Historically, I don’t like games that don’t have dice. Back in the day, I used to “play” Dungeons and Dragons and the Marvel Super Heroes RPG…but by “play,” I mean “make characters and then not use them,” because the generation process consisted mostly of rolling dice. Whether or not that points to some sort of innate gambling problem or what, I don’t know, but that was definitely the case. The last year or two has significantly changed my feelings on this, with my introduction to, and love of, Settlers of Catan and Carcassonne.
When looking at the Tasty Minstrel Games release Belfort, I got the feeling that it might be similar to those other games I had come to love, and since other TMG games (Eminent Domain, Martian Dice, Train of Thought, Jab), had received very good reviews on this site, I was pretty psyched to give it a whirl. My anticipation did not go unrewarded.
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A few months ago we took a look at the simple to play and easy to transport cup of dice game Zombie Dice from Steve Jackson Games. In it you play as zombies and roll different dice to try and eat as many brains as you can before getting shotgunned to death (so to speak, you are a zombie after all).
It’s a crazy simple game, plays up to however many people you have and is nice and portable which makes it great for both downtime at a con or even at the bar with friends.
Well, Tasty Minstrel Games has a new dice game that takes the basic premise of Zombie Dice and adds a nice twist to it, making it ever so slightly more complex and (we think) fun to play. Instead of zombies you play as martians, and instead of eating brains you’re trying to scoop up as many earthly inhabitants as possible
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Shopping for geeks at the holidays is hard, luckily we’re here to help! Alot of people think board games live and die with Monopoly and Clue, and that’s a real shame. There’s a whole plethora of fantastic games out there just waiting to be played, wonderfully crafted and ones that appeal to any age group and interest. Below is a list of our favorite games from 2011.
Whether the geek on your list is a Sci-Fi fan or a Fantasy nut, likes role playing or just rolling dice, there’s something on the list that they’d love to see under the tree!
Thanks for looking and don’t forget to check out our previous gift guides, all about Books and Sound & Vision!
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This past weekend, my wife and I celebrated our seventh anniversary. Like any good geek couple shackled with the responsibilities of jobs, school, and parenthood, we didn’t have our hopes set too high for a night on the town or a weekend away. Instead, we celebrated the only way we knew how – by cracking open a brand new game. Lucky for us, it made our anniversary a memorable one. Why? Because Eminent Domain might just be our favorite game so far.
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Personally, I don’t understand the sport of boxing. It’s not that I can’t follow what’s going on in the ring or why people enjoy watching it. No, it’s more that I don’t understand why people would want to participate in a sport where the goal is to limit the amount you get beat up. Getting punched in the head at work is not something I’ll ever find myself interested in doing. All that said I really like boxing videogames and LOVE movies about the punch-happy sport. Hell, I’ve lived all my life across the river from where Rocky was filmed. I’ve run up the steps at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. I’ve ate lightning and crapped thunder!
To say that I’ve never played a tabletop game based on boxing is a lie, I owned Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots like any other child of my era worth their salt in having good toy taste. It’s definitely suffice to say that I’ve never played a tabletop card game based on boxing. Let alone one that’s played in real time. Hit the jump and I’ll explain some more.
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I was never much for charades, Pictionary makes my skin crawl, and the last game of Twister I played resulted in two separate ambulances and a bevy of court orders. Needless to say, party games aren’t usually my thing. And yet despite my general distaste for the genre, I found myself slapping on an engineer’s cap and playing conductor for a few rounds of Train of Thought. As it turns out, there’s a little party fun tucked away somewhere inside me after all.
Train of Thought is a party game that’s all about word association. Stacks of cards are scattered around the table, and on each card are six different words. Players will take turns being the conductor, and it’s the conductor’s job to roll a die to determine a starting word, draw a new card kept in secret, and attempt to get the other players to say the word on the secret card using a three word clue that contains the word on the first card. So if I roll a 6, and on the first card the sixth word is car and the second card the sixth word is engine, I might give a clue like “Under car hood.” Somebody might guess engine, and if they do, both the guesser and the conductor get a point.
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