Goa and Power Grid thoughts

I played Power Grid with 2 players for the first time. I liked it.
It definitely feels a bit different than the multi-player version, but
it's still quite good. The auctions are quite different, and the
competition for cities is not relevant starting in Step 2, but the
quality of someone needing to occupy all the cities to end the game is
very appealing. While I'm unlikely to seek it out frequently with
two, it also seems it would be a very good introduction to the game
and provides an environment to experiment with the tactics a little
less disruptively.

I continue to enjoy Goa a great deal. It's long, but worth it. It
appears there are several errors in the translation on the Geek, when
compared to the Rio Grande rules. I encourage those who've learned
the rules by reading the rules on the Geek to check their English
rules if they have them. A few specifics:

• You can place the flag marker on any place on the edge or in any unoccupied square, so long as at least one tile is orthogonally adjacent.
  
• When you draw expedition cards, you discard/play (playing at most one) down to your hand limit after you draw.
  
• The expedition cards for getting to the fourth and fifth rows are awarded seperately for each column, allowing up to 10 to be awarded per game. (This is unclear even in the Rio Grande rules, and I have played it both ways)
  

With experienced players, the game is close to the 90 minute estimate
and a lot of fun. It's a lot to keep in your head at once and I'm
tempted to allow planning on paper next time I play.

October 2004 Games

30 games played, 27 titles (7 new to me) over 8 sessions with 33 different people.

Hot Games for October, 2004

Goa (1 play)

Some of the shine is beginning to come off of this, but it's still great.

Victory & Honor (1 play)

Clever, different, interesting trick taking game.

Goldbrau (1 play)

Fun combination of business and simultanous action selection.

Puerto Rico (1 play)

I somehow went months without playing this. I apparently forgot a great deal of strategy.

Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde (1 play)

Another great and extremely clever trick taking game

Exxtra (2 plays)

An underplayed filler.

Ticket to Ride (1 play)

I managed to complete about 7 routes and still lose.

Crokinole (2 plays)

One of many perennials.

Ra (1 play)

Another old favorite.

Heroscape (1 play)

I continue to be surprised how much I enjoy this...

April 2004 Games

April, 2004

Gamewise, April was dominated by the Gathering.

115 games played, 69 titles (32 new to me) over 14 sessions
with 110 different people.

Hot Games for April, 2004

San Juan

I enjoyed this the first few times and am enjoying it more with successive plays

Tongiaki

Chaotic, but good chaos. Better with fewer players, perhaps ideal at 4.

PowerGrid

Better than Funkenschlag and that was pretty good

Ma Ni Ki!

Fun, amusing, quick.

Goa

Length might be the only thing preventing this from being truly amazing.

St. Petersburg

Nothing amazingly new here, but very good

Immer Oben Auf!

Clever and fun memory game

Le Passe Trappe

Frantic and fun dexterity game

Quack Shot

Also frantic and fun, with well armed ducks

Marco Polo

More subtle than most people are giving it credit for

Gathering Of Friends 2004

I just returned from the Gathering this year, having had a great time. I'll soon expand on this, but some extremely quick thoughts:

Games of note: Goa, St. Petersburg, Power Grid, SanJuan. All of them were very good. It was also great to see many old friends and make some new friends. As ever, talking to Friedemann Friese, Jay Tummelson and others to hear their insights into the business, marketing and industry aspects of game publishing was very interesting. Also, if you're ever in Columbus, Ohio, try Graeter's Ice Cream. Mmmmm.

For some extremely brief comments on many of the new games I played, see the list of new-to-me games.

Games played:        100
Titles played:        60
New to me:            30
People played with:   96

Individual Game Reviews

New Games

I've started with reviews of games where I have somewhat dissenting opinions on their quality, such as Marco Polo, Tongiaki and Sunken City.

• Immer Oben Auf!
  
• Marco Polo
  
• Sunken City
  
• Tongiaki
  

Old Games

• ZooSim
  

New To Me Games

These are games that are new to me, with the newest at the top, along
with whatever ultra-brief commentary I have on them. I periodically
update this, but the post time will no longer change and it won't show
up as new in RSSI fees.

2004

May

Der Herr der Ringe: Die Rückkehr des Königs Ugh. Uninteresting game of dice rolling.

Stapelei Simple, extremely compact dexterity game with a donkey.

Nuba Older abstract Knizia game worth a few plays

April (Gathering of Friends)

• DickeLuftInDerGruft Beautiful kids memory game
  
• SunkenCity Light exploration and screw-your-neighbor game
  
• Kaleidos Find words in busy pictures. Ok, but not as fun as I'd heard.
  
• Masterdieb Amazingly produced geometry, memory and role selection game.
  
• SmartyParty Fun party game with lists whose imperfections can be annoying
  
• DestinationTresor Clever, novel and enjoyable deduction game
  
• Tongiaki Somewhat chaotic but some real opportunity for interesting tricks.
  
• PayoffMachine Old 1970s game with marbles. Rather Neat.
  
• 5thAvenue Disappointing, but worth another play.
  
• MaNiKi Very entertaining animal stacking puzzle game
  
• Marco Polo Light but strong game of carefully timed cardplay
  
• StPetersburg Few new mechanics but a very good game none the less
  
• OldTown Older deduction game (sort of) with a very nice mechanic but very random results
  
• Immer oben auf! Fun and cute animal stacking memory game
  
• Goa Outstanding complex game in the mold of PrincesOfFlorence or PuertoRico
  
• Zopp Fun dexterity game
  
• RailroadDice Clever mechanics, fun game, but has some endgame problems
  
• OhPharaoh Disappointing pyramid building game with some potential
  
• PowerGrid Outstanding Funkenschlag rework
  
• MangaManga Dull realtime cardgame
  
• LostValley Beautifully produced but blandly mechanical game
  
• Spy I liked this like Knizia cardgame but most others were unimpressed
  
• Saga Interesting smallbox card game with a nice twist on influence games
  
• LePasseTrappe Simple, fun, entertaining wooden dexterity game
  
• MusicMystery Music trivia game. Not my thing.
  
• Memoir44 BattleCry in World War 2. Fun and nicely produced.
  
• BlueMoon Nice Knizia two player. Needs more plays, but I'm in no rush.
  

April

• Alexandros Some nice mechanics but led to a bad kingmaker result.
  
• SanJuan Very good. Lots of potential.
  

March

• Hansa Not bad, but awfully monotonous commodity collection game
  
• EinfachGenial Fun 2-, 3- or 4-player abstract from Reiner Knizia
  
• Corsari Very light and seemingly overly-luck dominated card game
  
• TicketToRide Nice middle-weight game of connecting cities and building rails
  
• Maritim Interesting puzzle movement game. _Way_ too long with six players.
  
• Landlord A "take that" game from Friedemann Friese. Not bad for a "take that" game, but...
  

February

• Mississippi Interesting older Mattel game all about chain reactions
  
• BalloonRennen Very chaotic and random, but we laughed a lot everytime someone slammed into the mountains.
  
• Industria Pretty good, but feels a bit scattered. Worth another play.
  
• UndTschuss Interesting, but I'm not sure what I think yet
  
• Yinsh Very good
  

January

• PrincesOfTheRenaissance
  
• Dracula A little long, but fun
  
• Adam & Eva Very good
  
• Piratenbucht
  
• Trampelfanten A light kids game with a funky rule or two. Fun.
  
• Coda A quick, light deduction game. That's a rare combination
  
• Bus
  
• LoadedQuestions OK party game
  
• CrocodilePoolParty
  

2003

December

• Viele Dinge
  
• Fish Eat Fish
  
• 10 Days in Africa
  
• Floriado
  

June 2004 Games

June was another slow month for games, with a great many other
priorities surpassing game playing. I will soon be redefining what
constitutes a "slow" month. Fortunately, I did get to play several longer games.

24 games played, 17 titles (1 new to me) over 7 sessions with 22 different people.

Hot Games for June, 2004

Goa

I am extremely fond of this game. I liked Traders of Genoa, also by Rudiger Dorn, but this is even better. It's got interesting auctions, a complex but manageable system of interlocking bits and a variety of paths to victory. It seems to be a bit north of two hours, and I hope that gets lower with experience, but I really don't usually mind.

Power Grid

I was never a huge fan of Funkenschlag, but Power Grid manages to fix the two "problems" it had: components and length. It's still not short, but it's an outstanding business game.

Tongiaki

I'm saddened that other people don't seem to enjoy this as much as I do.

Ma Ni Ki!

It's so cute and it's good filler.

Mole Hill

This is a clever game with a good lesson in advance planning.

Electronic Catchphrase

"Vittles" is very hard to clue, if "tender" doesn't send people down the right track.

Royal Turf

Go Nougat!

San Juan

This is experiencing a greater durability than expected under a pretty heavy load of play.

Apples to Apples

Not as novel as it used to be, but still fun to pull out occasionally.

Lost Cities

Played every year from 1999 to 2004 and deserves it.

5s and 10s for 2004

As has become the tradition, here are the games I played this year at least 20 times, 10 times and 5 times.
Italicized games have appeared on my lists in past years. See also my list from last year.

I played somewhat fewer games total this year, but also fewer different titles which means the 5s and 10s list is about the same size as usual. It was a good year for word games (Electronic Catchphrase, Typo and Buy Word) as well as for new games.

20+

Electronic Catchphrase (23)

10+

10 Days in Africa (13), Crokinole (13), Quack Shot (13), San Juan (13),
Heroscape (11)

5+

Adam & Eva (8), Typo (8), Phoenix (7), Tongiaki (7), Buy Word (6),
Einfach Genial (6), Geschenkt (6), Light Speed (6)
Ma Ni Ki (6), Oasis (6), Power Grid (6), Yinsh (6), Goa (5),
Magic: the Gathering (5), Marco Polo (5), St. Petersburg (5), Zirkus Flohcati (5)

The only game on this list that doesn't entirely "deserve" to be there is Quack Shot, which was played 13 times all in one sitting.

Ten Years of Games

I have been tracking the games I play now for 10 years. I tracked games some in '97, '98 and '99, but didn't start keeping really good records until 2000. In this past decade, I played:

• 4480 games: 1.2 games/day
• 1060 titles: 2 new titles/week
• 1267 different days: 2.4 days/week
• with 977 different people: 8 new people/month

Top People

Of the top ten people (by number of games played) my wife and daughter are #1 and #10. Of the remaining eight, two (FR & ET) are folks I game with every month, two are people I've gamed with many times a year for the entire decade (RS & SD) and four are four are people who I gamed with a lot and then they moved away.

Top Games

The following 30 games got 20 or more plays in the decade:

100+: Electronic Catchphrase, Race for the Galaxy, Crokinole

50+: Dominion, Call My Bluff, Speed

40+: Battle Line, 6 nimmt!, Geister, Spin Ball, Can't Stop

30+: For Sale, Zirkus Flohcati, Apples to Apples, Light Speed, Loopin' Louie, Trans America, Knockabout

20+: Pente, Ra, Carcassonne, Puerto Rico, Go Away Monster!, Blue Moon, Hick Hack in Gacklewack, Werewolf, Heroscape, Flinke Pinke, San Juan, Princes of Florence

A few games that didn't make the 20 plays threshold, but deserve mention from this decade, for me: Descent, Traumfabrik, Vinci, Fiese Freunde Fette Feten, RoboRally, Power Grid, Schnaeppchen Jagd, Goa, Battlestations, Medici, Fresh Fish & Medina.

Every Year

Only four games got played every year of the decade, because well, a lot of great games came out during the past decade. Those four are Igel Argern, Can't Stop, 6 nimmt! and Ra. A bunch of games managed to hit 9/10 years though: Medici, Knockabout, Crokinole, Basari, Battle Line, Call my Bluff, Lord of the Rings, For Sale, Zirkus Flohcati, Speed, Electronic Catchphrase & Apples to Apples.

Year-by-year breakdown

Year    Games   New     Diff    Ses     Ppl
1997     ~30
1998    ~100
1999    ~150     63
2000     301    112     141     126     129
2001     712    172     266     175     165
2002     650    161     279     163     241
2003     552    128     272     129     180
2004     470     80     212     112     216
2005     429     92     208     124     236
2006     365     84     205      83     216
2007     256     73     153      78     170
2008     370     66     168     140     159
2009     365     54     192     141     162

What's the Buzz?

I played another 9 games today. The recurring theme for me seems to
be that if I had high expectations, I find myself a bit disappointed
and if I wasn't expecting much, I find myself pleased. The major
exception remains Friedemann Friese's new game (co-designed with
Marcel-Andre Cassasola-Merkle, which I forgot to mention yesterday>Report-2
yesterday) which I expected to be good and now having played it
three times can continue to enthusiastically recommend it.

Kreta, I had no preconceived notions about other than it being Stefan
Dorra (a plus) and Goldseiber (neutral). It's pretty good. Nothing
revolutionary, but nicely done. Australia was a bit of a surprise;
it's a light, simple, fast Kramer-Kiesling game. Better than
expected, but I didn't expect much. Louis XIV, I expected great
things and I found it good, but probably not great. I'll play it a
couple more times before I really decide. It may be great, yet.
Submarine, all the reviews seemed to say it was very dry. Well, yeah,
I guess, but I've played drier games. Clever mechanics that combine
in interesting ways. I liked it.

As for what the "buzz" is this year, I wouldn't say it's particularly
focused. Last year, St. Petersburg, Power Grid, Goa and Ticket to
Ride had a lot of play and a lot of positive buzz. The new stuff is
getting a lot of play, but not a lot of overwhelming consent on what's
great. Loius XIV seems to be in general impressing most people
though, and Heckmeck im Bratwurmeck is getting a lot of positive
comments and play as a filler. A couple of well-developed prototypes
are getting a lot of positive opinions and I hope they see publishing.
Everyone I've played FFFF with has enjoyed it a great deal as well.
Ticket to Ride Europe has also been well received, though not getting
as much play as TTR did last year.

Game Metrics for 2004

I've discussed game metrics before, and listed my top games by various measures last year, so here's this years version. My favorite measures remain the Huber Happiness Heuristic and Matthew's Month Metric, and not just because they are pleasingly alliterative.

Huber Happiness Heuristic

Equation for a games "happiness units (HU)": (Rating-Offset)*Total Time

1. Goa (3300 HUs)
   
2. Power Grid (3240 HUs)
   
3. San Juan (2630 HUs)
   
4. Heroscape (2230 HUs)
   
5. Oasis (1620 HUs)
   
6. Electronic Catchphrase (1610 HUs)
   
7. St. Petersburg (1520 HUs)
   
8. 10 Days in Africa (1365 HUs)
   
9. Crokinole (1365 HUs)
   
10. Princes of Florence (1215 HUs)
    

Other games yielding at least 500 HUs: Typo, Marco Polo, Tongiaki, Ticket to Ride, Einfach Genial, Yinsh, Buy Word, Phoenix, Vinci, Adam & Eva, Victory & Honor, Attika, Geschenkt.

Month Metric

Month Metric
(distinct months in which the game was played)

1. Electronic Catchphrase (8 months in 2004, 31 ever)
   
2. San Juan (6 months in 2004, 6 ever)
   
3. 10 Days in Africa (6 months in 2004, 7 ever)
   
4. Oasis (5 months in 2004, 6 ever)
   
5. Crokinole (5 months in 2004, 20 ever)
   
6. Adam & Eva (5 months in 2004, 5 ever)
   
7. Ticket to Ride (4 months in 2004, 4 ever)
   
8. Tongiaki (4 months in 2004, 4 ever)
   
9. Typo (4 months in 2004, 4 ever)
   
10. Can't Stop (4 months in 2004, 22 ever)
    
11. Coda (4 months in 2004, 4 ever)
    
12. Einfach Genial (4 months in 2004, 4ever)
    

Most Plays Metric

See the 5sAnd10s2004 list.

Most Sessions

1. San Juan (13 sessions)
   
2. Electronic Catchphrase (9 sessions)
   
3. 10 Days in Africa (9 sessions)
   
4. Crokinole (8 sessions)
   
5. Heroscape (7 sessions)
   
6. Tongiaki (7 sessions)
   
7. Adam & Eva (6 sessions)
   
8. Oasis (6 sessions)
   
9. Power Grid (6 sessions)
   
10. Typo (6 sessions)