I love board games. No, seriously, it’s gotten out of hand in the last few years. This is part of what my basement looks like: Yeah, this is only half of it. And yeah, those two black cubbies down there are also full of games. Ahem. Anyway.  It’s honestly been really cool to watch the hobby evolve over the last 10 or so years. I went to my first GenCon in 2014. If you’re not familiar with the convention, it’s been around since ...

Space is fascinating - and, admittedly, a little bit terrifying. While I’ve always had a sense of awe for space exploration and discovery, I wouldn’t say that it’s something that I ever paid particularly close attention to.  My best friend, Brian, however, absolutely loved space and everything associated with it. He followed space launches, read endless articles and content online, and had several space books strewn throughout his apartment. When Offworld Tr...

Ah, Kickstarter: the land of hopes, dreams, and thousands of people with cash to burn. In its earliest days, Kickstarter was a platform that provided creators with a venue for funding projects they otherwise would never be able to do on their own (and for some, couldn’t do even with successful funding).   Nowadays, Kickstarter is still an effective way for indie developers and other small creators to get their projects funded and out in the public eye, but it’s...

I know there’s an overall stereotype about gamers being solitary and reclusive by nature, and while it’s not altogether untrue, there are definitely outliers. I’m one of them, and the coming weeks of isolation are looming over my head like an ominous shadow - dramatic, sure, but that’s not exactly off brand for me. I am an extremely social person. I host dinners and game nights regularly, I go to the gym (albeit not nearly as often as I’d like to), I visit w...

Next week marks one of my favorite holidays. Unfortunately for me and my office mates, we will be spending it apart from each other in our own homes. For us, May 4th is a day of geeky celebration, of shared memes and, more importantly, shared (and themed!) food. When my first opportunity to celebrate Star Wars with some fellow nerds came around, I started fairly simple. I happened to have cupcake wrappers and decorations that were Star Wars themed, so I made a batch of cupcakes, decked the...

I have seen quite a lot of desktop backgrounds over the years from all manner of friends and family. Heck, I remember as far back as one of my family’s first PCs, a Packard Bell, that we excitedly bought a screensaver and background software for so that we could have aquarium fishes swimming around when we idled. I mention the above mostly to point out a pretty obvious fact: everyone has different tastes. There’s no right or wrong way to customize your desktop - and, whether yo...

We make a lot of software here at Stardock, and while all of it is wonderful and useful in their own ways, there are just a couple of programs that I consider my “ride or dies” for my PC experience. Fences is absolutely at the top of that list (followed very closely by Groupy ). The basic functionality of organizing my icons, folders, and programs into fenced in areas on my PC desktop is great enough on its own, but the more I explored Fences I began to realize that ...

Back at the beginning of quarantine, I talked a little bit about how Groupy helped me work from home . It saves me the desk space of having to juggle around too many monitors by letting me use my two-monitor setup more efficiently.  It’s about more than just saving space, though. Groupy allows me to sort my work into categories, making it easier for me to compartmentalize what I’m working on, especially when I have several tasks working all at the same time. To b...

Happy spooky season, everyone! Here at Stardock, we love two things: Halloween, and desktop customization. Stardock Halloween 2019! Actually, we love quite a lot more than just those two things, but stick with me here! Halloween is on Saturday, and unfortunately this year won't be filled with the usual trick-or-treating hullabaloo (normally I get 400+ kids in my neighborhood!). That doesn't stop me from decorating for the holiday anyway! I'll be turning my porch light off this year, savin...

Before coming to Stardock, I never really had a deep appreciation for Windows customization. I remember downloading the occasional Windows background and all sorts of skins (and frankly, probably viruses - sorry mom and dad!) for WinAmp back in my teen years, but that was about the extent of it.  Since being here though, I've garnered an entirely new appreciation for being able to make my desktop look fun and unique - both my PC desktop AND my workspace desktop, too. My work de...

I’ve said this before, but I struggle with heavy strategy video games like Galactic Civilizations III and Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion. For 4X games, it’s usually that I suffer from decision paralysis because there are just too many options. For RTS games, too much happens too quickly and my brain’s swiss-cheese processing power just can’t keep up. That said, I find that if I am playing a strategy board game, I have an easier time of it....

I’ve said it before, but I suppose it bears repeating: I love games - board, video, card, and otherwise. In particular, since the board game scene exploded over the last few years, I’ve found myself neck-deep into the hobby, excitedly following blogs and Kickstarter for the next ‘big game’ coming down the line. With all of the new games, sometimes I forget about the ‘classics’ - you know, the kinds of games that have been around forever but may not be as...

I don’t know about you, but I’m a little stir-crazy at this point. The days are starting to blend together so much that I can scarcely keep track of what day it even is anymore, which becomes especially difficult during the work week since I’ve lost the routine of leaving my house and getting in my car to drive there every day. One of the cool things I’ve seen come out of this quarantine period, however, are the numerous people and companies who have come up w...

Image credit: TechCrunch A few weeks ago, my dad and I had a conversation about how, if we have to weather a pandemic, we’re sure glad it’s happening in 2020. Don’t get me wrong - obviously, we wish we weren’t living through this craziness at all, but to deal with it now versus in, say, 1990? We’re all way better equipped in certain areas. For one thing, the internet has come a long way since its dial-up days and is commonplace in most home...

Monday was Star Wars Day, and as I’m writing this it’s currently Revenge of the 5th, so...I’m just declaring that this week is “Star Wars Week” and so you’re getting a Star Wars blog. Yub nub! I am prone to nostalgia, I fully admit this. Star Wars, in and of itself, is full of those old, wonderful memories for me - my Dad raised me and my sister on the movies, and our favorite Friday night ritual consisted of tackling him when he got home from work, popp...