Worthington Games

Worthington games maybe the next company to go AT on us.  Worthington games have been around for about 5-6 years.  Their early games were simple but high quality war games.  For the next month I may sound like a shill for Worthington games but actually I have absolutely no relationship or contact with the company.   This first post is an over view of the company.  The second will be a review of Hold the Line.  Finally I hope to get an interview with Worthington games to see what’s up with future games.

I listened to an interview with the brain trust of Worthington games.  They would suggest that they’ve taken war games, added great components and then simplified or Euro gamed the war games.  For me that sounds like a Marin Wallace war game.  But I would classify their games as simple old school micro war games (like ORGE) from the 1970s with great components and updated rules.   While I like Wallace war games they’re much more gamey and complex than Worthington game war games.  Worthington war games are striped down to the essential fun and exciting elements of war gaming without getting to bogged down with war game rules or Euro gamey elements.  I think they’re the type of game you can pull out to play with your brother who likes Last Night on Earth but thought Arkham Horror was too complex and too long.

The first Worthington game I played was Coyboys which was a very simple but fun man to man combat game in the Wild West.  Other Worthington titles include:  Victoria Cross, Clash of the Continents (early version of Hold the Line), Prussia's Defiant Stand and Forge in Fire.

Upcoming from Worthington games looks like a departure from there war gaming past and into  AT territory with Bloodlust, Arctic Survivial and Chainmail.

In Bloodlust: The leader of the coven is dead and the quest is on for between 2 to 10 players to be the vampire who adds teh most to their bloodline and becomes the new leader.  Fast playing card game using the vampire genre.  Beautiful cards, rules and board brings the game to life.

Arctic Survival is about using your instincts to prevail in the coldest and most remote place on earth. The object is to make it safely to your igloo before your opponent can make it safely to theirs. In the way are treacherous moving ice floes, with icebergs and thin ice blocking your path. Lurking within are friendly and unfriendly Orca whales and smart penguins that can guide the way across the ice floes. Once across, unfriendly polar bears, wolves and many other types of arctic wildlife confront you as you try to reach the safety and comfort of the igloo waiting across this vast ever changing environment.

CHAINMAIL is a game of card play and management, which unfolds on the historical battle map - it uses squares, rather than hexes – with the use of some beautiful, super-size counters. This is a game of position, feint, and sudden attack with what you hope are better odds (since you don’t know what cards your opponent will play, if any, and you never know what his final strength will be). No dice are used. And there are no CRT’s. Skill determines the outcome.

The game thus becomes a tense battle. When do you play your cards? How many do you play? What do you do with them? Will you be caught short and be subject to a sudden attack by your opponent? CHAINMAIL includes four of the major battles of the Medieval period: Legnano (1176), Bouvines (1214), Lewes (1264), and Bannockburn (1314).