jducoeur

So as a few people have noticed, I haven't been posting much for the past couple of weeks. This is because I've been busy, but moreover because I've been out of town -- five days at the Origins Game Fair last weekend, three at the Known World Dance Symposium this past weekend. I haven't been offline, but I generally believe in not posting a gigantic sign saying, "Look at me! I'm out of town!" on my blog, so I've been letting it be. Now I'm home again, so it's time to start catching up.

So first, a listing of New Games before I go to bed. At Origins, unsurprisingly, I wound up accumulating a stupidly large number of games, and shipped a large box home. That arrived last Wednesday, just before I left for KWDS, and I just opened it up. Here's a quick list of the haul:

Fealty: okay, this one I didn't ship home, I hand-carried it because it's precious. It's mindways' first published game, which was released in a limited run of 100 copies for Origins. He, I and Chris (the publisher) spent a fair chunk of the weekend demo'ing it with considerable success. It's quite an excellent strategy game, especially for a game that can be played in as little as 10 minutes: the strategy aspect is strongest with two players, but it scales nicely to 4. The flavor is abtract-strategy, and the area-control mechanic is pretty unique. So demo'ing it was great fun: I can explain the basics in about two minutes, play enough sample game to show how it works in another five, and play a full first game in another ten or so. And over half the players then wanted to know which booth had copies, which is what I want to hear. The full release is going to be in the fall, but I'll be teaching it to folks in the meantime with my limited-edition copy -- it's good stuff, and I think is going to be something of a hit.

Dominion: Cornucopia: quite some time ago, I became a serious Dominion geek. The new expansion is a half-set, and is Good. Not as great as Prosperity, not as weak as Alchemy, but solidly Good. It introduces a couple of new toys, including a small pile of one-off Prize Kingdom cards that you can win during gameplay. I played a couple of hands of it, and it'll likely become something of a staple.

Infinite City: mindways and I played a demo of this in the AEG booth, and both quickly agreed that it's more my speed than his. It's essentially a card game, competing to build a city based on the cards in your hand and placing your influence in the city squares. Instead of cards, it's actually played with about a million square cardboard tiles, but it's still basically a tactical card game. Fun, lightweight, with enough strategy to not be stupid but not a thinky game like Fealty. I'll probably pull it out frequently.

Myth: Pantheons: a freebie that I was given with Infinite City. The lady in the AEG booth asked us whether our game night preferred co-op or competitive games; when we allowed that competitive games were considerably more popular, she handed me this one. So presumably it's competitive. Beyond that, I know little about it yet.

The Heavens of Olympus: honestly, I don't know much about it except that the box is Big. mindways and I spent the bulk of Origins in the Board Room -- essentially the extra-price board-gaming room that includes a huge library of loaner games. With your Board Room ribbon came various goodies, including randomly-selected free games. Rio Grande donated a small pile of this game, in which you are playing minor gods trying to help Zeus build the heavens. Sometime soon, I'll finish reading the rules.

Rails of New England: again, I know little about it -- haven't actually had a chance to open the box yet. But it's a new game from Rio Grande, and was co-written by my friend Walter Hunt, who organized the Masonic Lodge meetings at Arisia. So I figured it was worth giving it a try: I'll tell more when I have more idea what it's like.

Loch Ness: another freebie from Rio Grande, in this case the one that mindways got. He decided (based on the online info) that it doesn't look like his cup of tea, but figured that the families at Camelot might enjoy it. So I've brought it home as a donation -- we'll see what folks think.

Innovation: Echoes of the Past is the sequel to the previous major game from Asmadi, the publisher of Fealty, and was a big hit at Origins last year. Innovation is a totally different game from Fealty, but is also quite a lot of fun, and I've been play-testing the sequel a bit for the past few months. I'm still getting the hang of Innovation, but will be happy to teach it to folks.

Sturgeon: no clue. This was yet another freebie from the Board Room, and I haven't opened it yet. Looks very lightweight -- we'll see what it's like. My expectations are low (the ratings on BGG are weak), but hey, I'll try almost any game once. (And free is free.)

Field Hospital: created by someone mindways knows from the game-design community, and he tried it out last year. The game is apparently a slightly scarily accurate simulation of a hospital, where it sounds like you're trying to triage patients, not get too overwhelmed, and not *actually* let anybody die -- or at least, not get blamed for it. Purchased mostly because unicornpearlz studies the history of medicine as her main focus these days, so I figure it was worth trying out of curiosity.

So that's the haul. Expect to see a lot of Fealty in the coming months, and other games from time to time. (And more LJ entries as I have time to write them...)