March 5, 2013 Reviews King of Tokyo The newest recruit to team Shut Up & Sit Down takes a look at King of Tokyo. A game of throwing handfuls of heavy dice at your friends, as hard as you can. I might have got that wrong. Is that wrong, Matt?
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Robinson Crusoe: Adventures on the Cursed Island is a game created by Ignacy Trzewiczek, the author of Stronghold. This time Trzewiczek takes the players to a deserted island, where they’ll play the parts of shipwreck survivors confronted by an extraordinary adventure. They’ll be faced with the challenges of building a shelter, finding food, fighting wild beasts, and protecting themselves from weather changes. Building walls around their homes, animal domestication, constructing weapons and tools from what they find and much more awaits them on the island. The players decide in which direction the game will unfold and – after several in-game weeks of hard work – how their settlement will look. Will they manage to discover the secret of the island in the meantime? Will they find a pirate treasure, or an abandoned village? Will they discover an underground city or a cursed temple at the bottom of a volcano? Answers to these questions lie in hundreds of event cards and hundreds of object and structure cards that can be used during the game…
Robinson Crusoe: Adventures on the Cursed Island is an epic game from Portal. You will build a shelter, palisade, weapons, you will create tools like axes, knives, sacks, you will do everything you can to… to survive. You will have to find food, fight wild beasts, protect yourself from weather changes…
Take the role of one of four characters from the ship crew (cook, carpenter, explorer or soldier) and face the adventure. Use your determination skills to help your team mates, discuss with them your plan and put it into practice. Debate, discuss, and work on the best plan you all can make.
Search for treasures. Discover mysteries. Follow goals of six different, engaging scenarios. Start by building a big pile of wood and setting it on fire to call for help, and then start new adventures. Become an exorcist on cursed Island. Become a treasure hunter on Volcano Island. Become a rescue team for a young lady who’s stuck on rock island…
Let the adventure live!
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You know when you buy a game, and you know it’s going to be good?
“This will be a great time,” you announce to your cactus or spouse. “I have been convinced by this game’s art and premise that I will enjoy myself.”
Your coat’s still on. You pick up the phone. “Barry?” You say. “It’s me. Would you like to come over and have a great time?”
I was convinced Robinson Crusoe was the game for me. Guess what!
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Magic: The Gathering MTG also known as Magic is a trading card game created by Richard Garfield.
First published in 1993 by Wizards of the Coast, Magic was the first trading card game produced and it continues to thrive, with approximately twenty million players as of 2015. Magic can be played by two or more players in various formats, the most common of which uses a deck of 60+ cards, containing no more than 4 of a single card with the exception of basic land cards, either in person with printed cards or using a deck of virtual cards through the Internet-based Magic: The Gathering Online, on a smartphone or tablet, or other programs.
Each game represents a battle between wizards known as “planeswalkers”, who employ spells, artifacts, and creatures depicted on individual Magic cards to defeat their opponents. Although the original concept of the game drew heavily from the motifs of traditional fantasy role-playing games such as Dungeons & Dragons, the gameplay of Magic bears little similarity to pencil-and-paper adventure games, while having substantially more cards and more complex rules than many other card games.
New cards are released on a regular basis through expansion sets. An organized tournament system played at an international level and a worldwide community of professional Magic players has developed, as well as a substantial secondary market for Magic cards. Certain Magic cards can be valuable due to their rarity and utility in game play, with prices ranging from a few cents to thousands of dollars.
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Quinns: Think to get flickering lasers and evil Empires you’d have to play the X-Wing Miniatures Game? Think again, mister! Or miss. Sorry miss.
Paul: No, it’s me, I am a mist-
Quinns: Say hello to Fortress: America (and imagine it responding to your greeting with an excitable 21 gun salute).The ENTIRE WORLD (made up of three players) is invading near-future America (controlled by one player). I’m talking bombers over Boston. Hovertanks in Houston. APCs in… in, uh…
Paul: In Annapolis! This may well be the ultimate in what we call Ameritrash, big flashy board games with lots of components.
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Quinns: I’m meeting a lot of board gamers here in New York. It’s like Christmas, and I’m Santa, except they gift me with a game and only rarely sit on my lap and you know what this analogy doesn’t work at all
Today I was walked through WONDERFUL post-apocalyptic tactics game Neuroshima Hex!, released in 2006 and since expanded by a untidy bag of army packs. My friend took out this game, taught it to me, and promptly put it away again.
“We’ll play on the iPad,” he said. “It’s better on the iPad.”
My face promptly crumpled up like a plastic bag in a strong breeze. Worst part of it is, he was right.
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Quinns: The first edition of Innovation, a card game ranked in Board Game Geek’s top 150 games of ALL TIME, looks – as you can see – supernaturally boring.
The tiny box looks like it should contain soviet suppositories, and inside it you’ll find 110 cards in the same hospitalised colour (Lung? Nicotine?). The deathly manual informs you that every one of these cards is an “innovation”, from archery to automobiles, and 2-4 players will use them to race from one end of history to the other.
Let’s say you agree to play Innovation, even though it’s clearly not your thing. That experience can be compared to going to drink a tall glass of dirty water, and discovering it’s neat whisky.
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Shadows over Camelot is a cooperative/semi-cooperative hand-management and deduction-based board game for 3–7 players.
Each player represents a knight of the Round Table and they must collaborate to overcome a number of quests, ranging from defeating the Black Knight to the search for the Holy Grail. Completed quests place white swords on the Round Table; failed quests add black swords and/or siege engines around Camelot. The knights are trying to build a majority of white swords on the Table before Camelot falls.
On each knight’s turn, the knight takes a “heroic action”, such as moving to a new quest, building his hand, or playing cards to advance the forces of good. However, he must also choose one of three evil actions, each of which will bring Camelot closer to defeat.
Moreover, one of the knights may be a traitor, pretending to be a loyal member of the party but secretly hindering his fellow knights in subtle ways, biding his time, waiting to strike at the worst possible moment…
But enough words… don your cloak, climb astride your warhorse, and gallop into the Shadows to join us in Camelot!
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Quinns: Oh god. OK.
Because board games age so goddamn well, running a board game site can be a bit like running a daycare centre. Those guys can’t rest because it might mean a kid getting stuck behind a radiator or someone eating a rock. We can’t rest because even if we stay on top of new games, we’re writing under the weight of every awesome game we’ve never played.
Shadows over Camelot is one such older game we need to tell you about. One of HUNDREDS. It never ends, but all the same we’re going to talk about it with the good humour of men throwing a shiny penny into a wishing well.
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Paul: Right then, shall we look inside a box that hasn’t been opened in at least sixteen years?
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