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Month: July 2018

The Cave

I always have a little bit of trouble at the board game cafe. Should we play the game we all know so that we can be sure? Or should we try a new game to take advantage of this vast library? A few weeks ago I opted to go for the latter and try out The Cave, a “cooperative” game which is about exploring a cave. I have to admit that the rules were a little much to understand on the first reading, but once a person gets into it, the turns start to go faster. The concept is that you are exploring a cave and collecting tokens either by being the first to find a good photo spot, the first to descend to a lower level, the first to make a tight squeeze, etc. The game pieces are visually appealing, but the play of the game left me wanting for something.

Individual “teams” discovering new tunnels all alone…

I found that the game doesn’t really encourage “teams” (the word the game uses for each individual player) to interact with each other much at all, and that success is easiest to achieve by being lucky on the draw of unexplored tiles. At my table there were one or two occasions when one player would scoop some tokens left behind or not yet reached by another player, but for most if it we all started discovering our own tunnels. I found the only real obstacle to racking up points was getting a bad draw: even if it’s not a complete dead end, drawing a piece that makes it difficult to navigate your current tunnel can be a more subtle obstacle. Nothing in the play of the game suggests that it would be advantageous for any teams to work together, so we are just left hoping that our draws match the kind of equipment we happen to have packed.

While I think it’s a fine idea to play a cooperative game based on cave exploration, I think that it’s probably better if players have some kind of incentive to cooperate. I will probably give this game another one or two tries to give it a fair shake, but right now I am feeling like I could have insisted on Carcassonne or 7 Wonders despite the fact that it’s not a terribly novel experience and doesn’t have the same promise of being a completely cooperative game. As frustrating as it is to see a resource you need in 7 Wonders too far away to trade for, at least I know how player to player interaction will go. Or maybe I should just dispense with the pretence of being there mainly to play games and just have delicious local ice cream with some friends on a hot summer night…


August 2018 is going to be Full Steam Ahead’s “Month of Adam.” I will still be here moderating comments and generally keeping the behind-the-scenes part of the site running, and will be returning in September with some great new content. Until then, please continue to enjoy Alastair’s excellent series.

Full Steam Ahead – Batman: Arkham Asylum

Time logged before Full Steam Ahead: 46 Hours

Just so that we’re clear beforehand, I love comics, and heroes, and good storytelling. The character of Batman is one the earliest memories I have, and the fact that Batman has always sort of been at the front of many aspects of geek culture has been particularly good to me and my interests. So make no mistake, there will be many other opportunities to talk about what that means to me, and what Batman means to me, and how I feel about the Batman games in my steam library, as well as introductions and more in-depth explanations of various aspects of the Batman mythos. But that’s not what I want to use this post to talk about.

You see, I’ve already played Batman – Arkham Asylum many times. I love this game. I’ve played the story, I’ve played the challenge maps, I’ve completed all the Riddler’s challenges. So I want to try something different with this game. In my mind, without a doubt, the Batman – Arkham series of games by Rocksteady Studios do a better job of capturing the feeling of being Batman. So, if that’s the case, how good a Batman can I be?

Nana nana nana nana…

Full Steam Ahead: Age of Empires III

Time logged before Full Steam Ahead: 9 Hours.

 

The Age of Empires series of games is special to me. These are the games that introduced me to the real-time-strategy genre. Age of Empires got me interested in the classical empires of Persia, Egypt, and Greece. Age of Empires II brought the stories of medieval leaders to life: Joan of Arc, Genghis Khan, and Saladin. Age of Mythology took the well-balanced, carefully crafted gameplay I had come to love, and transported it to the world of Norse, Egyptian, and Greek legend.

So, let’s make no mistake: Age of Empires III is fun game. It is a well-balanced real time strategy game, and part of one of that genre’s most consistently excellent series.

Now watch as I spend most of the rest of this article barely talking about the game.

The Spanish home city, and title screen of Age of Empires III.

Not Being That Kind of Jerk at the Card Table

Yesterday I was at an annual Canada Day BBQ when someone pulled out a copy of Cards against Muggles. I didn’t want to have anything to do with this game. At first it appears to be Cards Against Humanity, but saturated with Harry Potter references. Having already decided that I never need to play Cards Against Humanity again I was already predisposed to take a pass on any game called Cards Against ____________. I have no problem with the format, but the idea of playing a game where people compete to be the most shocking in their “ironic” racism, rapism, ableism, homophobia… have I missed any? If so, can someone please pass me a marker and the blank card? If I want to be something more than a jerk then this is a game I cannot play.

I try not to be a jerk about jokey card games.

Cards Against Muggles, to its credit, is crude without a lot of the stuff that makes Cards Against Humanity bad. Sure, I have heard more speculative jokes about the sexual exploits of the Weasley family in the past 24 hours than I would care to ever again, but it was something I could hang around the edges of without feeling like there is something fundamentally wrong with what we, as a group of people, are doing. Most of it was simply an endless barrage of references, a few of which I recognize, but mostly stuff I know to be related to the fandom but have no personal knowledge of. This is what I imagine it’s like to read Ready Player One if you didn’t grow up white and nerdy. This is something that I could, if I was really desperate to play a card game, play. I declined because I found cheeseburgers and side conversations to be far more appealing. In this, however, I still have a responsibility to refrain from being a jerk. I’m not a Potter fan, and that’s okay. Some of the people at the party were huge fans. That’s okay too. For the same reasons I can’t abide playing Cards Against Humanity, I have to let people enjoy Cards Against Muggles without complaint from me. I don’t want to be the kind of jerk that dehumanizes other people for fun, but nor do I want to be the kind of jerk that presumes to judge people liking what I don’t and not liking what I do. I want to be the kind of person that does a reasonably good job of holding those two things in balance, and I want to be the kind of person who does his own small part to make this what being a “Canadian” is about.