inconsequential ruminations

I’ve known most of my gaming buddies since boyhood and we mainly game to stay in touch, as we’ve all grown out of going out on the lash every single weekend. Unfortunately, it’s been difficult to get some of our old buddies to show up, as they are not gaming types. Happily one of our oldest mutual non-gamer friends showed up to see what it’s all about.

Rette Sich Wer Kann
This was perfect as my newbie friend was very tired and we were in the mood for something fun and interactive. He’s definitely the kind of guy who enjoys serious competition. I cannot see myself ever taking this out of my collection. Everybody gets huge laughs out of it and it never really hurts to lose, as it’s so light-hearted. Fittingly, and unsurprisingly in a purely political game, my newbie friend won.

Linie 1
I got this for the bargain price of €6 from Adam-Spielt, which turned into €12.50 after postage costs – not such a bargain, but still good. Unfortunately, the box is massive, about twice as big as it needs to be, which will probably reduce the length of time it stays on my shelf. Maybe I’ll find a smaller box somewhere and decant the components into that?

We played played a three-player two-stop game using the Streetcar rules, with diceless movement. We were a bit tired, so the simplicity of Linie 1 appealed to us, but not the lack of obvious strategy. I mainly got this one due the strongest possible recommendation from Rick Heli, whose Spotlight On Games! site is one of the best gaming resources on the net. Rick makes this comment on it:

the game has been called “broken” because of what has been termed its “conflicting goals.” I guess that is another way of saying that there is no clear indication of exactly what steps are needed to obtain victory. Complainants will state that the three main goals in the game are incompatible with one another: (1) minimize the number of stops on your route, (2) minimize your route length, (3) minimize the amount of time to complete your route. But on the other hand this is what makes the game so fascinating

I’m interested in testing this out further, but definitely with more players and more stops, maybe even the four-stop variant on the Geek?

This entry was posted on Friday, April 23rd, 2004 at 15:58 and is filed under boardgames.