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Category Archives: Overview

Overview of a game or game session

Chubby Unicorn’s Favorite Games 2017 Edition

When we first started working on this blog, we filled out player profiles which included our favorite games. I listed mine as Castle Panic, Shadows Over Camelot, and 7 Wonders.

In the nearly two years since then, we’ve played a lot of new games or revisited older games with a new expansion or end goal. A lot of other things have changed as well, so I don’t think I’d pick the same games today as I did back then.

Castle Panic is a great co-op game, and it’s often one I like to pick as a new game for someone.

Shadows Over Camelot we don’t play as much. It’s a co-op game, but with how many quests there are to complete, you end up splitting up and working alone, so a lot of the time you don’t feel like you’re working together.

7 Wonders is a great game, but we haven’t been able to play it lately. It’s hard to be excited about a game that doesn’t see a lot of play. Right now it’s just Professor and me, so we’re more likely to play 7 Wonders Duel.

So I think today I would say my favorites are:
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Teaching Games

Professor and I have taught people to play a lot of games, which means most of the time we learn to play on our own and then teach others. There have been a few times others have taught us how to play, and having been both a teacher and a student, I had some thoughts on how to approach teaching/learning a game.

For the person teaching the game:

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Spiting

There is a very interesting and frustrating thing that happens when Professor and I play games with his mom. Without meaning to, she manages to constantly spite me the entire game. I believe this partially happens because I take my turn after her.

When we played Qwirkle, she was consistently playing where I had planned to play which often resulted in her making a Qwirkle. I then would have to settle for far fewer points.

My zoo in Zooloretto was just a mess. Even though the first player in that game changes, I just couldn’t get the animals I needed and ended up with a bunch that I didn’t need. Professor and his mom, though, they did quite well.

Then there was Takenoko. Professor did spite me when he had the panda eat the yellow bamboo I needed, but his mom was spiting me all the time. She would move the gardener or the panda in a way that meant I would have to move them at least twice to meet my end goal instead of just once. I’m surprised I managed to complete so many quests by the end because that game was a real struggle for me.

I’ve had my plans ruined while playing games before, but never so often by the same person. I told Professor the next time we play, I want to take my turn before his mom. I’d like to see if my plans get destroyed as often.

The Pillars of the Earth

A while back we attended a gaming convention (shocking, I know). There were some door and raffle prizes. We entered and won a Board Game that was in German. We weren’t especially enthused (not being German readers/speakers), and set it on a shelf where it gathered dust for a couple months. While we were cleaning house (and getting rid of some games), Chubby Unicorn suggested we toss it, since we didn’t plan to learn German. I told her that we should play it at least once; that the folks on BoardGameGeek probably had a translation and that I would download it and learn the rules.
So I did. I found out that it is an early Worker Placement game with 6 rounds and based on a book. Each round is divided into 3 parts:

  1. Draft resources and/or craftsmen
  2. Master Build Assignment
  3. Board Actions

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Alpaca Pacapaca

Llamas have become sort of a thing in our house because of a hilarious road trip incident. As we were driving to a convention, Professor asked if Space Cat and I had read the new rules.

He said, “They aren’t allowing llamas!”

He interrupted his own sentence to point out llamas in a field beside the road, but we took the sentence as you see it above, stating our disbelief that they wouldn’t be allowing llamas. This occurred near the beginning of the trip, so we had mostly forgotten about it by the time we arrived at the con.

Then we walked into the dealer’s hall.

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Lanterns: The Harvest Festival

Lanterns is a tile placement game. The starting Lake Tile is placed in the center of the table with the red side facing the first player. 7 different colored Lantern Cards are separated into stacks and placed off to the side; the Favor Tokens are also set aside; Dedication Tokens are separated into 3 stacks by type and set aside; the Lake Tiles are stacked to create a draw pile. Each player then draws 3 Lake Tiles. Players then receive Lantern Cards matching the color that’s facing them on the starting Lake Tile. First player will get a red Lantern Card.

There’s also a little boat token which can either be given to the first player or used to mark the last tile played to help with distributing Lantern Cards.

Each turn players will place Lake Tiles and gather Lantern Cards. As long as there are cards of the color available, everyone will receive at least one card beginning with the active player. If a stack of Lantern Cards runs out, players who would have received that color, receive nothing.

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The Dresden Files Cooperative Card Game

The Dresden Files Cooperative Card Game is another game we backed on Kickstarter (Kickstarter campaign).

It is a quick (< 30 minutes) co-op game where Harry Dresden (the protagonist of the Dresden Files book series, by Jim Butcher) and his friends/allies defeat various fiends, overcome obstacles, take advantages, and solve cases.

In game play terms, one person is Harry Dresden, and then everyone else picks who they like. However, in a 2 player game, each player takes 2 characters, but then shuffles those 2 decks together (a la Smash Up). Harry decides who goes first, at which point the game is afoot!

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Qwirkle

Qwirkle is an easy family game. Everyone gets 6 tiles, and you take turns laying them on the board. A line (horizontal or vertical) can be by color or shape. So a completed line or Qwirkle can be 6 green shapes (each shape must be different) or 6 squares of the same shape in the 6 different colors. You cannot repeat a color in a shape line. You cannot repeat a shape in a color line. That’s the most important thing to remember.

When you take your turn, you can only play in one direction (horizontal or vertical), but you can play as many tiles as you want/can in that direction. You then replenish your tiles from the tile bag.

If you don’t have any moves (perhaps the player before you took your move), or don’t want to make any moves, you can trade in 1-6 tiles. Hopefully your new tiles will be more useful.

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The Game Anywhere Table

A while back we backed the Game Anywhere Table on by Transforming Designs. Like most kickstarters, it did not make its anticipated delivery date (Dec 2016). There were a few delays, during which they made some upgrades and tweaks (all of which were VERY well communicated); they are on target to have delivery complete for the tables by end of July (accessories are a different story) and are working on a larger one.

I’ll cut right to the chase: this table is great for gaming on. Being able to fold it up and put it away when not in use is also great. It means we have a designated table for games, without it taking up a lot of space.

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Kooky Kalooki

Several years ago my husband and I stumbled upon Kooky Kalooki while we were out shopping. It says it’s a Jamaican card game, and since his mom is from Jamaica, we thought it would be a great gift for her. Despite never having heard of the game before, his mom quickly became the expert (9 times out of 10, she wins).

If you’ve ever played Phase 10, it’s a little like that, but more complicated. Everyone starts on Round 1, so everyone is dealt 9 cards and is trying to get 3 sets (more on sets later). If I’m the only one who gets 3 sets, I move on to Round 2 and get 10 cards for my next hand while everyone else is still on Round 1. So once you play a few hands, you can all be working towards different goals (the tricky part for whoever is dealing is remembering how many cards everyone gets). Now, in the rules you’re supposed to play 9 rounds or to a certain amount of points, but we play until someone completes Round 9. The way we play always takes longer.

For each Round you need a certain number of sets and/or runs:
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