Game Night Report for October 18, 2007

We finally have a Thursday evening free and Mark takes off and cancels game night. Grrr. Fortunately it was Mike C. to the rescue and he opened us his bachelor pad (ha! not for long, apparently) to his fellow game geeks.

Uptown

Oh my, I AM liking this little jewel. This was the first playing for me but I've played it twice since. Originally, this looked like a bland little abstract in the same vein as many others. Plus, it is (was?) only available from Funagain which is rather pricey for an online store. But, since Ed had heard good things about it, their savvy marketing ploy worked and we placed our last game order with them. Good decision. This is an excellent game which falls in the beloved Ingenius/Qwirkle category for me. It's short and simple yet requires a bit of thinking to do well. It also has a lot of that delicious "oh, please, please let me draw the tile I need" drama. The game is very clever and different enough from others like it to make me glad I have a copy. Btw, this would make a good "spouse game" for those of you always on the lookout for such.

Himalaya

I've written about this fine game before. I was hoping to try it with the 5& 6 player expansion but we ended up with just three. It was a little less tense with fewer players as there was more room to wander without constantly running into someone else. And yet Mike still managed to irritate me several times by stealing things out from under my nose! It was still enjoyable though, and a very close game.

Phoenicia

This is an economic snowball game which means that I should adore it, but for some reason I was unimpressed. I think that there have been so many of these types of games in recent years that I've gotten picky. I have played one of its predecessors, The Scepter of Zavandor, but it was a long time ago and I remember that the game seemed very confusing, in part because of the theme and a weird thing with the currency in the game. The theme in Phoenicia doesn't grab me either and feels downright boring although it at least makes sense. As far as the game play goes, I felt like I got sucked onto a particular path too early, leaving me with few options. It felt a bit too scripted. Okay, I'll just admit it. I was bored. In contrast, I really enjoyed another recent game of this type, Pillars of the Earth. I know that I am making any members of the Carnivore Club cringe, but I really like the excitement and tactical adjustments that have to be made when a little luck is thrown into a game's design. That being said, I really wouldn't mind playing Phoenicia again to see if my opinion improves. These types of games need to be played multiple times to really get a good feel for them. We'll see.

I don't think Ed took any pictures but Mike posted one along with his thoughts on the games he played here.

Random gaming thoughts:

Essen: Usually, I am salivating over the previews, reviews, reports, pictures and any other little tidbits that the lucky gamers who go are willing to throw out in the various online forums and blogs. This year- not so much. Sure, I kept one eye on it, but to be honest, there was just too much. Waaaayyy too much. The cream will float to the top and even get published in English eventually. These days, I'm not even guaranteed to like the cream. And, if we miss something, we can just be happy playing one of the other 800+ (!) games we own. I do appreciate all the in-depth reports people have been posting and I have been skimming them. My favorite is Mike Siggins' blog. His entertaining short takes on the games are just the right amount of coverage for my game-overloaded brain.

Big-box buying: I'm surprised about how many of our gaming dollars have been spent at our local big-box stores lately. We all know that those gaming aisles are supposed to be devoid of anything worthwhile for the serious elite gamer. (I guess I'm not one of those!) A few weeks ago, there was a 30% off sale on Hasbro games at Toys R Us and I scored the new Swarm of the Marro base set for Heroscape. This past week I went back and joy of joys, they had gotten in the Monopoly Express game that I was raving about in my previous post. But, that wasn't all. They had all of the exclusive Heroscape flagbearers in stock! We had been trying to get those in math trades, thinking them to be long gone from the stores. They have now been tucked away for Shea for Christmas. I am also eyeing a "Where's Waldo" type of game at Target called Pictureka. Frank Branham had nice things to say about it in his blog on BGN. Obviously, I'm regressing as a gamer by buying "toys," a party game and a game with Monopoly in the title ;-) However, we are planning to get 1960: The Making of the President soon so I guess I'm not too far gone yet!

A wasted morning

I stumbled across this little time-waster this morning. Look away now, lest you be sucked in too!

Monopoly Express

I've been keeping my eye for these Express games at my local big box stores but I haven't seen them show up yet. I love push-your-luck games so this is a must buy. Perhaps if it is small enough it can join Cinq-o at the bottom of my purse and be another game I carry around "just in case."

Thrifting

I come from a long line of antique and junk collectors. I spent a lot of my youth being dragged to garage and estate sales and of course, thrift stores like the Goodwill. It's in my genes. It carried over into my early adulthood but then died as our household income increased and my free time decreased. The bug has hit me again. The catalyst was an out-of-print author whose books I've fallen in love with and which sell for ridiculously high prices on eBay. So, I've started scouring the local thrift stores and I've discovered that Austin has plenty of them and many are conveniently located along one particular drag, Burnet Rd. I haven't found a single book yet, but I've found plenty of new or nearly new clothes, including some made by Abercrombie and Fitch, highly coveted by my son Kevin. I've found a few nice knick-knacks and I've found a few games. You have to have time and patience to shop in these places and be willing to dig through lots of crapola to find the treasures. Right now, I'm thoroughly enjoying it. Not only is it saving us money, but it also appeals to my "voluntary simplicity" side. There is way too much waste in our society. Ed however, hates thrift stores. All he sees when he walks in is a bunch of junk and old clothes!

Naturally, I scour the game/toy section of these places when I go. I haven't found any shrink-wrapped copies of Dune or Jati yet, but I have found some pretty nice deals on mainstream games. If you haven't noticed, there are a few good games on the shelves of your local big box store or have been in years past. Really. For a few bucks, I'm willing to take a chance on a few games and if nothing else, my money is helping somebody else. If they turn out to be duds, I'll just donate them back. Here are a few of my recent "treasures."

Clue DVD Game. This game seems gets some high praise on BGG from gamers whose opinions I respect. I love deduction games and this game is currently around $26 in stores. I got a pristine copy for $3. I hope to put my new laptop that plays DVDs to use and try this one out soon.

Moods. This is one of the few party games that I enjoy. I have a copy myself but it is a hard game to find now. I couldn't resist picking up another copy for $5 at the Goodwill. That box was torn up but the contents were still in shrink. The original owners missed out a real treat. Maybe we can trade it in a math trade on BGG.

Can't Stop. I've found two copies for about $1 each with beat up boxes but complete contents. What a great game. I'm tempted to give these copies to friends.

Heroscape. I found a complete master set, mostly in shrink, for $5. You can never have too much of Heroscape. Both of my kids love building with it. There is currently a large set-up upstairs. Some expansions need to show up in thrift stores next.

Equate and Tribulation. The first is Scrabble with math equations instead of words and the second is a math version of Boggle. I was a math nerd in high school and my son is even worse. I haven't gotten to try them with him yet but at a $1.50 apiece, it's hard to go wrong. If they don't catch our fancy, I'll donate them to his school. They would be great in a math class.

Some older finds include Traverse (neat abstract game), Liar's Dice, Apples to Apples, Conspiracy, Clue - The Great Museum Caper, Scrutineyes, and an old copy of Diplomacy.

I pass over many nice Ravensburger kid's games because we either have them or my kids are too old. I've also ignored the 999 copies of Trivial Pursuit that I've seen. I see lots and lots of party games that I'm tempted to buy but we rarely play them.

The worst problem with buying games from a thrift store is that games are often missing pieces. I always open them up and count the pieces, but sometimes the boxes are taped shut by somebody who got a little over zealous with the packing tape. Just recently, I came across a copy of a 40th anniversary edition of Risk. I wouldn't normally be interested in Risk but the box claimed that it had all metal pieces which sounded neat. However, the box felt waaay too light to be full of metal. I broke the tape and discovered only the board and rules were inside. Bummer.

Btw, if you are from Austin, this entire post is all a lie. The thrift stores here are terrible and I've never found anything decent - just old copies of Candyland with bent cards. So, don't even bother going to any of these awful places. ;-)

Good Games and Sad News

Well, we finally did get a game of Battlelore in although it took two weeks of having the game set up and ready to go on a table in our living room. (Yes, we keep a big, ugly, plastic folding table smack-dab in the middle of our living room) We played the second scenario in the book. What a nail-biter! Ed beat me by one flag. I only needed one more turn to take him out. I love these Command & Color games. They don't overwhelm me with too many picky details or units to maneuver on any given turn. Battlelore will probably end up being my favorite due to the fantasy theme and the Days of Wondrous components. I can't wait to try a scenario with creatures and lore. That badass spider wants out of the box!

I also finally got to play Arkadia which I surprisingly loved. I knew it was a good game, having been nominated for the Spiel des Jahres and garnering many compliments by fellow gamers. However, many of the newer eurogames have been falling flat and feeling same-y to me lately. I mistakenly thought Arkadia was yet another majority control game when in fact, it's not. It's more about set collecting and timing when to sell your sets for the maximum profit. It has a nice spatial element that is card driven and the game allows for a little looking ahead to try to set up clever plays. It has that puzzle-y feel I enjoy and I like it a whole lot better than Zooloretto, the game that did take home the SdJ. I guess it's hard to compete against baby pandas for a family game award.

Lastly, I got to play the new 10 Days is Asia, a fine addition to this series of games. The trains add a nice new twist and once again my poor geography skills were challenged. I was rather disappointed in the quality of some of the components, though. I'm not sure I like the new larger map with its valleys and some of the tiles came already marked while still in shrink. At least that is an improvement over our 10 Days in Europe copy which came with many of the tiles stuck together.

I'm going to end this blog entry on a sad note. Last week, Ed and I, and a few others, attended the memorial services for Helen Dunsmoir, an off and on member of our gaming group for many years. Helen was challenged by a myriad of health problems that finally became too much for her body to take. She was unusually upbeat these past few months and seemed to enjoy our game days. We recently spent a very pleasant afternoon playing Empire Builder. She was only 40 years old :-(

Here's a picture from earlier in the year of Helen (on the right) and me playing To Court the King. Helen loved this game and nearly always requested it as a closer on our game days.