Social Games

Because of a bet, Billy is in the uncomfortable position of having to eat 15 worms in 15 days. The worms are supplied by his opponent, whose motto is "the bigger and juicier, the better"! At first Billy's problem is whether or not he can swallow the worm placed before him, even with a choice of condiments from peanut butter to horseradish. But later it looks as if Billy will win, and the challenge becomes getting to the worm to eat it. Billy's family, after checking with the doctor, takes everything in stride.

In a near-future society, gaming is everything! Professional esports teams are the mainstream celebrities and kids begin training as young hopefuls aspiring for the big leagues. Twelve-year-old Reyna Cheng is the up-and-coming junior amateur Dayhold gamer, competing in a VR battle royale against AI monsters and human players alike. But despite Reyna's rising popularity and skills, no one know who she is. Gaming is still a boy's club, and to protect herself against trolls, she games as the mysterious TheRuiNar.

At thirteen years old, Valeria "Magic" Salomón is already the best soccer player her town has ever seen. She has talent in spades and an abuelo whose tough-love coaching and lessons about “strength and honor” have made her the star of the Overlords, the top boys’ team in the state. But everything changes at the State Cup semi-final when Valeria gets her first period while Wearing. White. Shorts. After her team is unexpectedly eliminated, she goes from their secret weapon to their scapegoat.

Designers & Dragons: The ’70s is a comprehensive picture of the beginnings of the RPG industry. This second edition expands the original single book into a series of four, and we’ve added over 50,000 new words to this volume alone. Learn about the colorful history of TSR and the wave of D&D inspired games (and gaming companies) to follow, and dip your toes into war gaming trivia. Regardless of your gaming background, Shannon Appelcline’s meticulously researched history won’t disappoint.

A riveting account of the birth and remarkable evolution of the most important development in entertainment since television, Replay is the ultimate history of video games. From its origins in the research labs of the 1940s to the groundbreaking success of the Wii, Replay sheds new light on gaming's past.

Ella of Frell wants nothing more than to be free of Lucinda's gift of obedience and feel that she belongs to herself. For how can she truly belong to herself if she knows that at any time, anyone can order her to hop on one foot, cut off her hand, or betray her kingdom, and she'll have to obey?

Con men are artists of persuasion and exploiters of trust. They hold a deep, enigmatic fascination for us. But how do they do it? Whether it's a suspicious-looking email or a multimillion-dollar global swindle, Maria Konnikova investigates the psychological principles that underlie each stage of the confidence game and the profile of both the con artist and his mark.

In How We Can Win, Jones delves into the impacts of systemic racism and reveals how her formative years in Chicago gave birth to a lifelong devotion to justice. Here, in a vital expansion of her declaration, she calls for Reconstruction 2.0, a multilayered plan to reclaim economic and social restitutions - those restitutions promised with emancipation but blocked, again and again, for more than 150 years. And, most of all, Jones delivers strategies for how we can effect change as citizens and allies while nurturing ourselves in the fight against a system that is still rigged.

Bruce Bueno de Mesquita is a master of game theory, which is a fancy label for a simple idea: People compete, and they always do what they think is in their own best interest. Bueno de Mesquita uses game theory and its insights into human behavior to predict and even engineer political, financial, and personal events. His forecasts, which have been employed by everyone from the CIA to major business firms, have an amazing 90 percent accuracy rate.

Claire Costas, a popular gaming blogger, is crazy about computers and even more about gaming. She feels safe, secure and content living this virtual life, until her opinions stirrs some resentment that's slowly translating into a threat to her safety. Adam, a strangely compelling guy she meets in-game charms her and when they finally meet, sparks fly and he's convinced she might be the one. They embark on a romance filled with sweet gestures and steamy nights. But when someone leaks Claire's blogging identity to the internet, their lives are turned upside down and Adam will risk it all to ...

Everyone in Bayport can't wait for the biggest event of the season: the premiere of G-Force - the newest ride by the world-renowned Piperato Brothers. Their creation is going to change the fortunes of Funsport, Bayport's small and recently run-down amusement park. Frank and Joe are friends with Daisy Rodriguez, the owner's daughter, and are first in line for the ride's launch. Purple lights click off, a huge whoosh emanates from the floor, loud music pulses....

Getting Gamers will show that rather than being a waste of time, video games can help us develop skills, make friends, succeed at work, form good habits, and be happy. Taking the time to learn what's happening in our heads as we play and shop allows us to approach games and gaming communities on our own terms and get more out of them. With examples from the games themselves, Jamie Madigan offers a fuller understanding of the impact of games on our psychology and the influence of psychology on our games.

Today, most Westerners still see the war in Afghanistan as a contest between democracy and Islamist fanaticism. That war is real, but it sits atop an older struggle between Kabul and the countryside, between order and chaos, between a modernist impulse to join the world and the pull of an older Afghanistan - a tribal universe of village republics permeated by Islam. Now, Tamim Ansary draws on his Afghan background, Muslim roots, and Western and Afghan sources to explain history from the inside out and to illuminate the long, internal struggle that the outside world has never fully understood.

For nearly 40 years, Washington and much of the American public have held up disclosure and campaign finance laws as ideals and the path to cleaner and freer elections. This book will show, through firsthand accounts, how both have been hijacked by the Left as weapons against free speech and free association, becoming the most powerful tools of those intent on silencing their political opposition.

Inspired by the groundbreaking A History of the World in 100 Objects, this book draws on the unique collections of The Strong museum in Rochester, New York, to chronicle the evolution of video games, from Pong to first-person shooters, told through the stories of dozens of objects essential to the field’s creation and development. Drawing on the World Video Game Hall of Fame’s unmatched collection of video game artifacts, this fascinating history offers an expansive look at the development of one of the most popular and influential activities of the modern world: video gaming.

Do you have relationships you'd like to repair but feel it's too late or don't know where to start? It could be a co-worker, ex-friend, or family member. Perhaps the conflict has gone on for so long that trying something new and different seems hardly worth the effort or even feels like a complete waste of time. In Build New Bridges: The Art of Restoring Impossible Relationships, author Greg Stephens offers practical tools and hope for tackling seemingly insurmountable conflicts.

A step by step analysis of the future we can expect.

Millions of us love sports—playing, supporting, watching. But have you ever thought about how your love for sports connects with your love for Jesus? This book will show you what the Bible says. You’ll discover a more liberating approach than feeling a bit guilty, a deeper approach than seeing sports as only an evangelistic opportunity, and a better approach than not linking your faith and your love of sports at all.

The original Dungeons & Dragons released by TSR (Tactical Studies Rules) in 1974 created a radical new medium: the role-playing game. For the next two decades, TSR rocketed to success. But by 1997, a series of ruinous choices and failed projects brought TSR to the edge of doom—only to be saved by their fiercest competitor, Wizards of the Coast. Unearthed from Ben Riggs’s own adventurous campaign of in-depth research, interviews with major players, and acquisitions of secret documents, Slaying the Dragon reveals the true story of the rise and fall of TSR.

Sinn Féin is the most popular political party in both Northern Ireland and the Republic. A movement once synonymous with a paramilitary campaign is on the brink of taking real power through purely democratic means. But if Sinn Féin has mastered the art of electoral politics, it remains strangely opaque. Who really runs the party? How is it funded? And what can we expect of it as a party of government? Aoife Moore, Irish Journalist of the Year in 2021, explores these and other burning questions in The Long Game.