2011.12.29
Holiday Gaming: 2011 Edition
I’ve been doing some gaming over the past few weeks. It’s been a mix of old and new.
Flash Point: Fire Rescure is the “new hotness” as Jason puts it (pun intended), and he got me a copy for my birthday. To date, I think this one is only available to people who backed it on Kickstarter, which is a shame because it’s a fantastic cooperative game. The mechanics fit the theme really well, and the game moves along with relatively little downtime. The difficulty is adjustable but so far it feels about right at the regular difficulty level. You’re not going to win every game (it’s been close every game so far, either winning or losing), but it doesn’t grind you into the dust like Ghost Stories always seems to. I’ve only tried the two maps that come with the base game, and haven’t yet attempted the expansion maps which appear more difficult.
As for older games, I played all three of the following with various members of my family over the break:
I have played all of them before, but I was the only one at the table who had played them. 6 Nimmt went over predictably well, and we got pretty goofy by the end of the game (a couple of glasses of red wine may have contributed). Everyone had fun, and we all agreed the light tactics were just the right level for what we wanted that evening.
Mom and I played a couple of games of Carcassonne, and though it took her a little bit to see the strategies, she enjoyed playing the game and came pretty close to beating me both games. This is still my favorite incarnation of Carcassonne to play, and the chance to play it with mom reminded me of why.
Finally, Settlers of Catan hit the table. My sister wound up winning quite handily, and although it’s still far from my favorite game, I enjoyed this play of it more than previous plays. The dice still hated me as they always do, but I started to at least get a bit of momentum in the mid-game. It proved to be too little, too late as mom was challenging me for the longest army while my sister had somehow managed to get 4 of the VP cards in the development card deck. I ended up in second place, but there was a lot of back and forth to get there (I was in last for the majority of the game). I’d be willing to give this one another try, although I will stick to my vow to never play it with the 5/6 player expansion ever again.
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