Unfiltered board game and book reviews plus personal essays from Elliot Rhodes — the honest read on what actually worked and what didn't, no review copies, no rounding up.https://elliotunfiltered.com/en-UShttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/other-minds/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/other-minds/Peter Godfrey-Smith's case for the octopus as the closest thing on Earth to an alien intelligence, held together more by curiosity than by a tight argument.Wed, 19 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMTBooksElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/the-spreadsheet-maren-made-me-start/https://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/the-spreadsheet-maren-made-me-start/A routine examined: the actual columns in the log that turned a vague sense of what I'd read and played into something I can point to and defend.Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMTPersonalElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/self-comes-to-mind/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/self-comes-to-mind/Antonio Damasio's account of how a self assembles itself out of feeling before thought, dense enough that I'm certain I only came away with a third of it.Sun, 16 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMTBooksElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/why-i-wont-round-a-3-up-to-a-4/https://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/why-i-wont-round-a-3-up-to-a-4/A strongly held opinion about rating discipline, and why I think most reviews online are secretly written to spare someone's feelings instead of tell the truth.Fri, 31 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTPersonalElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/godtear/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/godtear/A genuinely clever plot-and-clash skirmish system buried under the most expensive path to a complete game I've priced out this year.Tue, 28 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTBoard GamesElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/gloomhaven-jaws-of-the-lion/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/gloomhaven-jaws-of-the-lion/The correct entry point into this entire genre, a streamlined map-book campaign that teaches its own systems better than almost anything else on my shelf.Sat, 25 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTBoard GamesElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/the-house-that-failed-its-own-open-house/https://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/the-house-that-failed-its-own-open-house/A story from the job, not the hobby: the worst inspection I've run in nine years, and the specific moment a seller's agent stopped smiling.Fri, 10 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTPersonalElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/frosthaven/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/frosthaven/A bigger, more polished Gloomhaven that solves most of the original's real problems and replaces them with a building-management layer that occasionally reads like a spreadsheet in a fantasy costume.Fri, 19 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMTBoard GamesElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/dales-foreman-voice-comes-out-during-rules-disputes/https://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/dales-foreman-voice-comes-out-during-rules-disputes/Twenty years running a contracting crew leaves a specific tone of voice behind, and I've come to genuinely rely on it every time our Thursday table hits a genuine rules disagreement.Mon, 08 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMTPersonalElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/the-first-law/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/the-first-law/Abercrombie's grimy, funny, character-first fantasy debut, front-loaded with setup that pays off harder once the trilogy's back half starts collecting its debts.Fri, 05 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMTBooksElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/teaching-priyas-nephew-a-coop-game-that-almost-ended-in-tears/https://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/teaching-priyas-nephew-a-coop-game-that-almost-ended-in-tears/A ten year old, a cooperative dungeon crawler, and a lesson in how badly I misjudge difficulty curves when I'm the one who's played the tutorial a dozen times already.Sat, 09 May 2026 00:00:00 GMTPersonalElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/ready-player-one/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/ready-player-one/A treasure hunt built almost entirely out of eighties trivia, genuinely fun in short bursts and genuinely tiring across the full length of a novel.Tue, 28 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMTBooksElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/thunder-road-vendetta/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/thunder-road-vendetta/Loud, dumb, gleefully random car-combat mayhem that knows exactly what it's for and never pretends to be anything more sophisticated.Mon, 20 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMTBoard GamesElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/harry-potter/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/harry-potter/A reread of the series that put me in three different reader camps at once, and a stage-play coda that split the fandom harder than any of the actual novels did.Wed, 15 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMTBooksElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/magical-athlete/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/magical-athlete/A roll-and-move race game held together entirely by the drafting phase and the collisions between broken character powers, and not much else.Sat, 11 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMTBoard GamesElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/brass-birmingham/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/brass-birmingham/A brutally interlocking economic engine that earns its top-of-the-charts reputation, wrapped in art direction I still don't fully understand the acclaim for.Mon, 06 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMTBoard GamesElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/the-punch-list-i-run-on-every-game-now/https://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/the-punch-list-i-run-on-every-game-now/Nine years of writing up other people's houses trained a habit I didn't notice until Dale pointed out I was doing it to his board games too.Sun, 29 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMTPersonalElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/kemet-blood-and-sand/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/kemet-blood-and-sand/A streamlined, better-looking remake of a genuinely great area control game, undercut a little by a rulebook that never quite gets out of its own way.Wed, 25 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMTBoard GamesElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/six-years-in-and-i-still-keep-the-receipts/https://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/six-years-in-and-i-still-keep-the-receipts/A small, stubborn routine: why I've never once taken a free review copy, and the specific reason it matters more to me than it probably should.Sat, 14 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMTPersonalElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/star-realms/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/star-realms/A tiny, sharp, aggressive deckbuilder that plays in twenty minutes and somehow still burns players out after a few hundred rounds.Wed, 04 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMTBoard GamesElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/thinking-fast-and-slow/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/thinking-fast-and-slow/Kahneman's map of the two systems running your brain, exhaustive almost to a fault, and genuinely hard to argue with once you've caught yourself making the mistakes it describes.Fri, 30 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMTBooksElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/foundation/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/foundation/Asimov's founding text of the genre, built almost entirely out of conversation and cold political calculation instead of action, which is exactly why it still holds up.Wed, 28 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMTBooksElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/ninefox-gambit/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/ninefox-gambit/A military sci-fi novel that throws you into a calendar-based magic system with zero glossary and dares you to keep up, which is either thrilling or exhausting depending entirely on your tolerance for confusion.Thu, 22 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMTBooksElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/what-hail-season-does-to-a-kansas-city-roof-and-my-schedule/https://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/what-hail-season-does-to-a-kansas-city-roof-and-my-schedule/Late spring in Missouri means storms on a schedule nobody controls, a phone that won't stop ringing, and a stretch of months where reading and gaming both get pushed to whatever's left of the evening.Tue, 13 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMTPersonalElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/castles-of-burgundy-special-edition/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/castles-of-burgundy-special-edition/The same tight, action-chaining point salad it's always been, dressed up in acrylic and 3D buildings that mostly justify the markup, mostly.Fri, 02 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMTBoard GamesElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/at-home-in-the-universe/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/at-home-in-the-universe/Stuart Kauffman's argument that life might not be an improbable accident so much as something complexity itself tends toward, dense, occasionally self-indulgent, and hard to shake once you've read it.Wed, 31 Dec 2025 00:00:00 GMTBooksElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/the-five-stars-i-took-back/https://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/the-five-stars-i-took-back/A mistake, admitted honestly: a game I rated a 5 on the strength of one incredible night, and the harder conversation with myself once six more plays wore the shine off.Fri, 26 Dec 2025 00:00:00 GMTPersonalElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/why-i-read-the-rulebook-cover-to-cover-first/https://elliotunfiltered.com/essays/why-i-read-the-rulebook-cover-to-cover-first/A habit that annoys my own game group more than any other, and the specific job-trained reason I refuse to teach from a skim.Sat, 29 Nov 2025 00:00:00 GMTPersonalElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/spirit-island/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/spirit-island/The deepest cooperative game on my shelf, and one that earns every bit of its reputation for punishing analysis paralysis right alongside the invaders.Thu, 27 Nov 2025 00:00:00 GMTBoard GamesElliot Rhodeshttps://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/the-dispossessed/https://elliotunfiltered.com/reviews/the-dispossessed/Le Guin's ambiguous utopia, a physicist shuttling between an anarchist moon and the world it fled, still the sharpest argument against easy answers I've read in the genre.Tue, 18 Nov 2025 00:00:00 GMTBooksElliot Rhodes