Shut Up & Sit Down

Games News! 13/07/15

happy exetans, formative bulges, ejecting gamers, actual fire

Quinns: Good MORNING everybody! What do you get up to this weekend? Answers in the comments below. Keep ’em short, sweet and tell me what your favourite component was.

The big story this week is the arrival of Games Workshop’s divisive, eccentric reboot of Warhammer Fantasy, Warhammer: Age of Sigmar. The new ruleset scraps point values for miniatures, leaving players to guess at what a fair fight might look like. It also adds a ton of bonuses that players can earn by acting a certain way while they play. Own a stuck-up High Elf dragon rider? You can re-roll your dice if you don’t smile for the entire hero phase.

A lot of Warhammer fans are confused. Some are upset. Some are really upset. And then you have the guy who uploaded a video where he sets fire to his army.

I’ve been watching the fallout for a week. It’s nuts!

192 Comments

Review: Trajan

dollops of thought-sauce, squeaking men in england, quintin's attic

Buckle up, boardkids! It’s time for Team SU&SD to tackle the Official 38th Best Board Game of All Time: Trajan. A game of thrashing as many victory points as you can out of Ancient Rome.

Don’t believe what you’ve heard. Shut Up & Sit Down can still handle heavy eurogames.

…or can they?

Leave a comment

Podcast #30: An Opera of Toys

Matt's dangerous gambit, wooden jelly, tripping bowls

You ever eat Nerd Rope? Just an endlessly long, glutinous tongue, speckled with sour little gobbets? That’s basically the 30th ever SU&SD podcast. On this lengthy journey of no less than one hour and one minute, we discuss the absence of bitterness in the magnificent Forbidden Stars. We chat about the sheer joy of Funemployed … Read more

Leave a comment

Interview: Volko Ruhnke’s Modern Wargames

the ballad of the sweet warlord and Hitler's forgotten shoes

Thrower: Do you find numbers scary? Do you dread the pointy 1, the razor-sharp 7, the misery of an unsolved sum? If you do, you’ve probably realised that most board games are just fearsome equations wearing friendly grins.

Designers, however, understand this, and more. They welcome it, glory in it, roll in it like pigs in mathematical mud. Because it’s what they use to build the foundations of something fun, yet something real.

Take Volko Ruhnke, designer of contemporary wargames Labyrinth and the Counter-Insurgency (or COIN) series. “Most board games and video games that are about something are models,” he told me. “Trading games, railroad building games, shooting games, strategic war games. They all communicate the game designers’ model of certain aspects of human affairs.”

62 Comments

Games News! 06/07/15

tomorrow's india, yesterday's japan, ticket to elfs, Paul's trunks

Paul: This is a disaster. How much food do we have left? How many days can we go? Will we even get rescued out here?

Quinns: I’m sure it’ll be fine, just keep sending up the flares and don’t put any limbs in the water. Look, I managed to salvage a few of the more intact parts of Matt, which we can probably cook, and then there’s the…

Paul: What?

Quinns: The Games News. I’m really sorry, Paul. We’re going to have to eat the Games News.

101 Comments

Review: Spyfall

samantha mumba, you better belief, indubibably, the worst hotel

The English language version of Spyfall is finally available! …And stock has immediately drained out shops the world over like a vodka martini through a sieve.

Don’t worry, friends! Operating in a dangerous web of international intrigue, and with a little help from Starlit Citadel, Team SU&SD has secured a review copy. At last, we’re here to tell you if this party game live up to the hype.

19 Comments

Review: Cockroach Poker Royal

royale with cheats, hair eggs, lil' mandibles, the queen's duties

Quinns: Catch Team SU&SD at our most tired and soul-blasted, when we’re done walking the halls of a giant convention, and there’s a single game we’ll always still be able to play. It’s Skull.

It’s the arsenic-laced wafer thin mint of board gaming, and there’s always room for its lies and laughter. The one thing more impressive than Asmodee daring to call Skull “the very quintessence of bluffing” is that actually, I don’t think they’re wrong.

Two months ago I was in a pub with a friend who I trust completely. “If you like Skull,” he said, “Then write this down. ‘Cockroach Poker’. Best £10 you’ll ever spend.”

Today I’m the proud owner of one “Cockroach Poker Royal”, the en-complicated 2012 sequel to 2004’s Cockroach Poker. And I’ll tell you what! It’s not just a great game of lying to your friends. It’s a great game of lying with your friends.

85 Comments

Games News! 29/06/15

suspense, intrigue, pummelings, mingo fanty, chicken pizzas of the ancient world

Quinns: This weekend was a Party Weekend for the Quinns household. The good news is that we got to try out both Cockroach Poker AND Spyfall, and you can expect some very funny, positive reviews of those later this week. The bad news is that I’m so hungover that I’m having trouble focusing my eyes. I offer my sincerest apologies for what might be a distinct lack of humour, accuracy, bravery, words, truth or news in this week’s news.

Don’t worry! It’s all good news, at least. We never played Gale Force Nine’s Firefly board game (that’d be the team behind the innovative but wanting Spurticus tie-in game), because we heard Firefly was still wanting but a little less innovative.

That hasn’t stopped the game gathering quite the following, though, with GFN this week announcing three expansions! Firefly: The Game – Kalidasa is a big box offering a new sector of space and a wad of new cards, and the two miniature expansions will add new Fireflies (Fireflii?).

Leave a comment

Review: Specter Ops

Tiny car, actually doing history, laundry stealth challenge

What’s this, sneaking into Friday’s schedule? Why, it’s a review of Plaid Hat’s hotly anticipated Specter Ops, a hidden movement game from one of the industry’s most renowned publishers.

Paul takes a long, hard look at the game and… well, has anyone taken a long hard look for Paul recently? Actually, it’s probably best not to. He appears to have both gone missing and gone a little… mournfully malfunctional. This is the first time that’s happened since last time. Do let us know if you spot him, or even any part of him. Probably don’t approach him, mind.

Best not dwell on that. Have a lovely weekend!

Leave a comment

Miniatures Game Review: Infinity

ramboesque swathes, wandering hearts, nice cakes, cheese cakes

[Introducing another new series of articles! Eric Tonjes is professional Nebraskan and miniatures gamer who’s agreed to review some of 2015’s most popular miniatures games. You guys were so sweet to Hilary yesterday, so please give Eric the same welcome!]

Eric: So you’ve played a lot of games. You’ve gone from the simple family stuff to the weightiest Euro, and it still isn’t satisfying. You’re looking for something more. Lately, maybe you’ve been eyeing those hunched figures in the back of the game shop, pushing around their armies of painted men and orcs and arguing about byzantine rules. You’re looking, and you’re wondering… Has it perhaps come to this? Dare I become a *gulp* miniatures gamer?

Or maybe you’ve just noticed those boxes with gloriously painted figurines on the covers and wondered what they’re all about.

In the coming months I’ll be serving as your guide to the dark world of tabletop miniatures gaming. More than that, I’ll be trying to tell you what makes the very best ones sing – what about each one makes them unique, and why people spend huge amounts of money and even larger amounts of time assembling and painting little soldiers.

Up first, let’s take a gander at Infinity, the phenomenal flagship game of Corvus Belli.

197 Comments

Feeds