Jan
24
Advanced Civilization
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We played Adv Civ during the Christmas holidays and had fun. We also had a photographer with us who took a awesome picture of one of us playing.
Image by Sonja Tolvanen
Jan
20
Lautapelinurkka – Soul Hunters
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Lautapelinurkan jaksossa käsitellään Ville Hankipohjan suunnittelemaa ja Tuonela Productionsin julkaisemaa korttipeliä Soul Hunters.
http://www.vimeo.com/8858512Jan
13
Lautapelinurkka – Dominion
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Lautapelinurkka on muuttunut videolähetykseksi ja sitä julkaistaan nykyisin Lautapelioppaassa.
Tästedes yritän kuitenkin saada jakson näkymään myös täällä.
http://www.vimeo.com/8746425Nov
3
Session report: Last Train to Wensleydale and Genial Card Game
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We had again weekly session at Nokia Board Game Club and we got to play some pretty decent games. First we played Martin Wallace’s latest work Last Train to Wensleydale which is one of the Treefrog line and has all wooden components. Game is all about transporting goods and people with trains and building your railroad network in a euroish way.
Image from BGG by James Hamilton
I had played the game twice before and had a feel for the game. There were three of us playing which was something different compared to the games I had played before and the game was also very different with three; there were a lot more space and collecting goods was far more easy. Game also took a lot longer since with three the game takes one round longer than with four.
I have to say that I really enjoy Last Train to Wensleydale. There’s some clever mechanics and especially the selling railroads to bigger game directed companies is interesting element in the game. The only complain I have with the game is that it looks ugly. The board is just hideous even though it might have been done in purpose; there must have been a way to create a better looking board.
Image from BGG by Werner Baer
Second game we had time to play was Genial Card Game which I bought few weeks ago from Lautapelit.fi with 2 euro and game offers bang for the buck. There’s several games that have exploited the Genial brand and most of the games are totally obsolete but Genial Card Game has the feel on original Genial and is unique. It’s fast, easy and has the same elements as it’s big brother but there’s some special rules with the scoring and obviously cards play much different than tiles even though there’s luck involved with both. If you’re looking for a good filler and like Genial here’s a good game for you.
Oct
16
Game session: Diamonds Club, Genial Spezial and Inquisition
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Thursday night reserved for games in Leppävaara and this time I was also able to join the club and play some games.
First I sat down on a table where half of the people were preparing for the European Championships in Spiel. We played Diamonds Club which I had played once before and had liked it and I even remembered how to play the game. Diamonds Club is like Japanese whisky; it’s clean and perfectly balanced but it doesn’t have same character as the best of the games in its genre. It tastes good but you know that there’s better drams waiting for you out there.
Image from BGG by Tomasz Baron
After Diamonds Club I ended up reading the rules of Knizia’s Genial Spezial and playing it for the first time. Genial Spezial looks and feels like the original Genial. It also has some similarities, like scoring and shape of tiles used in the game, with its big brother but in the end it’ totally different game than the original Genial. I liked the game as I think most of the Genial friends would do but still I feel that this is just a way to profit from the Genial brand. Game would have deserved own identity; now it’s just a part of a growing lineup of Genial franchise.
Image from BGG by Werner Baer
The night ended with two games of Inquisitio at WilliamK (a bar next to the library the game club is held). Inquisition is an interesting game from a Finnish game designer Jani Rönkkönen produced by Tuonela Productions. It won the first prize in the Finnish Board Game Society’s game develop contest back in 2006 after which the designer has tried hard to find publisher for the game (even with the help of Bruno Faidutti). It took three years to find one from Oulu, Finland and end result is a deck of cards and few discs in a compact box.
Image from BGG by Daniel Danzer
Inquisitio is a game where players are accused of different sins in the medieval Europe waiting for their turn to be tortured by the Inquisition. One can easily understand why it was so hard to find someone to publish the game – the theme is really extreme and it’s well incorporated in the game.
What happens in the game is basically this: players are lined up in front of the torture room to be taken in. The choice of who’s going in the room depends of the bribe the character is willing to pay for the Interrogator and as the man gets greedy the others will have to pay more to avoid the room. Unfortunately someone doesn’t have the money to bribe the interrogator and he’ll be dragged into the room to be tortured. Before your head is put in a head press or they cut one of your body parts of you have an option to confess your sins, even though you might not have done anything, and avoid being tortured. If you don’t, you’ll fall into the worst nightmares one could imagine, suffer mental and physical damage and are left with marks of torture on your body which can (and will) be used against you later on. Obviously, if you’re the one the Inquisition finds to be most guilty for the crimes you will be burned at the stake in front of a cheering audience.
Image from BGG by Mikko Lahtinen
All above is executed with cards in a clever way. Players have money and features in their hands and first they try to avoid the torture chamber with money. Interrogator and torture method are also face up and from the interrogator card one can see which features the interrogator looks after and for which sin he accuses players of. The player who ends up to be tortured has to reveal all features in his hand which are similar to those shown in the interrogator card. After revealing the cards he receives money and has a choice of either to be tortured or to confess. Torturing causes damage and weakens player’s chances to win the game and confessing makes character more guilty and he might end up being burnt at the stake (and loosing the game).
Sometimes it’s good to confess though because:
a) you suffer less damage while they don’t torture you
b) the other players who have confessed the same sin before you become more quilty when you confess
c) you get to point a finger to one of the other players and accuse him for one of the features in the game. If he has cards of that feature in his hand he must reveal them and suffer from the increased guilt points in the end of the game.
So it might not be such a bad idea to confess after all but the problem with this is that in the end you score points for all the interrogator cards that have lead to a confession.
Image from BGG by Mikko Lahtinen
In our game we confessed every sin that came upon us; whether it was witchcraft or blasphemy we were guilty (and probably this would have been the case in the real life too since non of us probably would want to try out any of the torture methods). In the end the there were a lot of guilt points awarded because of the several sins confessed and huge amount of features in the interrogator cards on the table which also generated points.
Luckily I avoided the worst combinations and did not have the most guilt points; the two lucky players who tied the most guilt points were burned alive. Of those who survived the Inquisition I had the most mental and physical stamina left and I won the game (probably in real life I would have also had the best chance to recover from the horrors of the torture chamber).
Was I happy to win the game? Well, sure but more than that I was happy to be alive.
Was the game any good? Sure, it’s solid game, there’s interesting mechanics in it and it has a strong theme to support the game play.
Why am I so disturbed then? One could not play without thinking of the real thing and at least for me it raised some disturbing images in my head. We laughed at someone being tortured and damaged by an interrogator because, in the context we played in, it was funny. But there are some things you don’t want to play with and torture is quite high on that list, at least for me.
Learn your history before you play Inquisio because it helps you to appreciate the theme and the fact that there’s absolutely nothing fun or good in torture even though the game itself can be entertaining.
Oct
14
Night of Finnish card games
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It’s been a long time since the last entry -I apologize. I’ve played games but most of the gaming has happened online so there’s really not that much to report on.
Thus it was fun to have some friends over and play games; especially because I just received fall lineup for Tuonela Productions to review. They have three new card games which all look promising after quick glance on the rules.
We began the night with Politix while one of my friends is active in the field and we always get laughs out of it. Politix is a decent game; it’s quick to play, one gets table talk out of it and there’s even some depth and tactics in it. Obviously it’s nothing for the die hards of gamers games but I rather like it and I’m willing to play it at least with friends who I know will like the game and the theme.
Image from BGG by Touko Tahkokallio
I ended up the the left wing of the political map with Päivi and we squeezed I quite easy win over the right wing. Rightist forgot to secure voters from farmers fraction and lost the election handsomely.
Image from BGG by Daniel Danzer
The second game of the night was Tuonela’s and Ville Hankipohja’s Soul Hunters. Soul Hunters is a card game where players play events and soul hunters on the table to gather negative or positive influence. Influence is used to capture free souls by the players and the one who has captured the most when the game ends wins the game.
There’s a lot of different cards in the games and there’s definitely several paths to play the game and in my opinion that makes Soul Hunters interesting. In our game more choices unfortunately meant also more playing time and more down time for the players. Reading all the cards and trying to figure out how and when to use them is hard especially is any of the players is declined to AP.
Image from BGG by Daniel Danzer
The best part of the game is graphics which I really enjoyed. There’s different groups of soul hunters in the play and every group is easily recognizable because of the color scheme in the cards and also because of the pictures. It’s also extremely fun to table God to gather souls for you when the other players have devils and cultists and even aliens on the table.
Soul Hunters appears to be interesting game and I’m keen on testing it more. If playing time can be reduced to the 60 minutes stated in the box, Soul Hunters is a winner but if 4 player game takes more than 2 hours then there’s not enough content in the game.
Aug
28
Session report: French Tarot
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It’s fun to play games and it’s even more fun to do it unexpectedly but this was the case in our little Tarot session in Wednesday night. My gaming pal Markku was in town because of his work and looked for something to do other than playing games in BSW (which by the way is a great way to spend time). We didn’t have much time to arrange the event but were lucky enough to have Janne to play with us.
As all three of us are seriously into card games it was no wonder that we immediately began to think of a card game for three. I suggested French Tarot which I had learned in Ropecon and found out to be fun and not overly complex Tarot game. Others had not played it and were willing to try this beast out.
French Tarot is played with 78 card French Tarot deck which I don’t own (ordered it though to avoid similar situation in the future). Luckily these games cand be played with others decks as long as there’s the same amount of cards in them and I had my 78 card Piemontese deck with Italian suits with me. Obviously this made the game a bit harder since none of us had played much with the Italian suits and figuring out what we had in our hands after the deal was rather hard.
21 trumps of a game of Tarot
The game itself is of moderate challenge. The trick taking part of the game is simple for those who have played any trick taking games before; one player plays against the others and tries to win enough tricks to score adequate amount of card points. What makes the game a little bit tougher that typical trick taking games is the auction of who gets to play. The amount of card points you have to win depends on the ends (tarot 21,0 and fool) you win from the tricks. To make the bidding a bit more challenging there’s also a dog of six cards on the table which you can use (in a way or another) if you win the auction. Typically you get the cards on the table and change some cards from your hand to those but there are other possibilities for the dog as well.
Bidding is quite harsh because if you win you get a number of points from the opponents and if you lose you pay the same amount of points to all of your opponents. This leads to a situation where failing a high bid can really ruin your game because you score a stupendous negative score. Janne basically tried this option in our game in the second deal and did not recover from it and helped me and Markku quite a bit since we got the points Janne lost.
I liked the game and hope to play it soon again. These games need experience to be most enjoyable and after one or two plays one can only feel that thay are great games if you master them well.
Aug
24
Video introduction to Politix
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I did something I haven’t done before and that’s a video review of a new Finnish card game Politix.
You can check it out from Lautapeliopas [ review can be found here] and please leave comments so that I’ll be able to develop this new brand of Boardgaming Finland.
Unfortunately this is only for those who understand Finnish but maybe someday I’ll have time and energy to do something similar in English.
Aug
16
Session Report: Politix
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Year 2009 is going to be very interesting for the Finnish games scene. We have already seen one solid board game released and more is coming at Spiel fair in Essen in October. I had an oppurtunity to try out the newest addition to the list of Finnish games, Politix.
Image by Touko Tahkokallio
Politix is a game by Onni Games and Tuoko Tahkokallio and it’s a card game of Finnish politics. I got a chance to try it out with my friend as a two player game while we could have had up to six players. The first thing that one notices when getting hold of olitix is the great graphics in the game. Illutration is witty and fun and creates humorous atmosphere for the game before it even has started. Cards are of good quality but so thick that they are hard to shuffle but fortunately you don’t have to shuffle cards too often and you can get rid of the problem with card sleeves.
Politix is a game where players are members of a Finnish political party and play the role of well known member of the parlament. What you try to do is to attract voter groups by playing politicking and/or special cards. There’s six different voter groups and there’s seven cards in each group and game ends when all voter cards have been taken out by parties. Winner of the game is the one who has best worst group after all cards have been divided among the players and thus the game reminds me of many of the Rainer Knizia games.
In our game I was Center Party and my friend Right Wing while I took the role of Paavo Väyrynen and my frined was Sauli Niinistö (both of whom are currently active in the Finnish political scene). Game started slowly while we were figuring out how one should play the game but I soon realised that my friend did not quite get the winning condition of the game and let me collect votes from farmest too easily. This was basically due to the fact that Center Party got bonuses for attracting farmers. In the end I secured all seven farmer cards available and since I also got at least one card from every other voter group I knew that I had won the game.
Image by Touko Tahkokallio
We both enjoyed our first play even though my friend did not quite grasp the rules of the game. With two players Politix is tense game where you really have to keep track of what your opponent is doing and count the voter group cards. I suppose that with more players it’s more work to keep track of the cards and you just try to balance your own game. It’s also interesting but realistic how it’s very hard to attract some voter groups when you belong to wrong party and your character doesn’t have the right attributes.
Interesting game and I hope I’ll be able to try it out again soon.
Jul
23
Summer of cooperative games
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Summer has gone by really fast and I’ve been able to play some games. Interestingly many of the games have been cooperative and while there is nothing wromg with cooperation in games that’s not a mechanism which is very common in games in general. The last year has been great for cooperative games and there’s several good new cooperative games to try.
Image by Dan Rosewater / BGG
Pandemic has been high on my gaming list lately and it is a great game. It did’t win SdJ but I’m pretty sure it was the runner up for the prize. I’ve also played Ghost Stories a few times and have enjoyed the game even though it’s almost impossible to beat even in the lowest skill level.
Last night I got on the table two other interesting cooperative games that have been gathering dust on my game shelf. The first of the two was Reiner Knizia’s look at the Lord of the Rings saga as a boardgame which was one of the first cooperative games that caught the attention of the gamers in 2000. I bought the game in the summer of 2007 and had not played the game so it was about the time to test the game.
Image by Dean / BGG
In the game players form the fellowship and head to the Mount Doom. Game is card driven and the idea of the game is to play cards and by doing so move the fellowship toward the final goal. Every player also has to draw tiles that typically hurt the fellowship but can also be quite neutral and there’s a board for character miniatures and Sauron miniature where members of the fellowship try to keep away from Sauron. There’s several ways to lose the game but only one way to win and ,as we noticed in our game, darkness is victorious in most of the games played.
I liked the game; it had the feel of the Lord of the Ring book, it was easy enough to play and it didn’t took too long. the fact that cooperative game is tough is ont a problem and adds playability in a longer perspective. The most disturbing part of the game was the rulebook which is hideous and it’s almost impossible to find information quickly from it.
The second interesting cooperative game of the night was Battlestar Galactica which I had played maybe nine months ago and have had in my shelf for too long unplayed. Battlestar Galactica is based in the TV series of the same name and usually these franchises are plainly bad. There are some exceptions and this game is one of those.
Image by Surya Van Lierde / BGG
In the game players are the members of Battlestar Galactica. As in the TV series, there are cylons among the crew but in the beginning none of the players now who they are. With four players there is a possibility to get two cylons in the game, one for the first half and second when the second half begins, but information of this is kept secret and that’s actually the biggest issue in the game.
There’s quite a few things I like in BG. Firstly, the aspect of having a traitor in the ship and the mechanisms that support this are absolutely cool. Players play cards together to resolve skill checks but while there’s two cards added to those played by the players the Cylon can really screw thing over. Having a traitor on board causes also a lot of interaction and table talk both of which I like very much.
BT has also I great feel of struggle in space and therefore the theme of the game works very well. I have not watched any of the Battlestar Gallactica seasons on TV so I don’t get any kicks out of the BG theme but it does not really bother me at all; the game is fun to play even if you are not familiar with the series and even more so if you are a fan of it.
There’s two negative things in the game: you need at least four people to play the game (preferably 5-6) and game takes at least 2 hours which makes it harder to play. Apart from these minor problems Battlestar Galactica is great game!
Our game ended when one of the non-cylon members of Galactica had to leave. Game had not taken huge amount of time at that point but I didn’t tell my friends that game could take long. This was sad because it looked so good for the humans. We had a cylon in the first half of the game (I actually believed that we didn’t) but he revealed himself just before the start of the second phase. Sadly for the Cylon side that second cylon card went to the cylon player thus creating a situation which would have been easier for the humans (only one cylon in the game compared to two).
I’m looking forward to play all of there games again and there’s still Space Alert in my shelf waiting to be played some time soon.