The Downfall of Pompeii

If I had to describe the current popular technological advances that face the masses, I'd have to describe it as "blending."  A blu-ray player can also hop onto Hulu or Netflix to stream videos.  Your television can sync with a tablet device and act as a larger screen.  Your phone probably either has a camera or a built-in mp3 player.  Even non-entertainment-based technology seems to be coming together, with bluetooth services available in cars for easy telephone use, shoes that sync with your phone to count your steps, and a chair that refills your empty beer.  Obviously we are living in a golden age.

Now, board games don't have the same luxuries.  We all remember the games that tried to advance technology from earlier times.  They either involved swiping a pretend charge card as you travelled through a mall, playing the sound of a missile that missed a battleship, or using an electronic randomizer to replace dice.  Better blendings in board games tend to come from historical periods, allowing you to either retrace the original rail lines of America, simulate the early settler expansion across America, or in the case of one of my favorite board games, repeat an event that caused the deaths of sixteen thousand people.

Let's dig in.