GAMING NEWS: Necronopoly? And More! (29 July 2006)

.
Hi Everyone,

I managed to stop by A-1 Comics in Roseville yesterday and met a few friends for some gaming...

A-1 Comics link:

http://www.a-1comics.com/a1main.htm

The following were present:
- Chris
- Dave
- Jason
- Kimbo
- Maksim (me!)

I was last there and missed out on a few games including this amusing spawn of Cthulhu and Monopoly (no kidding):

NECRONOPOLY

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/game/15057

I don't remember who won (Code for "Kimbo won!" Mazel Tov, Kimbo!), but I did get to see Jason go insane and turn into a ghoul. Very amusing. And Dave got eaten by an Elder force so it couldn't have been all bad.

Here's mighty Kimbo's summation of the game:

An obvious take off on Monopoly. This is a simple "roll and move" game that might be a bit of fun for the fan of the Cthulhu Mythos. Instead of money, the currency of the game is sanity, and it goes away fast! The "winner" is the last player to have any sanity left. (I call this person the "Last loser".) You can buy property in this game (using Sanity of course) but there is no trading of properties, no houses or hotels to build. The game is all about trying to preserve the sanity you start with longer than everyone else. One advantage this game has over Monopoly is that when a player goes insane (loses all his sanity), he becomes a monster in the game (a cultist) and begins working against the remaining players. A cultist can't "win" the game, but at least he's not sitting around waiting for the game to end...

Good for a laugh or two, but not a game to be taken seriously.

Mazel Tov again to Kimbo, the Great Old One!

El Grande

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/game/93

Next we played El Grande, which I have been avoiding for awhile. It gets good reviews, but I have had a very bad feeling about it, which was well vindicated during play. Dave blindsided me on the first turn and I was stuck anywhere from twenty to forty points behind all of the other players. El Grande is a basic territorial dominance game with bidding for special cards, which affect gameplay. I stuck it out (after the blindside), but the amount of backstabbing in the game (We often call it the "Kimbage factor" and I'm not sure why since Kimbo really isn't a vindictive person... guess it's just teasing.) decreased my enjoyment of the game. Or I could just be kvetching...

Flip-Tac-Toe http://www.boardgamegeek.com/game/24540

Dave must have had a screw loose because he suggested that we play a Tic-Tac-Toe game with foam "Romper Room" pieces next. The twist with Flip-Tac-Toe was that you could stack the pieces four high or move stacks. I think that I would have been more amused if we had played food fight with the pieces. I manage sneak in a quick victory on the first game and sat out the second game, which dragged out forever.

And while they spent about forty minutes FLIP-TAC-TOE'ing each other, I ran into Mike Hardy, who was working on minis. We chatted about a number of things including his Cold Navy miniatures line and game universe, which he has now sold off. For more information, check out the Cold Navy web site:
http://coldnavy.xtreme-hobby.com/

Mike Hardy is an interesting guy and one of the most consistently gnenerous gamers I've known. I originally met him at the old Hobby Workshop gaming store...

(ASIDE: I miss good ol' Machiavellian Bill, the owner of that classy joint! Bill was one f those folks you'll remember for life... like the proprietor from the KODT comic book gaming shop...)

...in the early 2000's, while he was demo'ing Reaper's CAV game. Later CAV burned him out...

(ASIDE: Reaper still has yet to come out with CAV 2... it's been something like two or three years since they last announced that it was forthcoming...)

...and I've lately caught him playing War Machine from Privateer Press. I think that War Machine is a good game, but have avoided it because I don't want to buy into another miniatures game.

Mike is probably best known for his Cold Navy miniatures line, which is very impressive. Unfortunately, the pressure of raising a family, maintaining a day job and trying to run a low profit hobby company was too much and Mike sold off the company. I wish both Mike and his successor luck in their future ventures. The miniatures and board game hobby industries are notoriously hard to break into.

KODT comic book link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KODT

Rum & Pirates

http://www.boardgamegeek.com/game/19948

After the FLIP-TAC-TOE carnage ended (They stopped "flipping" each other...), we proceeded to play a game that I can never quite get the hang of, Rum & Pirates. What seems like a simple five turn pirate-themed version of Candyland and the old TSR Fantasy Forest has some very deceptive bidding game mechanics, which saw me end in a dead heat for last place again. My friend, Dick Mitchell, has mentioned that I must have lost my mojo. I'm starting to think that he may be right. I'd like to give Rum & Pirates another go or so... it has promise.

And because I haven't posted any shots of "gratuitous babes" in awhile, I chose this one from the recently passed Comicon comic book convention:

http://www.comicon.com/index.html

Look, Mom! It's Latina Wonder Woman!

I have to admit that most folks who attend conventions of any type in costume scare me, but every now and then someone shows up in a Spandex bodysuit who should actually be allowed to wear one, and this person certainly qualifies. She's also a nice change of pace for my poor weary eyes... so tired from looking at "over and underweight nerd groupies with anime neon bright hairdoos"... try saying that five times quickly.

On the other hand, someone probably ought to feed her. I'm sure that that's nothing a little lox and chicken soup with "Super Schmaltz" can't fix...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lox

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schmaltz

Have a great Sunday!

Shalom,
Maksim-Smelchak.