Lost Treasures of the Eurogames Reclamation Project

Most of my favorite games are "second tier" games regardless of whether they're euro or trash. I love City of Remnants that's definitely 2nd teir. Spartacus too. Tammany Hall, Cyclades, Agents of SMERSH, Flash Point, Runebound, Battle Beyond Space, Core Worlds, Ankh-Morpork. I don't think any of those games would be considered Top Tier but they all fit more specific niches of my gaming library and they all see more table time than all but a small, small handful of the AAA titles.

I played Around the World in 80 Days with a table full of adult gamers and had a blast and plan on bringing it around again. So there!

Yeah, I've only played 80 Days with adults. I've also played Ticket to Ride and Elfenland with adults and I'm more surprised those held interest. Then again I tend to play mostly with people I could pull out Sorry Sliders with and we'd have fun.

I was once told by someone that I shouldn't own/like 80 Days because his friends at the GoF say its too simple and a bad design compared to real games like St Petersburg and Goa. I'm not making that up. So I guess the real gamers wouldn't be interested in this.

Michael Barnes wrote: The thing you start to realize about the "second tier Euros" is that's actually where a lot of the best stuff is. The things that are regarded as "first tier" tend to be the BGG crowd-pleasers that don't do crazy things, have odd themes or are dismissed as "family" games due to a lot of luck or whatever. Robert Martin, AT founding father, used to always say "you know when you see something is ranked in the sixes at BGG that it's probably a really good game". This is so very true with the more family-style Eurogames. Almost every ERP title I've brought in is like a 6.51, 6.92 or 6.03 whatever.

Sorry if this outs me as a common user of BGG features, but: does anyone have a good list of a few BGG folks who have good taste & comments related to German family games, for Geekbuddy Analysis purposes? I like to have a wide range of folks as Geekbuddies, so that, say, I can get Euro-lovers' opinions on hardcore Euros, and also AT-lovers' opinions on AT games, etc. I even have Clearclaw as a geekbuddy for this reason. But I've never found anyone who's, to my taste, really gung-ho enough and trustworthy for the family games. Almost all of my "Euro-geekbuddies" all start up the same complaints about "too random" etc.

Speaking of random: I really like Hera and Zeus. I sold mine a while back I think because it was high-priced and they were announcing a reprint (not sure if that ever happened), but I got probably over a hundred plays out of it. Not only does it not feel like a Euro, it doesn't even feel like a '90s-Euro: it's VERY chaotic, to the point where the game can (and has, in my experience) end on the first turn. It does not feel like any of the other half-dozen Kosmos 2-player games I've played, and is the least dry of all of them; it reminds me of MTG kind of a lot, actually. That said: as a slimmed-down Stratego, LOTR: Confrontation is much better (actually, I think that was in the Kosmos 2-player line too; I take back what I said about Hera and Zeus being the least dry), so with that and my Magic cards, I'm just fine without it.

Oh, it's also basically language-independent, in case it's hard to find an English version: there is no text on the cards other than the name. All the special abilities for all the cards are on cheatsheets, which is pretty annoying for teaching new players, but nice once you know all the abilities by heart (think GW Dungeonquest or GW The Fury of Dracula items).

Thank god I'm not a "real gamer".

Yeah, I don't think kids are going to get 80 Days...the time thing in particular, and that whole "whoever finishes with the most time left wins, not the person to finish first.

They actually did OK with a jimmied-up version of Elfenland...I basically just laid out all of the travel tokens at random and then let them draft cards and move the pieces to get their treasures (or "elf packages" as Scarlett called them). I don't think they can manage Ticket to Ride at all right now.

Villa Paletti is a huge hit though, we play it all the time. Without the crazy scoring. I like Midnight Party over Viva Topo.

I'm getting a game from Germany, and the seller also has a copy of Ave Caesar, the original Ravensburger version (the new, readily-available version changed the maps, changed the card distribution, and also included two fewer maps, if you want to know why you'd want the original). I already have it, but if anyone here wants it, please let me know. It's only $30, which is outrageously low-priced compared to everywhere else; I'll ask him how much extra shipping it would be, but if you want it, please FATmail me by the end of the night tonight.

For kids, Chicken Cha Cha, Gulo Gulo, and Dawn Under. Chicken Cha Cha and Dawn Under are memory games, and little kids don't have 50 years of crap cluttering up their brains and will bust you up. Gulo Gulo is supposed to be a version of a snack bowl bar game, and their little fingers are perfect for it.

I want. I will, in turn, sell my Pro Ludo Ave Caesar to anyone here for $50 shipped. The changes aren't really that big of a deal, to be honest the main reason I want the old one is for nostalgia purposes. Even the extra courses are kind of negligible.

Damn...There I was sending a TM to dragonstout when I come back to this...

RobertB wrote: For kids, Chicken Cha Cha, Gulo Gulo, and Dawn Under. Chicken Cha Cha and Dawn Under are memory games, and little kids don't have 50 years of crap cluttering up their brains and will bust you up. Gulo Gulo is supposed to be a version of a snack bowl bar game, and their little fingers are perfect for it.

Chicken Cha Cha Cha is awesome. The family has had a blast with that one. By far the daughter's favorite is the Poopin' Chicken. If you can find Ducklin' Dancing that's a great addition adding ducks for 5 and 6 players. It also has piles of poop that you can leave behind for other players to potentially step in and lose feathers. Games are so much more colorful when coming from a country with a scat fetish.

You already have the Pro Ludo one don't you?

We have Chicken Cha Cha Cha and it's been a regular since Christmas...they were kind of having a hard time with it at first and the game seemed way long, but then I took out three different groups of egg tiles and their hexes. I figured if the full game was 4, I'd cut out 1/4 of it. It worked great, and now the game plays what I feel like is the right pace and length. Scarlett wins it all the time. There's a poopin' chicken in it too.

I was wondering about Dawn Under, they LOVE vampires.

Trying to buy a copy of Ghost Chase from a BGG seller but they've not responded.

Actually, Dan, if you want it go ahead and email Andy- I think I'll just wait. That's a great deal but I've brought in way too much over the past couple of days.

Yeah...So go for it. Going to place a CSI order anyways to get those Diskwars.
More maps the better was my thought.

I never thought about taking out some of the hexes and eggs! My daughter was having a hard time with it at first two years back and that would have been perfect.

Somebody better buy the damn thing!

It's still a double-sided board with two tracks, but there are parts "roped off" for certain numbers of players. The big thing to me is that the board is bigger, the Pro Ludo board is a little small. The art is also more modern and kind of ugly in the newer one. The chariot and coin pieces are actually exactly the same.

I've never seen a copy of Aubregemst, but I'd love to get a hold of one.