Interactive Board Game Hexes

What does the future of board games look like? Ten years from now, will we still be playing with silly cardboard hexagons and wooden meeples? Or will it look more like something out of science fiction?

Science Daily reported last week about an experiment predicting the future of board games by associate professor Roel Vertegaal, from Queen’s University’s Human Media Lab. Currently the system uses white cardboard hexes and a camera and projector system which calls to mind the Surfacescapes Dungeons & Dragons demo. The video demonstration shows them joining hexes to send an army to attack,  “pouring” a ship from one hex to another and bringing up contextual menus based on the relative positions of the hexes.

The idea is that when thin-film OLED screens become more practical, you’ll be able to play this sort of game without the elaborate camera setup. Instead, the hexes themselves will be screens and computers, able to respond to movement and position and taps. What really caught my attention, though, was Vertegaal’s comment: “This is no doubt the future of board games.” Also adding to the hype is the sweeping statement that this “groundbreaking technology … may make traditional board games a thing of the past.”

Really?

Part of the joy of board games is the cardboard tiles, the colorful wooden pieces, shuffling the cards. It’s moving little miniatures around, akin to playing with toy soldiers, I suppose. I can’t help but think that the old ways are never going to completely die out. Sure, this technology looks awesome and will make new types of games possible, but is it going to replace traditional board games? That’s like saying that high-quality electronic keyboards will eventually completely replace pianos, or that nobody will bother drawing on paper with messy pencils and paints because of Photoshop. Why would you ever play Scrabble manually when you could play online and have it add up your scores instantly? Until the singularity arrives and we really are living in a digital construct, the analog world will always have its appeal: paper books, cardboard-and-paper-and-wood games, LEGO.

I think Vertegaal and team are thinking too small, and it reminds me again of that Dungeons & Dragons demo: you’ve got this amazing table with some very cool interactive abilities, but you’re simulating rolling dice. The reason we use dice in games because it’s a good analog method for randomness; but there’s a reason videogames don’t usually include them: it’s a different environment, with different rules.

If Vertegaal thinks some fancy screens and moving images will make board games obsolete, he’s probably playing the wrong games.

Related Links:

The Human Media Lab’s original press release (for some reason, in all lowercase)

For the Love of the (Board) Game

SurfaceScapes Revisited: Maps and Dice and Orcs (Oh, My!)

Chrononauts. Image: Looney Labs

What would you do with your very own time machine? Go back and forth in time, collect a few artifacts, make some changes to history that will result in a better present for you … same as everyone, right? But then, what if there are several other people with time machines, zipping around and fiddling with the timeline too? Well, then you’d get something like Chrononauts.

Chrononauts is a card game from Looney Labs (the folks behind the Fluxx series and Icehouse games, among others) which pits up to six players against each other as they manipulate history. The basic game’s timeline runs from 1865 (Lincoln’s assassination) to 1999 (Columbine High School Massacre), with 32 significant events.

The view of time travel here is something between “Back to the Future” and “12 Monkeys”: you can change the future, but only bits at a time. There are Linchpins which you can change which then affect certain Ripplepoints down the line. Saving Honest Abe, for instance, creates a paradox in 1868, Andrew Johnson’s impeachment. Causing too many paradoxes will destroy the space-time continuum, though, so Chrononauts are careful to patch them: for example, by playing 1868′: Abraham Lincoln impeached.

The trick is, all the Chrononauts are from different timelines. One way to win the game is to get back home by adjusting the timeline to match your ID. Each ID comes with three important dates and shows whether they are the current version (which conveniently matches the timeline we live in) or the alternate version; there’s also a short story about each character, and these make for wonderful mini-scifi tales.

Another way to win is by getting the right Artifacts, according to your mission card. For instance, you might need to collect three live dinosaurs, or maybe your mission is “Stuff from the Future” which includes the Sports Almanac from the Future and the Cure for Cancer. Just watch out for the “Get There First” card, which allows somebody to steal an artifact from you. Or worse, “It Never Existed,” which discards it.

The game shares some similarities to Fluxx, so if you’ve played any of those you’ll have a grasp of at least part of it, with the added dimension of the time travel. But it’s not too difficult to pick up even if you’re totally new to it. It’s recommended for ages 11 and up, though older players may be more familiar with the historical events on the timeline. That said, it’s a fun way to teach a little history, too. Andrew Looney has helpfully written up the Mysteries of the Timeline in which he explains why a Zeppelin factory would stop the Korean War and other links between linchpins and ripplepoints.

It’s also a really funny game and the time travel riffs are great. The Sports Almanac is a nod to “Back to the Future,” but one of my favorites is the Videotape of the Creation of the Universe (on Beta), and the fact that the Brontosaurus is named Emily. (Work it out, folks.) One of the cruelest cards you can play on an opponent is “Your Parents Never Met,” which discards their identity and forces them to draw a new one.

Version 1.4 of Chrononauts (the second published version, as far as I can tell) was just released in December. If you already have the first version there’s not much of a change other than a new box, a few added cards (the Beatles Reunion Album is one) and an updated rule sheet which is much easier to read. Released at the same time is the Gore Years expansion, which adds five more timeline cards (from 2000 to 2008), a couple identities and patches.

If you like the idea of time travel, Chrononauts is a fun way to play with it. There’s also a solitaire variant, as well as a simple Fluxx-like variant which does away with the timeline, but I would reserve that only for younger players who don’t quite understand the time travel portion yet.

You can buy Chrononauts from Amazon or your local games store for about $20, and the older version will run you about $15 if you can find it.

Wired: Changing history, collecting live dinosaurs, what’s not to like?

Tired: Not much, other than those other pesky Chrononauts who keep thwarting your plans.

Disclosure: Looney Labs provided a copy of the game for review purposes. However, I did own a copy of version 1.0 that I’d previously purchased myself.

Carcassonne (image: waltthewell.com)

It wasn’t until last year that I was introduced to the Carcassonne board game. Once I had been though, I wish I’d discovered it years ago. Our family simply fell in love with the game and couldn’t stop playing it.

But although it’s a great game to play it’s a little more difficult to describe. So I’ve started to put together a series of posts about the main game and each of the expansion packs - all from a family perspective. Here’smy first one, an introduction to the basics of Carcassonne (kindly provided by Green Knight Games)…

Introduction

Carcassonne combines medieval map creation with Risk-like troop management to create a fantasy strategy game that looks as endearing as it plays. With tens of expansions, Carcassonne will keep family board game fans entertained for weeks.

Type of Game

Carcassonne is a tile-based strategy board game for two to five players. Game play revolves around laying tiles and wooden people, a process whereby each player can only place there tile next to others with matching sides to slowly build fields, towns and roads.

The strategic element in Carcassonne is deciding where to lay your tiles - to help yourself or hinder opponents - as well as when and where to place your wooden men to score points. There is a balance between scoring points immediately and placing people to try and score points at the end of the game.

Kits and Expansions

The main Carcassonne game is around $40 and usually comes with one expansion set in the box - rivers - as this has become a very common way to play the game and offers a better starting point - each player takes it in turn to lay a series of river tiles to generate a tributary around which the game can then be played.

Carcassonne has spawned a raft of expansions and spin-offs that range from $15 to $30 and take the game in different directions. Inns and Cathedrals add new tiles, and a larger two-e person. Traders and Builders adds new trade good tiles for players to collect, a pig field multiplier piece, and builder piece that permits an additional turn in certain circumstances. The Princess and the Dragon adds tiles that generate a wooden dragon that removes people from the board. The Tower adds a vertically built towers that can capture nearby followers. Abbey and Mayor that includes new general tiles and special wagons and mayor pieces. The Catapult changes the game with a real fire-able catapult that can attack pieces it hits.

Getting Started

Carcassonne is quite simple to get started playing. The basic premise of drawing a card from a bag (which is not actually provided in the box) and laying it along with a wooden person is easy to understand and execute. The basics of scoring are quite simple to begin with as well, as players keep track of points scored from completed cities and roads.

The finer details of the game are much more complex though. The ability to steal into someone else’s city or field is a science that takes a good few plays to master. Also, after playing a few times you get a much better idea of where points are really scored - and a sense that Carcassonne is often won and lost on the post game totting up of fields.

Playing the Game

Once you have unpacked the game and found a bag to pop the tiles in, you each take turns drawing a laying a piece so that slowly a medieval landscape emerges. Each turn you draw a new terrain tile and place it adjacent to tiles that are already face up. The tile must be placed to match the existing tiles on the board it touches - roads must connect to roads, cities to cities and fields to fields.

Once you have laid a card you can decide to place a wooden person (meeple) piece on the tile - in a field, road or city. This is the only time you can place the people and the only way to score points so it all becomes quite tactical.

You score points each turn for cities that are completed - have an unbroken outside wall, and roads that terminate at both ends, as well as cloisters that are surrounded by other tiles. The game ends when there are no tiles left to lay. You then score points for part completed, cities and roads before the high scoring fields. The player with the most points wins.

How Long and How Old

Although the tactics really require children of at least ten years old, the simple pattern matching of the tiles means than younger players can also enjoy joining in. Games do take a good forty five minutes to play that can be a challenge to young player’s attention spans. You can control the duration by removing tiles from the game beforehand - provided a balanced deck remains.

Adding in the board game expansion packs, of which there are many, increases the complexity and duration considerably. New rules, more complex tiles and the basic number of pieces in play make the expanded Carcassonne board game a tactical challenge for even expert players.

Conclusion

Carcassonne is a board game that has grown and developed over the last few years. The basic game creates an ambling strategic experience that culminates in a battle for control of the fields. The novelty of created a medieval map as you play the game adds a real fantasy feel to proceedings. Those that warm to the experience will soon want to consider expanding their tactical options with an extra set of two - each of which we will be reviewing over the next few weeks.

Game in progress: seven turns left on the countdown clock

The diabolical Doctor Necreaux is up to his old shenanigans: he captured the world’s top scientists and forced them to build a doomsday device on his secluded hideaway (a volcano, naturally). When he demanded that the world bow to him, however, a small team of specialists was sent in to plant a bomb deep in his island fortress. They planted the bomb and then were never heard from again.

That’s where you come in. You (and up to four others) are a crack team of specialists, sent to find the scientists and hop in the escape pod before everything blows up. Sound like your idea of fun? Then you should take a trip to The Isle of Doctor Necreaux.

I like cooperative board games, but there aren’t a whole lot of them. (Many games feature partial cooperation, either with two teams, or one large team against one person.) So when a friend of mine tipped me off about Doctor Necreaux, I went to BoardGameGeek and looked it up. It turns out that the game designer, Jonathan Leistiko, is an active member of BGG, and he was generous enough to send me a copy of the game to play. (Leistiko also has a website, Invisible City, which has a big collection of print-and-play board games.)

Basic Information

The theme, as you can see from the description above, is an homage to your 1950’s action fantasy flicks. Even the artwork on the cards has a sort of Buck Rogers feel to it, which is great. The game is for one to five players, and plays pretty quickly, roughly 40 minutes for a game but it can vary greatly depending on whether you die horribly. It’s recommended for ages 14 and up; I don’t think there’s too much that’s inappropriate for younger players, but the gameplay might be a bit tricky for most pre-teens.

The object of the game is to survive a trip through the deck of Adventure cards and find the Scientists and the Escape Pod before the countdown timer reaches zero. The Adventure deck consists of Monsters (bad), Traps (bad), Events (mostly bad), Rooms (good) and Items (good, but you have to fight monsters to collect them). The countdown timer, seen in the photo above, goes up to 23, but most games start at 12 or fewer turns to start with, which makes the game plenty challenging.

Character card: Tough as Nails

Components

The game comes with 75 Adventure cards plus the Scientists and Escape Pod cards; 33 Character cards, three dice, a countdown board, and a pile of tokens used to track “charges.” It would have been nice to have a few more dice (if you’re playing with five people, you quite often need at least five) but I have plenty of them around anyway, and you can make do with three if need be. The cards are nice and hefty, with a glossy finish that makes them easy to shuffle. The cardboard tokens and countdown track are sturdy but nothing special. The artwork is wonderful, although I wish some of the traps and events (which have just a standard one-size-fits-all illustration) had more artwork. In fact, probably the only art I didn’t really care for is the cover of the box, with its glowering Doctor Necreaux—it makes it look like more of a horror theme and might be easily passed over. The box, by the way, is fairly small and just right for the components, and (a plus in my opinion) quite portable.

Rules

The rulebook is pretty small and easy to read. There’s just enough flavor text to spice it up, but not so much that it distracts from the actual rules of the game. And as a bonus, they’ve included several variants which tweak your character choices and difficulty of the game, and you can always make it easier or harder by shifting the countdown timer.

My one complaint was that there are a few aspects of the rules that are a little more confusing. In particular, one key aspect: each player is one “team member,” with various character attributes (represented by the Character cards). The first couple times I played, I thought each Character card was a “team member,” which makes a lot of the gameplay much harder than it actually should be.

One nice thing, however, is that since Leistiko is on the BGG forums, he does respond to player questions and can give clarifications on rules. If you’d like to take a look, the full rulebook is also available on BoardGameGeek.

Not friendly: Gargantuan Reanimated Cyborg Ape

Gameplay

Each player starts with three Character cards with attributes like “Heroic,” “Tech” and “Psychic,” and various abilities. (There’s even an Ninja! But no Pirate.) Some abilities are automatic, like “+1 on all combat die rolls,” while others require you to “discharge” from your limited number of tokens. With 33 Character cards, there’s a lot of variety, and some combinations of cards work better than others.

Depending on the number of players, you start with eight to twelve turns on the countdown timer. Then, as a team, you decide each turn whether to move or rest. Resting allows you a chance to heal, recharge a card, and take a peek at the top card (and, if you choose, move it to the bottom of the deck); however, it does cost a full turn on the countdown clock and those quickly become very valuable.

If you choose to move, you select a speed, which determines the number of cards you’ll need to flip before you can stop and regroup. As I said before, there are a lot of Very Bad Things that you’ll encounter. Traps can either cause you damage, end your turn, or require you to increase your speed; most traps come with a speed check, where you’ll need to roll either higher or lower than your speed depending on the trap. There are also a wide variety of Monsters with differing Combat Values (CV), and different abilities. (The Gargantuan Reanimated Cyborg Ape, pictured above, doesn’t have any special abilities, but with a CV of 6 it’s one of the nastiest of the bunch.) Combat is fairly simple and resolved with die rolls, but the combination of Character abilities and Monster abilities gives the encounters a lot of variation. Room cards are generally good, but your success with them often depends on what teammates you have. Events are a mix of good and bad (mostly bad), but again the severity of the consequences can change with different characters.

The goal is to find the Scientists card (shuffled into the middle third of the deck) and the Escape Pod (shuffled into the last third). The trick is finding a balance of resting and moving which allows you to get through enough cards per turn, but not so quickly that it kills you.

The game is pretty heavily luck-based, from the Character selection to card order to die rolls, but it still requires a deal of planning and teamwork. I’m sure for a hardcore RPG fan the d6-based decisions will seem very simplistic, but for a game of this type I felt that there was enough variety to keep me interested. (Interested enough, in fact, that I’ve played about ten solo games and six to eight multi-player games since I received it a month ago.) However, for gamers who dislike dice and luck, this might not be the best choice. Outcomes can vary significantly: There have been some games where we’ve moved too fast from the get-go, and wiped out our team by the second or third turn. And there’s been at least one game where we won with several turns to go.

But there’s no question that it’s a tough game. Leistiko has commented that when he designed it he wanted the win/loss ratio to be about 1:3. What he hoped was that if you win, usually it’s on the last move, and I’ve found that this has usually been the case for me. It really fits the narrative: nobody ever makes a movie where the heroes win with several hours to go, right?

Verdict

I’ve really loved this game. As I said, I’ve played it more than a dozen times, and most of the others I’ve played it with are ready for another game as soon as it ends. I will admit that it’s not for everyone, but if you like the theme and you haven’t played any cooperative games before, you should give this a try. And at only $25 retail (I’ve spotted it for $20 in some places), it won’t break the bank.

Buy it from the publisher or from your Friendly Neighborhood Game Store (if you have one).

Wired: A great beat-the-clock, rescue the scientists from the evil supervillain theme; cool retro artwork; tremendous variety in the characters and monsters.

Tired: Heavily luck-based, rules a little confusing at first.

Talisman (image: www.libermortis.co.uk)

We all love board games at GeekDad, so I was excited when iguk sent over the forth edition of Talisman. As many will know this is the much awaited upgrade adds 14 3D figures, a fresh revision of the rules, and upgraded cards and board.

If you haven’t come across it before, Talisman creates a varied role playing experience around a board game - character development, loot, equipment, spells, dice and cards combine to make this accessible and authentic. The complexity of the game is well worth it but you do need children ten or older and a lot of free time to play. Here’s what a friend of mine (board-game gamer) made of it.

Type of Game
The Talisman series of board games were originally created by Games Workshop, and are role playing adventure games. The board provides the fantasy setting, divided into three regions, which players work through by a series of dice throws and card draws which shape their game.

Like in a traditional Role Play Game, players slowly build their characters’ powers through both card and dice based play, eventually gaining enough strength to move into the centre of the game board and win the game.

Kits and Expansions
Talisman is now in its fourth edition, having been first released in 1983. The game is playable by up to 6 people, so you really don’t need an expansion kit. However, there are expansions available: The Reaper, The Dungeon, and The Frostmarch. These expansions add different characters, adventure cards, and spell cards to the game, as well as alternative quests.

Getting Started
We were excited when we received our Talisman set - it looks beautiful, the artwork is gorgeous, and entices you into its fantasy world immediately. Setup was relatively straightforward although it did take us a long time to wade through the lengthy rule book, and work out how to begin. In fact, our first attempt was a total false start as we realized we’d been playing the game incorrectly so we had to re-try the next day! If you are playing this with family and friends, it certainly warrants some test plays before hand - or an evening spent reading through and figuring out the rules.

Playing the Game
Talisman gameplay is fairly complex and will sound complicated below. But as long as you are up for a slightly geeky challenge, you should enjoy getting to know how it all works. The rules have obviously all been thought through in detail and work to create a real sense of role playing an adventure. Each player has a character with various special abilities. Dice rolls determine where you land on the board, which in turn determines how your quest unfolds. As you move around the board, adventure cards are turned up that give opportunity to build your character’s strength and craft.

You have a certain amount of lives at the beginning of the game, these can be both lost and gained as you play. You also receive a number of fate tokens that can be played to try and change the outcome of a certain scenario. Your character can be equipped with useful objects that again improve their abilities, as well as the talisman itself which you must earn before you can win the game. You can also collect and cast spells as the game progresses. Battles are played out through a series of dice rolls, as are encounters triggered at certain places on the board.

As well as all this, you can determine whether your character is good, neutral or evil with the alignment cards. This alignment affects how your character responds to various adventure cards. You can also earn money which can be used to help you in different ways. Alongside these various decisions, the game is quite dependent on luck and at times you have little control over their encounters - which can get annoying at times. However, with a large choice of characters and the wide variety of adventure cards available, Talisman truly is different every time, which is a real strength.

How Long and How Old
Talisman’s box gives a guide of 90 minutes for a game, with an age range of 10+ . I definitely endorse the age guide, not least because even if the average 10 year old can understand how to play the game, they really will need to be able to keep concentrating for a long time! But you will need at least two hours to play it if you are playing with any more than two people.

Playing with a family, the game could easily go on for three hours or more. In fact, my children haven’t made it to the end of a game yet as games always seem to go on and on until bedtime and beyond, with no-one earning the strength they need to complete their adventure, which is quite frustrating.

Conclusion
Talisman is an interesting and involving game, but I found it simply took too long for our family to play. We all loved the look of the board game, the concept, characters, and even the complex gameplay, but in practice it took too long for any of our characters to gain the powers they needed to make progress. Each character is unique and therefore their adventures play out differently, so it’s even impossible to set a time limit and decide who has won at a certain point - as you can if you get bored in a long game of Monopoly! As a result, I think this is a fabulous game for fantasy adventure role playing lovers, but not for an average family, unless you have a lot of time to spare.

Wired: Real role play encounters.

Tired: Can take longer than Risk.

Price: $54.46 (Amazon)

(I should note that actually I am a huge NFL fan. Go Vikes!)

Basically, Blood Bowl is football played in a fantasy roleplaying setting like Dungeons & Dragons — or more accurately, like Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, one of the most beloved D&D alternatives out there, known for the grittiness of its campaign setting. To play the game you need two teams, dice, a game board, and a copy of the rules. Your players block, tackle and throw the ball to score touch downs similar to football. However, the fantasy element comes to the forefront as you have sneaky goblins with clever gadgets, hobbits being thrown like footballs, regenerating skeletal blitzers, and all manner of dirty tricks and shenanigans.

Note: For some reason I was under the impression that Blood Bowl was out of print, and wrote the original post accordingly. Thanks to reader Kradlum for correctly pointing out that Games Workshop still supports Blood Bowl.

Blood Bowl was created by game designer Jervis Johnson for Games Workshop in 1987. Soon, new editions appeared, along with a bevy of miniatures including all skill positions and even peripheral characters like cheerleaders and coaches. Because the game is a niche product, the materials available from GW’s online store tend to run on the expensive side… $45-50 for a partial team and $75 for the basic set. However, GW permits users to freely download the rulebook, which has been altered and amended by the game’s fan base. Additionally, some groups have taken to the Web to avoid having to buy game boards and figures. Others continue to play in person with friends, mocking up their own boards on sheets of cardboard, and using random figures or even LEGO minifigs as playing pieces.

Currently I’m playing in a league of nine people, using our own flavor of the rules that differs from both the original rules and the Living Rulebook. My team, the Erengrad Claws, has fallen to 0-2 but we have high hopes for the future.

[This post originally ran in November of 2007]