Thursday, September 6, 2007

The Next Big Thing

Well like I said last time my friends and I have been on the look out for the next big game, that new game that will excite and compel us to play for hours and hours until we finally succumb to sleep depravation and pass out in what we hope will be a graceful manner. Scott sure picked a winner last time with “Thebes” but that did not slow him down on his mission to always search out new sources of gaming goodness. So here is what Scott and the rest of us are considering for purchase.

I know that Ed is looking strongly at a game called “Through the Ages”,
www.boardgamegeek.com/game/25613



Ed says that this game is like the “Civilization” Board Game but a lite version as it only uses cards. We all liked the “Civilization” Board Game, but as it was mentioned elsewhere on this blog the game was a marathon, requiring 2-3 days to play. This “Through the Ages” game promises to be much shorter, but contain all the depth and feel of “Civilization”. I find it interesting from the standpoint that it appears to have even more depth in some areas, like all the advancements your civilization can attain. The game is supposed to be re-printed soon with better components and hopefully better artwork on the cards, if it does get the re-print Ed says he will buy it, GO FOR IT ED! I will play it with ya, even if Scott won’t.

Now Scott, always looking for the next game to hook us with, has also been on the look out for a good Horror game. We both really like the Avalon Hill game “Betrayal at House on the Hill”, but it is only really fun with 4 players. A while back I bought “Arkham Horror”, an HP Lovecraft based Horror game by Fantasy Flight. I really like it, but Scott absolutely despises it. Well now Scott has his eye on this game called “Last Night on Earth, The Zombie Game”,
www.boardgamegeek.com/game/25613



This game definitely has the right “atmosfear”. The artwork really sells the theme. I’ve been hearing about this game for awhile now and I know Scott has been watching it for a long time too, but I don’t know much about the play mechanics of the game, I wonder when this game will be done so we can find out more. I do have to say that the theme looks great and the idea of a modular board which will make every game different sounds very appealing.

As for myself, I have been watching very intently the big release from Fantasy Flight Games called “Starcraft the Board Game”, www.boardgamegeek.com/game/22827



I know that lots of people have been waiting for this one and there was no information for a long time, this, I think, was due to the fact that the game went through a process of having its early design completely scrapped and reworked from scratch. I have to say my enthusiasm for this game did die down quite a bit once information was finally released. I really thought the game would be completely different than the way I now know it will be. I was envisioning more of a huge warfare/skirmish game with tons of tiny plastic army units battling it out on a modular board that changed for every game, and contained hidden resources that you would move in and take possession of and defend. In short I thought it would be like the computer game in slow motion, some people think that would be boring, but I thought it could work if there were more resource management and strategic decisions for the player to make in order to keep it interesting while the battles were being fought. I was also a little bit disappointed that the game looks and has a lot of similarities to the game “Twilight Imperium” or TI, don’t get me wrong, I like TI, I own TI, but let me say that it is so obvious that Christian T. Peterson (the designer of TI) helped in the design of “Starcraft”. Like I said there is nothing wrong with TI or Christian Peterson, I was just hoping that “Starcraft” would be more unique. Despite my reservations I still plan to purchase the game, I still think it looks very cool, and I know that the other guys will play it and in the end I guess that is all we really want; to find a game that we all enjoy playing together.

15 comments:

Ed said...

Well as far as Through the ages goes, I had kind of forgotten about it until you just brought it up again, I had planned on putting it on the back burner until the reprint comes out to see how it looks. not to mention the fact that Scott shot it down! he he Mike I noticed you have coliseum on order, I heard an online review of the game and it sounds WAY cool. I cant wait to try that one out.

Mike David said...

Yep, I finally am ordering games again and Coliseum is one of 'em. I plan my next post to be about my order when it comes it.

Scott said...

Well, as you both know by now, I bought "Last Night on Earth"! I paid a bit extra for it, but it was WELL worth it! I even got the 2 GenCon promo cards with my order for FREE!! Anyhow, the kids like it a lot! Especially Syerra. She did very well at cornering my heroes and killing just enough of them to win our first game. I was just one zombie away from winning too!! Ahhhhhh! Payback comes today though. Later!

Scott said...

I played about a half game or so of the "Escape in the Truck" scenario last night by myself. It's the first "Advanced" one after "Die Zombies, Die" ( the only basic scenario ). Anyhow, the scenario requires that your heroes ( there's always 4 heroes in the beginning ) must fend off or kill zombies before the sun goes down. The catch is, they must also find keys and gasoline for the truck ( the truck is placed in the town center at the start ). At least 2 heroes must get to the truck before sun down with the items, use them, survive any fights, to win. Here's a little more info. Each "side" starts off with a 40 card deck in a basic game ( 60 in the advanced games + I've thrown in both promos to make 61 per side ). Another way the zombie team can win is to deplete the heroe's deck. There are some zombie cards that cause the hero player(s) to discard cards. This can also be a good thing for the hero ( if timed right ). Some locations allow heroes to go through the discard deck for specific items ( for example, the sheriff can look for a revolver ). One of my favorite things about fighting is the fact you can use a ranged weapon on a well placed gas can or dynamite and blow the hell out of zombies from a distance! I still haven't had the pleasure ( since it was such a chore just to find ONE can of gas! Hahaha! ). I did find some dynamite, but I was too busy with zombies and searching to use it. If I had a lighter though! Kablam! Anyhow, I've only scratched the surface of what this game has to offer! Oh, there are a couple minor things in the rules that sort of bug me, but we can see if we want to keep them or make a "house" rule on them. It's really not that big. The first expansion ( of many I gather ) is called "Growing Hunger". It's due out early next year...I can't wait!! However, until then, we have enough to keep us busy. Not only that, but we can make our own scenarios too! This game has "raised" my hopes that there can be a good horror game ( besides "Betrayal..." and "Fury..." ) and I don't see it being "buried" for quite some time!

Mike David said...

Stop IT!! I am so itching to play this game now! Seriously, thanks for posting the info on my blog, we WILL be playing this weekend!

Ed said...

Yeah me too, it sounds really cool.

Scott said...

So, how often are you to post something "new" in your blog? Maybe after this weekend you'll be inspired to write?! I know I will!

Scott said...

I needed to make a correction about "dynamite" from LNOE posting. Gas is the only thing you can drop and shoot at. Dynamite can only be lit and thrown. Most scenarios require your character to have a "fire" item ( a lighter or torch )to do that though. I was a bit foggy on some rules and have posted 3 questions on BGG to clear things up. I pretty much had it correct on most, but I just wanted to play it safe and know for sure. Mike, I'd suggest printing off that rules summary before this weekend. Just browse over them. It's all quite simple.

Mike David said...

I am posting new stuff to my blog when I have time at work. You know how my job can be though so the postings could be sparse sometimes. I work on my blog at work because it is for the KAPP/KVEW website and I am kinda being paid for it.

Scott said...

I know it's your job bucko! I just wasn't sure if the High Command had a set schedule for you. I figured they would want you to have something "new" with in a certain time line. To keep things fresh ya know. See ya tonight.

Mike David said...

Yeah, they originally told me three a week, ha ha yeah right.

Hey I enjoyed playing Last Night on Earth. I know you will probably hate this comparison but it seems like it is kinda hard for the Hero's to win just like in Arkham Horror. It makes sense that the heroes would not always win becuase it is an army of zombies after all, I'm not complaining I'm just pointing out that the designers made it more of a challenge for the heroes.

Scott said...

Mike! Do I need to wash your mouth out with soap?! You bad boy you! OK, OK, I agree, it is difficult for the heroes and it should be ( just like in AH ). But, unlike AH ( which has one "scenario" ) there are multiple scenarios for LNOE. This allows each to have it's own win/loss ratio. I believe it's easier to pull off a victory in LNOE in ANY scenario, compared to AH. In AH it seems like to the toilet has flushed from the get go and all we can do is try to hold on to the rim as long as we can! But, eventually we know where we're gonna end up in the end. Well, most of the time. I never feel like it's hopeless from the beginning of LNOE, like I do in AH. I still can't understand how some say that AH is too easy?! I don't get it! To me, AH is like riding a raft towards Niagara Falls and LNOE is like riding a raft on the Colorado River.

Scott said...

FYI, the next MTG set "Lorwyn" has 5 decks!! Woohooo!

Mike David said...

Ya know now that I think of it, wouldn't it be cool if there were scenarios in Arkam Horror. Instead of always trying to close all the gates and beat the Ancient One, there could be a scenario where you start the game with a certain type of monster and you have to kill them all or you have to find a certain item or group of items in town or something like that. I wonder if anyone else has though of this.... I think I will check BGG.

So the new Magic set has 5 pre-cons huh? Does that mean they are all monocolor, like in the core sets?

Scott said...

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=magic/expansion/lorwyn
See for yourself. It all looks cool to me! Anyhow, a scenario for AH would possibly make it interesting.