Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Episode 26: 2024 Re-boot! image

Episode 26: 2024 Re-boot!

S2 E26 ยท Board Game Chinwag
Avatar
62 Plays11 months ago

Join us as we try to get better at this!

Recommended
Transcript

Introduction to the 2024 Reboot

00:00:03
Speaker
And nothing happens. Sounds like the select screen in a Resident Evil game.
00:00:19
Speaker
Roll. Roll tape. Let's see if that stays in the recording. Hello everyone. Welcome to the 2024 reboot of the chinwag. I guess I'll just keep talking and introduce folks. How you going, Dave? I couldn't be better right now. Lovely to hear. Shane, how's the oven that you're recording from?
00:00:43
Speaker
Oh, it is sweltering bloody hot here. And it's good to be back in 2024 for season 14. Season 14. How many episodes have we even had 14 episodes? No, no, no. Sorry, we've had two episodes.

Podcast Goals and Game Recap

00:01:00
Speaker
And G-Money, how are you doing, bud? Yeah, I'm very well, thank you. Lovely to speak to everybody in 2024.
00:01:06
Speaker
Uh, which this will probably come out in 2025 based on our previous, um, so anyway, we decided that we got to, I guess, be a little bit more serious. And by that, I mean some level of seriousness regarding the podcasts over the next.
00:01:26
Speaker
until we get sick of it. So this will be the second episode of 2024 after our top 13s on our last episode, which makes no sense if you're listening to me to explain that now, because you would have seen that that episode already came out. Point being, we're rebooting. We're starting again. We're certainly not going to be any better. We're just going to try and be a bit more regular, but, you know, take some more brand and make it work. I think tripping the operative word, because we've tried in the past. Yes. Yes. We weren't intentionally shit.
00:02:00
Speaker
I didn't really try a lot to be honest anyway we thought no it's just the four of us Joe and Helena absentees but we'll hopefully get them
00:02:16
Speaker
on the next few episodes, but in the meantime, we just sort of talk about our Januarys slash Decembers since we last caught up and what we got played over the holidays, what we caught up, what we did. And I guess probably the easiest way to start with that is that all of us, including Helen and Joe, were involved in one epic 11-hour 8-player TI4 game at Dave's House, which was pretty awesome.
00:02:42
Speaker
Um, anyone want to elaborate on their, uh, the TI four adventure from that game? No. Helen played really well. Helen played really well. Helen just annihilated everyone. I knew going in, like everyone's like, Helen's going to win. And she's like, nah. We're like, all eight of us are going, yeah, Helen's going to win. She's like, nah. And then she fucking wins by like five points. Like it wasn't even close.
00:03:10
Speaker
I have a play with Helen a lot, but every time I play with her, she gives off the vibes that she's not enjoying it and she's doing poorly and she always wins. I mean, we haven't played co-op games with Helen to be fair. Like we're playing aggressive, you know, combat games usually, but yeah, she doesn't hold back. I was going to say, can Helen do co-op?
00:03:40
Speaker
I couldn't say that. I've got to say, as always, there's always good stories and lots of stories that come out of playing TI4 and Steve fucked me over once again.
00:04:03
Speaker
Glasshouse has been like seriously Me with your entire army right next to my home base for half the game and I didn't touch you Yeah, and you whisper to you and your little whispers with Joe. I
00:04:17
Speaker
clearly plotting against me. You, my friend, I would have had a very dire end of that game. No, no. Joe knew I could take your whole home base. And I said, I can't be that person. I can't do it to him. I had the ability to take your whole home base at one point. He said, just do it. Do it. Do it. It'd be awesome.
00:04:38
Speaker
No shit Sherlock, because you knocked all of my guys out on the previous ex. I can't do it through. But I like the fact that I ended up trading off
00:04:52
Speaker
my death star today so that he could have the ability to make his, which he then traded to you. Yeah. Defensively. Then you use that to destroy me. Yep. And that's why I said, you know. It's the circle of life.

Game Day Stories and Community Events

00:05:11
Speaker
Thank you, Simba.
00:05:17
Speaker
But yeah, in 11 hours, it didn't feel like 11 hours. It's always one of those games. It just doesn't like, you know, you play for eight hours and you're like, shit, have we started already? Like, yeah, that was good fun. Such a good game. And, you know, I've assigned myself once a year to play that game, once a year only. And it's always at a day of events.
00:05:42
Speaker
because someone else invited me to another game of it and I said, no, I've already played my game for the year. I got my next one booked in. Well, that was 2023, you played, right? Yeah, so my 2024 was already booked in for this year. Yeah, cool. Well, not including online. Speaking of who you've invited to play, Shane, have you got a... I remember something quite hilarious happening at the game day, two days later. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:06:10
Speaker
Hang on, there's probably a couple of things that happened the game day, two days later. So we're at the EVV at the community place. Awesome turnout too. Having, you know, 80 plus people there, you know, playing games and having fun. But, you know, shit real confusion. Someone came up to me and
00:06:33
Speaker
very energetically said, come on, come on, let's go, let's go. You know, I've bought it today. You said you'd play it this year with me. And as soon as he said it, a massive thunder strike. Thunder, it was huge. And I just pointed up to him and I said, nope, the gods have spoken. We are not playing that bloody game. That was the only loud clap of thunder we had the whole day. Yeah, yeah. And it was at that point, literally at the point where he was asking me to play the game.
00:07:01
Speaker
Oh, no, no, no. Someone upstairs told me, bad news. And, uh, you know, it's amazing how many, how many shit real confusion to see on marketplace for sale. So, so I've got to say, uh, Shana, I probably started that. I got a coffee off Tony and I'm like, Hey, I heard, uh, I heard Shane wants to play. And he goes, really? I thought he didn't like it. I'm like, Oh, you bet you need my player this year.
00:07:36
Speaker
Sorry. I will do the right thing by him. I have promised I will play it with him. So Tony, we will play shit real confusing at some point in 2024. Why would you do that to yourself again though? Well, I did it with the City Big Show as a seed. Just never know, right?
00:07:55
Speaker
I was there when you went through that. You were not happy. At one point I'm pretty sure you looked at me and you said help get me out of here. I was actually trying to write something in the carpet so that someone could see from up in space to help me. Or someone would know your last message because you died there. It was the worst game.
00:08:29
Speaker
I played with Tony and Helen and a few other people at the LXG retreat last year and it was an enjoyable experience. I think it's just the people and the timing. I think you were playing it where you were drinking and you're playing it in between other games with people that didn't know what they were doing and no one paid attention.
00:08:50
Speaker
Like my game, I think everybody was so into it that there was just literally like throwing things at each other across the table. So it was kind of enjoyable. No, no, there was no drinking when we were playing that game. Just drinking. Just tears. Maybe you should have been drinking. I should have been drinking. Yeah. Should have been drinking. Usually helps. But I was trying to think what else we played on that day. There was lots of games we played that day. It was a really good day at the TCP.
00:09:20
Speaker
It was, it was a great day. It was, uh, I was lucky enough to be down there. I was obviously over the Christmas break. And, um, I turned out with my whole, my brother, my sister, my sister-in-law, my nephew and my wife, and we played and my son better include him, I guess. Um, and we played last light, which was awesome. We played a game of Thunder Road Vendetta, which, um, is like, I'm going to get that tattooed on me soon, I think. Um, but it was one of those things where that game, I want to show it to everyone, but I always worry that it's,
00:09:50
Speaker
Like maybe a Eurogamer is just not going to like it because it's just too crazy and it's essentially a roll and move game. And my nephew is a Eurogamer and my brother pretty much is as well. And they loved it. It was just ridiculous. That was probably the most ridiculous game of that I think I've ever had.
00:10:11
Speaker
Um, and we, uh, you know, you're doing the same with last light, you know, you're having a good game or something when other people are just randomly coming over and watching your play for 15 minutes. And that happened in both of those games. So, um, that was a great two.
00:10:24
Speaker
fantastic games, followed by possibly the worst game of TO that I have played. Like an enjoyable game of TO, but a game where I sucked so hard. And it was the funny, that was like a moment for me because it was with Shane and Ingrid and yourself Shane, so two Shanes. And it was just so funny because they're like, oh, we want to play TO with the TO master. Like I'm some sort of genius or something. And I'm like, it's just my favorite game. It doesn't mean I'm good at it.
00:10:54
Speaker
But the first turn, everyone's taken like, oh, I'll just get some wood or I'll just get some stone. And I've gone, all right, well, I'm going to lock my dice here, which gets me this, which moves me on that track and a little bit build that and get this. And I claim this discovery tile and I get nine points. And they're all just like, oh, shit. We did. We all went where we are. We instantly just looked at each other and went where? Fuck.
00:11:18
Speaker
But I lost, I came last in that game by a fair distance. Like I, it was, I couldn't get anything going and everyone and Ingrid just smashed everyone. She nearly lapped me in the end. It was just like, I was like, maybe there's, you know, there's too much pressure. Like I had, I had to, had to be the, be the, uh, the TO guy. And I ended up absolutely just played a dreadful game and there's this great photo. I didn't take any photos of the day, but,
00:11:45
Speaker
I don't know who took the photo, maybe it was Ingrid, I'm not quite sure who took it, but it's just me looking at my board and you can see the look on my face. It's like, what the fuck have I done today? I don't understand. So great. So great.

Board Game Reviews and Teaching Experiences

00:11:59
Speaker
Yeah, no, that was a good game. Any moments from you, Dave and G from your TI event? The TI, look, the TI, like, TI was great for me.
00:12:13
Speaker
the first of a series of three all-day events that I'd had a pretty quick suggestion there. The community of day was really good, but I wanted to give a special shout out to Joe who donated about four hours of his life that he's never going to get back and tried to teach me and Phil and to Voidfall from scratch, not actually having a super clear idea on how to play it himself. So the setup and the unboxing took about an hour and a half, which we,
00:12:42
Speaker
sort of struggled through. And if you haven't played void vault, it's a fairly complex one. It's a, um, mind clash games, relatively new, a lot of complexity in the setup and the play style and the resource management. And there's a scenario book that goes along with just to actually set up the base game. So by the time we'd set it up, work through the rules and had our player boards all ready to go, Joe actually had to leave. So he's like, okay, I'll just call my wife and get like another hour.
00:13:12
Speaker
and then tried to talk us through the first couple of turns, and we didn't even get through a whole round. So the game is three rounds long. We didn't even finish one round. It was four hours, and he's like, ah, I've got to go. Thanks anyway. But it was a tough situation, I think. But in the end, it was enough for me to actually get the game out. And then I went and played two rounds of it, or sort of walked another group through two rounds of it two days later.
00:13:41
Speaker
Um, and it's, it's good. Like we spent nearly eight hours and a couple of days after that, playing two whole games of it. We played through the tutorial. We played through a random set up game and it's deep and complex and very good. And there's lots going on, but, um, I don't know. What do you think Jim? It's going to be hard to get out and actually give it another go. I think it's, it's just like a clip second son, but there's no player interaction.
00:14:11
Speaker
It's just you. It's virtually solo playing it, but it's kind of the same thing. There is a little bit of fighting, but it's not really like you wouldn't really want to fight someone else because it's all predetermined. Every fight is predetermined. There's no gotcha. Like if you, if you attack me, I know you lose. So it's very much like you just weigh up what options you've got and where you get the most points and things. So I loved it. I reckon it was amazing. But, um,
00:14:40
Speaker
I think it would be an incredible solo game. Because you've got the board element. So the whole game is you're like an abandoned or sort of ignominious little house trying to fight back against the void who taking over most of the galaxy and push everybody out to the fringes. So you all start in the corners and you've got to try and fight into the void who are the board controlled element. And you know exactly how they're going to come back and kill you. And every turn they get to fight you so you can sort of plan against them.
00:15:07
Speaker
And you very rarely actually have to even interact with the other players, but you can if you wanted to. It's just not good for you or them. You're better off fighting the board and expanding your empire that way. I must say it was quite hilarious because I had my drinks upstairs in the fridge. So every now and again, I'd come up and get a drink and Phil was there, wasn't he? Yeah, Phil was there. And he was up there and it was just like every time I walked in,
00:15:35
Speaker
There was like Joe heading the rule book, Dave looking at the board, trying to figure stuff out. And Phil's just sitting in his seat looking off into space like, why am I here? He was always up for a chat when I walked past. He was just looking for an escape. It was enough for me to walk past and go, gee, I'm glad I didn't put my hand up for that.
00:15:58
Speaker
I like, I'm sure it would be good, but yeah, that you guys, it was, didn't look like it was the most enjoyable four hours either. It was seemed like it was very hard work at that point. And that's what I saw in a G money. So we put probably 10 hours of training into actually being able to play. It's one of the only games I've ever had that sort of entry requirement. I think you, like nobody, I know, um, with the exception of some very special people would be able to pick up that rule book and play that game.
00:16:27
Speaker
got to watch videos, then you've got to watch play throughs, then you've got to actually play through it. And then you've got to, even with the tutorial, there's probably 20 or so steps that say, don't play this in the tutorial, play this in every other game. So you're reading through the how to play guide and it's telling you stuff that you need to know, but not yet. So the intro game, I think everybody kind of enjoyed and we'd got through it and we, we understood what we needed to do.
00:16:56
Speaker
And I think the real payoff was then everybody set up and played their own unique game with asymmetric powers and with the building of the galaxies out a little differently. Um, and I think that's like, you've got to capitalize on that. You've got to actually use that invested time to be able to then play the game again. Cause what's going to happen, I can see it already is we'll all just put that game back on the shelf for another six months and we'll, we'll go to look at it and no reason how to play it. And we'll just sort of never play it again.
00:17:25
Speaker
Why these guys are all struggling through the teach or the learning of the game, Jiminy, you're at the board game barbecue game day. What did you guys, what did you, what were you playing there? Um, so I, I went in and I taught Nucleum and it was a lovely, lovely group of people. They very didn't need hardly any teaching. Cause I just went, have you guys played, uh, um, brass? Yep. Have you played branch? Yep. Okay, cool. It's kind of those two.
00:17:54
Speaker
And then that took just, I think, three and a half hours, I think. They all did really well. Then I was going to teach Terraforming Mars, but the three people that had signed in, they unfortunately had to leave early. And just when I was packing up,
00:18:12
Speaker
a lovely couple had wandered in and they were like, Oh, we saw you got the yellow shirt on. Um, we just got here. We've never been to one of these before. What do we do? And I, in my infinite wisdom said, would you like to play a board game? He's the most stupid response given the time and place. And, um, I think I sat with them and another guy for 10 hours.
00:18:34
Speaker
Wow. Oh, cool. I taught about five games. I taught Architects of the West Kingdom, Lost Temples of Arnak, Santorini, plus a few other games here and there. And they play two rooms in a boom with 40 people.
00:18:54
Speaker
And that's like max count, max count that they had, they had a ball. There was a point where they were still trying to smash out the best they could in Arnak. And I was like, no, like, what are we playing next? And I was just like, I just mentioned to you, it is 10 PM. And they went, what?
00:19:10
Speaker
Our cat's going to be so angry. And then they packed up. But it was magic. I think we just had a ball and it was just like 10 hours went nowhere. And then I died because I taught like five, six games. And then everyone was like, why are you grumpy? At like 1am. But how awesome for those two people to rock up at game day and the first person they made you do. I think everyone had a good time.
00:19:38
Speaker
They could ask anyone better. That's brilliant. At the TCP game day, I got coaxed into playing Age of Steam with Joe, and loved it. Really, really enjoyed Age of Steam. It was my second play, and I hadn't played it for a couple of years.
00:20:00
Speaker
I kind of forgot a couple of rules until about halfway through and then I went, oh shit, I remember that now. And then I started trying to play catch up and I knew my game was screwed after that when you're trying to play catch up in that game. And then I taught Ingrid and Shane Nova Roma, which is a new game by Stanislav Kordinsky, who did Endless Winter. And that's just basically a big point salad euro puzzle
00:20:31
Speaker
where you're kind of using the target mechanic. And that was awesome. It's such a good game. Probably one of my favorite games I've played all year. And then, TA with you, Steve. That was fun. That was awesome. God, that game's underrated. It's just stupid fun.
00:21:03
Speaker
Really enjoyed that game. So that was my TCP day. But I've been playing a buttload of Navaroma. And to the point where Lauren even joined a four-player game with Ingrid, Minnie, and Shane. So Shane, Shane, Ingrid, and Lauren. And two and a half hours.
00:21:30
Speaker
And Lauren said, yeah, I liked it. Don't like the two and a half hours, but she didn't mind it. And then I played it solo, which has been really good fun. But I think the best thing for me that's happened in the TCP day was that I now have a loaned copy of City of the Big Shoulders. Thanks to Mr. Steven Shivers.
00:21:59
Speaker
And the next day I found a solo variant for it. So printed it all out, laminated all the cards, laminated all the calculators that come with it. Then spent probably about an hour and a half playing it solo. Realized, nah, this is broken. It needs a few other things added to it. Basically an Excel spreadsheet calculator in the background to work out.
00:22:31
Speaker
If any game is screaming out for an Excel spreadsheet, it's sitting there. It does exist. It does exist. It's just a spreadsheet, right? You can actually just play it on Excel. We're not on BG anymore. We're on this XLSX file and you're good to go. Because it tells you don't worry about, you know, what are the,
00:23:00
Speaker
the companies are doing for the AI player. But then you're like, all you're trying to do is beat your own score. I actually want to beat the AI players. So you're not actually calculating the value of the shares for the AI players. So that's okay. I'm gonna work on that myself. I had to, it was quite funny because I decided to give it to Shane because I was, it just had to be getting played out here.

Family Gaming and Memorable Moments

00:23:25
Speaker
And it's the one time it's at your table
00:23:27
Speaker
is one more time than it's hit the table for probably two years. I had to stop myself, but I feel like I still overdid it. When I gave it to Shane, I was very happy to give it to Shane, but I was also very quick to point out that
00:23:45
Speaker
It was alone after a few times. I'm like, I need to stop talking because now it sounds like I'm, I'm pushing this too hard. Like it's like, I'm giving you this, but here's my list of conditions. You got to stop me. You just got to, you got to move on with your life. It's going into a better place for the time being. Cause I did the same with, um, an acronym. So I had the essential edition, like the full all in.
00:24:13
Speaker
And we played it once and it didn't sort of click with the group. And I saw Liam Mac was actually looking to buy a copy. So I said, okay, here you go, Liam. Like you can have it for what I paid for it. However, the condition is if you ever want to sell, you have to sell it back to me. I would like it back at some stage and I'll give you back the exact same amount of money that you gave for it. So it's like a loan with a bond. And if you never give it back, well, that's fine too.
00:24:39
Speaker
Well, in realistic terms, the only reason I made those agreements with Shane is because I didn't want to see it on the board game marketplace in six months. He wouldn't tell it. He'd give it away. That's harsh. People learn from their mistakes, Steve. Hey, the other thing that I ended up doing on the community plate stay, which I forgot is the blood on the clock tower.
00:25:10
Speaker
Um, I hadn't played that before. And I took my nine year old daughter along cause she's got a hankering for one night. I'll talk well. And so we're all getting quite sick of playing it with her. So I thought I'll take it along to a game day and she can, you know, grab some randoms and have a game. But anyway, so we're sitting around waiting and the clock tower people need a couple extra people. So we jumped into that and it was quite a fun experience and hadn't played a sort of big, uh, game open.
00:25:35
Speaker
at a game day like that with a bunch of people. So it was really enjoyable. But yeah, my daughter had an awesome time playing that. We played two games of that and she loved every second of it.
00:25:44
Speaker
And that's great. And you can just see the adults sort of toning down their language and their style of aggressiveness a little bit, but not too much. Funny story, my brother brought that up as well and we played it on New Year's Eve. My whole, all of my family came over to our apartment on New Year's Eve to watch the fireworks and all that. And we set up a game at a cocktail, I think it was 14 or 15 of us, something like that.
00:26:13
Speaker
Like that game, if you run it, it goes for like what, 45 minutes to an hour. It's not too long, but it's my family like to talk. Surprise, surprise. Um, and specifically some members of our family like to play the game. So the fact that you can break off and have these little chats, some people wanted to do that, like for an hour each round.
00:26:37
Speaker
And, um, so during the, during the second round, Helen and Heidi got sick of all of this chatting and waiting for the game to start that they started making a pavlova in the kitchen. And, um, we just come back, Mark's running the game and he's like, I've had some wild things that happened in blood of the clock tower, but I've never had a time out for a pavlova.
00:27:01
Speaker
But it went for hours. It was entertaining. But my brother in law, Dave, who is not a board gamer, he jumps in every now and again, but he's not. This isn't anywhere in his wheelhouse. He was just sitting on his chair looking like an old man watching the cricket. You know, like he looks like he was half asleep. He wasn't really paying attention, but he was there.
00:27:21
Speaker
Um, and whenever he had to, he raised his hand to vote, but he never said a word basically for the whole night he just sat there. Um, but everyone else was fairly well into it. And, uh, it was a good, it was a good story. Like we had, um,
00:27:36
Speaker
one person who had all this information, but was either drunk or or had a spell on them pretty much every single round. So they kept on getting conflicting information. And it was it was great. But it was it was the longest game of clock tower that I've ever seen or been involved in. But yeah, the fact that you got to win in probably less time is a good indication. After the first round, you have five minutes for discussion in the first round. It was 90 seconds for any pretty pretty. Oh, wow.
00:28:06
Speaker
Wow. Yeah, you're not making a pavlova in 90 seconds. But I was quite impressed with my daughter. So there was a point where someone was accusing her. And so she's gone and she's playing the game, full grown adults. And there's another lady who's probably mid 20s. And she was relatively small in comparison. So the guy goes, oh, the two small people over there, they're the sus ones. And she goes, oh, you're talking to me. He goes, yeah, short one.
00:28:36
Speaker
She goes, well, at least I've got an excuse. Well, when Fisk bumped her, I was like, yeah, probably just turn it down a bit. You don't need to be sassy at all. No, no, no, no. You keep going. That's great. Fantastic. Was she a bad person? No, no. I can't remember the name, but it was the one that
00:29:04
Speaker
You get to nominate somebody once and they just die. Is there the maker? The reaper or something? Oh, I don't come at me. Yeah. She just stands up at once and I said, you need to do it now. Cause so they got to kill you next to her, but she's like, Oh, okay. I think it's them. And they're like, no, it's not me. She's like, Oh, worth a shot. But yeah, it was good fun. What have you been up to Steve?

Revitalizing Gaming Interests

00:29:34
Speaker
You've been playing a lot of games lately. Uh, loads. It's, it's, it's almost been a board gaming Renaissance, I guess. Like I just.
00:29:41
Speaker
I haven't played this many games in this short of a time for years. And it's been awesome. It hasn't been the usual suspects, both in games and in people I'm playing with. Obviously, being down in Brisbane helped a lot with that, but I got to catch up with Liam and play a game with Liam face-to-face, which Liam is... Did you play Gloomhaven? No, we didn't. Liam's part of our Gloomhaven crew. He's the head honcho in our Gloomhaven crew.
00:30:09
Speaker
But that was actually a really cool night because it was Liam and it was my nephew, Mick. And that was the first time I've ever been at anything with Mick without his parents, my brother. Like it was just Mick, Liam and I. And you could tell that he loved that too. Like he loved being just one of the other adults. He's 18. He's at uni. He's 19 now. But yeah, like he just loved being one of the adults.
00:30:37
Speaker
And so we played, of course, Thunder Road, Vendetta. But then Liam taught Ra, and that's a really great game that I can't believe I've missed all of these years. I'm really glad I got a copy, and we played it again since. But have any of you guys played Ra? No, but it's on my list this year. No, it's on my list too. I don't know, aren't they this year?
00:31:02
Speaker
Well, I think they've done one because I've got a fancy version, but not the fancy, fancy version. Um, but there's like a super everything wooden kind of crazy version. Um, so yeah, that there was that. And then, um, then we played, uh, Cthulhu death may die, which I, I have not enjoyed any HP Lovecraft themed board games pretty much at all in the hobby of, of, of there been a blank spot for me, whether it's.
00:31:31
Speaker
you know, any of the Arkham Horrors, Eldritch Horrors or Elder Sign or whatever. I've never liked any of them. And, but I just, everyone kept talking about this game and people that I like similar games to, like other YouTubers and whatnot that I follow. And I thought, I'll give it a go. And of course, because it's a come on game, you don't just go, Oh, I'll go and buy that $30 game. You buy $280 worth of shit.
00:31:54
Speaker
Um, and it turned up and I'm like, oh geez, if I made a mistake and then we played it and I'm like, nah, this is awesome. This is great. We've played that probably four or five times since. And it's, it's just a really, really nifty way of telling the story, but, um, and also pretty much right from the start, it's like giving you that, that tension of, yeah, am I going to go insane? Am we going to get killed? Like Raf and I played it twice today. And the reason we played it twice is that we died after five minutes in the first one.
00:32:25
Speaker
And then we're like, well, let's reset and do that again. And let's not just walk in there and try and kill everything on the first turn.
00:32:31
Speaker
Let's move away and think about things for a minute so we can make a better run of it. So it's been awesome. That game is such a great game though. I play it with Anita and Cass. Anita's got the full playing down version, all painted minis. And I'm always the little girl who's just super powerful. I thought about it today. She was awesome. She just annihilates anyone that walks in the room. And it's such a good game. So we used to have our Friday night game nights here.
00:32:59
Speaker
we were doing just different, it's just brilliant. And every little girl comes out on the map and just obliterates people. It's such a good game. I think that the text really helps that game too, because it's, she's one example, but some of the ways that they describe the characters, it's very pulpy, it's clearly not taking itself too seriously. Like there's one character, I can't remember what their name is, but she's just got two axes.
00:33:27
Speaker
And basically, if you read the blurb, they're like, we don't know much about her. We just know that she really likes to use her axes. And hopefully, it's going to be on the cultists and not on us kind of thing. She's just some crazy lady who throws axes everywhere. And then there's one guy who can't die. And he's just like, oh, I'm so over this. They're going to kill me again. I'm going to come back. Like, you know, an old guy yelling at a cloud kind of person. It's very well done.

Game Purchases and Reviews

00:33:57
Speaker
And the other game that probably deserves a mention is when I was in Brizzy, I obviously did the whole vault games and mind games thing. And I was so disappointed that I couldn't spend money. I know that's crazy, but you look forward to going to them.
00:34:12
Speaker
I just, I couldn't find anything that I really wanted. And I was, and I was chatting to my brother. I'm like, Oh yeah. Um, yeah, that's all right. I've got plenty of games to play. I bought a buddy ton down. And, um, he's like, why don't you go to more than meatballs? And I was like, isn't that just like someone's apartment? You order online and you go and pick it up from their apartment. He's like, Oh no, it's been a store for like two years now. So I jumped on the train and headed over to the valley and, um, went to the shop and I bought, uh, the Castles of Burgundy special edition.
00:34:40
Speaker
without the acrylic tiles because I didn't have them. I would have bought them if they did, let's be fair. And I've, because Joe, the guy in Emerald that I play games with, he taught me the game again, because I'd played it before, but I'd really struggled with the colors being colorblind, but he taught it and I really enjoyed it. And then actually, and I know Shane, you've just gone all out and bought the acrylic tiles. So I hope I'm not upsetting you here, but I actually think I prefer it without the acrylic tiles.
00:35:11
Speaker
because on the back of the tiles, if they're not acrylic, it actually explains what every tile does. Like it tells you, it gives you a full breakdown of what that tile does. So you don't need to go looking for like a sheet to find exactly what the buildings do. You literally pick it up, read it and put it back down. And it's like, it's just made it, I found it really easy to teach because when people say, what does that building do? You go, just flip it over and read it and it'll tell you. Yeah, Awaken Realms put out a sticker sheet.
00:35:39
Speaker
that you can download and then print out and then you can stick on the back of the acrylic tiles. But you've got the play rate. The play rate actually explains it pretty well.
00:35:49
Speaker
Yeah, it's fine, too. Yeah, it does. It says everything that's on the back of the thing. So it's just and it's all in one place. So it's very well set out to either way. I just quite like that. I don't know what that title is. Pick it up and read it. You don't have to find that on a sheet or anything like that. But either way, it's been really good. And Helen likes it. Raph likes it. We've been playing it a few times since then. And that's what I mean. It's been a weird time in the last sort of four weeks where
00:36:15
Speaker
I've hardly played any of the games that saw regular board game time prior to this holiday period. So it's been nice. It's been different. That's awesome. Anyway, it's a very long answer to your question, G-Money. But yeah, loads of games being played. And I probably should mention that Raf and I started and finished the Undaunted North Africa campaign. We finished it today. Oh, wow. Onto Undaunted Stalingrad next.
00:36:43
Speaker
I, for Christmas, Lauren and the boys bought me the upgraded, upgraded tiles. So I actually have the minis instead of them. So I've got the acrylic tiles, but now they've got me the minis. There's a board game store in Adelaide. I should give them a plug because they're excellent. A couple of days I had the delivery. I can't remember what they're called now though, but they had it on sale for 159 bucks.
00:37:12
Speaker
the upgraded minis for it. So it's a big box full of ships and cart and all these different types of properties and piggies and cows, etc. So I'm looking forward, haven't played it yet.
00:37:31
Speaker
really good. And it's like all the expansions, I was like, Oh, yeah, we'll just, we won't play with all of them. But it's so easy to like, most of the expansions are just like add a tile, or add this little tiny thing into the game, add this extra building. There's nothing that's like, I haven't done the wine one yet, the vineyards, no, everything else. We play with everything else. Yeah. Yeah. So it's great. I had a day here and Ingrid and Shane came around.
00:38:02
Speaker
It's actually, it's been a bit of an Ingrid and Shane Christmas and New Year's really, we've played quite a few games with them both and I got apiary over Christmas and Lauren and I played a two player game of that. Lauren really enjoyed it. Really simple, tile laying, upgrading bees, hibernating bees, bringing bees back into the game.
00:38:32
Speaker
And you know big point salad puzzle and taught Shannon Ingrid What I really like about a period. I think tapestry does this as well. It's like a one page how to teach oh Yeah, cool, and you can actually just run through step by step you've done in about five ten minutes. You can you've taught the game so
00:38:57
Speaker
I thought of teaching Shannon Ingrid. I thought I'll run through that. I'm pretty sure they enjoyed it because we haven't played it since, because we've been playing a bit of Nova Roma together. So that's been the bit of a game that we've decided to play. But APR is good. I just need to paint my B. That's my next mini that I'm going to paint. That'll be some of the easiest painting ever, right? You just go like yellow stripe, black stripe, yellow stripe, black stripe. No one's done that.
00:39:24
Speaker
Just don't mess with the beekeeper. Everyone's done the really weird looking bees, like different colours, bright colours. I'm pretty good at just black and yellow. No, we won't mess with the beekeeper. Couldn't be any easier to paint that. I don't know, the cost of paints though, it's a bit of a sting. That's a sting in the tail, yeah. That's not very good. I'll edit that out.
00:39:52
Speaker
No, you will not. I think it's pulled later on, we can edit them in. One of the other non-board game related, most enjoyable things I did over the break was go and see the beekeeper movie with G money. And if you haven't seen it, do yourself a favor and waste, you know, 20 bucks and two hours of your life that you'll never get back. But it is horrible, dumb, enjoyable action with bee puns.
00:40:22
Speaker
At one stage a guy who looks like a bee with like spiky hair and yellow says to be or not to be and Jason said to be. Is this like another Tremors where you just watch it for the for the lols? It's like it's like a
00:40:46
Speaker
Hic version of John Wick. Yeah, it's the meth version of John Wick. It's not the best thing ever.
00:40:57
Speaker
Yeah, no lead-in, no ending, it's just all action, all dumb shit. He goes under the water and the lights turned on. Like in the cinema, it was just, get the fuck out. Yeah, he kills the end guy, puts a scuba suit on, and just dives in the water and then finishes. Like, 30 seconds after. I went home and watched The Meg 2 immediately afterwards, and it was seamless. It was a seamless transition. Those two movies went together.
00:41:23
Speaker
I just, I, I can't, I feel like I need to support Jason Statham because I loved snatch. And, um, was he in lock, lock, stock and two second barrels as well? No, he wasn't. It wasn't there. Okay. It's just it's not just Turkish. I just, I can't believe he's just turned into a, just like the new Steven Seagal seat.

Movies, Threads, and Game Speculation

00:41:46
Speaker
But he was in Expendables 4, right? Expendables 4 is worse than Beekeeper. It is terrible. There's no redeeming problems. There's no good parts of it. But Statham was incredible in it. He looked head and shoulders about all the other actors. He held his gun like you would hold a gun. Meagan Fox is just doing everything from the hits.
00:42:06
Speaker
like there's no aiming she's just like shooting probably to you know accentuate the hips more but you know at least statham looked like he was a professional doing things yeah everyone else was just like phoning it in it was horrible but he certainly did not phone in the biggie but he put his effort into that movie as bad as it is yeah there's gems there's little bits of like really good thought and cinema and you know
00:42:34
Speaker
film acting, but it is just a shithouse movie. I've tried to hate it and I can't. No. It's one of those ones. It's one of the ones that you just have to give a watch or something. You see it and you watch it and you go, yeah, I'm glad I watched it. Do you guys ever see Undercover Brother? Was that Damon Waynes? Yeah. Yeah. I think this might have been a few of the Waynes. Yeah. I remember my mate and I, we saw the shorts for that. We're like, oh, we need to go and see that movie. And I reckon we were two minutes into the movie and we both were like,
00:43:03
Speaker
I think they might've just shown us the best bits in the shots. And we sat through that movie and it was the same thing. We were like, we will never watch that movie again. However, to this day, we still quiet lines from that movie to each other. Very memorable for all the wrong reasons. Anyway, so April, you've probably got nothing to do with B-Keep about Worth a Look, eh? Worth a Look, good game. Very enjoyable.
00:43:29
Speaker
Yeah. Watch, watch the beekeeper and then go pay apry. Yeah. Play apry in the cinema. While watching beekeeper. Yeah. But you'd miss all the plot nuances. That wasn't any of those. Anyway, is apry a stonema again? It is. It is. I haven't seen too much about it.
00:44:01
Speaker
It's got a pretty cool funky looking box with a big space. Space B, right? Space B, yeah, it's a big space B. I got to be in an astronaut suit. No, very enjoyable. Who's going for wormspan, speaking of stonemargains? No. I don't know. I don't know. Is the world asking for that? I don't know. It seems a bit strange, but...
00:44:28
Speaker
I think because they did Libertalia and they were probably pretty successful with the reboot. Well, rehash of that, even though that was good. I don't know. Didn't Elizabeth Hargroves do that butterfly one and didn't go learn so well? Mariposa. That wasn't through stonema though. No, but that was her follow-up game after Wings fan. Well, she's just on the Fox experiment, which everyone's raving about as well. So she might, she might've hit again there, but
00:44:55
Speaker
The worm span one, it's just wingspan for dragons. I mean, I'd give it a go. Wingspan's fine enough. Apparently it adds a few extra things, but I just... I don't know if anyone was jumping up and down going, we wish we had dragons in wingspan, but... I think originally that's what they were all talking about when wingspan first came out. Everyone was saying this would be really cool as dragons. Oh, right, okay. And there they are.
00:45:23
Speaker
I think they must have all collected Pokemon cards too, but it's not, no, I just went, no, no, it's not for me, it's a hard no. I hope one of the food choices is birds. Eggs. Yeah. Oh, it was hilarious, I was watching, I was reading a bit of a thread about it, and a massive debate about what was going on about dragon eggs, on what, you know, different colours of dragon eggs and what,
00:45:53
Speaker
This is ridiculous. I can't believe I was wasting my time reading the thread. But then I found myself sucked in. I was like, I can't believe they're actually debating my stuff. I'm going to do a bit of a callback to when GMoney was talking about Nucleum. I read a thread on BGG today that I was just losing my shit at. So they're bringing out an expansion to Nucleum and it's based in Australia.
00:46:17
Speaker
because your claim is all about mining and specifically uranium, but also other mining. And obviously, Australia is a pretty decent world power when it comes to mining. And also, apparently, it adds bringing shipping lines in because that's how all the coal and stuff gets out of Australia, right, on the ships.
00:46:35
Speaker
And some dude has started a thread on BGG where he's like, um, I need to ask him questions about the map because you haven't included Canberra, which is the nation's capital. And I don't know whether he's trolling or not. I think he might be trolling because he finishes it off with man from Canberra was his son off. Um, and then like a few people were quick to point out that Nucleum has set in a time before Canberra existed.
00:46:58
Speaker
Um, and then he went on and he's like, no, no, Canberra has been a place. It's been a locality for many years before it was a city and explained to the whole history of how long it's been there and all the rest that I'm like, all right. So his argument is that it should be there. So Canberra should be there in a game that set before it was a city in a landlocked area that doesn't
00:47:19
Speaker
do any mining in a game about mining where it adds shipping trails into the game. But he is Adam. And even David Turchi got on there and was like, um, I think you need to do your research because, you know, your timelines are all out. And he's like, Oh, I think you should find out that. And he was, I was like, this is fantastic. Uh, I just, uh, BGGs is the gift that keeps giving sometimes. Who has the time for that shit? Honestly, man from Canberra. Man from Canberra. Well done.
00:47:49
Speaker
I'm just, I've just added it to the chat cause I still got an open. I just realized it's probably Peter Dutton. Person from Canberra. That's it. That's his person from Canva and his response to David Tertsy is hi, David, your so-called facts are incorrect. Like I should have used it about 18, 20, 18, 20 exclamation mark. Um, it's great. It's fantastic.
00:48:20
Speaker
I love that there are people that are that passionate about something in the world doing things and using their God-given right to type things on a keyboard and express their views. About Canberra of all places. More of it. Well done. I apologize if you're one of our four listeners, but you've provided us with lots of entertainment and I'm still pretty sure you're trolling, but if not, it's fantastic. It's good either way.
00:48:48
Speaker
He's talking to Canberra. Bordercon's coming up, I think. Is Bordercon the Canberra one or is that? Cancon. Cancon's coming up. Cancon's coming up. So David Turdsey, I'm sure man from Canberra is going to be at Cancon. Get down there. Bring your so-called facts. Bring a playtest of the Australia expansion and just not just have this whole section and just where Canberra would be and just put no man's land there or something.
00:49:17
Speaker
No, just Mad Max. Man in Camberland.

Anticipated Games and Future Plans

00:49:24
Speaker
I'd cancel the whole thing. I'd burn it all to the ground just because there's one guy out of fight with him over the thing. I'm in New Zealand now. So good. What's 2024 look like for you guys for gaming?
00:49:42
Speaker
Activities or events coming up? Is there games you're particularly keen on? Well, it started pretty poorly for me when I realised the Ra thing is finished. I was like really looking forward to that and then it's like over. Now I've got to go and try and find a copy. The Kickstarter thing's already happened, hasn't it? Like the Kickstarter for Ra, right?
00:50:02
Speaker
Yeah, but the addition I've got, it's nice. It's just not as fancy as the fancy schmancy fancies. But it's like, it's retail. You can buy it. It's just through 25th century games. I feel like it might've been at mine games when I was there. I bought it when I was in the US. But yeah, it's, I feel like I've seen it in Brizzy when I was down, so. Gameology, I've won G money for $210. $210. That's not the one I bought then. That would be the fancy schmancy. Check with Joe.
00:50:31
Speaker
because I reckon Joe had a copy from a leftover Kickstarter. All right, I'll send you a message. Yeah. There you go. I'm selling Joe's games everywhere at the moment. Joe appreciates that. It's funny, when Liam was teaching us the game, he said, have you played before? I said, no, all I know about this game is that at certain points, for whatever reason, everyone at the table says, rah, rah, rah. And he's like, no, they don't.
00:50:59
Speaker
I'm pretty sure there's nothing about that in the rules. And we've gone through and he's like, but we're putting it in there now. Like we're going to do that from now on. There's definitely nothing about that in the rules. I'm like, oh, there you go. Missed opportunity though, if it's not in there. For sure. Yeah. I'm looking forward to Steam Power coming out and Kickstarter in, I think it's Feb.
00:51:24
Speaker
from Mr. Wallace. That's a really good game. He played it a few times. Very enjoyable. I saw there was a bit of a thread that I was actually reading through, Shane, around a new brass expansion and or new version. Scotland. Well, it didn't actually say, but it said Roxley. Roxley were working on a new brass. Scotland. Brass Scotland. What are they going to be mining, just like angry people?
00:51:55
Speaker
You gotta make haggis. You gotta make haggis. Haggis. People complaining about the weather. I don't know. Scotch. There you go. Whiskey. Yeah, I guess whiskey. Whiskey trade. Makes sense. Didn't they invent curling, Scotland? I have no idea.
00:52:13
Speaker
Curling, the ice thing, the brooms, I thought that was Canada. That feels like a Canada thing. Hang on. No, it's not Canada's national sport because that's lacrosse. I learned that at a trivia game. It was first formed in Scotland. First recognized curling clubs were formed in Scotland in 19th century. Right. So it's all curling, whisky and haggis. That's what's in it. I just realised I've managed to offend Canberra and Scotland in five minutes. So, good job, Steve.
00:52:43
Speaker
Let's build that 24 audience. Just another 245 countries to go, Steve. There's a game actually of his that's getting a bit of a buzz at the moment, and I didn't see anything about it called Chaos Cove. Have you guys heard or seen that? No. No, there's a lot of people raving about it out there. But I think it went to Kickstarter, but it didn't do that well. But I can't find it. I can't find how to get onto it.
00:53:13
Speaker
Um, but a lot of people are saying that's a game they're really looking forward to in 2024. Um, actually Shane, you're the, you're the Martin Wallace collection man. Um, I don't know if you guys have seen it, but there's a new Cthulhu game set in the death may die universe, which is essentially a reprint of the study. Yeah.
00:53:34
Speaker
Yeah, which is interesting because I've never played a study in Emerald. Firstly, I looked at it and went, oh, cool, more Death Made Die content to throw another $500 at. But no, it's not. It's just in that universe, but it's literally a study in Emerald. So what's that game like? Have you played that one? Yeah, it's excellent. It's really good fun. If you watch the Dice Tower, sorry, if you watch the Dice Tower,
00:54:01
Speaker
They are doing a play through of the new one with Travis from CMON. And you can actually see them play the whole game. It looks great. Studied Emerald First Edition is not that great. They fixed it in the second edition. I think that's the way it goes. I've got the first. I enjoy the first. But yeah, apparently they fixed the issue that's in it in the second edition.
00:54:28
Speaker
I haven't found whatever issue that is. I don't go searching. It's like, you know, a few acres of snow. Apparently there's a massive issue in that game. I don't want to look it up because then as soon as I know it, it's going to be hard to unknow it. It's like apparently tapestries imbalanced, but I'm so bored. I haven't found the, I haven't found the strong factions yet. But just on a redo for all of the faction balancing stuff. Yeah, right. You can literally like buy a pack now and update all your stuff.
00:54:58
Speaker
Yeah. So yes, no, it's jump on it. You can jump on Cmon and pre-order it as well. Yeah. It's not expensive, neither. Yeah, I didn't think it was too bad. Nah, it's around about 70 bucks. You did get five extra characters for Death May Die, but yeah. And obviously, Cmon clearly pay a lot for like Facebook marketing because I see that all the time now. Yeah. And I never see, usually you never see board game content because
00:55:28
Speaker
I don't know, maybe they're just not making enough money to pay for marketing, but Seaman definitely do. That's for sure. And I think in our South East Queensland group, mate, if you jump in there, we've got a group going that is going to do a group buy on it. So. OK. Cool, cool. Yeah, because the shipping, I did jump in and the shipping was like nearly as much as the game. So yeah. Yeah. Cool. But I have twenty four of his games. So.
00:55:59
Speaker
Just a few. I have two. They're both very good. So I think my favorite at the moment of his, I mean, I've got Bloodstones come through, which is really good, but Discworld Unk Morkok would have to be one of my favorites of his. So for all an anti-narking either or Discworld's a little bit more quirky. A lot of take that in it and
00:56:27
Speaker
You can be a real asshole in the game. It's great fun. As far as year goals go, Dave, I haven't really set any goals of games, but what we have done is with Joe and his wife up in Emerald here, Helen and I have started a legacy game regular meetup.

Legacy and Complex Games Discussion

00:56:51
Speaker
At the moment it's on Saturday afternoons and we started with Ticket to Ride Legacy, which has been awesome. So we played the first three
00:56:57
Speaker
Um, modules of that, I guess. Um, and it's really fun. Like, like, yeah, it's ticket to ride. So the longest it goes for is about 30 minutes, 45 minutes. Everyone knows how to play. There's something in that too, about sitting down to a big legacy game.
00:57:12
Speaker
and everyone just already knowing what to do. Like there's no, no way. You're just going to say, okay, these are the two things that happen in this game that are different to the normal game. Let's go. Um, that was awesome. Um, so we're just getting to the point where things are getting a little bit different and there's this really cool, like underlying story, which isn't that big of a deal at the moment, but you can just tell is going to play a major role later on in the story, which is pretty cool. Um, and then we'll just move on from that. When that's done, we'll probably go into like,
00:57:40
Speaker
legacy of Gravehold, Aon's End or something and just keep going until we can actually do these legacy games that we've both got sitting on our shelves, unplayed. So you're on. Yeah, you're right. We've been every Fortnite on a Thursday, myself, Lucky Phil, Pastor Nick and Andy. I've been playing Pandemic Legacy Season Zero, making our way through that. That's been excellent. It's good fun.
00:58:08
Speaker
Really enjoying that. I look forward to my fortnight Thursday nights. That will continue on in 2024. Then we'll just have our regular events at the ferret and at the community place. They'll continue and wherever else, our community decides to pull up events this year. We've got Briskon in 2024 on May 4th and 5th.
00:58:42
Speaker
How's frost saving going G money? I think I'm just delaying the ending now. Like I'm just finishing off other stuff. Now like side quests and stuff like that. I think I've got like the last part of it. I've done all the puzzle book and everything now. So I think I've got the last missions just to finish off.
00:59:09
Speaker
I got a Facebook notification, G Money, that a year ago today was when I started playing Frosthaven with Raf. Nice. You've nearly finished the game in that year and I think we're on mission four. I think it took me the better part of, because I played in bursts, do like a year, or sorry, like a cycle at a time.
00:59:31
Speaker
Yeah, but yeah, I remember there's it's yeah, there's lots of good stuff like got nothing but praise For it. I think it's it's heating up in the in the rankings now. I think it's jumping up a bit It's in like the top something I think in BGG I'll go and have a look the top something yeah, I think it was in like the top 50 or something last time I was looking but
00:59:57
Speaker
I might just see it in places that it's not there. I just see it there. When I close my eyes, I just... Right, let's have a look before. So, Martin Wallace and a bridged version of Martin Wallace's notable games had 55 games on it. Right. It didn't have the full list that produced games. I think it's like 142 games, isn't it? Man, it's prolific.
01:00:26
Speaker
142 games in there, you know, something like that. That 38 at the moment, Frosthaven. Yeah, that's... That's slider. Yeah, and I think it was in the thousands before that. I don't think it'll go as high as Gloomhaven ever did, because it doesn't really do anything revolutionary. Everything about it is better. It just does everything better. It doesn't really do anything new.
01:00:55
Speaker
Do you think it feels to me like it's a game that is made for fans of Gloomhaven? Like I don't think it's going to bring anyone into the hobby or not into the hobby, but no one's going to go, Oh yeah, I'll just play Frosthaven. Like it almost, it's almost just made for people who have done Gloomhaven, even Jaws of the Lion. It's a bit of a jump to go from the Jaws of the Lion to that. It's almost unplayable. Like in terms of the admin and the effort and everything you got to put into it.
01:01:22
Speaker
Like it's just the amount of energy and stuff it takes. Like some missions, you know, it takes you like, it could take you six hours to play a mission. You fail on the last turn. Now I have to play that again. Yeah. Yeah. I gotta go.
01:01:43
Speaker
The come back to town thing was hard, not hard, but it was kind of like, because as you know, we play Gloomhaven a lot. So the actual playing of the game in Frosthaven made enough sense because we've done stuff like that before, but because I've only played a handful of missions, I just felt like, okay, I'll get the rule book out now. What can I do in the winter? What can I do? When does this, when do I do this? When do I do that? And you could just see like, and I'm playing with Raph and I could just see that he was so
01:02:11
Speaker
like happy with finishing the mission and then was kind of like, cool. Where's the next mission? And I'm like, well, hang on. We've got to go and do all this other stuff first before we can even get to the next mission, you know? Yeah. And we got to go back and then build buildings and activate buildings and then figure out if you want to make potions and yeah, do all those other things. And then, yeah.
01:02:31
Speaker
So it's cool. But yeah, you got to be looking for that, which I don't think anyone off the street would be looking for that. So much work, at least for at least for me, like just for one dude playing four handed solo. Like, yeah, it's a lot of work. But the characters were all phenomenal. Missions were pretty much for the most part,
01:02:57
Speaker
Not better, but more balanced. And yeah, I just, yeah, it's fantastic. But if they ever make a digital copy of it, holy shit. It's almost worth holding out for. Never play it unless it's on like a digital copy. Unplayable otherwise. What about you Dave? You posed the question, but what have you got going on this year?
01:03:22
Speaker
No, I'm struggling a bit to try and sort of find the passion and get back into it on minimizing my kickstarters and my purchasing. I'm trying to sort of downsize a little bit. So yeah, I'm enjoying playing a few games that we did. I managed to get through the dead reckoning campaign, which I really enjoyed. And I think there's another couple there for this year. I'd be keen to craft out a bit more John Company and maybe a few of the games that I'd be
01:03:49
Speaker
that have sat on my shelf in shrink for a little while, like high frontier or something like that. Like, yeah, I'm sort of at a weird spot in the hobby where it's a lot of effort and energy to try and get out some of those bigger games. And, you know, things like Voidfall, where we put in two or three days worth of effort just to be able to play the game once. I'm like, I don't know if I'm going to get that one back out again anytime soon.
01:04:14
Speaker
Yeah, a lot more like digital versions of games like the June Imperium apps really good and we played a bit of that heaps of BGA, the TI app that's just started up. So yeah, I think I'm still going to play a whole bunch of games that I might struggle to get board games to the board game table a little bit more. There's still plenty, I've still got 100 games in shrink that I need to probably get out at some stage.
01:04:42
Speaker
I just have a look at the BGG list. I didn't realize Ark Nova was now number four. Yeah, and it's been that high for ages. Yeah, it'll probably jump into the top two soon, I reckon.
01:04:51
Speaker
People loved it. Did you guys see the top 100 dice tower list? Yeah. That thing. I thought it was pretty, I liked, I only watched the top 10. I didn't watch all the rest, but their number one games were cool. I reckon that was, that was super interesting. And first of all, I was like. And they all had new ones. Yeah, all new ones. And first of all, I was like, that's bullshit. Like those games, they're good, but like, come on. And then I realized they must play so many games that these are the ones that they actually enjoy the most.
01:05:21
Speaker
Yeah. Uh, and that, and then it kind of clicked and I was like, yeah, that, that makes perfect sense. It's funny. Like I've found similar to what you were saying, Dave, I went through a phase a bit similar to you probably a couple of years ago where I just, like, I remember there was, there was one month in February where I think I played three games the whole month. Um, and it was just, I just didn't want to get anything to the table. I didn't want to learn any new games. I've done a lot of learning of games and I was just, I was over it.
01:05:51
Speaker
Um, and that's probably still carried on to now. I'm, I'm not looking, I'm not looking for big games to play. And I think when we did our top 13, I was, I think I might've mentioned that a lot of the bigger, longer games have just dropped right out of my list because yeah, I, I often, I, you know, I blame my wife sometimes and say, Oh, she doesn't like playing the longer games, but it's not that I don't like playing longer games. I just, it's easier to throw a game on the table. That's over in 45 minutes and pack it up and put it away.
01:06:21
Speaker
as opposed to something that's going to take three hours. And, um, that's why I spent the money on Castles of Burgundy because it's, it's a beautiful production and you're paying a lot of money for all this plastic. And where previously I'd be like, well, it's not, it's not, there's not enough game there to spend that kind of money. You know, like something like dwellings, which is huge. I think I may have, I think I may have mentioned this in the past, not sure, but dwellings is excellent. One of my favorite games of all time.
01:06:47
Speaker
But I rarely play it because it takes a while. Where I'm going to see those castles of Burgundy components way more often because it's a shorter game, easier to teach and easier to just throw out and get straight into. Like it's almost changed my whole perception on what I want to spend my money on. I want to kind of spend it on short, sharp experiences rather than the big, long, epic games. You're right because dwellings, you need the right group to play with too.
01:07:17
Speaker
And if you found a group of player and they enjoyed it, you just want to bring it out with that group all the time. But that group may not meet that regularly. But we played coffee traders over the break and played in a full player count. And it was a great game. I haven't played that game for about two years because again, you didn't have the right people to play that game with.
01:07:42
Speaker
So similar to, you know, I've got dwellings here. I haven't played dwellings since, I think it was my birthday a couple of years ago with Dave. But I really enjoyed playing dwellings. So. But yeah, you're right. I'm just finding like, especially with the Kickstarter, a lot of it is bigger, fancier versions of existing games or
01:08:07
Speaker
you know, updates and additional reprints with some extra stuff. I'm not getting as excited about the brand new games and I'm a bit sort of burned and a bit less risk tolerant of chucking two or 300 bucks and waiting two years on a new untested IP, but also I don't really want to chuck two or 300 bucks on a game that I've got 90% of already. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, just for me, it's sort of sitting in that spot of,
01:08:36
Speaker
I think I've probably got enough at the moment. I probably need to still trim and downsize a little bit and focus more on what I actually want to play. And what I end up wanting to play tends to not be palatable or be able to be played very often. Things like Barrage and Pipeline and TI and Dwellings and those bigger sort of experience games more. I'm going down the pathway of, you know, I used to buy games left, right and center because of the old FOMO. But now I'm
01:09:06
Speaker
really being really selective on, well, am I going to like that game? No. Move on. Forget the FOMO. Like Ark Nova, I actually don't like the game. I bought it. Sold it. Sold it to Helen. Don't like it. I find that with Ark Nova, the more I play it, the more I like it.
01:09:32
Speaker
To be honest, the reason I love Arknova too, I think it's fantastic. But again, it's long. And now I've got Earth. And Earth, the scratches are similar, it's not, yeah, I think Arknova's probably a better game, but Earth is simultaneous play. They play five-player game, it's over in 45 minutes. Again, it's gonna hit the table way more often because it can. It's, you know, what's the other game? It's like, you know, same with Wingspan. You sit down and play a five-player game in Wingspan, you'll never wanna play Wingspan again.
01:10:02
Speaker
Yeah, but Earth is comparable to Wingspan as well. It's comparable to Terraforming Mars. And you sort of go, all of those games, except with the exception of Wingspan and Low Play accounts, but Terraforming Mars, Arked Nova, they're both long games. And then you've got this other version, which may or may not be, depending on who you are, it may or may not be as good, but it's pretty, you know, it scratches a similar itch and you're done in less than an hour. It's hard to,
01:10:32
Speaker
And again, like that game of last light that I played, we played a six player game of that at the game day and we were done. That was a teach. I play everything in about an hour and 10 minutes. And that was two days after we played an 11 hour game of TI4. And there's definitely things in TI4 that happen that don't happen in last light for sure. But again, it's kind of a similar feel and it scratches that itch. You don't have to wait once a year to do it. You can do it every other week.
01:11:01
Speaker
And you know, if you had Eclipse, TI4 or Last Light, what would you pull out and play? You'd pull out Last Light because you know it's going to be done a lot quicker. Yeah, you don't have to plan for it. You don't have to organize meals around it and stuff. But then again, you'd probably put it third out of those three games as far as what your favorites are, but you'll probably play it 15 times more. Yeah.
01:11:27
Speaker
And they've all got their time. They're all different. TI is a 10 hour and Eclipse is a three hour and Last Light's a one hour. Depending on how you feel and who the people are and what the experiences you're seeking. That TI experience that doesn't come around very often. You can't replicate that in a one hour game. As much as the game might be similar and might go quickly and you might enjoy it just as much.
01:11:53
Speaker
It's all the other shit that goes along with it and the stories. I've never encountered a game that gives you those longevity in the stories. For sure. I agree with that. I'll always play that. That probably rounds us up, eh? That's a solid hour and 10 minutes plus of talking about board games. Yeah, with a little beekeeper nugget in there as well.
01:12:23
Speaker
It's worth it. It was worth it. It's very good chatting to you guys again. Yeah. Well, let's hope we can get this episode out in 2024 and to many more this year, hopefully. I've got my new computer now. I'm all set up. So editing will actually be a lot quicker and more enjoyable. So yeah, hopefully this will get out within a week of it being recorded, which is unheard of.
01:12:53
Speaker
Don't want to set up that expectation there. Never do it. We haven't said when we recorded this, so it's fine. Last we recorded this three days ago. February the 2nd. 2025. Yeah. We're getting it out in 2024 because that's how good we are. Cool. All right. Well, it's been a pleasure, folks, and I guess we'll stop it there and catch up on the next episode.
01:13:21
Speaker
Have a great one.