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Secret Hitler, Arkham Horror, Terraforming Mars, Tumbling Monkeys—just some of the board games in the bright paper boxes at  808 Games. In one corner of the café, four drunk patrons squabbled over tokens the size of their fingernails. In another corner, three women were engrossed in their first session of ROOT, a strategy game about animals trying to rule the forest. The players are strangers to each other, but they have played together online every week for a month. A player who goes by Ms X_X on the social media platform X, held a paper pamphlet twice the size of her hand while she mulled over the colourful tokens. Her two fellow players pored over the rules book like a treasure map. Chris Lo, the owner of 808 Games and a veteran of the board game industry for over 11 years, approached them for assistance. “Has my turn ended?”  X_X asked. “Not yet. You still have to do a night action,” Lo replied. This is a typical afternoon at 808 Games. a board game café in Mong Kok which rents out games to its customers for an hourly fee. It has an assortment of games ranging from UNO to Cthulhu: Death May Die, a lengthy campaign board game which includes a 60cm plastic statue of Cthulhu, a mythical creature in the Lovecraft horror. The cluttered café has been in operation since 2010, making it the oldest board game café in Hong Kong. Since then, other cafés such as Wheat and Wood, a casual café centered around socializing, or Jolly Thinkers, which has its own Board Game educator programme, have opened in Hong Kong There are now more than ten board game cafés in the city. Since 2010, 808 Games has gone through two owners, one renovation and a pandemic. Lo, …

Cantopop has played an important role in Hong Kong music culture since 1960, yet faced criticism for being dominated by mainstream love songs, or so-called “K-songs”. The term “K-song” appeared 20 to 30 years ago and comes from the word “karaoke”, a popular choice of activity teenagers like to do in the 80s-90s, according to Michael Kam Wing-hin, associate programme director of the associate degree in social sciences at College of Institute. Some say that the emergence of “K-song” reflects the musical preferences of mainstream audiences while critics say K song is a commercial act adopted by music production companies to gain profit. Jacky Chueng, one of the four “Heavenly Kings” in Cantopop, had high sales of his K songs in the 80s and 90s, but his jazz style in the later years led to mediocre sales, Kam said. “This situation may reflect that ‘K songs’ have a good response and audience acceptance, but it does not necessarily mean that the quality of ‘K songs’ is high. While those with a high level of musical quality does not mean that they are easy to become hits,” said Kam. As K songs guaranteed commercial success, companies have shifted their attention more to producing these types of songs, which reduced the diversity of songs in the music industry, and led to mass production of songs with similar characteristics. Kam agreed K songs are a product of the music market. Songwriters tend to produce K songs because audience acceptance and market response is the key to decide whether a song is hot or not, and K songs are mostly about love, with catchy melodies that are easy for people to sing along with, gaining a lot of concern and support, Kam said. “K song” is also seen as a way for artists to …