December 2002 Archives

I went "back home" to visit my parents with Johanna. Games couldn't be avoided, especially since I had given Villa Paletti to my mother as a Christmas present. It turned out to be a good gift - which was expected, since she has always enjoyed Timpuri, a Finnish variant of Jenga.

Well, we played a few games, me, Johanna, my mother and Ismo. It was fun, even though I did collapse the tower in two games out of three. Still, I enjoyed it and it's clear to see the Spiel des Jahres award was well deserved. I was also happy to hear they had played few games by themselves, too.

On the rare video game front, we had some interesting moments with Playstation, playing Driver 2 and some version of Crash Bandicoot. Interesting, yet frustrating - starting all over after each mistake gets very boring very soon. Driver 2 was sort of silly for other reasons. I'd rather play board games, thank you. <--

Driver 2

Crash Bandicoot

Later, me and Johanna had great fun with a real classic game, Scrabble. It's a decent game, but we added a twist that made it funnier: using words you wouldn't use when playing with your parents gave double points. Unfortunately, most of the words were of the ordinary, nice kind. However, some bonus points were scored with obscenities. I think each of us got two or three of them. It's a great way to spice up the old classic!

While waiting for the gifts, I played some games with my girlfriend Johanna. Because we were spending the Christmas at her parent's home, we had her old game collection to use: Afrikan tähti (Star of Africa, named after the huge diamond) and Pekingin mysteerit (aka Mysteries of Peking).

Afrikan tähti is the best-selling Finnish game ever. Designed by Kari Mannerla in 1951, it's still the most-loved boardgame in Finland and available everywhere where board games are sold. It was nice to refresh my memory of the game, unfortunately the memories were better than the game was. I was mostly shocked by the poor quality of the components. The board was almost paper thin when compared to the heavy, mounted boards of German games and the tokens were really flimsy.

The game was ok. Of course, it was a luck-filled dice race, but for children's game (and for a game of it's age), it's still fairly good. I'm happy the board has gone unchanged in the maelstroms of political correctness, the happy African tribesmen are still dancing in the heart of Africa.

Mysteries of Peking was one of my favourites when I was younger. It's still an ok game, but it's definitely not a deduction game - it's more of a race game, in which players try to race around the board gathering evidence and then to find the guilty person. It all comes down to the luck of dice and card. Still, for children, it's an excellent game because the components are well done. I'd definitely play it with my children, if I had any and they'd enjoy it.

Anyway, it was a fun way to pass some time (the games were over surprisingly fast), especially as Johanna won both games. Mysteries of Peking were close - we both knew who the criminal was and where he was. I was two steps from the right dragon and it was Johanna's turn. She didn't reach the dragon (she had no chance), but she got a "move a dragon"-card from the fortune cookie and moved to dragon to her and won. I do claim moral victory in Afrikan tähti, as I was one step from Cairo with the Africa Star when I decided to go to Tangiers instead...

So, great fun even with these more simple games. All it takes is some good company and some time to waste...

This was probably the last game session this year... I played few games at the Brettspielwelt, classic BSW games really.

First, I played seven hands of Lost Cities, losing most of them. Still, it was pretty fun. At least it didn't take a long time.

Then, I played a two-player game of good old Carcassonne. It was a close game, which I won 120-119 even though my opponent was able to finish a 40-point city. Well, I did get most of the cloisters.

Happy holidays to all of my readers!

I've been thinking about the tournaments in the board game club. In 2001, we had a very simple tournament. In our December meeting, we played a four-game tournament and the winner got the prize. This year, a small one-game tournament was played every time and the finals in the December meeting. That was better, but still not perfect. The tournament games take a lot of time. When El Grande was the tourney game, we had to play two first round games and a final with only one set, which took a lot of time and tied up many players.

Now, with some help from my friends, I've come up with a better plan. We'll choose a game for three meetings (using the same popularity criteria as before). Instead of organizing formal tournaments, everyone can play the game and gain points according to their placement. After every three meeting the points are counted and Tournament Points awarded. After that a new game is chosen.

In the end of the year, the players with most Tournament Points will meet in a final match-up and the winner will get the prize. I'll have to work on the details, but this sounds like a better system.

The last meeting for this year of the Tampere University board game club was yesterday. We had a nice amount of people playing lots of different games. The Game of the Year -award was given to Puerto Rico (last year's winner was Carcassonne) and the finals of the Spirit of the Game -tournament was played. Olli Hämäläinen was the big winner, carrying home the Mug of Might award.

But, the games:

The games began with a game of Carcassonne: Hunters & Gatherers. It was my first face-to-face game of the new Carcassonne. It's better that way - the Brettspielwelt game is hard to play because the tiles get too small. It's nice, some of the new twists are very good (I love the rivers), but it takes too long. Sure, some of it was because the game was new to us, but still - 5-player game took 45 minutes. Regular Carcassonne never takes that long. The tiles are more complicated, people spent more time thinking about their tile placement. I think Carcassonne works better when played relatively fast.

Second game I played was my third playing of Die Händler. I was joined with Manu and Robert, so it was also my first 3-player game. The game works equally well with only three players. It was a fun game. Robert got a bit left behind in the status, partly because of a rules confusion. Eventually I won the game with one step from Robert, while Manu was one step behind Robert.

I like the game. Robert thought there was too much stuff going on, he prefers games that are simpler. He's right - those who like simple games, should stay far from Die Händler. Manu seemed to like the game, however, even though he suffered a bit from being the only player with no capability to move the Courier. The basic distribution of the special abilities is bad, because the Courier is important and if you don't have the ability to move it, you won't be getting many cards. Fortunately Manu was able to get one Sozialer Aufstieg, which is the best card of them all. Auctioning the special abilities is good, so the Courier abilities will cost more.

Then it was time for the Spirit of the Game -tourney finals. The final game was the Game of the Year, Puerto Rico. The five most successful players played the final game, winner being the winner of the tournament. It was an interesting game and quite close too, at least between the more experienced top three. Robert and Janne, being less experienced (Robert playing his first game) were a bit further behind. Me and Olli, the top two, played both Factory strategy. I did it better, as I had all five crops going, but Olli won the game anyway.

Then I took an opportunity to play a new game: Isis & Osiris. It's a sort of abstract memory game. Players have two kinds of tokens: round markers in their own colour and number tiles. The board is 6x6 grid, which starts empty. Players have two options during their turn: either place a marker or a tile. The tiles (which are really thick and feel very good) have numbers from -4 to +4. You must choose one blind, show it and place it on the board face down. Markers are placed next to the tiles and in the end, score points according to the four tiles next to them. So, you must place your own markers to good scoring places and place the negative tiles so they hurt your opponents. You must also remember where are the good and the bad tiles, so you're guaranteed some surprises in the end.

Few people seem to like the game and I agree it is very simple. I'd still give it 8, because it was great fun. I'm not sure how long that fun will last, but since the game takes only five minutes or so, it's not a big deal. I wouldn't buy the game myself, or at least pay much for it, but I like it still. As the components are so simple, it's a possible DIY project.

My evening ended with a six-player game of DIY Bluff. I was the first one out after 15 minutes of playing, and I didn't wait to see the result, but instead went home. This was the first game played with the "show-and-reroll"-rule, and I think it was ok. At least it made the first bids more interesting. In the other hand, it also made the game a bit longer, I think.

Another attitude towards games:

I had great fun playing Poker with my girlfriend yesterday. We play for Go stones, as I have plenty of those, and the way we play would probably make most Poker experts hilariously insane.

Yesterday we tried out a new variant, inspired by a very silly strip poker program in TV. No, we didn't strip, even though that probably would've been fun. Instead, I dealed two open and common cards for the table and three cards for both of us. One exchange, and then whoever has better hand when combined with the open cards wins. That was a stupid variant.

So, we went back to basics. Five cards, one exchange. However, that's not the main idea. Neither is winning lots of tokens. The main point of the whole exercise is to gather as many tokens as possible for Johanna and have as much of fun as possible while doing it. So, if the stakes are high and it turns out I have a better hand and would thus win lots of tokens, oops, it turns out that in a situation, where one player has a pair of Aces and a pair of tens, and the other player has a pair of Jacks and a pair of sixes, then the winner is actually the player with a seven. And that's Johanna, even though I had a seven, too. She had a better one ;-)

So, that's far from serious, and these Poker games of ours are probably the funniest games I've ever played.

After 119 more players, I still rule the Ricochet Robot. See for yourself: Scores for 12.12.2002.

This is only the first of many victories to come! (But today I screwed up - I found seven move solution, but only after I had spent about 80 seconds doing an 18-move one...)

It's 9:42 AM in the USA, 190 players have already completed the daily Ricochet Robot puzzle and I'm still number one! I knew I found a good solution (I'd say optimal) and fairly fast, too, but it's still hard to believe.

I just played another game of Puerto Rico at the Brettspielwelt. However, it was an exceptional game: it had five players.

I've only played three 5-player games this far. It was an interesting experience, even though it only reinforced my opinion: Puerto Rico is a four player game. Five players make the game a bit too chaotic in my opinion. In some games the chaos doesn't matter that much, but Puerto Rico is a game in which I'd like to keep control.

To prove my theory, I lost the game. However, my play was weak - playing like that, I would've lost a 4-player game as well.

I met up with some of my friends yesterday for couple of hours of gaming. Unfortunately only two of them showed up in the end, but we had two hours of fun and games anyway. And I had a wonderful and very tasty chicken bread, too. Try it, if you ever happen to visit Klubi at Tampere...

Games of the evening were Lost Cities, Bluff and Canal Grande.

I started and ended the evening with Lost Cities - I teached it to Olli before Ville came and to Ville after Olli left. Of course I won both games, but that happens a lot when teaching. Olli played a tighter game, but in the other hand, I managed to do a 40-point expedition in that game...

Then came two games of 3-player Bluff. We started both games with 9 dice each to make it more interesting. I won the first one - when Olli went out, I had a huge lead, but eventually it did come down to 1-1 which I won. In the second game, I was first one out and Olli was able to win the game.

Then Olli left and I played two games of Canal Grande with Ville. I still can't say whether I like it or not. Next time, I know, I'll be trying the original rule (as revealed by Aaron Weissblum, one of the game's designers, on Spielfrieks list) of not requiring a matching district card to join the vote. That should prevent forced victories in situations where one player has all cards for a district.

The new buildings for Puerto Rico can be found at the Terminal City Gamers web site. How to get them for real, I don't know, but at least you can make your own with these.

1. Tichu (-)
2. Puerto Rico (8)
3. Die Macher (1)
4. Mahjong (-)
5. Africa (9)
6. Princes of Florence (4)
7. Die Händler (3)
8. Through the Desert (5)
9. Tigris & Euphrates (7)
10. Canal Grande (-)

Not my day today, it seems. Well, I did win my first game of Carcassonne at the Brettspielwelt thanks to some very nasty tile placements. I lost the second game, a two-player duel, by one point. If I hadn't made a mistake with the last tile, I would've won.

Then came two games of Web of Power. I lost both. I suck.

I'm addicted. Ricochet Robot is my favourite puzzle game. Unfortunately, it's a bit difficult to find opponents good enough, as it is a game where newbie has little chance against a seasoned veteran. The new brains simply doesn't function fast enough compared to RR-tuned brains.

Well, there's a solution: Online Ricochet Robot. There's a daily puzzle one can try to solve and fastest solvers score points. In addition to the general ranking, there are divisions and competitions. One can compete with friends or co-workers and there's, for example, on-going USA vs Europe competition. Try it out, if you like Ricochet Robot and lack opponents.

I played my first games of Canal Grande last weekend and here's a quick review based on those games. First of all, I should say I'm not familiar with San Marco, so I'm not biased either way in that regard.

For a start, the cards are very ugly. The backs are hideous and the pictures are very fuzzy and unclear. Could've been much better! The rulebook is ok (at least when compared with, say, Vom Kap Bis Kairo), but the game seems awful lot more complicated than it is.

Basically it's "I divide, you choose" all the time. As I have a brother two years younger than I am, this mechanic is very familiar to me from my childhood. It causes some kind of learning curve, as it's quite hard to know what's good and what's not in the beginning, but after few games one should be able to do some tactical manoeuvring in the division.

After the cards are divided, the chooser takes the pile he or she wants and does what the cards say. District cards and gondolas are taken to hand, number cards are placed on table and other actions carried out. Traitors allow one to steal one card from one's opponent, spies give one extra cards from the deck and doges start votes.
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These votes are what counts. When voting starts, the challenger (the player who played the doge) plays a district card, choosing where the vote takes place. Now the defender can play cards. The defender has to play at least one similar district card. Cards for other districts can be used with the gondolas. Players take turns playing cards until both sides are done. The winner takes the original district card and loses all other cards used. Loser discards the first card played and all gondolas used, but keeps the rest.

Then the divider takes his or her actions. After that, if neither player has acquired ten points, the roles are reversed and new turn starts. If ten points has been reached, then the player who has less points takes three extra cards from the deck. The player with more points is also the next divider. Number cards are then discarded and the decks shuffled anew.

The game is over when a player has either at least one card for each of the six districts or four cards from one district. Latter is a good goal, if you happen to have all five cards for one district...

I played few games and enjoyed the game, at least somewhat. Votes were usually won by single card, which opponent couldn't match, which is somewhat boring. But sometimes doges wouldn't appear for a turn or two, and the players were able to gather a larger pile of cards, leading to a bit more exciting votes. If that's desired more, perhaps removing one or two doges could be possible. I wouldn't remove any traitors, though - they are your only hope, if your opponent has all five cards from a district. If he or she doesn't lose any of them, the game is practically over as they can play them one by one and win for sure. Of course, that'll take some time as they can only have one vote over that district each turn.

I hadn't a chance to try out the four player partnership game. I assume it's a bit more interesting. Right now, my rating for Canal Grande is about seven. Nice and interesting at least for a while, but nothing spectacular. Pretty much what you'd expect from an Adlung game, I suppose?

Another issue of the fabulous Games Journal is out.

There's an interesting article about modifying games for the blind people to play and Greg Schloesser's thoughts about writing bad reviews. There's also an interesting Lord of the Rings: Confrontation puzzle I'm definitely trying to solve.