I'm still sort of reeling from my trip to Indianapolis this past weekend. Between long days patrolling the show floor looking for cool games to demo, long nights gaming and little sleep between one day and the next, I still feel as though my brain is floating somewhere up above my skull, not quite all the way in. I played a lot of stuff on the floor and in the gaming hall, and had a really great time.
Since I'm pretty wasted still, here are the quick hits:
Relic Knights has some of the most beautiful models, and some pretty clever gameplay, but I didn't like them both together. My friend Peter said, "it's like puzzle quest." Yep, match-three gameplay and anime robot girls. The One Shot model makes me want to learn how to paint better.
THQ's Space Marine feels like a pretty derivative 3rd person shooter, though only being able to regenerate health by performing brutal melee attacks is a cool idea. The weapons felt nice, the action was decent, and THQ's love for the Warhammer 40K setting is well established at this point, so while this might not be a day 1 purchase for most, 40K fans will probably get a lot out of it.
Tanto Cuore was my obsession during the show, partly because of how ludicrous it was and partly because I secretly wanted it to be the best deck-building game I'd ever played. I liked it better than dominion, however the $50 price point seems way off base, even if the art and production values seemed pretty high. There are some solid ideas in that game, the best being the private maids and the ability to chamber maids by taking actions, pulling them out of your deck and scoring more points at the end of the game. Surprisingly, the demo consisted of an entire game. Misogyny..... sometimes it takes a game about being the "master" of a house of Japanese maids to make you realize what a pig you are.
Rune Age is a deck building game set in Runebound's world of Terrinoth. Ugh..... I didn't like this game. Not sure if it is because deck building games are pretty boring once you crack the formula to winning, or if because I generally dislike everything that has to do with Runebound. As much as I like FFG's Silver Line of games, I have to say STAY AWAY.
Blood Bowl Team Manager was the best game I played all show. Unfortunately it sold out on Thursday and I couldn't get a copy. A friend of mine did, however, and you can see my review in a bit.
Ascension..... that's another deckbuilding game. I like this one more than Dominion, but that's not saying much. It's easy to see the influence of Magic: The Gathering pro-tour players in the gameplay, but really they made a game that's like really linear Rochester drafting where you only sometimes get to pick the card you want. I accidentally made my friend buy the whole line. WOOPS!
Star Wars LCG. A cooperative LCG. I had a fun time demoing it, even though we only played it for one round. This is a game I would like to sit down and play any time, but not one that I would ever buy. I'm not a big fan of cooperative games (except for Space Hulk: Death Angel, of course), but I had a fine time playing this demo. It will probably sell pretty well.
Sedition Wars is Mike McVey's game. The models aren't bad looking. I hear the game is in beta still. The rules felt pretty rough to me. It didn't stand out.
Psi-Duel is a two player card-game about two psychics trying to melt each other's brains. I liked it enough to drop $15 on a copy. What it comes down to is a lightning fast (3-4 rounds) hand management game with some rock<paper<scissors elements.
The Ares Project is like a game me and Peter were working on, except finished and really good. Basically it is like a computer real-time strategy game. Think build orders, fog of war, base development, scouting, skirmishes, and attacks. We only played a very little bit during the demo but even that stuff seemed really cool, so I can only imagine what the rest of that game is like.
Dust is getting miniature rules that they were demoing on a very attractive table. The minis are rather nice, and the setting seems cool, but I was not super turned on by the miniature rules themselves.
Quarriors was another deck-building game, though this one used dice instead of cards and was designed in part by Eric Lang who worked on the Call of Cthulhu CCG. I liked Quarriors because it had a bit more player interaction (sort of), though I imagine that like most deck-building games it might get somewhat stale after multiple plays. In terms of depth, it ain't no Puerto Rico, but it was fun.
whew, i think that's all the stuff I played, except for the best game of all....
Blood Bowl: Team Manager
So, for those who don't know, Blood Bowl is the game of fantasy football. That is, fantasy as in there are elves and orcs and beastmen running around on the field. Based on Games Workshop's miniature/board game hybrid, Blood Bowl Team Manager is sort of the fantasy football game of fantasy football. Instead of controlling the actions of individual athletes on the field, players commit cards representing athletes to highlight cards (1 for each player) during each week of the season. Each week there are also special events that effect play and sometimes tournaments which function as sort of extra highlights that all teams can play on simultaneously. Each highlight can support two opposing teams, and the team with the most star power on one side of a highlight wins a reward printed in the center of the card, though both teams also receive a reward just for showing up. Rewards include fans (VPs), team-specific upgrades that give you static bonuses, star player cards and coaching staff upgrades that give you special abilities usable once per week. The goal of the game is to end the season with the most fans.
Each team (there are 6 in the game) has 12 athletes on it who play various positions including linemen, blitzers, throwers, blockers, and sometimes monsters like trolls and ogres. Each athlete has a Star Power attribute when standing, a Star Power attribute when tackled, and might have a number of icons that indicate which skills they have (tackle, cheat, sprint, or pass). They might also have a special ability written in text on their card. When an athlete is comitted to a highlight they resolve their icons in order, so they might cheat first and take a cheat token and then throw a tackle against an opposing athlete on the other side of the highlight, or they might pass which moves the ball (adding two star power to the team who possesses it) closer to their side of the highlight. The icons are all pretty useful, though I found that tackle and pass were a bit more useful than cheat and sprint.
Fans of the original will appreciate the tackle mechanics, which are resolved with special tackle dice that are very similar to those used in the miniature game except that star power doubles as strength in this game. Tackled athletes have lower star power, drop the ball if they're the ball carrier, have blanked text boxes and are removed from the pitch as casualties if tackled again. Including dice in the game introduces some variance and makes for some great upsets when your favorable tackle sometimes winds up knocking your own athlete down and reducing your team's starpower for the highlight. I thought the ball passing mechanic was nicely done, and makes for some great swings where your ball carrier can get tackled, returning the ball to midfield, and then the opposing player can play a thrower with the pass icon out of their hand to gain possession and the extra star power the ball gives. Even linemen, who are generally the worst players on each team come in handy with their ability to take a hit for another player, thus protecting your precious ball carriers. Cheating is a swingy mechanic that places a cheat token on the athlete that resolves when the highlight is being scored, and sometimes adds star power or fans, but can also get your athlete ejected from the game. Sprinting allows you to draw an athlete from your team deck and discard one from your hand, effectively letting you cycle linemen and other weak atheletes out of your hand in favor of strong blitzers, monsters and star players.
Each round players will usually draw and commit a total of 6 athletes split between two different highlights, though occasionally you might find yourself playing for more highlights. There is a lot of decision making here, as sometimes you will not be sure how committed your opponents are to winning a particular highlight until it is too late, and you might find out that you should have played more or better athletes to try and secure one highlight instead of spreading yourself too thin between two. After all players have committed their athletes, each highlight is scored and rewards are distributed, then a new week starts with new highlights. Play continues for 5 weeks and at the end of the season the team with the most fans wins.
Blood Bowl Team Manager is an absolute blast to play for newcomers and fans of the miniature game alike. The designers have managed to include a great assortment of teams which feel very different in play style and include Humans, Wood Elves, Dwarves, Orcs, Chaos and Skaven. The game is quick to learn but very challenging, and you will find yourself having to make tough decisions each turn. Play is quick, taking about an hour per game once you've got it all figured out. I expect that the great variety in teams, star players and upgrade cards along with the variance introduced by the tackle dice, special event and highlight decks will give this game great replay value. The production value was very nice, with excellent artwork and high build quality throughout, though I could have done without the tiny upgrade cards. I spent most of my free time at Gen Con playing this game and I highly recommend it to anyone who is even remotely curious about it. There isn't a lot that I didn't like, though I can see where some might not enjoy the variance in tackles and special events.
On a scale of 1-10, I'd give it a solid 8.5, which is relatively close to some of my favorite games including Shogun, Puerto Rico and Command's and Colors: Ancients, which I would score above a 9. At an MSRP of $35, this is a game you can't afford not to buy.
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