Boxes come and go from my house with solemn regularity. A few weeks back, though, something entirely new turned up: a crate. Not some half-assed fake piece of printed card but an actual wooden crate, complete with crowbar tied to the top. When I got home that night, my whole family were sweating curiosity from every pore. I could've used the crowbar to lever open the anticipation but, instead, I used it on the crate. And as the tension reached fever pitch the lid popped off and inside there was ..

Does this look infected to you?

Let's Kill Hitler!

Shakespeare, right? For so many kids his plays were compulsory study at school, and he had a way of making me feel I don’t understand my native language – English. Did you know though, that he wrote about a mysterious ‘Dark Lady’? Far from the romantic language people associate him with, it got downright bawdy, talking about his ‘nobler part’ rising and falling. Wink wink, nudge nudge. Black Sonata puts you in London in the early 1600s, tracking down this elusive temptress and trying to determine her true identity.

More thoughts on failure, Blades in the Dark, and the reasons we're dumber alone than we are together.

In my four-odd years of gaming, I don't think any event in the hobby was quite as big as the 2009 reprint of Space Hulk. It was out of print for some 15 years, and used copies were fetching a pretty penny on eBay. And what a reprint it was. The minis and tiles were some of the best ever produced. For perhaps the only time ever, a game totally looked like it was worth $100. 

And just like that, the game was gone. Speculators bought up tons of copies to resell them on eBay, and soon $100 looked like a bargain compared to what some people were asking. Those who didn't make the impulse buy were left to the vultures. Fantasy Flight clearly saw an opportunity here. Having previously done some very well-received work in the Warhammer and 40K universes (with Warhammer: Invasion and Chaos in the Old World), they put the gifted Corey Konieczka to an interesting task. Turn the tense, claustrophobic atmosphere of Space Hulk into a game that might fill the gap left by the blink-and-you'll-miss-it reprint. In a rare show of restraint, FFG chose to make a small card game, and they chose to make it cooperative. Death Angel: Space Hulk - The Card Game was the result. 

That they actually were quite successful is no mean feat. Death Angel is very good indeed, and I'd venture to say that it's one of the best purely cooperative games on the market. The setting for the game is identical to that of its big brother. The players take the role of Space Marines charged with clearing out a derelict spacecraft (the titular space hulk). Standing in their way are the vicious Genestealers, who come crawling out of the walls to attack the players. Instead of miniatures and tiles, however, this is represented in a vertical row of cards. Other items along this line are represented by cards on either side, as are the swarms of Genestealers. The Marines move from floor to floor, slaying attacking swarms and accomplishing other objectives. If you clear all the floors, the Marines win. 

The most amazing thing about Death Angel is that the game takes this setting, recreates it very faithfully, and does so in an entirely different way from its predecessor. The formation of Space Marines is definitely abstracted, but it does an amazing job of bringing that sense of claustrophobia. There's a definite pressure to line up just perfectly, and that's not completely easy. Another sharp abstraction is the action system. Each player is given three actions, and picks one each turn. That action cannot be selected in the next round, so each player essentially gets a binary decision each time. Each player has a unique squadron consisting of two marines, so they can contribute special powers to the attack. The action selection is very straightforward, but it's also agonizing. It's not particularly thematic, but it's excellent from a design perspective. 

The soul of the action is a single six-sided die, which is used for attacking, defending, and several event cards. Trust me when I say that this die is merciless. Like the original game, it only takes one hit to finish someone. If you lose that defending roll, your marine is gone for good. And there are times when you need to successfully hit a Genestealer, and the die is deaf to your pleas. There are ways to get support tokens, which allow for rerolls, but they don't tone down the harshness of the die rolls much. This may sound a little brutal, but it's actually a very good thing. Even when groups get good at coordinating between each other, there's a good chance the die will screw them anyway. It really keeps you on your toes. Every roll feels important, because they almost always are. 

 In another stroke of brilliance, FFG included a very well-done solo variant. Essentially, the player takes charge of three different squadrons, and runs the game the same otherwise. I am normally not the type to solo much, although fatherhood has forced it upon me. Normally I find solitaire variants to have too much in the way of housekeeping, and not enough in the way of fun. But this one is light enough that you can set it up and run it without too much effort. I've played way more solo than with others, probably over 20 games. It makes this game a total no-brainer for people who worry about finding other players. I'd say that it's a little easier than it is with others, just because it's easier to coordinate actions without other people to argue with. 

If there is any complaint, it's that Death Angel suffers from the common problem of cooperative games: familiarity. You figure the game out, and it doesn't really surprise anymore. Death Angel does better than most, because the die keeps things tense. But it really could use some more variety. When there are 3 or 6 players, all marines are used, and that makes things a little more predictable. Fortunately, FFG has produced two small print-on-demand expansions, one with extra locations and another with extra Space Marines. These are terrific, and if you plan on buying Death Angel, you can just pick these up with it. They give just enough variety to make the game stick around. Each expansion also has a little "1" attached to it, so I hope we can see some more like them. 

Is Death Angel better than the original? Not many games are, so I wouldn't say this one is. It isn't quite as direct or visceral. And of course, you can never underestimate the physical aspect, which is as much a part of Space Hulk as anything else. But Death Angel looks really good too, and if you want to play Space Hulk with any more or less than two people, this is definitely the way to go. It's a lean $25, which is one quarter the price for three quarters the awesome. That's a very good ratio, and this one is still available in stores. It's a great balance between terrific theme and solid mechanics, and it will appeal to Ameritrashers and cube-pushers alike.

Check out this review and others at my game blog,The Rumpus Room. Subscribe and start an argument.

I have fond memories of heading to the local Blockbuster store on the corner of South Clerk Street and Bernard Terrace in Edinburgh. To a film nerd like myself they were churches of unseen treasures, future loves and fond memories. With the rise of digital consumption it was inevitable that Blockbuster, much like HMV who I worked for, would crumble. What wasn’t predictable was that Big Potato Games would release a Blockbuster inspired party game, but they did.

The biggest name in fantasy sporting is back.

So far, 2012 has been the year I had to keep making exceptions about not liking sports games. I still don't want to play a game about soccer or baseball or cricket or professional curling, but I'm considering changing my opinion about sports games in general. There are just too many oddball sports games out there that I wind up liking. Hell, a while back, I even liked one about hockey (though in my defense, that was just barely about hockey).

This week I'm looking at two of Blue Orange Games' latest from Reiner Knizia and the Bruno Cathala/Ludovic Maublanc team.

The highest military order of merit one could be awarded in the Imperial German military had a strangely French name. The Pour le Merite was to be granted to individuals strictly in recognition of extraordinary personal achievement.

The men called it the Blue Max.

In 1983 I was 15 years old and I have a distinct memory of a snowy day in the middle of a Connecticut winter. There was no school and I was at my best friend Curt's house. On his expansive dining room table we had set up a copy of GDW's game of "Dogfights over France". That paper map became the sky and those cardboard chits became our machines as we spent that entire day in life or death struggles in the air.

I suppose it was Ace of Aces that had led us to it. That book game, acquired at the local hobby store then known as The Train Exchange, had given us hours of enjoyment the previous summer when we had spent two weeks at boyscout camp. This game promised to be all the fun of that game and more...and it was. There are few games that I remember as fondly as this.

So it was not without a sense of nostalgia driven excitement that I heard of the new edition being released by Stratelibri (distributed by Fantasy Flight).  Excitement but also trepidation. Would the game hold up or would it be old and outdated? Would the memory be better than the reality? 

There was only one way to find out.

The first thing that struck me was the components. As I mentioned, the original game had a paper map and chits that, even though they had unique paint jobs of the planes they represented, were really quite small. Not so here. The map is a fully mounted double sided map. One side has a bird's eye view of the French landscape circa 1917 while the other has the traditional sky blue. The hexagonal tokens that represent the aircraft are large and have a side view and model name of the aircraft as well as the pilot associated with it purely for information's sake on one side while the other is the for function and has a top down view of the plane with the numbers and facing letters needed to play the game.

There are cards for each of the planes as well. Each with an image that reflects the unique paint job of the aircraft it's associated with. One side listing data such as the date when it was introduced into service, top speed, weight, armament and other things. All for flavor and coolness. The other side of the card depicts the plane with numbers showing how much damage various areas of the plane can absorb, fuel capacity, stability rating and maximum altitude.

Yes all that is well and good but how does it play?

The basics of the game are simple and can be explained in a few minutes. Each plane has it's own maneuver chart which shows the moves the plane can make and which way it's facing when it's done. All players simultaneously and secretly choose what their plane will do and then all moves are resolved at the same time. After all movement is done, if there is an enemy within range of your guns you can shoot at and hopefully destroy him. 

Sound familiar?

Of course it does because it's the very same system used in some of the most popular games at the present time. Star Wars: X-Wing, Star Trek Attack Wing and Sails of Glory  are all the children of Blue Max. The natural comparison, though, will be to Wings of War due to the theme.

They are similar and that can't be denied. You might say to yourself "Why would I want to play with cardboard tokens when I can play pretty much the same game with super awesome minis?"

Well there are some differences and they are important.

One of the big changes when the system progressed from Wings of War to X-wing/Attack Wing was the elimination of the 3-maneuver per planning step idea and reverting to the immediacy of one maneuver at a time via the dials.

Blue Max was that way from the start. It does require the use of pen and paper to write down what you wish to do. One maneuver at a time. Some might find this to be laughably outdated but I think I prefer it to the card selection in Wings of War and because you are choosing a maneuver off of a chart, the variety of potential actions is much greater than X-wing's dials would allow if only out of space/font size requirements.

Another difference is the combat system. There are dice in Blue Max. Custom dice that have blank sides, blue sides and red sides.  When you take a shot you start with two dice and depending on certain factors like range, length of the burst of gunfire, speed of your last maneuver and several other things  you add or subtract die to a minimum of 0 or a maximum of 6. You then roll these dice and each colored face that comes up is a hit. The enemy draws one card for each hit off one of  several decks depending on which side of the token the fire came from (Fire that comes from behind is more likely to damage the tail, from the front the engine). Each damage card has a red half and a blue half and the damage taken is indicated by the color of the die result. (Red is worse than blue).

I like dice and I think it's a bit more thrilling than the card pulls in Wings of War.

Another big difference is in the "optional rules". I put that in quotes because even in the brief time I have owned the game, I wouldn't dream of playing Blue Max without them.

Elevation rules have been the bane of table top airplane games for as long as there have been such things. Blue Max has a simple yet effective system that while it may not be a precise simulation is also not a burden to implement. Thus keeping a player immersed in the game.

Fuel Capacity is the other optional rule. It differentiates the planes in a huge way. Yes the DR1 is the most agile plane in the game so why would you want to fly any other? Well because it's got a teeny tiny fuel tank and all those nifty turns and flips will drink all your fuel much faster than you would want while that slower lumbering Neuport just goes on flying and flying and flying.

There is also a subtle difference of tone between the two games. Blue Max is more brutal than Wings of War. For instance, when taking damage in Wings of War I often get the feeling that it's an all or nothing affair. I take a point here or there but I really have to be shot a lot before those one or two points add up to enough to take down my plane. That is unless I draw the Ka-boom card of instant death regardless of previous damage. If you take a long burst at short range in Blue Max it's going to hurt unless the hand of God comes down to alter the dice roll. Your wings are going to be shot to pieces, your engine might catch fire, your tail might be shot off. Maybe you'll be left with enough plane to fly but don't count on it.

Aerial collisions are also much less forgiving. Rather than the "Pardon me sir, our bases have touched," politeness of Wings of War, in Blue Max you can end up smashing in to your foe...or your ally...and end up killing you both.

Run out of gas? You die. Try the Tom Cruise "I'll pull the air brakes and he'll fly right on by" Top Gun trick? Maybe your plane stalls completely and you go into an uncontrollable spin...and you die. Get on somebody's tail for the killing shot and maybe your machine gun jams...for good! Now you're nothing but a target.

Brutal.

Now this comparison isn't all one sided. Wings of War is a great game. I like it a lot. And it has those minis! Those glorious fantastic models of the planes where Blue Max has tokens, nice tokens but tokens none the less. I like those models. No! I LOVE those models.

Of course those are double edged. Blue Max cost me $35 and comes with 18 planes. 18 planes for Wings of War is going to cost you a bit more than that.

Also the sheer number of different planes produced for Wings of War is far greater than is in Blue Max. It comes with 18 planes, yes, but only six different types of planes. In a perfect world Blue Max would be wildly popular and they'd produce packages of many other planes but we don't live in a perfect world and I really am not holding my breath for that to happen.

If we leave Wings of War behind and carry our comparison over to X Wing/Attack Wing certainly Blue Max suffers from the lack of scenarios and the there being no ability to customize your plane/ship. A DR1 is going to fly the same regardless if the pilot is Manfred Von Richthofen or Fritz von Schleppingheim. 

So is Blue Max worth getting?

Oh heck yes. The last time I played we were shouting and cheering and groaning as the battle between three Sopwith Triplanes and three DR1's teetered back and forth. Things looked good for my side until that scoundrel Jim was able to extinguish the fire that had nearly ended him and put a lucky burst into my friend Billy Zavos and sent the Canadian Ace crashing to earth.

Any game that can have six grown men on the edge of their seats holding their breath as one prepares to throw the dice that will cause elation or despair is a damn good game.

What you really need to enjoy this Halloween is a game that will terrify you, one that will make you want to scream in terror because it will be so terrible. Actually, wait, that is not what you need. I just checked, and you just need like, candy or something.

My new plan of playing the games I actually enjoy even though I have a huge stack of review copies sitting in the corner of the room and calling in silent, hissing voices, 'play us!' is working out pretty well. Today, instead of playing one of the dozen games I've got lurking in the corners of my office like monstrous toddlers with sharpened teeth, I played two games of Risk Legacy. I may not have reduced the pile any, but DAMN! did I have a good time.

The first time I reviewed Risk Legacy was about a year ago, before it came out. I played 13 games on that particular copy, which was obviously unlucky because my house caught fire before I could make it to 14, and destroyed that copy of the game. That level of luck is infectious, apparently, because when Risk Legacy's numerical curse destroyed the copy I had, it took every other game with it. It also cost me fifteen thousand dollars to fix the house. That was one unlucky board game.

So being a rationally superstitious man, when I got a replacement copy of Risk Legacy for my birthday a month ago, I resolved that I absolutely had to play it more than 13 times. Sure, I could have decided to stop playing after 12 games, but come on. It's Risk Legacy. It's one of my favorite games. I would much rather break the curse by going to 14. I'll risk it.

The thing that struck me as I played games two and three on my new copy was how incredibly awesome this game really is. I already know what's in all the envelopes, so it's not as though I'm looking forward to the surprises Hasbro has seen fit to bestow upon me. But what amazes me is how this new board is completely different, and the games I play on it will be new and fun and unlike anything we've played before. The surprises that matter are not the ones Hasbro dreamed up. The surprises are the ones you'll create yourself because you really need to protect North Africa, so you put in a bunker, or the world capital winding up in Canada and being named Sphincter.

Like it or not, Japanese Idol culture is stealthily sneaking into pop culture like Solid Snake dressed in a blue sequinned tutu. Now it's board games' turn.

This week's companion piece is a list of my five favourite games in my least favourite genre. Yep, that's right, it's Worker Placement time. You can see the results of my ruminations over at Rollin' Dice.

Perhaps the most interesting thing I discovered while compiling the list is how badly lots of randomness fits into the mechanic. Normally, tons of dice or cards is a fine addition to any game and, indeed, some of my picks showcase how well they can work in Worker Placement. But raw chaos and aggression alongside heavy strategy just doesn't sit well for me. Too much chalk with too much cheese. Or perhaps too much milk with too many pickles.

Why am I back to compiling listcicles? Because it's been a long time since I was really excited by a board game new release. I can't even muster any enthusiasm for Warhammer Quest: Silver Tower, not when I've got Descent, DungeonQuest, Mage Knight, the Adventure System and lord knows how many other fantasy adventure games kicking around already. Instead, we're still have tons of fun with Automobiles and X-Wing. There will be a review of the latest wave coming soon, but other than that, I'm content with what I have.

Sometimes though, even when you're immersed in ennui, something can come along and jerk you out of your torpor. That happened recently when I got given a copy of Twilight Squabble via its designer, who lives near me. It's a tiny thing, just a small deck of cards and a few cubes, and it's got nothing to do with its Struggle namesake, except for a cold war theme. But there's a surprising amount crammed into that little box.

At first glance, it's a simple bluffing game. Each turn you get three cards valued at 1, 2 and 3. You play two face down, one on the "space race" and the other on "balance of power". Highest card wins, except you can use your third card to either counter an enemy card or buy bonus points to allocate the following round. There's also an Agent you can use to find out what card your opponent has played. After a few rounds, highest balance of power wins, with ties settled by the space race, unless one side has accumulated two much power and started a nuclear war for an instant loss.

On first play, it turns out to be surprisingly convoluted. You need to read and stick to the rules very closely, and there's a lot of mechanical elements which don't serve an immediately obvious purpose. Halfway through the first hand of this supposedly short game, with flip of the rulebook on every play, I was ready to give it up as rubbish. But once we got the hang of things and the game flowed, it proved both fast and fun.

The cleverness in the game is the way it marries bluff with probability. We encountered several points when, in spite of the hidden information element, there was a "right" and a "wrong" play and making a bad call had the potential to lose you the game. If you're ahead on the balance of power, for instance, failing to negate one of your own cards with your own cubes (which you can do) can mean instant armageddon. 

I was also atrociously bad at it. So, if you fancy an unusually quick and deep bluffing game for two, or just a game you can beat me at if we ever meet, it's worth checking out.

"We still found it difficult to introduce any imitation into our game of either retreat or the surrender of men not actually taken prisoners in a melee. Both things were possible by the rules, but nobody did them because there was no inducement to do them. Games were apt to end obstinately with the death or capture of the last man. An inducement was needed. This we contrived by playing not for the game but for points, scoring the result of each game and counting the points towards the decision of a campaign."

Periodically I look at my game shelf to see if there’s anything I feel I could part with, either in a sale or in trade. It’s a way for me to ensure that games I don’t play don’t sit gathering dust. Whenever I do this, I’m a little surprised to see that yes, I still own Tobago. It’s not that Tobago is a bad game. Actually it’s pretty great, creative and accessible. But it sometimes feels like it was released, enjoyed for a while, and then largely abandoned. Once or twice I’ve toyed with moving it off of my shelf and on to someone else, but then I play it again and remember why I own it in the first place.