Monday, November 13, 2006

At BGG.Con... Day 3

I got to the con pretty early yesterday as they had a flea market in the morning and I wanted to see what games I could pick up for cheap. And boy, there were ALOT of games there for sale. I didn't see much of what I wanted, but I did pick up a DVD from Scott Nicholson and a game, Goal a Minute Soccer, for US$3. So that was alright.

I went over to the gaming room and started with Canal Mania, which I think is a very nice game. I think it sits a nice inbetween Age of Steam and Railroad Tycooon, with bits of Ticket to Ride thrown in.

I played Mission Red Planet next at the Asmodee table, which was being demoed there. I have to say, I was expecting much more from that particular game. It wasn't quite my game, and the theme, I felt, was quite thin.

I went for lunch after that and came back in the afternoon to play a game of Antike, which I taught to a couple friends. I think they liked it, though again, they tended toward building armies and taking territory. I'm of the opinion that taking territory is not the most efficient way to get a victory, and it leads to the common end game problem experienced by many people.

I had a short dinner after that, and I didn't play any other game til much later because I wanted to be in the Game Show. And I'm glad that I did take part, cos it was an awesome event! I really enjoyed that particular event, and I think it was well worth taking 2 hours away from my gaming time. I didn't stop laughing for almost the entire duration of the game. The very last question on the quiz show was "Which person, past or present, would you like to speak to the most?". Several answers included "my grandparents", "my parents" and "Reiner Kniza". But several teams knew what the final answer was (including mine), and we were all chanting "Jesus! Jesus! Jesus!" at the very end.

The game show was a complete blast, and the rest of the evening was topped off with pizza AND a game of Shogun.

Yes... Shogun... the new re-themed, reworked Wallenstein... And it was great! It was an absolute blast to play, and the rest of the table were really awesome people. We only played one year in the game, but by the end, we had starved the peasants badly, multiple provinces were revolting and we had to individually subdue the rioting mobs.

I also managed to play 2 games of Diamant after that before calling it a night at 3am.

I plan to get there as soon as I can this morning to get more gaming in before the official end of the con.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

It was great to meet so many new people at BGG this year, including Ken. I got to play Maestro Leonardo with him and he obviousky clued into the game much faster than anyone else.

I sure hope he can make it back next year
--Jim Carroll

Anonymous said...

I second that - he was a wonderful teacher of Antike. So glad you made the trip to Big D Ken. Great meeting you. - Rob

Ken Lee said...

It was great fun playing games with you guys! I sure hope I can make it to BGG.Con again soon!

And Rob... congrats on your lucky draw win on Saturday!

Anonymous said...

I was the other person that played the Red Planet Demo with you, I have to agree it didn't really appeal to me much, especially at that price! The Demoer was nice though so I didn't want to say that right to him heh.