Mark Jackson

I've been in love with board games since elementary school (which, for those who want to know, was a very long time ago - well, the mid-1970s). I discovered wargaming in junior high and RPGs in high school. In the 80s, Games Magazine exposed me to board games outside the mainstream outlets... and that was augmented by the appearance of the MB Gamemaster series and the Games Workshop flirtation with actual board games. The 1990s brought the "German Invasion" - and the internet became a portal for me to take a lifelong hobby and turn it into a delightful obsession.

In the past 30 years, I've run a board game website (Game Central Station), written a blog with lots of board game content (akapastorguy), appeared on a variety of gaming podcasts, written for the Opinionated Gamers website, playtested a number of games (examples include Heroscape, Suburbia, and Unmatched), and just played a whole lot of games. A good friend left an invitational game gathering with me and said, "You guys like to win but you love to play" - which is really my heart when it comes to board gaming.

I have eclectic gaming tastes - everything from the silliest of filler games to long, drawn-out civilization building games. Long time favorites include Memoir '44, Race for the Galaxy, and Clash of Cultures. Still, I'm always interested in trying something new!