GamesReviews written by Aarontu
A good, light, fun family game; it is easy to learn, not overly confrontational, has a good dose of luck but still a decent amount of strategy required, looks nice and cool and attractive on the table, and has fun little bits to play with when you're waiting for your turn. It's a "family game" that actually has some opportunity for strategy and conflict, and it's actually fun.
A lot of choices and strategy here, which is almost always a good thing. The theme is thin and uninteresting, though. Also, I guess you have to play it several times before you "get" the strategy. There wasn't much there to interest me, though. If the strategy isn't intuitive or if I can't figure out what to do after a game, there has to be *something* inherently fun or interesting about the game for me to want to play it again. It's *not* inherently fun or interesting to me, though, and I don't care for the theme at all. I just didn't get into the game at all. Maybe it was partly because of the theme, though I found Ingenious and Qwirkle more engaging and interesting that this game, so it wasn't just the dry theme.
I think the best part of the game was when I got to say "I HAS A CORM"
Risk is a simple war themed game, one of the classics. The strategies involved are simple; most of the strategy comes down to convincing the guy on one front not to attack you so you can focus on the guy on your other front. Mission Risk is a great variant that shortens play time and adds another strategic element to the game. Fun, when I'm in the mood, but it can take kind of a long time (and there's so many other games that provide more fun, strategy, and/or negotiation in a comparable amount of time).
A quick, light, and easy wargame that is actually pretty balanced! INGENIOUS!!!
The pieces are certainly cool and nice to look at, though the box is a bit overly-yellow. The modular board is very nice, colorful, and cartoony. The game scales well for any number of players; the staggered starting income is a great balancing mechanism, and all the exploration tiles are roughly equal in value. I use blue acrylic crystals for rubium, which add a Starcraft-esque coolness to the game. The game is simple and easy, moves fast, and looks and feels way cool! Also, the pieces have a distinct alien-odor that just adds to the theme!
But, for some reason, I just don't feel like playing it very much. Since the object of the game is simply to win a bunch of battles, every game feels kind of the same. I still love the game and think it's great, but it's not my first choice, anymore.
A light and easy miniatures game enjoyable by gamers, causal gamers, and non-gamers (it's really great with younger casual gamers). What makes it cool is that it has fantasy things, the Men in Black, army dudes, robots, and samurai, ALL IN ONE!!! How cool is that? I could probably use my warhammer40k minis for this, too. The only bad thing about all the different kinds of dudes is that it doesn't feel like it has any specific theme, or that it's any real battle.
This game would be great for anyone who would like a miniature wargame that is light, easy, relativley short and inexpensive, and doesn't require arts and crafts skills (or if you just don't have the time for it, anymore).
This was my introduction to European games, and it still stands as one of the very best ever. Short enough to get played often, but long enough to be satisfying. Simple enough to teach casual gamers to play (and they like and understand it), but still a very engaging and fun game. Has lots of decision making and player interaction, and requires a good mix of luck, strategy, and trading.
Just wow. There are so many different unit types and technologies and stuff, it's nearly overwhelming. You could do or build something different every game for quite a few games and still learn about the way different units interact and how well some units/technologies are in different situations. (though it seems that archons, battlecruisers, and ultralisks are the way to go most of the time)
The order placement part of the game is cool, though it is probably the most difficult rule for people to grasp at first. It lets people see where people are doing things at the start of the turn, but they don't know what they're doing or when they are doing them. You can even mess up other people's plans by placing your orders on other people's. Also, the way you spend resources is simple and intuitive and is great because it doesn't require bookkeeping. On the other hand, managing all your little worker tokens is annoying and can get "fiddly".
At first, I felt that you drew way too many combat cards during the game, but after a couple plays I saw that that isn't true at all; I only had a ton of combat cards when I was researching and not fighting. The rest of the time, you'll be attacking people and getting attacked and lose your Ultralisk because you don't have a matching card or stuff like that. The combat cards do a great job at emulating your armies' health levels.
Unfortunately, all players need to be paying attention and trying to prevent everyone else from winning for the game to be tense and exciting to the end. The only thing I don't like about the game is the way the special victories can end it in a spectacularly anticlimactic fashion sometimes.
One of the most fun things about the game is all the times you can quote the units from the PC game. I love having a chance to say "I'm about to drop the hammer, and dispense some indiscriminate justice!" to someone without getting a funny look. One more good thing about the game is that it feels and plays like an epic "monster game", but you can fit it into a few hours. Also, the minis simply rock; they have got to be the most awesome board game components I own.
Kind of a European fantasy quest game. You have a modular board which you run around trying to do tasks and quests. There is no fighting each other; it's more of a race and efficiency contest between players to see who can defeat the Evil Overlord (a.k.a. "the Nameless") first. The rule book is the worst I've ever seen, but you can find an (actually good) English translation of it on BGG. It's hard to figure out exactly how strong you have to be to win when you start playing, but when your skill+dice is 13 or higher you have a good chance at beating the nameless.
I just can't get really into it like other fantasy games. Maybe it's the flavorless tasks and quests, or the hokey-looking goofy CGI on the tiles and map. The fantasy world in this game is as thin and generic as I've ever seen. Also, the beardless female dwarf is a bit odd.
Chaotic, crazy, fantasy-themed, random insanity! May not be perfectly balanced, but it's a bunch of silly adventuring fun. This new edition looks really nice, with the cool gold coins, awesome board and card art, and little plastic pieces for stats (they aren't very readable, so I'm just using all of them for '1'). Great for casual gamers who like fantasy stuff (though it can run kind of long if you don't use any time-saving variants).
The 4th edition is nearly identical to the 2nd edition in gameplay, which isn't a bad thing. It's not mentally taxing, doesn't have downtime, is heavy on theme, feels like an adventure, and is an endless source of dramatic situations that can cause feelings in players all over the emotional spectrum.
The old expansions were good (for the most part). The extra card expansions and the dungeon were great for variety. The city and timescape kind of took away from the cutthroatness and player interaction, which I didn't like.
At first glance, there doesn't seem to be much choice or opportunity for strategy (just roll a die, move that many, draw a card and do what it says), but there's a bit more decision making than people give it credit for. You feel like you are both choosing your own adventure and simply going along with the story. Still, there isn't *a lot* of strategy here, and this is a nice game to play when you want some light fun after a long day, or when you're with a bunch of friends and want to play something light, fun, thematic, and cutthroat.
Extremely awesome space empire game. The role selection part works, and the minis, cards, and hexes all look absolutley fantastic. Always willing to play and wanting to get people together to play a game. Sometimes I like to use a few variants to try to shorten game time. This monster of a game takes good planning to get to the table, but it is oh so satisfying...
As a long time fan of Master of Orion II and other civilization games and sci-fi games, the theme for this one is perfect for me. It's my "monster game" of choice.