My other half was away for a week so we had a chance to play for a full day. After coffee, danish pastries and croissants (yum) we started with a game of Wabash Cannonball. This is one of the Winsome games from last years Essen, There are 4 railroads and each player gets the chance to buy shares in these companies via an auction. The money raised is used by the company to build track, which is controlled by the player with the most shares. There are also a few other things you can do to enhance the value of the company as your network snakes west. At the end of each round a dividend is paid to the owners of the shares based on the value of each company, the winner is the person with the most cash.
None of us really knew what we were doing and we only started to 'get it' about half way through. It's a really clever game and I liked it a lot, if only the production quality was a bit better, it's a typical Winsome home DTP effort (or lack of effort) I think I'll have to have a bash at making a decent board.
Richard 77, Steve 48, Jo 45, Garry 34
Next was Ice Flow which Steve had bought at the UK Games Expo. It's a very nicely produce game about crossing the Baring Strait from Alaska to Russia. You have 3 men and ou have to make your way via the icebergs making sure you avoid the polar bears along the way.
I must admit that with 4 players I did feel as though it was a bit chaotic, mind you this was only my first play so now that I know how it works the next few games may be different.
Richard won
After a bite to eat we had a go at Pandemic, I'd not played before but it wasn't too difficult to learn and as it's a co-operative game it was easy to pick things up as we went along. It's quite a well themed game and it brought back memories of the TV show 'Survivors' that I watched back in the 70s.
Make sure you wash your hands before playing
Pandemic is a co-operative game which means that your are not playing against each other but against the game system, there is no winner or loser you all win or lose against the game. I'd not played this type of game before and it does feel a little odd as we had a little discussion about what we should do before each turn. Luckily our group is quite well balanced but if you were playing with a control freak or a very bossy person I could imagine it wouldn't be much fun. Over all I enjoyed it but I wold need to play a few more time before I made up my mind. It's also plays single player as well which might be good for when you can't find any opponents.
We started off OK and seemed to start getting things under control and even managed to cure a few diseases but unfortunately the Italians succumbed to the fatal blue cubeitis so we all lost.
We all failed.
Finally we played Oregon. This is a Hans im Gluck game released at last years Essen. I did play it during the show and thought 'meh' but the others assured me that it was a good game.
I forgot to take a photo so here's a postcard from Oregon
It uses cards to drive the placement of of meeples and various buildings on a squared grid. I started off OK and was even in the lead at one point but a duff run of cards meant I ended up having to put a lot of pieces in the far corner and I dropped behind. Not a bad game but I still think it's a bit 'meh'.
None of us really knew what we were doing and we only started to 'get it' about half way through. It's a really clever game and I liked it a lot, if only the production quality was a bit better, it's a typical Winsome home DTP effort (or lack of effort) I think I'll have to have a bash at making a decent board.Richard 77, Steve 48, Jo 45, Garry 34
Next was Ice Flow which Steve had bought at the UK Games Expo. It's a very nicely produce game about crossing the Baring Strait from Alaska to Russia. You have 3 men and ou have to make your way via the icebergs making sure you avoid the polar bears along the way.
I must admit that with 4 players I did feel as though it was a bit chaotic, mind you this was only my first play so now that I know how it works the next few games may be different.
Richard won
After a bite to eat we had a go at Pandemic, I'd not played before but it wasn't too difficult to learn and as it's a co-operative game it was easy to pick things up as we went along. It's quite a well themed game and it brought back memories of the TV show 'Survivors' that I watched back in the 70s.
Make sure you wash your hands before playingPandemic is a co-operative game which means that your are not playing against each other but against the game system, there is no winner or loser you all win or lose against the game. I'd not played this type of game before and it does feel a little odd as we had a little discussion about what we should do before each turn. Luckily our group is quite well balanced but if you were playing with a control freak or a very bossy person I could imagine it wouldn't be much fun. Over all I enjoyed it but I wold need to play a few more time before I made up my mind. It's also plays single player as well which might be good for when you can't find any opponents.
We started off OK and seemed to start getting things under control and even managed to cure a few diseases but unfortunately the Italians succumbed to the fatal blue cubeitis so we all lost.
We all failed.
Finally we played Oregon. This is a Hans im Gluck game released at last years Essen. I did play it during the show and thought 'meh' but the others assured me that it was a good game.
I forgot to take a photo so here's a postcard from OregonIt uses cards to drive the placement of of meeples and various buildings on a squared grid. I started off OK and was even in the lead at one point but a duff run of cards meant I ended up having to put a lot of pieces in the far corner and I dropped behind. Not a bad game but I still think it's a bit 'meh'.
Jo 81, Steve 71, Richard 66, Garry 49
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