Game Day

Saturday Nov. 29, 2008 - Game Depot. The day started out with my arrival at the Game Depot. I spent a bit of time looking around and checking out the new games. Okko looked pretty interesting (though after checking on the geek, I'm less interested) as did the big box for the new Killer Bunnies game (yes, I know how bad the card game sucked, but I have a young son). The LCG for A Game of Thrones also caught my eye, but I said no more purchases for the year, so I sadly walked away from them all. Bobby had to run and get Christa from the airport, so when Mike G showed up, he offered to teach me Dominion with Bobby's copy. Dominion is one game that has been getting a load of hype and I wanted to try before I grabbed a copy. I can safely say that I'll be getting one sometime next year. Its a pretty good game that plays really quickly (which is good for what it is). Its a VP engine game where the action revolves around you building a deck of cards turn by turn and trying to balance the cards you need to accomplish your goals with getting victory point cards (which just water your deck down). As with any new game where there are a dozen actions that have text to pay attention to, I felt a bit overwhelmed to start the game. That lasted about 5 minutes and I never really felt it even when we changed cards for the second game. Mike beat me 43-31 in the first game and I came back for a 36-33 win in the second game.
Bobby and Christa arrived so the four of us sat down for some Tichu (Christa and I were partners). Apparently Bobby had talked a little smack outside to Christa, indicating he was the best Tichu player of the four of us - it came back to haunt him as he went out last in every hand we had (we played a half game to 500) and he and Mike scored a measly 45 points (to our 550). It should also be noted that Mike nabbed all of those points for their team.
After Tichu, we split into a couple of three player groups and Bobby, Christa and I started playing some Wasabi! This is a little set collection game with a sushi theme. The game is really gorgeous, though pretty straightforward to play. I got smoked here with Bobby winning 24-22-16(me).
Next up, I asked Bobby to teach me Arkadia, and he obliged. This one was a bit different and a little hard to describe, though easy to play. Its something of a influence game with a bit of the stock market and some spatial game play thrown in. I liked it a good amount and need to try and play it as a 2 or 4 player game. It really doesn't take too long to play and is probably a good finisher for the end of the night when you want something satisfying, but not long.
I finished off the day with a game of Agricola (using the standard deck) with Mike and Matt Cullinan. We did a card draft of the occupations and minor improvements. none of the cards were crazy special, and the game was pretty standard. Mike couldn't pin down which way he wanted to go and the game was between Matt and I. I eeked out a couple more points than Matt to win 33-31-19