I haven't read it all. One of the reasons is probably that not all the articles are very "grabby" - one way or another, they didn't catch my attention. Perhaps more pictures, highlights of cool bits, teaser text &c could inspire the reader more?

The sidebar commentary I found less than useful, mostly. It felt like a group of friends were chit-chatting & joking with each other while I was trying to listen to a lecture, you know what I mean?

For me, quirk works. Strange ideas and stuff out of left field grabs my attention. I read both the games right away.

(In fact, I believe you're the Anti-Matthijs.)

Personally, I love the marginalia, and in fact I used the large margins to scribble my own comments.

The sidebar commentary is the coolest. Seriously, it's my favorite feature of the book.

The cover and format both worked for me. The layout is nice and clean, and invites reading. A touch more graphical flair might be nice (based on your other work, Jonathan, I know you can make some kickass iconic stuff). But don't overdo it. The clean simple look is good.

I also appreciate the mini-games. They're interesting from a design perspective, and they're a good proof-of-concept for the type of lighter-weight, easy buy-in games that you're advocating.

Hmmm. I don't know if those count as "more extensive" comments, but now I have to run. Hope that helps.

Writing a substantive and insightful article is an amazingly difficult endeavor. (My own sub-1000 word contribution to Second Person: Role-Playing and Story in Games and Playable Media fails the "substantive" test.) So personally I was rather worried the margin commentary would come across as the smug, arrogant quipping of a group of insiders who couldn't themselves have produced articles worth reading. (You see that I fear these same traits in myself, right?)

It is to the credit of everyone associated with Push that this worry of mine was proved wrong. I'm not sure the commentary added much, but it didn't distract or detract, and I liked the book quite a bit.

Paul

I've got a weird one. I was disappointed by the paper. I've been waiting to get my hands on a copy for ages, and finally got won a few weeks ago. I opened it and went 'Huh.' I'm not sure what it was about it, but the paper seems yellower and of less quality than I was expecting. I don't know why I had that impression, but I was genuinely surprised when I first opened it.

Claire

Hmm, well, it sounds like people liked Push for very different reasons. I guess that's cool. I'm taking notes, though. There have been some good points made.

Like Paul I was kinda worried that the marginal comments would be endearing if you actually know some of the people involved in producing them (whether online or otherwise) and might sound like an "insider's club" to people who don't feel a part of communities like SG. I think we avoided most of that, but some of it still crept in.

I'd ball-punch that Brand asshole, but I think he lives in Torontario somewhere, up in Canadia where they rassle polar bears.

I just got my copy of Push Vol. 1 a couple weeks ago. I've been reading it piecemeal, digesting bits and thinking about the material as I go along.

I enjoy reading games and then reading designer's notes. So reading Jonathan Walton talk about how "Waiting for the Queen/Tea at Midnight" came into being alongside the game was very cool.

Shreyas Sampat's game was fascinating, and something I was able to use as a talking point with a friend who is into cultural anthropology but has also been burned on RPGs (thanks to some bad roleplaying experiences). I don't know if I'll ever play the game, but it is an eye-opening bit of interesting. I partly wish that there were some designers notes on it, but at the same time the lead does enough to set up the actual idea -- what if RPGs grew out of something other than wargaming -- so it doesn't really need the added info.

The contrast I'll make here is that in how each, to me, handles "New Thinking About Roleplaying." Jonathan talks about the idea itself some before going to the actual application whereas Shreyas jumps right out of the game with application. Both are awesome and rather complimentary. Shreya's piece seems to follow the "show me, don't tell me" model, whereas Jonathan does half-and-half. I like both, but I don't think I would enjoy an issue that was more focused on showing at the determent of telling.

I can't say I found Emily Care Boss's article particularly insightful, but then I've been dining from the plate of new gaming idea for some time now so the topic isn't new to me. That being said, I think it's well-organized and interesting. And there are plenty of folks for whom these topics are new -- there are a couple people in my gaming groups who are going to be handed my copy when I'm done and told to read this article specifically.

Eero Tuovinen has some interesting things to say, but unfortunately I don't. It was a neat look into a different gaming culture and the effects of globalization, and I'd be interesting in reading more such things, but I don't have any particular comments.

I am a bit ashamed to admit that I haven't finished John Kim's article yet. Rather, I haven't finished it a second time. It's interesting, but I need to digest it a bit longer before I'd have more to say.

As far as the commentary goes, I'm a fan. I particularly like it when the commentary offers an alternative point of view or some other reference point for the discussion. I started gaming with GURPS books, so I didn't have a problem with the sidebars.

My two cents, for what it may be worth.

Posted By: shreyas

Hey Ryan, what sort of designers' notes would you be interested in seeing?

Hmm. The quick-and-probably-useless answer is that I'm big on the thought process. That's what I try to capture in my own column. I guess part of the issue for Mridangam is particular is that it's well constructed, and bolting on designer's notes with it might have weakened the overall impact of that piece. That being said, a web article on it would be very cool.

Of course, saying something more specific would probably be more helpful to you, but it's so, well, anti-traditional (not that I'm saying that's a bad thing) that I could only come up with questions like "Why dance?", "How did you come up with the mechanic?", and "The origin is interesting. What sparked that?" Naturally, I would expect more specific questions to arise during a conversation, but I only can think of some very basic seeds to start with right now. (Also, if I was to actually do an interview, I would spend more time working out questions than I have for this post.)

Maybe we can do an interview or something?

I would love to. Are you thinking about using an interview format for your web column?

I'm not sure if you're familiar with my podcast, Master Plan ( http://masterplan.libsyn.com/ ). I've just started doing it, and while right now it's me talking on the subject of game design, what I want to do is interview folks and get them to talk about it instead. If you'd like, we could set up a vocal interview some time for my podcast (which isn't mutually exclusive with the web column interview idea).