On a whim, I gave BrettspielWelt another shot and I am delighted to say that it is actually usable now. Rather than starting in a shoddily drawn 1980’s video-game world, you go straight to a simple page where you see open games waiting for players and there is a nice selector for starting new games on the right.
Performance seems to be faster too, but that may just be that I have upgraded my computer and ISP since I last tried BSW. The Java client still has that weird height/width problem with the game window, but at least I remembered it from last time.
The game design is also better. I tried Caylus and Saint Petersburg. Caylus is very impressive and could even be better online. St Petersburg is just serviceable – the user interface of the Westpark Gamers installable version is much better.
Please Skype me if you want to play.
Both Ra and Power Grid are good playable implementations, although I wish there was a way to turn some of the maps sideways. The San Juan one is a little fiddly – why do I have to click on a tiny goods symbol to sell it, when clicking on that production building clearly indicates which good I am trying to sell…
Thanks for the feedback Todd. I should get around to reading this geeklist at some point – but I’m daunted by all the text.
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/4239