Let’s pretend for a moment that you’re hosting a party and that the guests of honor should be arriving any minute. You’ve got your Star Trek DVDs locked and loaded, you’ve got your favorite Hanson album blasting away, and the eighteen topping pizzas that someone is sure to be allergic to are on their way. You’re confident that Captain Kirk can keep your guests actively engaged throughout the evening, but you’re thinking of bringing out a party game just to be sure.
Words can’t express how psyched I was when I discovered this game. I am a big fan of city builder games and a lot of the good ones that people recommended to me are either out of print or go for outrageous amounts on Amazon or eBay. Sure, you could play SimCity 4 or Cities XL on the PC…but the former was released in 2003 and the latter I didn’t find to be all that good. I desperately needed to scratch that city builder itch, and Sunrise City happened to come along just in the nick of time.
Being a customizable card game connoisseur can be expensive. More often than not, you’ll drop five bucks or more on expansion packs in the hopes of getting a rare card that will boost your main deck…sometimes with disappointing results. I experienced a lot of that when trying to build my first Star Trek Customizable Card Game deck when I was a kid. I may have to bring my binder out of mothballs and review that game as well…but for now, we’re going to take a look at a lighter two player card game that is much easier to pick up and play.
I enjoy a good mystery. I am not sure what appeals to me more…the leaps in logical deduction that I make during the ordeal or the smug satisfaction I feel when I finally figure out what really happened. I was secretly hoping that I would find a board game that featured the brilliant Sherlock Holmes, but Jack the Ripper turned out to work just as well.
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.
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!!!!”