Holidays, as I understand it, are coming. As I write this, Christmas is barrelling down on us like a festive red-and-white juggernaut, and it’s the time of year when families reach for games. If your experience of games at gatherings can be summed-up with Charades and Pictionary, you might be pleased to know that there are loads more to choose from.
In space, no-one can hear you scream. Luckily they can hear you shouting “Oh my god, I can’t believe you did that! You absolute nerf-herder!”, because you’ll be saying things like that quite often when you play Gravwell: 2nd Edition.
Roll-and-write games are bigger now than they’ve ever been. The runaway success of games like Railroad Ink and Ganz Schön Clever paved the way for more ambitious, complex games like Hadrian’s Wall. There are plenty of games out to the gap between those light and heavy titles, and Rolling Realms is one of the latest.
For many people, board game nirvana is teams of finely-detailed miniatures beating the fluff out of each other. Godtear, from Steamforged Games, is a game which epitomises the idea, where warbands of humans, creatures and… rocks throw down the gauntlet and vie for domination of the battlefield.
The best kind of mystery is the one that doesn’t reveal the culprit at the start. It leaves you to work out whodunnit for yourself, either by pulling you along through a story with the protagonist, or giving you the clues to do it yourself. The Detective Society takes this concept and runs with it.
Those of you who have ever opened the box of a game like Jamaica or Parks will know the irrational level of happiness that a good box insert can trigger. On the one hand, it’s just a matter of aesthetics. It looks nice in the box. A place for everything, and everything in its place.
Tackling On Mars was a daunting prospect. Both in terms of reviewing it, and in just learning how to play it properly. Both have been extremely rewarding exercises though. On Mars is one of the best games I’ve ever played, it’s as simple as that.
You’re sitting in a busy train station, wearing a pink carnation in your buttonhole, and reading a copy of The Times. A man in a fedora sits down on the bench behind you and says “The geese have flown south for the winter”. You reply with “Yes, but they’ll return in the spring”.
My first foray into the world of proper wargames is with the game with the longest title in my collection. Gandhi: The Decolonization of British India 1917-1947, to give it it’s full name, is an asymmetric game from the undisputed masters of the modern wargame, GMT Games.
Do you know that feeling at the start of a game of Chess? Your opponent makes their first move and you immediately start trying to get into their head. What are they doing? What’s their plan? That’s how Senjutsu gets after just a game or two.
