people who were new fans to drag & drag race, and like her because she has a funny youtube show - also, a lot of the fans are the people who go around twitter & facebook and post a lot of derogatory & ugly things to POC queens. but, that's another story!

the other queen who was in the running for the title was Shangela, a queen who appeared on season 2 and 3. she was the first one eliminated season 2, but RuPaul believed in her potential so much, she invited her back the next season. she made it pretty far season 3, but did not get top four. so, when she was invited back to All Stars 3, a lot of the dedicated fanbase who had been around since Shangela's debut were rooting for her and fully expected her to take the crown.

in a nutshell, shangela had the best track record and should have won this All Stars season. Trixie, at best, was mediocre, and i don't know how she cruised by.

but guess who won???

Not Shangela!

ok, well, that's enough of my AS3 rant. if i sounded bitter, well, i'll admit it - i am!

but at the end of the day, guess what? it's just a game. and games are supposed to be fun!

unless you're like me, and super competitive, and then things can get a bit... messy. especially if i'm not winning. but! i hope that doesn't deter us from maybe playing some Board Game Online. i think i can control my competitiveness for one evening... hopefully.

housekeeping

as we say goodbye to our digital art segment, i think our last Make - the GIF It All Together one - is definitely a great way to end. additionally, i'd like to say i'm pretty proud at how my GIF turned out. but first, we have to go back to the beginning! we started out with the GIFing a Process Make, which i created based off of my poetry process photoset. i used a filter on Giphy to make sure all of the photos had the same basic color aesthetic, and kept the pictures moving at a good pace - not too fast, not too slow.

 then when that was done, i started on the second make. i wanted to think of what concept really resonated with me the most so far when thinking about Digital Life & Art, and i knew it could only be one thing - the importance of creation, of doing. i think maybe it ties in with my relationship with my thesis, too, which makes sense. i wanted to think about all of the different ways digital art can be created, and how inspiration can show itself literally and metaphorically in a variety of forms. the only way for something to happen is to just do it - so why not? putting your creative self forward is a big step and a bit intimidating at times, but you don't know anything until you hit that send button & lay it out for the virtual world to experience.

when making the GIF, i found a few of them through the Giphy search engine. i also googled some examples of digital art as well. i wanted a mixture of GIFs & images that showed the spectrum of what art can be, as well as making sure they were also visually inspiring & engaging. images that would make me want to draw, write poetry, sculpt, paint, ect. something that gets those creative muscles in gear! but, as i said, i was pretty proud of it. and even though all of the images combined were subtle enough to say "hey!! inspiring art!!" i wanted to make sure everyone heard it loud & clear, so i wrote a big CREATE across the screen to add to the trippy GIF.

list of my MAKEs so far

speaking of creating, time to turn toward the DDAs for the week!

@netnarr #dda170 this pup just radiates warmth and good vibes and my goal is to now be as happy as this boi is #netnarr

found at https://t.co/5BtFqlNPdQ pic.twitter.com/pEpiWBhGMb

— hailey (@stryii) March 6, 2018

ok, ok, maybe this one is less creating, but i still wanted to share! i keep rewatching this GIF and falling more and more in love with this dog each second. i think Felix might have some competition for the cutest dog award now!

@netnarr #dda175 the joker of the class, jack, brought his nintendo 64 for science class 5th period instead of an actual project #netnarr pic.twitter.com/0FR8jf2AYv

— hailey (@stryii) March 6, 2018

this DDA was a bit sillier, but i loved the concept. i never really think of playing cards as prompts for stories, but i think it's gonna be hard to get out of my head now before i go play a round of cards downstairs later!

list of my DDAs so far

as we move along our #netnarr journey, it's interesting to see where i am in the twitterverse via the TAGSexplorer. i didn't know if i could zoom in or move it around, because my computer wouldn't let me. i don't have a mouse with me, so maybe that would've helped, so sorry about the bad screenshot.

i am but a small red dot, and @dogtrax is looming over us all.

and, last but not least:

links to all my blog posts so far

 i think the whirlwind of #netnarr, it's good to have some housekeeping going on, especially as we move on to the next segment. as we move into gaming, i'm excited to share some of my favorite games. in the real world, i love cards (as said above), especially Euchre, Crazy Eights, and Hearts. in terms of board games, i'm a big fan of Catan and Parcheesi, and One Night Ultimate Werewolf (which is not really a board or card game, but resembles Mafia). online, Board Game Online is a great experience maybe we can play in class, as it's free, fast, and fun. other online games i love to play are Sims and Civilization, but those are harder to include in our class.