Alec Winslow reviews speculative fiction books and board games from his basement, plus the odd personal essay.https://alecfromthebasement.com/en-UShttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/vantage/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/vantage/Nearly eight hundred locations across four hundred cards and it still comes down to three stats, which is a little underwhelming for the scale of the thing.Thu, 20 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMTVantageAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/the-insert-i-built-after-hours/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/the-insert-i-built-after-hours/The shop has a laser cutter nobody uses after five, and I finally admitted to myself why I kept staying late.Tue, 18 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/i-was-wrong-about-mage-knight/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/i-was-wrong-about-mage-knight/I almost traded it away after my second play. I'm glad something stopped me, even if I can't fully explain what.Mon, 17 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/dekes-table-eight-years-later/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/dekes-table-eight-years-later/The guy who got me into this hobby retired last month, and I finally told him what that folding table actually meant.Sun, 02 Aug 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/brass-birmingham/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/brass-birmingham/The board is so dark you'll want a real light over the table, and the rest of the game is bright enough to make up for it.Tue, 28 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTBrass: BirminghamAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/do-androids-dream-of-electric-sheep/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/do-androids-dream-of-electric-sheep/I'd seen Blade Runner a dozen times before I finally read this, and separating the two turned out to be harder than I expected.Fri, 24 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTDo Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?Alec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/blood-rage/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/blood-rage/The vikings apparently invented drafting, and honestly the whole game is more fun than I expected from something built on losing your dudes on purpose.Sun, 19 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTBlood RageAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/clank/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/clank/Ascension with a board is the honest description, and the dragon bag is the best idea in it.Fri, 17 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTClank!Alec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/mistborn/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/mistborn/The magic system is the star of the show here, and it holds to its own rules better than almost anything else on my shelf.Sat, 11 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTMistbornAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/behave/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/behave/Nearly eight hundred pages sorted by how many seconds or centuries before the behavior in question, and I lingered on every one of them.Wed, 24 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMTBehaveAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/what-a-west-michigan-winter-does-to-a-reading-chair/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/what-a-west-michigan-winter-does-to-a-reading-chair/Lake effect snow turns my basement into the only room in the house I actually want to be in, and my reading count doubles because of it.Sat, 30 May 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/from-bacteria-to-bach-and-back/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/from-bacteria-to-bach-and-back/I don't think I'd pass a test on everything in here, but the parts that got through changed how I think about my own mind.Wed, 27 May 2026 00:00:00 GMTFrom Bacteria to Bach and BackAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/mage-knight/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/mage-knight/Learning this game is training for a marathon, and I mean that as praise and complaint in the same breath.Sat, 09 May 2026 00:00:00 GMTMage Knight Board GameAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/the-study-of-instinct/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/the-study-of-instinct/An old book, and it shows its age in places, but it's more than worth the effort to actually sit with.Mon, 13 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMTThe Study of InstinctAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/slay-the-spire/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/slay-the-spire/I went in as a skeptic of hyped video game adaptations and came out sleeving cards at eleven at night, so that tells you something.Wed, 08 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMTSlay the Spire: The Board GameAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/andromedas-edge/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/andromedas-edge/Everyone's going to tell you this is Dwellings of Eldervale in space, and it is, but the insert alone should get its own line in the rulebook.Sun, 05 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMTAndromeda's EdgeAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/teaching-my-kid-to-lose-on-purpose/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/teaching-my-kid-to-lose-on-purpose/She wanted to quit halfway through and I almost let her, and then I didn't, and I'm still not sure which choice was the right one.Wed, 18 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/the-long-way-home-along-the-grand-river/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/the-long-way-home-along-the-grand-river/The straight route home takes fourteen minutes. The one I actually take takes twenty two, and I've stopped pretending that's an accident.Sat, 07 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/the-fault-that-wasnt-a-fault/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/the-fault-that-wasnt-a-fault/Spent four hours chasing a sensor that was lying to me, then came home and did the exact same thing to a rulebook.Tue, 03 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/ancillary-justice/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/ancillary-justice/A vengeful AI in a human body stalks the ruler of the galaxy, and yes, she sings a lot, and yes, it's slower than that logline makes it sound.Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMTAncillary JusticeAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/why-i-dont-play-solo/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/why-i-dont-play-solo/Half my shelf has a solo mode built in and I've used maybe three of them, and I finally worked out why that number is so low.Mon, 16 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/sentinels-of-the-multiverse/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/sentinels-of-the-multiverse/Every card in play has to be consulted against every other card in play, and by hour two that bookkeeping is doing more work than the theme is.Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMTSentinels of the MultiverseAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/poetics-of-relation/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/poetics-of-relation/Not something I'd normally reach for off my own shelf, but a friend's recommendation turned into one of the denser, more rewarding reads of my year.Fri, 23 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMTPoetics of RelationAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/i-will-not-sleeve-my-cards/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/i-will-not-sleeve-my-cards/Every reviewer I trust tells me to sleeve everything and I've decided I just don't care, and I want to actually defend that instead of apologizing for it.Thu, 22 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/sixty-cards-in/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/sixty-cards-in/The index card rack by the basement stairs started as a way to stop forgetting what I thought about things, and it's turned into something closer to a ledger of the last few years.Mon, 05 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMTpersonal_essayAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/dune/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/dune/Herbert didn't just write a book, he built a whole galaxy, and it's still worth getting lost in decades later.Sat, 03 Jan 2026 00:00:00 GMTDuneAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/starfish/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/starfish/An energy company sends abuse survivors three thousand meters down to run a geothermal plant, and somehow that's the least strange part of the book.Fri, 26 Dec 2025 00:00:00 GMTStarfishAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/sleeping-gods/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/sleeping-gods/The box says one to twenty hours, which is a lie, but the story that stretch of time actually tells is worth the honesty gap.Tue, 23 Dec 2025 00:00:00 GMTSleeping GodsAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/foundation/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/foundation/It reads more like Aesop's fables strung together than a novel, and once I stopped expecting a plot to carry it, I liked it a lot more.Mon, 15 Dec 2025 00:00:00 GMTFoundationAlec Winslowhttps://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/gloomhaven-jaws-of-the-lion/https://alecfromthebasement.com/articles/gloomhaven-jaws-of-the-lion/The one real complaint everyone has is fitting it back in the box, which tells you how little else there is to complain about.Fri, 12 Dec 2025 00:00:00 GMTGloomhaven: Jaws of the LionAlec Winslow