November 2009

As always, there was exciting new stuff launched at the Essen show last month, and this is now turning up here. I was surprised and pleased to be able to get some of the limited edition versions of the new Warfrog releases, both Last Train to Wensleydale and Playground of the Gods coming in the posh format. Most excitement at Essen was caused by Stronghold (2-4 players, lots of bits, quite long), Factory Manager (which we have already played and like, it is quite a lot quicker than the popular Power Grid by the same designer and reminiscent of the late lamented Industrial Waste) , and Tobago (very neat fairly lightweight game with nice pieces too, would sell by the truckload if it were the price it would have been before the collapse of the Pound). There is plenty of other good stuff too. A Brief History of the World is a streamlined version of Ragnar Brothers' classic from the nineties, Rise of Empires is another promising Civilisation-building game that should just squeeze into an evening, Imperial 2030 is an up-dated version of Splotter's very fine Imperial from three years back, there is the new Farmers of the Moor expansion for Agricola, there are even two little expansions for Small World, Grand Dames of Small World and Cursed. Grind is also attracting favourable comment as an alternative to the scarce and ageing Bloodbowl. But despite all these, my personal favourite from the last couple of months is still Ad Astra.

All of the above are medium or heavy weight, what of the lighter games? We have been keeping a copy of Musketeers to hand and slip in a game or two at the drop of a hat. It was one of a constant flow of small games from Gryphon Games - their Incan Gold and Roll Through the Ages are our other favourite quickies. I'm sure it won't be long before someone here gets tempted to try their latest offering, Bacchus, being on a subject dear to several hearts. And perhaps the greatest news is that we tracked down a couple of dozen copies of the out-of-print Tsuro. They are mostly slightly dented so we have most of them at a reduced price - nothing serious in the way of damage but only a few would be properly suitable as presents. However, this is the ideal game for a mixture of gamers and non-gamers at Christmas, every home should have one. Very simple in essence, very quick, very pretty, and plays well right through the range of numbers of players, which is an exceptional 2 - 8.

More suggestions soon, meanwhile here are my last suggestions, and below that, links to assorted favourites which are all normally still available.

September 2009

There has been so much exciting stuff lately that I have finally been driven to putting finger to keyboard - aided by the first signs of impending autumn with the resultant curtailment of outdoor pursuits. Any unfinished house, garage and shop renovations will have to wait till next year.

The biggest news as far as I am concerned is the return of Interplay, possibly my favourite two-player abstract game, and in a nice version too. The last version was pocket-sized and in garish colours, hardly likely to please the people of taste and discernment who are the natural Interplay players. This one I like.
The players take turns inserting long or short pegs into the holes in the 7 x 7 rectangular board; the aim is to get a row of 5, in one of three different combinations of long and short pegs. The row can be up and down, across, or diagonal, so before long there are several potential threats to keep an eye on while forming your own plans. The twist is that of the eight short pegs, half are hollow, and can share a space with an opponent's long peg. You cannot have two of your own pegs in a shared hole, so there is no way to stop your opponent from putting a long peg into one of your hollow short pegs, or dropping a hollow peg round one of your long'uns. And of course this works both ways. You can't just use the solid pegs, they will be needed for emergency blocking and those risky hollow ones will have to be in play. Early games tend to be very short as traps are sprung, and even with two experienced players a climax is reached before very long.

A brand new game that grabbed my attention is Ra: the dice game. I was very pleased to see the normal Ra back in print, as it was one of the classic games that established Reiner Knitzia's reputation back in the Nineties. With Roll through the Ages having become a firm favourite, Sally even having insisted that we have our own copy, the question was, could we justify having the dice version of Ra as well? Temptation soon got the better of me (and be it said, I am usually surprisingly strong willed in these matters, I have to be with so many desirable games around me all the time).
So, how does dice Ra compare with Roll through the Ages, and also with the original Ra game?

In Roll through the Ages, each player starts by rolling 3 dice with assorted symbols, and can re-roll twice, Yahtzee-style. Men can be used to build monuments of various sizes for victory points, but also to build cities which give you more dice. Theses cities have to be fed, by rolling food symbols; hungry cities result in deductions from your VPs. Finally there are goods and coin symbols; these can be used to buy upgrades to your civilisation, which both score VPs and add various advantages in your subsequent turns. Some of the goods symbols are accompanied by Disaster symbols, which cannot be re-rolled (except by using one of the above-mentioned upgrades); these can affect you or your opponents depending on how many are rolled and who has which upgrades. There is a rather cunning system of determining how much your goods are worth, and how you can save them up to buy the more expensive upgrades. As soon as someone has five upgrades the game finishes, keeping it short, so it is an ideal opener for a gaming session - though sufficiently addictive to be played repeatedly, all evening sometimes.

The original Ra is a set-collecting game, where face down tiles are turned over one at a time and laid out in row until someone chooses to start an auction for the face up tiles instead of adding another. If a Ra tile is turned over an auction starts automatically, and when several Ra tiles have been turned over the round ends and scoring is done; you need to have acquired Pharaohs, Civilisations, Nile tiles and preferably a Flood. After three rounds the game ends, Monuments are scored only then, but can be a game winner. Bidding for tiles to deny someone a winning combo is very much part of the game, and there are other little details and subtleties which make it such a good game.

The dice version retains the feel of the original while using a similar mechanism to Roll through the Ages. You always roll five dice; rather than pushing your luck on how far to let the tile track fill up before bidding for the tiles, you are deciding how lucky you feel on the re-rolls. Whereas in Roll through the Ages the scores and upgrades are marked on rather nifty individual wooden peg boards and on score pads, in Ra the position of all players in all areas of progress is clear to see on a shared board. For me, this makes it the neater game, but there is more variety of strategies in Roll. Suffice to say that if either game is being played early on a Wednesday night gaming session in the shop, both Sally and I will be drawn away from the work we are trying to finish. With both being for four players max, it is as well to have both games out and ready. They both play well with two, but the more the merrier - the original Ra is for 3 - 5, so to that extent they complement rather than compete with each other.

The next game I will mention is Days of Steam. It is essentially Steam Lite, Steam being the latest incarnation of Martin Wallace's Age of Steam. That was a fine game, but distinctly for the more serious gamer; it was all too easy to get things horribly wrong. Steam is definitely more user-friendly, but Days of Steam is even easier to open up and play with the very minimum of rules reading. In that respect it is similar to the well-established Ticket to Ride, but it just appeals to me more. It plays pretty well with two, three or four, it's quick, and under 20 quid - every home should have one.

Finally, I have now had several games of Galactic Emperor and always enjoy it while showing no signs of being likely to win. It is a space domination game in which you get to build nice big dreadnoughts and invade other people's territory - or you could sit quietly and build up points while no-one is looking, but that is really not what it is all about. With none of the overcomplexity that can so easily bedevil such games, it keeps everyone constantly involved and plays in an evening. Great stuff.

Phil