Aliens: Another Glorious Day in the Corps

The genre and IP may be tired, but if anyone can pull it off it's GF9. Color me interested.

Msample wrote: The genre and IP may be tired, but if anyone can pull it off it's GF9. Color me interested.

I don't think we can give GF9 the benefit of the doubt anymore, their entire design team left to form Monster Fight Club. The designer of this game , Andrew Haught, was responsible for their Dr. Who game (which had mixed reactions here and mostly ratings of mediocre eslewhere).

Tentacles.

www.monsterfightclub.com/post/it-was-nev...go-back-in-the-water

Yeah, they just unveiled that at New York Toy Fair. I think they've also hinted at some kind of miniatures game with a fantasy theme, but that was only a single promo shot recently.

charlest wrote: I don't think we can give GF9 the benefit of the doubt anymore, their entire design team left to form Monster Fight Club. The designer of this game , Andrew Haught, was responsible for their Dr. Who game (which had mixed reactions here and mostly ratings of mediocre eslewhere).

Not trying to split hairs because it's a valid point, but it wasn't the whole design team, right? IIRC, it was Kovaleski, the founder, their officer manager, and (the most important part) Aaron Dill, who was lead on Spartacus, Firefly, and Star Trek: Ascendancy. Dill is obviously the key there, since those are probably GF9's best releases, but I don't think the studio was totally gutted.

I’m still curious about this, but not like I was when it was announced a year ago. I think the main force driving my interest at this point is whether or not GF9 can rebound. The Doctor Who game was a misstep, but the real trouble started in Firefly Adventures, a fine game with cool ideas, but it’s in desperate need of an editor and feels like development was abandoned somewhere in the homestretch. I’m not hearing terrific things about Vault of Dragons, either.

Jackwraith wrote:

charlest wrote: I don't think we can give GF9 the benefit of the doubt anymore, their entire design team left to form Monster Fight Club. The designer of this game , Andrew Haught, was responsible for their Dr. Who game (which had mixed reactions here and mostly ratings of mediocre eslewhere).

Not trying to split hairs because it's a valid point, but it wasn't the whole design team, right? IIRC, it was Kovaleski, the founder, their officer manager, and (the most important part) Aaron Dill, who was lead on Spartacus, Firefly, and Star Trek: Ascendancy. Dill is obviously the key there, since those are probably GF9's best releases, but I don't think the studio was totally gutted.

If you look at the design credits on all of their games of the past (besides Dr. Who), Kovaleski, Dill, and Sweigart are the listed designers. Sweigart passed away, and Dill and Kovaleski have left as you noted.

Peter Przekop is the other person who left. He handled PR, demos, kind of jack of all trades. He also handled playtesting (he was lead on that) and wrote their rulebooks I believe.

I'm sure there's some behind the scenes people that were there before still plugging away, but I hardly think that should breed confidence. The trio of designers for all of their hits are gone.

I'm still excited for this game by the way and not trying to be overly negative, I'm just issuing caution.

Gale Force Nine hasn't been the same since Sweigart died.

Josh Look wrote: I’m still curious about this, but not like I was when it was announced a year ago. I think the main force driving my interest at this point is whether or not GF9 can rebound. The Doctor Who game was a misstep, but the real trouble started in Firefly Adventures, a fine game with cool ideas, but it’s in desperate need of an editor and feels like development was abandoned somewhere in the homestretch. I’m not hearing terrific things about Vault of Dragons, either.

I'm going to make some assumptions here, so don't take this as gospel. When Brigands and Browncoats was announced, they said there were other ideas kick around for firefly: The game and this was one of them. Swiegart is listed as a designer on the bgg page for this. So, maybe they took his unfinished ideas and made this game. It would explain a lot.

I think that both the Doctor Who and Firefly Adventures games were works in progress when Sweigart died. That seems like the turning point in terms of quality.

Is someone credited as Developer? The more I look the more I find that that's the role that seems to be critical to success on bigger games. A good developer herds the ideas, and points out the problems before they go to press.

I think I've only played one Gale Force 9 game -- Firefly -- and not with all the expansions. Seemed like a very good time to me. But I sure ain't an expert on their stuff.

Shellhead wrote: I think that both the Doctor Who and Firefly Adventures games were works in progress when Sweigart died. That seems like the turning point in terms of quality.

Unless I'm mistaken, Sweigart (and the other designers) had nothing to do with Doctor Who. They're not credited and it looks like they never worked on it.

While I know very little about this game, I suspect it will have a hard time beating Nemesis at its own game.