Board Games

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Stormbringer
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Re: Board Games

Post by Stormbringer » Tue Oct 15, 2019 1:19 pm

Maturin wrote:
Tue Oct 15, 2019 12:15 pm
I quite like the idea of Nedry, Muldoon and Hammond scarpering to the helicopter and leaving the rest to their deaths. :lol:
That can happen, as well any other combination of unlikely characters, e.g. Nedry, Hammond and Ray Arnold. You can just imagine the awkward conversation on the flight back to the mainland...
Between tedium and fright
Such is the song of the nether world
The hissing of rats
And the jarring chants of angels

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Stormbringer
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Re: Board Games

Post by Stormbringer » Tue Oct 15, 2019 1:30 pm

I'm eyeing up another game which I intend to buy next month in the hope that it will get my sons back into board gaming again:

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Catacombs of Karak is a very light, child-friendly, dungeon-crawler RPG, which seems like a hybrid of Talisman and DungeonQuest, which is something that strongly appeals to me.
Between tedium and fright
Such is the song of the nether world
The hissing of rats
And the jarring chants of angels

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Sly Boots
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Re: Board Games

Post by Sly Boots » Tue Oct 15, 2019 3:29 pm

Stormbringer wrote:
Tue Oct 15, 2019 1:30 pm
I'm eyeing up another game which I intend to buy next month in the hope that it will get my sons back into board gaming again:

Image

Catacombs of Karak is a very light, child-friendly, dungeon-crawler RPG, which seems like a hybrid of Talisman and DungeonQuest, which is something that strongly appeals to me.
That looks really intriguing, so much so that I'm thinking about buying it for our eldest this Christmas. One question though, where would you buy it from? It doesn't seem to be readily available from a very cursory search online.

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Raid
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Re: Board Games

Post by Raid » Tue Oct 15, 2019 4:07 pm

Stormbringer wrote:
Tue Oct 15, 2019 11:54 am
Jurassic Park: Danger!

What exactly happens if more than three make it to the helicopter? Does Hammond kick his grandkids into a swarming mass of velociraptors?

That sounds like it could be a right laugh for fans of the film.

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Re: Board Games

Post by Stormbringer » Tue Oct 15, 2019 5:24 pm

Sly Boots wrote:
Tue Oct 15, 2019 3:29 pm
That looks really intriguing, so much so that I'm thinking about buying it for our eldest this Christmas. One question though, where would you buy it from? It doesn't seem to be readily available from a very cursory search online.
Amazon.com!

Raid wrote:
Tue Oct 15, 2019 4:07 pm
Stormbringer wrote:
Tue Oct 15, 2019 11:54 am
Jurassic Park: Danger!

What exactly happens if more than three make it to the helicopter? Does Hammond kick his grandkids into a swarming mass of velociraptors?

That sounds like it could be a right laugh for fans of the film.
It is indeed a right laugh!

To answer your question, it is not possible for more than three to arrive at the helipad. As soon as the third character arrives, and if he or she has completed their personal objective, the helicopter takes off! So, if there were, for example, in a five player game, only one space left in the chopper, it is possible in theory for Hammond to "race" one of his grandkids to the helipad and try to beat them before the raptor catches them. Also, if Hammond and one or more of this grandkids are on the same space and are attacked by a dinosaur, the players could agree to let Tim be eaten to allow the other two to escape!

That said, the dinosaurs have a lot of advantages over the humans in this game, forcing the humans to work together with some pretty tight co-operative efficiency in order to win a victory. Sometimes the humans are forced into situations where they do have to sacrifice themselves in order to let others with a higher chance of survival to escape.
Between tedium and fright
Such is the song of the nether world
The hissing of rats
And the jarring chants of angels

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Re: Board Games

Post by Stormbringer » Thu Oct 17, 2019 1:58 am

When I was a kid, I owned a pack of TOP TRUMPS cards with a FANTASY theme. They came in a little red plastic box with a clear plastic lid and were published by the now-defunct Waddingtons:

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I don't recall actually playing the game with anyone, but I did absolutely love looking at the gorgeous artwork of 32 different fantasy creatures and memorising their names and attributes. I don't remember how I got hold of the cards, but they were a real treasure to me. Sadly, I seemed to lose them at some point; my last memory of playing with them was when I was 11, back in 1994.

Of course, Top Trumps have continued to sell throughout the decades, but to my grave disappointment, the set above has never been printed again...

...UNTIL NOW!

When my copy of Risk: Vikings arrived, it contained an advertisement sheet for Top Trumps card packs. I casually looked over the page, dismissing the boring themes that today's children are forced to choose from, when I noticed a section at the bottom that said: RETRO COLLECTION! And lo and behold, there was the Fantasy set, back in print once again. My eyes lit up and instantly I flew to Amazon and purchased the reprint version for the costly sum of £3.99.

Now it comes in a plastic casette case with toughened edges (to prevent cracking):
Image

The cards are also printed on a higher quality stock, which is very welcome.

Now, some people on the Amazon reviews have complained that the image quality is lower than the originals when compared side by side, suggesting the cards are mere scans of the originals rather than based on the original artwork. Somebody even said one of them looked like a "crease" had been scanned in to the image. Not owning the originals anymore, I cannot compare, but when my pack actually arrived yesterday I was utterly delighted by the quality of the images. There's nothing wrong with them whatsoever and I don't know what they're talking about.

The best thing of all is, my boys saw me looking through the cards last night and asked what they were. I told them it was a card game and they asked if they could play. Within minutes we were underway and the boys had an absolute blast, giggling with excitement and pure joy as their fantasy monsters "trumped" my own again and again and their deck got slowly larger.

That was the smallest amount of money I've ever spent on a complete tabletop game, yet delivered the biggest amount of WIN I've seen in years.
Between tedium and fright
Such is the song of the nether world
The hissing of rats
And the jarring chants of angels

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Re: Board Games

Post by Wrathbone » Thu Oct 17, 2019 6:05 am

I had that exact same pack! :o I used to play it all the time with my sister when I was a kid.

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Re: Board Games

Post by Sly Boots » Thu Oct 17, 2019 6:20 am

I used to love Top Trumps, probably around junior school sort of age. I had loads of sets, everything from that fantasy set and the equally great horror sets, to rockets to HGVs to tractors.

The tractors one was surprisingly engaging :lol:

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Re: Board Games

Post by Stormbringer » Thu Oct 17, 2019 7:02 am

Wrathbone wrote:
Thu Oct 17, 2019 6:05 am
I had that exact same pack! :o I used to play it all the time with my sister when I was a kid.
Now that you mention it, I do recall one instance of playing a round with my sister (I can even hear myself saying "Magic Power 100"), but I can't imagine we actually played the rules correctly. I was a bit... developmentally delayed... as a child.
Between tedium and fright
Such is the song of the nether world
The hissing of rats
And the jarring chants of angels

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Re: Board Games

Post by Rusty » Thu Oct 17, 2019 7:05 am

Talking of creases.. that second image showing the cards has many creases in it. Is that the Amazon picture or a picture of your original pack?
-- To be completed at some point --

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Re: Board Games

Post by Wrathbone » Thu Oct 17, 2019 7:20 am

Stormbringer wrote:
Thu Oct 17, 2019 7:02 am
Wrathbone wrote:
Thu Oct 17, 2019 6:05 am
I had that exact same pack! :o I used to play it all the time with my sister when I was a kid.
Now that you mention it, I do recall one instance of playing a round with my sister (I can even hear myself saying "Magic Power 100")
I've just remembered that we referred to the rock troll as Auntie Gweny due to the uncanny similarity to our dear, late Great Aunt Gwen (who I never actually met, but I was reliably informed by my older sister that she was identical in both looks and temperament). :lol:

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Re: Board Games

Post by Stormbringer » Thu Oct 17, 2019 7:27 am

Poor Aunt Gwen! :lol:
Rusty wrote:
Thu Oct 17, 2019 7:05 am
Talking of creases.. that second image showing the cards has many creases in it. Is that the Amazon picture or a picture of your original pack?
That is the Amazon picture and is a deliberate design decision for the cover card to give it an aged "retro" look.
Between tedium and fright
Such is the song of the nether world
The hissing of rats
And the jarring chants of angels

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Tichinde
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Re: Board Games

Post by Tichinde » Fri Oct 18, 2019 8:20 am

Sports Cars, Fantasy, Marvel heroes, Marvel Villains.......good time had by all with Top Trumps :)
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Re: Board Games

Post by The Jackal » Sat Oct 19, 2019 12:06 am

I go to the works' bar on Fridays to avoid the rush-hour at the train station. I read a book, drink, wait. Tonight there were a group of people playing boardgames - most of them I know, and know me, but they were particularly pissed and cajoled me into joining them.

We played Scrawl first, which is Pictionary meets Chinese Whispers, is the best I can describe it - you get a card, draw the image/scenario the sentence depicts, and pass it round. You then put a fresh slide over the other person's work, writing down a description of the image underneath. Pass around. You then draw what the slide you're passed depicts - continue until everyone gets their own original slide back, you present the wodge of slides to everyone counting back to your original creation (hilarity did ensue). There may be a scoring system but no one seemed to use it.

Then we played a game whose name escapes me, but it went as so: we split into two teams, and a card was drawn by an umpire and read out - it was invariably to name X things to do with Y, and each team does so. Then, head-to-head, each team "plays" one of their answers, with a point scored for being on the Answer card but no points for incorrect answers or repetition. If there's a draw, a tie-breaker ensues which is a Price Is Right-esque question about some seemingly ridiculous number-based thing, nearest to the bull wins. We won.

Finally we played Pass The Pandas - I joked about this being a PC-gone-mad Pass The Pigs but it's actually a whole other game and nowt to do with rolling pairs of... pandas. In essence, you get X dice to start with and take turns to roll them - you can discard upon rolling a certain symbol, trade for another, and there's a whole complex system about bamboo that our GM only unearthed more on when he found out the rules page was actually a fold-out booklet containing far more fucking rules than he'd previously known about... either way, it was fast-paced and a bit like Shithead but with dice, only once someone loses their dice that's the end of the game.

...yeah, I had a good time, in all.
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Stormbringer
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Re: Board Games

Post by Stormbringer » Sat Oct 19, 2019 2:05 am

The Jackal wrote:
Sat Oct 19, 2019 12:06 am
We played Scrawl first, which is Pictionary meets Chinese Whispers, is the best I can describe it - you get a card, draw the image/scenario the sentence depicts, and pass it round. You then put a fresh slide over the other person's work, writing down a description of the image underneath. Pass around. You then draw what the slide you're passed depicts - continue until everyone gets their own original slide back, you present the wodge of slides to everyone counting back to your original creation (hilarity did ensue). There may be a scoring system but no one seemed to use it.

We play this every Christmas at my wife's parents' house, but over there in Tennessee they call it "Telepictionary". It causes much hilarity and was a source of family in-jokes for years on end.
Between tedium and fright
Such is the song of the nether world
The hissing of rats
And the jarring chants of angels

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