50 iOS Boardgames - Five at a Time (50-46)

There are a lot of app conversions of boardgames out there - believe me, that was the sole reason I got an iPad back in the day and why I upgraded to a new iPad last year. While I do more than just play boardgame apps on my iPad, playing boardgame conversions was the main reason for my getting one. This series will do a countdown of my top 50 boardgame apps - five at a time. I took 50 of the best and dropped them into Pub Meeple's Ranking Engine so I could sort them and here is what I got...

** Note: There are a ton of boardgame apps I never purchased, and a huge number that I have, but that are currently not playable on iOS 11 - I'm only covering those that I can play and still have installed on my iPad.

Numbers 50-46

Tsuro
Full disclosure - I don't really love Tsuro in general, so it should be no surprise that I don't really love the app all that much either. Honestly, if the Zombie Dice app had been upgraded to iOS 11 support, that game would have been here instead. So why do I have this app at all? Well, I sold my tabletop copy and my kids like Tsuro enough that I spent a buck or whatever so we could still play this on occasion.

That said, despite being the last choice of apps to play, this conversion was really well done. It plays smoothly and is gorgeous to look at. It supports online and solo play. It also has a pretty cool AR feature that lets you have your screen on a table and you can move around the table for a different view (which is cool if you are doing pass and play, but this is really just a novelty that may or may not interest you). But it is still just Tsuro. I'd rather go play Angry Birds or something on my iPad than Tsuro...

Onirim
I'm probably going to get a bit of flack for this one being at the "end of my list". Truth is, I heard this was a great solo game that finally got an app, so I figured I'd try it. Time killers are good right? Eh. I found this to be marginally more interesting than "The Game", but not much more interesting than Freecell or any other solitaire-like card game.

The game is certainly pretty and does what it is supposed to do - let you play a quick solitaire game. If that's your thing, you should check this out.

Suburbia
I played the tabletop Suburbia game a couple times and decided that it just wasn't my thing. I think the variable goals are a good way to keep the game fresh, but combined with the way that tiles come out and you can get games where you can have a hard time meeting the goals simply because of bad draws. Despite this, I purchased this app when it came out to see if I was missing something since a lot of people really like this tabletop game. One thing I love about playing boardgames on my iPad - it really lets you deep dive games. Unfortunately, I only played the app a couple times and then never went back. If I recall correctly, the early release of the game had an big bug and though it got fixed in short order, I had already moved on. I'm going to try and play this a bit in the coming week and I'll throw out a note in a future post about any updated thoughts I have after spending some more time with it. There is a cool campaign game for playing solo and you can play async games against friends online - so we'll see.

I really don't have any complaints with this implementation, I just don't love the game enough to want to play it very much. I actually liked Alspach's followup better - Castles of Mad King Ludwig, but I never grabbed the app release of that game. It is on my list of games to get the next time there is a holiday sale on apps.

Scotland Yard
Ravensburger was one of the companies that jumped in early developing their games into apps for iOS and Android. Scotland Yard was one of their first to get converted. It is a game of chase - one player is Mr. X and trying to escape, while the other players try and coral Mr. X in the streets of London so that he is caught by the detectives. A little like Mr. Jack on steroids, or Fury of Dracula lite.

This implementation (like most of the Ravensburger implementations) is excellent - you can pinch to zoom around the map and things are animated, but there are only enough animations to let you know you are playing an electronic version of the game without being overly superfluous and making the game drag on as you watch them. You can play against the AI, or against real players asynchronously. All in all, this is a good implementation, but it isn't a game I yearn to play all the time. This is another where my kids like the game, but don't ask for it much, so I figured a couple buck for the app was better than a game on the shelf collecting dust.

Café International
I remember this being one of the first game conversions I purchased. Not because I knew and loved the tabletop game, but because it was one of the first that was available when I got my original iPad 3 (yeah, a while ago). The implementation is well done with goofy accented voice-overs for each nationality saying "Hello" in their native tongues. The AI isn't bad, making this a decent enough solo game, and while there is online async play, none of my friends were ever interested in getting the game to play. Like a lot of the implementations, the developers did a great job with the game, but if you don't like the source material, it doesn't matter how good they did with the conversion.

The game itself feels a bit random - you can get a bad draw of cards, and when you need points, the choice between actually getting some points vs setting up another player isn't really an interesting one. This is the main reason I rarely play it. It mostly is ahead of the above games only because the game is simple enough that I don't have to go back to rules when I choose to play it after months of not giving it any time.

Next time - numbers 45-41 (including one that I'm sure a number of folks love and will want to know how in the world it is in the bottom ten of my app games).

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Bits Containers - To 3D Print or Not to 3D Print

Last week, fellow Punchboard Media contributor Brian Everett (Cloak and Meeple) found some handy little bits trays for printing on Thingiverse (which should almost always be your first stop when looking for free 3D files of things to print).

Cool bits. Uncool pile for people to grab from...

Lots of games out there need something for you to put the piles of bits in - coins, chits, meeples, or whatever they may be. There are lots and lots of options out there.

A lot of people like Plano style containers (which are cheap, easy to find, and come in a bazillion different sizes and often "configurable").

Others prefer to take foam core sheets and make their own. This lets them get in some crafting while creating storage and/or trays that exactly fit the original game box and meets their needs precisely. Some prefer to take this particular approach to the next level and use a vendor such as The Broken Token which has a large number of predesigned laser cut wooden inserts and storage systems.

And while all of those work for putting the game away, they aren't always great for the table. Sure, one container of all the goods in Agricola is easy to pass around. It also means you need one dedicated spot on the table for it to sit. Vertical sides and small spaces can make it harder to get some pieces out at times, and of course, for games with coins (money), making change constantly from one place can be a pain in the butt.

Other games need the bits in a certain spot to work well. The workers in Orléans really need to be next to their spot on the game board so that players can see what is left, because the count is important.

Which brings me back to Brian's post about some little parts trays. User swholmstead on Thingiverse created a little bits tray that is stackable (slightly sloped sides) and has a little funnel on it to make it easier to get the bits back into their baggies when the game is done (because there is no reason they aren't all in their own little baggies right?)

Well, seeing as I have access to a 3D printer (and had nothing else to do), I went out and grabbed the model and setup the printer to print my own stack of these and see how they worked out.

The first thing I realized as I began printing them - they aren't as big as I thought they might be. Obviously they don't need to be LARGE, but the real issue is they aren't very TALL. The reason that is an issue is that it means that each little tray doesn't hold very many parts. Sure, for coins or cardboard tokens, these probably will work wonderfully, but if I'm playing Agricola with those bits from the picture at the top of this post, then I'm not going to have very many out on the table (and/or I'm going to spill them out of the tray a lot handing them to someone).

On the plus side, smaller means not a lot of printing material. Once my four trays were done printing I weighed them out. The four trays weighed in the neighborhood of 50g.

One thing I get asked a fair amount - is 3D printing "worth it"? Well, if we take the cost of the actual printer and the electricity used out of the equation, then our cost for any given print boils down to the cost of the material used in printing. In this case, we are talking about a spool of PLA. Depending on color (which I don't generally care about), a 1000g spool of PLA can be found on Amazon (Prime) for about $20 (give or take a dollar or two - including shipping). So about $0.02/gram for printing means those four trays cost me roughly a dollar to print out. That seems pretty decent/reasonable. Print out a dozen and most games that I play are probably covered and cost me $3 and some time.

Except that I own a dozen silicon baking cups like these (except in black). A dozen cups like these cost a bit more ($6 for a dozen), but I think have a couple of advantages.

First off, they offer all the same benefits of the 3D printed trays - stackable and they make it easy to "pour" the bits back into baggies at the end of the game.

Next, they are taller and flexible. The added height means I can fit more bits into the cup (meeple bits need this). Being flexible means that it is generally a little easier to get the parts out of the cup (especially with bigger fingers). As I mentioned, this is an issue with Plano containers sometimes - there is no room to grab.

These aren't perfect by any means, they are soft, which means that if you just grab one side, you can spill everything out if you aren't paying attention, but I've found that they take up the least amount of table/board space while offering the best benefit for a reasonable cost (and no, I never use mine to make muffins).

So assuming you have access to a printer, whether to print or not really boils down to the kind of bits you are going be playing with for any given game. If your game has piles of chits or tokens, the trays might be the better choice. If your games are more "Deluxified" then you might want to think about the silicon cup route. That being said, it is always fun using the 3D printer and making things!

Be sure to check us out at PunchBoard Media!

Cult of the Not So New - October 2007

What is Cult of the Not So New? Well, I've been playing games for a while now and I enjoy talking about games that newcomers to the hobby have never played. While everyone seems to be focused on the Cult of the New and Kickstarter the fact is that there are a lot of great older games out there. Maybe one or two of them can hit your table as a "new game".

BGG user JonMichael Rasmus (jmsr525) has been doing analysis of the games and their trends each month for, well what seems like forever. I thought it might be interesting to look back at what was so hot 10 years ago, so sit back and enjoy this blast from the past. Based on information in the geeklist - BGG Top 100 Analysis October 2007.

Prime Mover Oct 2007
Through the Ages: A Story of Civilization - Once upon a time there was a computer game called Civ (by Sid Meier) which occupied a fair portion of my life (and many others too). Then someone thought it'd be cool to make a boardgame version of the game to play with your friends and thus we got TtA, which claimed 12 spots on the BGG chart in Oct. 2007 to reach #48.
I've talked about this game before and will again in coming months as we all know (and if you don't, you may have been living in an anti-boardgame cave) TtA climbed into and stayed in the BGG Top 10 for a long time. Amusingly, the boardgame was recently released as an (wait for it...) app for your tablet and computer.

Is it still a thing?
Sort of still a thing. This version still sits at #18 on the BGG charts today. I mention version as a newer revision of the game was recently released and almost immediately shot up to #2 on the BGG rankings. If you are interested in this game, please skip the older version and investigate the newer one.

Falling Stars
Bonaparte at Marengo - jmsr525's definition of a falling star is a drop of more than 10 places in the top 100. Technically, there were none in October 2007, but BaM did fall seven places to #92 this month ten years ago. Though I am not a grognard nor a historian, I still think this game looks fascinating. One day I'm going to sit and watch this game get played at a convention or maybe learn it myself.

Is it still a thing?
Not even close. Today this sits at #1071 - as I've mentioned previously, the designer released Napoleon's Triumph which was the followup and was a much expanded game that eclipsed BaM enough that it has become an afterthought for collectors.

Hot Lava Birth October 2007
Three games jumped into the top 100 for the first time in October 2007 - Mr. Jack (#80), Here I Stand (#94) and Thebes (#98).

Mr. Jack is a clever little two-player where the players take turns playing as Jack the Ripper or Scotland Yard. Its a quick little logic puzzle really. The goal (of course) evade or find the other. The game has spawned expansions and other versions and today sits at #388.

Here I Stand is a card driven game from GMT about the political and religious conflicts of early 16th Century Europe. Here's the rub (assuming you haven't been stopped reading already). It plays best with six and is about an hour a player, so this is one of those really cool con-games that probably doesn't get much regular playings. There is a two-player variant that might get this out more. Maybe. I have been interested in this for years, and everyone I know that has played it raves about it. Despite the historical material and lengthy play, this game still only just missed the Top 150, sitting at #152.

Thebes is one of those great family games from Queen games that I don't think got the kind of print run and recognition it needed. Originally released in limited quantities as Jenseits von Theben, it was much sought after. I think by the time it was redone by Queen games, people were already on to the next thing. It may not be everyone's cup of tea - there is a fair bit of luck involved, but really the whole game is about mitigating the luck factor. It plays quickly, is easy to teach, and frankly, digging for treasure is kinda fun. It feels a little like Indiana Jones minus being chased by Nazis. This currently sits at #352, but is definitely worth checking out if you have never played it.

Top Ten Trends for October 2007
These are the movers in the Top 10 in October 2007:

• Power Grid +1 #2: All you need to know about PG is that since its release in 2004, it has remained relevant - just look at the golden geek awards. Since 2006, PG has finished as the top game 5 times and runner up another 3 times. Nothing about it is outdated or has been re-done better. You might not enjoy the mathy-ness of the game, but it isn't just an exercise in math. This is part auction game where planning and positioning is what matters. 
• Tigris and Euphrates -1 #3: One of Knizia's early masterpiece is still a great game. Not one that is easy to grok, but still a thing of beauty.
• Age of Steam +3 #8: I love Age of Steam, but I have to admit I prefer the revisions that followed (I prefer Steam). Really a great train game that got "derailed" because of issues between the designer and publisher later on. In 2007, this was still going strong and expansion maps were fetching crazy amounts of money. 
• BattleLore -2 #10: This may have been the height of the Command and Colors system. Memoir 44 was going strong, C&C: Ancients was going strong, and BattleLore ruled with its cool minis and fantasy play. Unfortunately I think BattleLore couldn't ultimately decide whether to be semi-fantasy or all-in-fantasy and despite a ton of expansions, just kind of faded. I personally think that they kept too close to the Memoir 44 mold instead of really taping into the potential they had of crazy fantasy battles between legions of monsters and wizards. Eventually, this would fall out of the Top 10 and Days of Wonder would sell the rights to the game to FFG, who would end up doing exactly that - making it a crazy fantasy battle game!

Top 5 Winning Movers for October 2007
(Highest ranked games that have shown any positive position movement in the last month that aren't in the top 10)

• Ra - Another great Knizia game! Seriously, if you have never played Ra, stop what you are doing, find a copy and four friends and go play this.
• Goa - an auction and resource management game. I've heard good things about this, but never played, mostly because my normal game group had played this to death before I joined and it sounded like they had most of the game down pat already, so trying to play with them would have been a waste of my time. I'd love to try this out with other newbs. 
• Hannibal: Rome vs. Carthage - a great card driven game that in many ways felt a lot like Twilight Struggle (I'm positive that TS was based off this). This looks and sounds like a war-game, but it is really an area control game between two asymmetrical sides. I enjoyed everything except that combat play, which was kind of luck based and would have been better and faster to just roll a die to resolve... 
• Age of Empires III: The Age of Discovery - So many great games mentioned this month! AoE3 was a fantastic worker placement game. It has been revised a couple times now and while it is probably overlooked, it shouldn't be. Lots of ways to score points and mess with other players. 
• Settlers of Catan, The (Second Month!) - and of course, the granddaddy of the hobby. Like it or hate it for what it is, it brought a lot of people into mainstream boardgames. This likely saw some blip in movement due to a reprint in 2007

And that's it for this look back in history. Lots of good games (that are still worth checking out) for you to go take a look at or dig out of the collection for a replay. 

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Review: Spires

Disclaimer: I received a copy of Spires from the publisher as a review copy. I received no other compensation nor consideration and all opinions are my own unless indicated.

From the publisher:

A royal family with a penchant for towers has decreed the builders of the kingdom – the players – to perk up the kingdom's skyline with new spires. In answer to their call, players compete to catch the eye of the royal family and ultimately, the title of Royal Builder. Players must be careful though. If they build a spire taller than the royal palace, they'll be penalized instead of praised.
Spires combines hand management, a unique take on trick-taking, and set collection into a 25-minute game. 1-4 Players compete for cards in different markets to try to build out their tableaus.

What's in the box?

Spires is a card game that comes in a "bigger" small box. The box contains 108 cards, 1 good sized wooden marker for the first player and a multi-page glossy rule book. The wooden marker is a bit superfluous and could have simply been a card, but I believe was added as part of the original Kickstarter stretch goals. 

The cards have a nice linen finish are a of good quality and should hold up to a lot of shuffling and playing. Card art is clean and bright and simpler, though in a good way. The small amount of iconography is also easy to identify and understand. 

How do you play?

Though there is a solo variant included in the box, I have not tried it, as I feel that that sort of thing is more the kind of $1 app I'd play on my iPad instead of getting out a game and sitting down at the table. I am instead focusing on the standard play of the game which I've played with both three and four-player counts. 

Each player is dealt a hand of five cards and takes three "selection" cards numbered 1-3. In the center of the play area are three markets (also numbered 1-3). One card is dealt to each market (face-up) for the players to see. 

Each round, players will secretly select the market from which they wish to compete for the card at that market. When all players have selected, the selections are revealed and the fun begins.

• If you were the only player that selected the market, you simply take the card and place it face up in front of you.
• If two or more players selected the same market, they compete for the card by selecting a card from their hand as a bid for the market. Cards matching the suit of the market card are considered "trump", but otherwise, highest card wins the market AND all the cards bid by the players. 

All cards acquired are placed face up in front of the players in overlapping stacks sorted by colors, so that everyone can see how many of each color a player has.

After all markets have been settled, cards are replaced in the markets and then players refill their hands to 5 cards. This is the only place that the start player marker matters - the refill happens starting with the player to the left of the marker - during the last hand(s), players may end up with fewer than 5 cards. Once all the cards have been acquired from the markets, players must discard a single card from their hand, and then place the remaining cards from their hand into their stacks of cards. 

For each card in a stack of three or less cards, players get 5 points for each. For any stack with more than three cards, players lose a point for each card. There are also three symbols (crown, leaf, dagger) that appear on some cards - the player(s) with the most of each type of symbol (regardless of the stack that the card is in) gets a number of bonus points and the player with the most points has won the game.

Who is this game for / who will like this?

While this is a card game, it is not a traditional trick taking kind of game. This is a game with a ton of player interaction and if you are the kind of person that enjoys the psychology of Rock-Paper-Scissors, you will love this game. 

On top of the "guess what everyone else is going to select", there is some tricky hand management and set collection going on. While different from a lot of games, the game is simple enough to quickly pickup for non-gamers and should appeal to gamers and families as well. This is a great filler game to start or end a game night.

My thoughts:

There is a fine balance with trying to acquire cards (the bonus for the majority symbols often makes taking those cards important) and trying not to acquire too many cards. You are also having to balance that out with the cards in your hand. Holding certain cards can be devastating to your score at the end of the game, but a lot of times, you just don't want to win a market and all the cards that will come with it. In fact, competing at markets is just as often about trying to underplay your opponents instead of winning. When you can foist a card onto your opponent and make their stack of three cards (15 points) into four cards (negative four points) - that's a big swing. There is a lot of trying to figure out what everyone else is trying to do, what they might go for, and then what they might actually play. 

Add to this a couple of special cards - there are cards that are simply worth points, which you win and just set aside until the end. There are also cards that allow you to discard cards from the ones in front of you. That crap that your buddy just foisted on you? The discard card you win the next round can let you turn that stack of four cards back into a point scoring stack. 

Its fast and furious and with just enough going on that you have to puzzle out both what you want to do and what others are trying to do. Its one of the best new games I've played in a long time and this is a game I'd run out to buy or easily recommend. It is good with three players and outstanding with four players.

My one caveat? I don't think it will work as well with two players. Yes, with two, you reduce the number of markets, but this kind of game plays best when there are more players than markets. With four players, you have a guarantee that two people (minimum) will be contesting a market. This makes a large difference in your approach, because you may not want any of the cards, but know that if you pick one that another player does want, you can dump junk off onto them. This is especially delicious when three or more players choose the same market and only one player really wanted the card there in the first place. Suddenly, nobody wants to gain four or more cards. 

So there it is - a great filler game for three and outstanding (filler) game for four players. The play is fast, it is easy to pick up, but has great decisions that need to be made each round of the game. 

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Review: Fast Food Fear!

Disclaimer: I received a copy of Fast Food Fear! from the publisher as a review copy. I received no other compensation nor consideration and all opinions are my own unless indicated.

From the publisher:

Monsters at the Legoblah! swamp prefer fast food nowadays. It’s quick, convenient and you can eat some of the most disgusting junk in the world. Business is good, but customers are extremely demanding; it is highly recommended you don’t keep them waiting. As soon as the customer’s order is in the kitchen, everyone must hurry to get it ready quickly. Having to explain to a slew of hungry customers why they haven’t got their food yet is no fun at all...

Fast Food Fear! is a cooperative game in real time for a close-knit team of 3-6 cooks: keep an eye on the hourglass and coordinate your teamwork to serve all the customers correctly and in time!

What's in the box?

Fast Food Fear! is a smaller box game that has 110 cards of good quality (euro-game standard, so not as wide as Magic cards), a two-minute sand timer, and rules (a single glossy color sheet folded in half into a booklet). Nothing special here as it is a simpler game and there are not a lot of components. The box also included a couple of small zipper bags for keeping the cards together. 

The cards mirror the box art - bright and humorous monsters and simple foods (hamburger, fries, drinks, tacos, fried chicken leg, etc). The game is in English, though the words are irrelevant on the food cards. On the actions cards, there are only a few types, I suspect that a quick translation and the graphic on the card might be enough to get a group through after a minute or two. 

## **How do you play?**

The setup is fairly simple. Each player gets dealt six cards (food and actions are all shuffled together). Then draw a number of monster (customer) cards equal to the number of players plus one and put them face up in the middle of the table where all the players can see them. In order to win, all players must work together to complete the orders for the monster cards. Each monster card has three or more different food items that that monster has ordered. A player is selected to begin and you start the timer. 

Player turns are very simple - you just take one of the three actions:

• If you have all the food cards matching the food any monster on the table requires, you can discard all those cards and remove the monster from the table (you are now closer to winning!)
• You can play an action card and then follow the instructions.
• You can discard any one card from your hand

After you have taken your action, you draw back up to six cards and the player to your left takes their turn. Play continues until either the timer runs out, or all the monster orders have been finished. Players can (and certainly should) talk about the cards they have and what they should keep, pass (action cards let you pass cards around), when you should play the card that lets you flip the timer to get more time, etc. Teamwork is key. Two minutes will not be enough to get the right cards into your hand, so paying attention to the timer and playing the cards that give you more time at the right moment is important. 

Additionally, the card/food distribution isn't equal. Drink cards are far more common than say the sushi cards. so holding onto one is important if you have monsters that ordered sushi, but everyone holding a chicken legs may not be immortal or ideal at all. The logistics would be really easy if it weren't for the timer constantly draining. 

This is not on the menu

Who is this game for / who will like this?

This is a semi-frantic co-op game. After our first game (which we barely won), my kids and I figured out how to best manage our time and started beating the game without much effort. The beauty of this is - it is super easy to up the difficulty of the game by just adding more customers. Which also mean that it should be really easy to dial things down if you are having family game night and playing with slower players (kids, grandma and grandpa, or just folks that don't like to be rushed). 

If you don't like social co-op games or games that make you feel rushed, this won't be for you. If you enjoy lighter filler games, co-op games, or a quick adrenalin rush, this might be your thing. If you have younger kids (8-10), this could be the game to get and a fun gateway game. This is also exactly the kind of game I see getting played later in the evening at gaming conventions, or right before dinner time when everyone wants to play another game, but don't want to commit to something that might drag on. 

Our thoughts:

It probably isn't a regular gaming thing for us, but may just get a suggestion when we are looking for 10 minutes to kill while waiting for dinner to finish or such.  Both my son (14) and daughter (12) enjoyed it. I enjoyed it for what it was - a quick little family filler. My kids are a mixed bag (like lots of kids) when it comes to working together. Co-op games don't always go over well, but this was well received since the frantic nature of the game didn't lend itself to any one person really getting a chance to become the "Alpha". It is also fairly quick to play, so we ended up playing it a number of times in a row. I don't know if this has a lot of legs with my crew, but if the kids were younger, I could see them asking to play this all the time (or just playing it all the time with their friends). 

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What I've been playing - Sept 2017 edition

Apparently, I'm too busy (or lazy) to do this weekly. Actually fall is stupidly busy and typically ends up with a lower play count and less time for board gaming since the kids have a football and diving and then there is Husker Football and NFL games all weekend. It makes for busy times. That being said, there still was some gaming (albeit a lot of it was digital). Anyway, on with the report!

Paperback
I had not heard of Paperback until it came out on iOS and I played it on my iPad. What is it? It is a deckbuilder and a word game rolled into one. You buy letters and make words. Words score you money to buy more letters and point cards (which are wild cards, but don't help you buy anything). It makes for a great game and is really fun - if you like word games. I do like word games and I like making words that use all my letters (even though it often makes absolutely no difference in your points for that turn). Plus, this game hits the major points for me - async gameplay and I can play vs my friends or the AI (and yeah, the AI cheats - hard AI has to cheat in a game where you make a combination of letters and the combo has to be valid...).

Biblios
Biblios is one that I've introduced to my co-workers and we play occasionally at lunch time. Everyone enjoys trying to out guess the other players and the auction portion. Plus, the more we play, the faster we get at the game. This great little game has two parts to it - divide the pie / press your luck and then the auction/stock portion of the game. Lots of good play in a little game.  For years I had heard about what a fun little game this was, but never saw it played or heard about it from anyone I knew. When I finally got this in a math trade, I was quite happy. It was easy to teach and has been a hit with non-gamers. Also a plus - the card quality is really decent.

Spires
Spires came to me from the publisher and is going around the Punchboard Media crew for reviews. The best compliment I can give this game is this: I don't want to give it up. This is another I tried out with some friends from work at our lunch game and everyone liked it a lot. I'll be doing a review of this at some point, but it has a great little mechanism that I haven't seen in a while ala Edel, Stein and Reich. If you aren't familiar with that game (and I bet you are not) the mechanism has everyone pick a thing they want - the catch being that if you are the only one that wants it, you get it. Otherwise you have to compete with the others for it. Sometimes you want that competition (and want to lose it to force them to take the card) and other times, you really don't. There is also a set collection mechanism where you only want a very small number of different types of cards and getting more is bad (this is where picking what you want becomes much harder). This is the kind of game that is great when a friendly group wants to go head to head constantly and bluffing and guessing is the name of the game.

Follow Up - Legendary DXP

For those who are not familiar with the Legendary deck-building games, Legendary DXP (DXP = Digital Experience) is the electronic form of the popular Upper Deck Legendary system. It was originally released in tabletop form as Legendary: A Marvel Deck Building game. There is no Marvel license here, but if you are familiar with that game, this is the same game with a re-theme (again, in electronic form). 

I wrote a review of the game as it was on the cusp of release in August. Since then, I have been playing the heck out of the game (I've been in the top 5 players each week since launch). While I'm obviously a huge fanboy, there were some things I disliked about the game and thought I should revisit them now that we are two months down road - there have been a number of enhancements and patches to the game that greatly improved the experience. 

• When you are asked to discard or KO cards, there is now a confirmation on each card - this has greatly improved things and makes it 100% better when you first learn to play the game. This was the worst thing about the game at launch - you often accidentally KO'd or discarded cards you didn't mean to touch or just wanted to look at.
• Solo play has changed. At launch, solo mode was you vs 2 (dumb) bots. This made a number of the schemes unplayable as the bots did nothing to avoid the troubles of the scheme. Solo play currently uses a slightly modified rules set and it is simply you vs the game. Turns are timed at an hour each, so it is a great way to play the game and get familiar with the interface and the various cards. Plus it gives you something to do when nobody is around to play with online.
• Speaking of online matches, this was one of the first improvements - being able to see others waiting in line for a match let you know if you are close to a match starting.
• Gauntlets went from 5 player only to 3-5 players. This small change made getting into a Gauntlet match much much easier. A steady diet of Gauntlets is what pushes players into the top of the rankings, as Gauntlets offer the biggest XP payout.
• Scheme details. At launch, there was not very good information about the scheme - often it was impossible to know how close you were to losing. Now each scheme shows the information clearly

Is the game perfect yet? No, but it is far better than it was two months ago at launch. At the end of this month, we should be close to a launch of the Android version of the app, which should infuse a large number of new players. I've talked to various developers on the project and I know they have a number of new features planned as well as talk about revising chunks of the UI to improve usability. Hope to see you online!

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