Lost Treasures of the Eurogames Reclamation Project

I actually think Tower of Babel sounds great...do you think I would like it?

I'm bidding on Wildlife Adventures (or whatever it is called). Thanks a lot ERP

You're in for a treat, Wildlife Adventure is one of the great games of the -80s-.

I think you ought to try Tower of Babel...it's cheap, I think there's a $12 copy on BGG right now. It's SUPER minimalist though...not quite Raj levels of minimalism, but there's some really simple mechanics at work- players do the rest. HIG actually insisted on Knizia putting some action cards into the design, but pretty much everyone says to just not play with them.

Earlier today I thought "why the hell do I not own a copy of Colossal Arena?" $12 later on eBay, rectified!

Colossal Arena is pretty good -- for a long time we were playing Citadels and Colossal Arena back to back at every game night.

Have you guys played Cheaty Mages? Pretty similar feel, and for some reason neither I can explain the rules worth a damn. I think I'm leaning towards Colossal Arena as the better game at this point.

Yeah, I was mistaken in my memory of it, that was my fault. It's a bidding game.

I definitely didn't think it was brilliant, but it wasn't a complete POS either. Just pretty vanilla. Extremely repetitive, I remember thinking it was a bit long for what it was.

VonTush wrote: Have you guys played Cheaty Mages? Pretty similar feel, and for some reason neither I can explain the rules worth a damn. I think I'm leaning towards Colossal Arena as the better game at this point.

I picked this up when it came out, it got boring as heck after a few plays so I traded it. It's "fine" and I'd play it if someone suggested it, but I didn't want a game I feel that way about on my shelf.

Yeah, I'm starting to feel the same way about it. I picked it up from CSI who I think had it mislabeled and was selling it for $7 and I think I got my money's worth at this point, but it peaked at the beginning.

This is a serious question. How do you think Scrabble fits in among the ERP games? I'd say it fits very well, at least in spirit.

scrabble is a multi faceted game, and can fit into the ARM or ERP branch depending on whether you allow words like twatknocker and flangetastica or not.

Mad Dog wrote: This is a serious question. How do you think Scrabble fits in among the ERP games? I'd say it fits very well, at least in spirit.

I'd classify it as an abstract personally.

Resurrecting an older thread, but I'm curious to know if anyone has any thoughts on Lancaster. Sure, it's a medieval-themed worker placement from Queen (yay!), but it also throws in a nice mix of voting/bidding, area control, and set collection, with a little bit of co-op AND take that (in the form if displacement in the WP phase).

It sounds like a mess, and in some ways it is. But it does all manage to fit together into a reasonably cohesive whole. Since each individual mechanic/element/phase is fairly simple, it's easy to teach (and relearn). And it plays quickly enough. 5 rounds in 60-90 minutes. Done.

Certainly not a G-great game, but a solid little-g great that I'll continue to enjoy.

Great thread! Love it! However most games here are better left buried, but it can be fun to look at these curiosities of the gaming world.



Attila is one Euro that has always fascinated me, with such a brutal title and with absolutely
no brutal game play. Mild worker placement at its best.

I do like it however, and find that it can be quite interesting.

I knew you'd like this thread Steve...come to find out, what is considered "Ameritrash" now is really just a bunch of scenario-based, semi-coop hidden traitor tactical skirmish Kickstarter dungeon crawl crap "dripping with theme" and piled up with overpriced gumball machine figures. Fact is, these older Eurogames and German family games are really more in the fun-first spirit of AT, at least as we knew and understood it back when we were spearheading the movement.

Atilla is a good one, I kept meaning to mention it. It kind of got bagged on back in the day (2000?) for really being a stock market game despite the Hun theme. Regardless, it was actually a pretty good stock market game that for a while was fetching like $100+. I think that' come down a lot as interested in this "hidden gem" tapered off.

It's a Karl Heinz-Schmiel design. You know, Die Macher.

I heard some good stuff about Lancaster back when it was new, just never got around to it.

The ERP will resume coverage in 2015...got behind with some reviews, but I think Tonga Bonga is going to be next.