I’m going to go out on a limb and say that most of you have at least heard of the board game Trouble. You know, die popper in the middle, diamond-shaped board, different colored pegs that you move around said board, etc? Personally, I am not a fan of games based on chance, but the overall gameplay is sound. I am a little fuzzy on how this particular version of Trouble landed into my board game closet, but I suppose the Force works in mystery ways.
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I’ve often maintained that you haven’t lived life to its fullest until you’ve become a parent. Today happens to be the day that we recognize the female of the human species responsible for bringing new life into this world. While not all mothers deserve this honor, there is one in particular that I wanted to recognize for her contributions in my life.
Sometimes the best things come in the smallest packages and sometimes, the smallest package does not always imply simplicity. I’ve often stated in my reviews that the hallmark of a great game is one that is simple to learn and difficult to master…this game certainly applies.
I’ve written many articles about Chess already, but I wanted to write a formal review so that it can be formatted appropriately for other websites and to serve as a one-stop shop for all of my articles on the subject.
I recently had the pleasure of visiting the Shaler Area Middle School to view Carly’s art exhibit (she won first place by the way) and I happened to take a detour into the room where science experiments were brewing. Don’t worry, I won’t turn this into one of those, “why I think you should stay in school” articles…I already did that quite a few times!
Ingenious, as I’ve stated in my review, is an excellent game. However, I was often the victim of fat finger syndrome…that is…I had issues constantly moving the small colored pegs up the scoring track.
Has anyone ever played Zoo Tycoon 2: Marine Mania for the PC? It’s a simulator game where you have to manage a zoo park, creating the perfect habitats for both land and sea animals. You have to manage employee wages, ticket prices, customer comfort…all that jazz. Well, Aquaretto, while having a zoo park theme, has none of these features. Yet, the question remains…is it a good game?
I have a confession to make…I’ve never played Dungeons and Dragons. I’ve always been interested but frankly, I wouldn’t know where to start now. I can only imagine how many books are out there and how long it would take for me to get up to speed on how the whole thing works. I’ve heard that it can take hours just to create a character…perhaps if I were twenty years younger and didn’t have a full-time job as both an accountant and a parent *shrug*. Luckily, I found this little gem, which takes place in the port city of Waterdeep from the D&D realm. Sure, there aren’t any D20 initiative rolls (my apologies if I butchered that), but the game still has “Dungeons and Dragons” printed on the box. At this day and age, I’ll take whatever I can get…assuming it takes less than two hours to play. As it turns out, I couldn’t be more than pleased with my purchase.
I am not sure why, but I’ve always liked “run your own casino” type games. Casino, Inc. for the PC is among my favorites, even though it suffers from quite a few flaws. I was watching Frasier the other night when the thought popped into my head…”Hey, I’ve been reviewing a lot of board games lately, maybe there’s a readily available casino themed game out there? TO AMAZON!!!” I must have said that last part out loud, based on the looks my dog and two cats gave me. After a little research, I went ahead and ordered this game, hoping for the best.
I wouldn’t last ten minutes on a farm. The cows would revolt by tipping themselves over on a regular basis…the rooster would crow throughout the night…the sheep would form a circle around me and take turns headbutting me in the behind…it wouldn’t be pretty. Luckily, I can experience the joys of being a farmer without all of the hard work that goes with it…that is…if you don’t count the time you spent trying to make sense of the manual.
There was a lot of debate over whether or not Gene Roddenberry and crew could pull this show off. There were those that felt that Star Trek should have been left alone while others wanted to see a return of the classic crew. I have to be honest, now that I’ve watched the full first season of this show, I’m shocked that it made it through seven seasons. Some of these episodes would have been an excellent substitute for a natural sleep aid…luckily they weren’t all bad. To that end, I’d like to briefly touch on the episodes I liked, and why.
Finally, a Star Trek game where I can fly ships around my head like I did when I was twenty-five eight…the rapid fire shooting noises, the impossible one hundred and eighty degree turns…it’s almost as if it was like yesterday twenty-two years ago. “PEWWWWWW! PEWWWWW! CHHHHHHHHHHHKKKKKK… VERRRRRRROOOWWMMMMM!!! PEW PEW PEW PEW!!!!”
I have to admit, I was a bit skeptical when I first saw this game online. The advertisement went on to describe how players would be picking various races throughout the game in an attempt to get the most points in the end. Territories that you conquered could be wiped out by another player who decided to start with a new race and a fresh hefty stack of army tokens…it seemed a bit too chaotic for my blood. Then, out of the blue, one of my friends recommended this game to me seeing as how I was covering a ton of board games on my blog. This good friend of mine, let’s call him “Booyah!” (his name was changed to protect the innocent), said that the game was a lot of fun once you get used to the racial abilities. “Booyah!” has never steered me wrong before…so I took a chance and bought the game. I’m glad I did.
My, my, how times have changed. I remember when Stratego used to be about Generals, Bombs, Admirals, Miners, and various other soldiers of military rank. I was surprised by how many variants that have been developed ever since I last played it back in the 80′s. There’s a Star Wars variant, a Narnia variant…even a Pirates of the Caribbean variant. *Shrug* If something is that successful…why not? Anyway, I wanted to briefly touch on this classic board game, using a variant recently released by Hasbro. I honestly didn’t know it was a variant when I bought it…all I knew is that my original was somewhere in a house long forgotten and that I wanted to expose my son to the game. I was in my local Wal-Mart and happened to come across a box with the word “Stratego” on it in the board game isle…I didn’t bother looking any harder. Boy was I surprised by what I found when I unboxed the game at home.
How many of you as kids used to play with those plastic army men soldiers? You know, those green and tan figures that were poised in various positions? If you were lucky, your package might have come with a barricade or a plastic tank. I distinctly remember setting them up in my backyard, specifically my sandbox, and narcissistically making them sink one by one as they did battle…this was in between chess games and Hi-C Ecto Cooler fruit drinks mind you. Anyway, seeing this particular game advertised on Steam brought back a flood of memories.
Have you ever played Civilization, be it the video game or the board game? If you have, then you’d be familiar with the concept of a ”tech tree.” If you haven’t played any sort of game where you’re leveling up your civilization, then imagine a giant tree and at the bottom of said tree are the technologies that start your civilization off…things like “writing” and “the wheel.” As you go up the tree, you advance in technology, unlocking things like “bronze working” and eventually things like “rocketry.” The tree branches out into different areas of tech, covering different aspects of a civilization like the military and economy.