I have never had a boomerang but I always believed it is kind a cool stuff. You throw it and sooner or later it comes back. Well, at least that’s what I saw when I was a kid and watched cartoons. Anyone here tried it in real life?

This week something 'boomerang style’ happened.

In 2012 I published Robinson. I spent countless hours designing the game and finally it got released. Thrown into the world. I got feedback very quickly, first ratings on BGG, first reviews, emails from players and meeting them on convention. That was awesome. Every hour, every night, every weekend spent on Robinson did pay off. Every time I receive geekmail from Robinson’s player, every time I meet players at convention I feel that it was damn worth it.

You know all of that. I write about this on my blog all the time.

This week however something extraordinary happened. New scenario for Robinson was published. Scenario designed by game’s fans. This was like a hit. That was exactly boomerang thing. I released the game and now it comes back with new content. Amazing content, to be precise.

I may be one of the best writers among boardgamers but this time it is hard to fully express my feelings about that unique experience. Reading great content created by fans for my game. Priceless, as Mastercard marketing would say.

This very first time I will just shut my mouth up and I will do something else. I will act. Here is my idea.

This weekend, 11th of May I am gonna play Robinson. I will play it first time in my life just for fun. I will not test new stuff. I will not balance it. I will not run demo game. I will play it for pure fun. Very first time in my life.

Please, join me this day and play Robinson. Take your copy from shelf and play The Naturalist scenario. Let’s play it worldwide, as many of you as possible. I will be on twitter for whole day (@trzewik) and I will report how many points I managed to get. Look for #naturalist hashtag.

Let us all say: 'Good work, thanks!’ to the team who developed The Naturalist scenario. This is amazing gift I was given.

11th May. I will be there, on the Island. Be there with me.

Here is a link to scenario: http://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/90628/the-naturalist-8th-s…

Here is a link to STORYonBOARD magazine where Robert and Marion published awesome article about creating this scenario. You have to ready this story! http://files.neuroshima.org/sob_008.pdf

Me and technology are natural enemies. I am the guy who created world of Neuroshima and invented evil Moloch. I am the guy who warns people against danger of technology.

Technology on the other hand is the one who turns off electricity in my village when I watch quarter finals of Champions League. Technology is the one who kills my router while I have very important Skype conference with ZMan Games. Technology is the one who kills battery in my Iphone when I am in the urgent need of using it.

Every single day technology tries to break me. My Ipad has breakdown the day I go to Essen, right after I downloaded 10 hours of podcasts to listen during trip. My car loses a wheel when I drive on the highway with speed 140 km/h and I have to survive with only 3 wheels and huge truck behind me…

This is war.

That is exactly why I had to ask my Merry important question when she bought flight tickets for our trip to France. The question was: 'Are you sure you wanna be on a one plane with me?’

As far as I know, there is a plenty of technology on the plane that can have a breakdown when I am there…

***

It was an hour before we leave. I wanted to check my phone bills, so I went to www.t-mobile.pl, which is my operator website. 'We have small problems. Please, visit us later’. Yeah, website was down. I showed it to Merry. And asked my question again. She smiled. 'We go’, she said.

I took our suitcase and went to car. Luggage got stuck. Can’t open it. Merry can’t open it too. We stay with suitcase next to our car. I look at Merry. I ask question. 'Shut up’ she says and tells me to put suitcase onto back seats.

We go to airport. We got departure. We are in the plane. I wonder what’s going to happen next. I don’t wait too long. Captains voice from speakers: 'There is a small problem with left wing. We have to wait for technical stuff. We suppose we will have about 30 or 40 minutes of delay. Please do not worry. Please, accept our apologizes.’

If you, by any chance don’t know it yet – yes, I am sitting right next to the left wing.

I look at Merry. I ask the question again. I think this time she is really considering not being on one plane with me…

***

Finally we reached Paris, then we got lost because our GPS didn’t see street where our hotel was but it was minor problem, I am used to such things. Next day we were on convention. It was great and I will write a post about it next week. 

Today we move couple of days forward. It is Sunday, last day of convention. We need to go back to Poland…

***

Flight to Poland is 8:15 PM.
Departure is at 6:00 PM
Trip from Etouvry to airport should take a little bit more than 3 hours.
Because I don’t trust GPS (it is technology device!) we decide to leave convention at 2 PM, 4 hours before departure.

And you already know it, right? This is beginning of 'a great adventure’.

Etouvry is the south of Paris. Our airport is the north Paris. And it turns out our GPS has never ever heard about bypassing cities. It, on the other hand, heard about sightseeing. So we drive into Paris. Into center of Paris. Into this very very middle of Paris with all those awesome monuments, with all those tourists and with this huge traffic jam. Biggest traffic jam I have ever seen in my life. We are stuck.

GPS is changing his statements. At the beginning it was telling us we will reach airport at 5 PM. Now it states we will reach it at 6 PM. Another hour in traffic. Now GPS states that we will reach airport at 7 PM. We are stuck. We are doomed. GPS changes its mind. Now it shows that we will reach airport at 7:30 PM.

This is a moment when I decide to stop be 'this cool guy from Poland’. It was Merry who drove. Now I take driving wheel. And I am gonna show Paris how I spent last couple of years with my Playstation.

Red lights? We had no time to stop and sightseeing Paris anymore…
Speed limit? If you take average speed by adding all those minutes we moved 0 km/h, I think I didn’t broke speed limits.
Being fair on road? I told you I had to stop be 'this cool guy from Poland’.

I literally broke all driving laws I knew. I probably broke a couple of other I have never heard of. It was crazy. And I proved that playing on Playstation may some day pay off.

***

Finally we reached airport. We run into departures section. 

DEPARTURES CLOSED AT 7:10 PM said the board on the wall.

I look at my mobile phone. It is 7:03 PM. It sounds unbelievable. It sounds like I made it up. But this is true. We reached airport 7 minutes before closing departures…

***

What can I say. If you find Robinson a difficult game, believe me, this is piece of cake when you compare it to my everyday adventures. 

And if you wonder how I came up with all this ideas for adventures… It just happen to me. I test them in real live, and then I implement them to my games…