Played a really neat game, that I really enjoyed. It's called Team Up!. It's a cooperative game based around packing a pallet. I would say it's a mash up of Tetris/reverse-Jenga/Hanabi. You don't technically lose, you just do less than perfect. You're playing against a set score track. There a deck of cards that makes you play either any block of a certain color, or any block of a certain shape family. It's a very simple game, but at the same time very challenging to actually do well.
So as I continue to live vicariously through my niece and nephew's childhoods, I've already started planning their Xmas boardgame purchases. She's 7 and he's 10 going on 13.
Plan was for the younger one:
Scarabya
Dixit
for the older, I was gonna get Kingdomino and then one of: Clank!, Cyclades or Fury of Dracula. I'm slightly concerned Kingdomino will be too simplistic for him and its also vaguely similar to Scarabya, but it's a lot more likely to be tolerated by the grandparents (my parents retired to the same town as my brother so they are over at least 2-3 times a week). It's good to have a quick play option in there too. Also worried Cyclades might be a tad too advanced and Dracula a tad too 'adult' themed with the horror bits running through it. And without me in town, I really only see him playing either Cyclades and Dracula with his father. Whereas Clank! could probably wrap in his mom and the grandparents, and possibly even his sister.
I'm really looking forward to having a lab. I hope I can recruit grad students that are interested in game night every month or three
In post 3308, shaft.ed wrote:I'm slightly concerned Kingdomino will be too simplistic for him and its also vaguely similar to Scarabya, but it's a lot more likely to be tolerated by the grandparents
You could look into Queendomino instead, which is Kingdomino but a little bit more advanced.
I think of the other 3 you mentioned Clank would definitely be the most accessible (Or you could try Clank!in!Space! if the theme matters?) and shortest. Obviously I don't know your nephew but Cyclades is fairly complex, for any 10 yr old. I'd just avoid dracula as I think there are more streamlined hidden movement games that do a better job in a shorter time but YMMV since people love it.
are you thinking of me when you're with somebody else?
Yeah fury of Dracula is 2-3 hours long..if I recall correctly.
Having a 10 year old be constantly engaged for that long might be tough. Set up is 15 minutes by itself. Explaining the rules the first time is gonna be a awful.
Thanks for the tips. I guess I'll keep it simple with Clank! Should be a good introduction to deck building concept and I can see my parents playing with them, which is good.
I'll probably get Cyclades or Inis (or both) for my lab.
And I think my Fury of Dracula obsession is really the fault of TableTop. I don't think I really want to play Fury of Dracula. I want to play Fury of Dracula with Will Wheaton, Amy Okuda, Grant Imahara, and Ify Nwadiwe.
Betrayal is fun and age fine. It's pretty campy, but the rules can sometimes be a little dicey especially because in many scenarios someone has to basically figure out the haunt by themselves and no one else knows what they are doing, so that could be dicey with kids.
In post 3316, PJ. wrote:Unclear rules + secret rules, would be my warning.
Sometimes a little long
good to know
this kid loves rules
when he was about 5, he was teaching me how to play some games on his Wii. He spent about 30 minutes reciting the rules for each game we would play in great detail. Sometimes I felt he enjoyed the rules more than the gameplay
Very fun game. Our first game played 6 people and took a long time because we were all fairly confused trying to figure our factions out. There are some factions that I just couldn't grasp. Second/Third game was with 3 people and played very quickly. We all knew how to play and just needed to take the time to learn our factions. I was surprised at how fast the game actually went (about 90 minutes) and that even when you are losing, there is a chance you can come back and win. I played the Lizards game 3 and was very far behind the leader but won because of a dominance card that I took and managed to hold.
The factions are all very fun to play, even the "easy" ones. I can see how Cole took inspiration from so many different styles of games like 18xx or Coin to create what is a fairly pretty and fluid game. I was expecting something a little heavier but in actuality, it was more like Terra Mystica where multiple play throughs is reasonable. I can see this being a competitive game played with my crew.
The problem is the more complex an asymmetric game is the less balanced it tends to be.
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