We had quite a bit of fun last year with our series of discussion reviews, looking back at games we’d previously covered over the years. Ideally we’d have liked to have done one or two more, but these things take time, and ultimately we considered that going back and re-playing games we’d already covered, and dissecting what we’d previously said about them, wasn’t the best use of our time, especially considering our already, um, steady update schedule.

Since then, though, we’ve been toying with the idea of returning to the format in some other capacity – one that actually involves new content being posted to FFG. What we came up with, eventually, was the following idea: a regular feature, provisionally called “The Two-Week Review”, which would involve one or the other of us picking a old game (preferably abandonware) to be played over a two-week period, at the end of which an MSN discussion would be convened, hammered into a readable shape, and added to the journal.

Well, we’ve ditched the name, and the two-week concept, mainly to sidestep likely future embarrassment at being unable to keep to it (tellingly, our first attempt took roughly two months, rather than two weeks, to come to fruition), but we’re going to stick with the idea.

It’s not that we’re bored with the standard review format, or are running out of things we want to cover. The general principle is really to try and have a bit of fun looking back at some oldies that we might not have otherwise played, without necessarily worrying about producing a reasonably detailed review at the end of it. Plus, the experience of discussion retrospectives last year was quite an enjoyable one, and it felt pretty good to actually work on something together for a change, rather than simply using FFG as a shared dumping ground for our individual work.

We haven’t really set out any hard and fast rules. In fact, our first effort has actually been added as a review, rather than as a journal entry. In this instance, we figured we’d seen enough of what the game had to offer and covered most of what either of us wanted to say during the discussion. On other occasions, though, it might not be appropriate: it might be that we don’t feel we know enough about what a game has to offer at the discussion stage, at which point one of us might continue work on putting together a review, or we might just decide that it’s not worth any further time or coverage.

Either way, we figure that the worst-case scenario is that we have some new content, even if it’s just a journal post offering some initial thoughts on a previously-untried oldie.

Any thoughts on our first effort, or the idea in general, would be most welcome.