What BOARD GAME(s) have you been playing?

Michael Barnes wrote: A couple of games of Thunder Alley.

Hooooooooooooooooo boy.

Go on and put your orders in. Don't wait for the review.

How it rates as a family game may not make it into your review (and that's fair), but well...how does it? I was considering getting Detroit-Cleveland Grand Prix (A game I loved back in college) but should I consider this one? Or is TA a bit heavier and DCGP still the better family game?

Family game: Detroit-Cleaveland is more kid friendly but Thunder Alley isn't so complex that a kid of 12 or so would have any problem.

I'd say that it is pitched at an "advanced family game" level. The rules are pretty easy, but the four different types of movement coupled with the impetus on using your cars TOGETHER to coordinate moves makes it strategically quite a bit more complex.

After reading the rules, it felt pretty confusing. But after half a lap, I totally got it. And this was soloing with four teams (16 cars). Second game, I barely had to look at the rulebook except for a couple of tricky moving situations.

I'm kind of blown away, the execution of the NASCAR style of race is just about as dead on as you could get. But more than that, there are racing concept in this game that work better than anything else out there. When you bust a car out of the back using lead movement and drag a whole line of cars around the leaders and into the front, it really feels like PACK movement, not just single car movement. It's funny that you want to compare DCGP to it, because I think it's VERY influenced by DCGP and without having played DCGP just recently, I'm not sure I would appreciate how much of the Kramer design is actually here. Kramer had that great idea of pacing the race and creating strategic decision points by having non-selective movement of opponent cars. Horger takes that further and puts the drafting, leading, and pursuit movement in there.

But it also avoids a lot of the fussy bullshit that bogs down other race games. Damage type doesn't usually matter unless an event card causes the car with the most tire damage to do something. There's no meticulous counting and recounting of spaces. There's no danger of oversteering and crashing into the wall- a brilliant piece of abstraction, why would these drivers even be on the track if they were that incompetent?

Great, great stuff.

You can get players up to speed on Thunder Alley in about three minutes. 90% of new user questions are addressed on the board for quick reference.

I had two eleven year olds playing in short order.

And I'll throw in with Barnes, the game really feels like NASCAR. They're creating an F-1 version next and I'll be curious to see how they change it. Horger is proving himself capable of coming at subjects from a different, refreshingly simple direction. Two for two as far as I'm concerned.

S.

Think 7 and 4.

And is it more fun than DCGP or just more thinky?

Jeff White wrote: Think 7 and 4.

And is it more fun that DCGP or just more thinky?

Both too young.

Sagrilarus wrote: They're creating an F-1 version next and I'll be curious to see how they change it. Horger is proving himself capable of coming at subjects from a different, refreshingly simple direction. Two for two as far as I'm concerned.

S.

Cool. I wonder if they'll have a Bernie Ecclestone Random Event table.

Michael Barnes wrote: Go on and put your orders in. Don't wait for the review.

curse you.

I managed to get some of my Netrunner buddies to play boardgames with me! We were late and didn't really play much but it was fun to play something else for a change.

We started with Citadels, which may be old hat to you guys but it's practically new to me and I love it. I got into this high level mindgame dynamic with one of the players which resulted in we beating the third player over and over again with Thief and Assassin. Basically everytime we outguessed each other, the poor guy ended up paying. Still very fun, I really want to get into the game more so our decisions become more grounded.

After a couple games I made them play Steam and it didn't go too well. One of the guys did better than the first time he played it but noticed I was gaining a huge edge from turn one and the other felt the game was difficult and gruelling and didn't like it much. Steam is a game of long-term planning and it takes a while before players realize how it really is played or how to bid on the auction so these reactions are common at first, they'll probably enjoy the game more once I make them play it again.

Curiously, I also found out that I have over 30€ of store credit. I don't even know what to buy with it, most of the games I'm on the lookout for are not available in the shop.

It's amazing how hard a time Horger has had getting his games made given the acclaim they get. He has bunch of other shit on p500, hopefully if people like thunder alley they'll push those over the top or someone else will come along and poach. Like, he has a basketball game there, doesn't he?