Kickstarter: Airborne In Your Pocket

Airborne In Your Pocket (AIYP) is a solitaire and co-operative war/board game (WWII: Normandy landings) created by the same designer who did the successful and recently released D-Day Dice (DDD), namely Emmanuel Aquin. He has, together with the game publisher Valley Games, Inc. (did DDD with Emmanuel), an ongoing Kickstarter campaign for AIYP (12 days to go, as of today).

I have pledged. Of course! I am utterly happy with DDD, which is one of the best (solitaire) games I have played in a long time, at least in the category of lightweight war games. Emmanuel and Valley Games did such a great job delivering DDD, that there is no chance I will miss the opportunity of yet another great game from the same designer and publisher.

The campaign is doing well. It has so far raised more than $68,000, which is well over target. So the game will be published. However, there are several stretch targets (at $70,000, $75,000 etc) that have not been reached yet. For each of these stretch targets reached, everyone in the campaign (pledging $70 or more) will receive extra rewards (like new cards, new figurines etc). There are stretch targets setup all the way up to $100,000.

If you have the slightest interest in WWII (light) war games, that you can play solitaire, or in a group with up to four players, you should definitely check this game out!

Kickstarter link here. Check out the excellent video, explaining and showing the game.

Disclaimer: I am in no way whatsoever associated with Valley Games (even if this blog post might look like an advertisement). I just happen to think DDD was such a great game, and wanted to mention Valley Games' new game coming out, so that this great campaign potentially could become ever greater (with more people jumping on the pledge train, and we all get more extra stuff)!

D-Day Dice - a beautiful game!

D-Day Dice - a fantastic, fun and just wonderful dice game!

Me, considering the next move!

I Kickstarted this game back in November 2011 (mentioned in this blog post). Last week I finally received the game by mail. And wow, what a big surprise! Just staring at the components and the gorgeous artwork makes me cry of happiness! And playing is certainly a lot of joy.

D-Day Dice (BoardGameGeek entry here) is a 1-4 player game (with several expansions available and more to follow in the future), that simulates (of course in a very abstract sense) the Normandy landings on June 6, 1944. The players storm the Normandy beaches with one Allied unit each and co-operate in reaching the German bunker in the top of the map. All Allied units must reach the bunker, or all players lose. A challenging task, to say the least.

My buddy Jonas,
ready to storm the
beach!

To your help, when storming the beach, you have various specialists and items, and sometimes vehicles. They all have abilities that alter the base rules. You move your unit sector by sector towards the bunker, and in every sector, the Germans fires at your unit.

Since Thursday last week (when I received the game), I have played it 30 times (27 solitaire sessions and 3 two-player sessions). My conclusion is that the game is near perfect. When playing, I have fun, and have to make a lot of tough decisions. I love dice and I love war games, so the combination is spot-on. Of course, there is a lot of luck involved, there are a lot of dice rolling after all, but how one manages resources (like soldiers, items etc) is crucial - without careful planning and consideration, the game will quickly be lost.

So, if you love (abstract) war games and dice, that are quick to setup and play, are challenging, fun, solitaire/co-operative and just wonderful - then this is the game for you!

Chinese boardgaming

My copy of Killers of the Three Kingdoms.

I got the chance to once again travel East to the great country of China, more specifically Shanghai. This time a short trip, only a week. One interesting thing was that my Chinese colleagues happened to share my interest in boardgaming, so they kindly brought me to a boardgaming café/bar one evening.

The boardgaming café/bar is a neat concept in where they provide tables, a plethora of boardgames, soft drinks etc. You just bring your friends and play! You can more or less drop in at anytime. They have late opening hours (as most other shops/services in Shanghai) and the café/bar staff can help teach a game if needed. I think this concept is really great and as far as I know, we don’t have this where I live, in Sweden. What we have here are boardgaming clubs, but membership is usually required.

What stroke me when glancing through the set of boardgames in the café/bar, was the number of “standard” Euro games (and other games) that had been translated into Chinese. The market has certainly grown a lot the recent couple of years (see a couple of references in the bottom of this post). There must be a huge market potential for Western game companies. Imagine getting a game translated into Chinese and published there!

One of the most popular games seem to be the card game Killers of the Three Kingdoms, and has been for a couple of years. There are tons of merchandise and expansions available for it. We played one session, and I enjoyed it a lot, even though I had a somewhat hard time memorizing all cards, since they were all in Chinese. I think after three four more plays, I would be able to play it quite fluently. (I actually own a copy of the base game, which I bought in Shanghai a few years ago. Think it is time to dust it down and let it hit the table!) I can definitely see why it is so popular. The game mechanic is certainly very interesting, where bluffing is a big part of the game play.

References:
http://www.globaltoynews.com/2012/03/board-games-in-china-.html
http://www.chinadecoded.com/2010/10/01/board-games-%E2%80%93-a-growing-trend-in-china/
http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/810040/the-recent-explosion-of-the-chinese-board-game-mar

States of Siege - the solitaire engine from Victory Point Games

Victory Point Games has a solitaire engine called States of Siege. They use it in many of their solitaire tabletop board games.

One of those games is Empires in America which I have had in my possession for a few years, but not really played it much - not until now. Below is a brief review of Empires in America.


Empires in America - brief review

Background

The game in action! I later won this game!

The game is about the French and Indian War (1754-62). The solitaire player controls the French, and must defend Montreal from the British forces slowly closing in from several directions. And that is actually what the States of Siege engine is all about - an enemy closing in from several directions, at the same time, and the player must do everything it takes to stop him, usually with a scarce number of countermeasures at hand.

Components
As with Victory Point Games, they are hand made. Cards/counters/maps/etc are printed and cut by hand. Might put a few off, others won't care. I must say that I actually like the idea of components crafted in this genuine manner - you can feel the love put into it. Everything is carefully and nicely packaged. And regarding the art -  I think it is colorful and attractive - no complaints there.

Gameplay
The rulebook takes a few readings before nailing the rules - especially the card locations. A card can be in one of seven different places (e.g. your hand, removed, discarded, bottomed etc). A little confusing at first, but something that you get used to after a few plays. Apart from that, the rulebook is very nicely laid out, and easy to navigate.

Gameplay is fun! And tense. You have a lot of decision making to do. The game is quite hard to beat. It is extremely frustrating to see all the British forces closing in on Montreal from all directions, but having so little space of maneuvering, so you can't stop them all.

The game rules are of low complexity. Game play is around 30-45 min.

The good
* Fun and engaging. A lot of decision making.
* High replayability. There is a big randomness around the pile of cards drawn. And since the cards drive the game, game play will look differently each time playing. A very good thing.
* Nice looking art.
* Very clear rulebook.
* Small footprint, and good when traveling - light and small in size!

The bad
* A minor complaint: There is a rule saying that if the British has two or more Leaders (haven't brought Leaders up in this review, but basically, they are a good thing and you need them!) than the French has (when starting the British phase), and a similar rule saying that if the French has two or more Leaders than the British has (when starting the French phase), then Leaders must be sacked, so that the gap in power between the two nations won't get too big. I don't like those kind of rules. I don't like it when the game system prevents one player to get too strong by comparing to the other player's power. Such power regulations should be handled by other means, within the system itself. It's hard to connect such action historically, or into the real world. Why would a winning, more powerful side of a conflict reduce its power because of the other side being weak - that is a great opportunity for offensive actions!

Conclusion
Despite the minor complaint, the game is excellent! I love it! And I would recommend it to any solitaire wargamer. I cannot compare it other games in the States of Siege series, since this is the only game I own in that series. But that is about to change... see below!


States of Siege - future (from my point of view)

* GMT Games and Victory Point Games has a strategic partnership, meaning that GMT releases some VPG games. Currently on GMT's P500 (pre-order) list, there is a game called Revolt and Revolution, which is three States of Siege games in one box! And with GMT's fine quality, mounted boards etc, this can't be bad! I have signed up on that one. I really hope it collects enough pre-orders to be published.

* Levee en Masse, which is a States of Siege game, will be developed for Android/iOS. I found the news here (The Gaming Gang) and here (BoardGameGeek). I'm an Android user, so this is wonderful news!

So, this means, more States of Siege for me in the future! Hopefully, at least one of the above products will be in my hands during 2012. Can't wait!

Tabletop board games on Android

I have been an Android (smart phone) user for about two years. As a vivid board gamer, it is nice to see how more and more tabletop board games are (professionally) ported into the Android platform.

There is a useful blog over at BoardGameGeek, covering news and posting reviews of Android/iOS board game apps (board games ported from the tabletop world). It's found here: iOS Board Games (despite the name of the blog, it covers the Android platform)

I have so far bought and installed three board game apps:

Carcasonne
An official version of Carcasonne, created by Exozet Games. The app is very true to the original board game. It features one expansion - The River II. Highly recommended if one cannot get enough of this classic. Would be nice if more expansions were added in the future though - would make it more challenging.

Hey, that's my fish!
Also a classic board game, this time from Fantasy Flight Games. Fun, quick and very good looking implementation.

Elder Sign: Omens
An Android implementation of the tabletop board game Elder Sign, also from Fantasy Flight Games. Basically the same game as its tabletop cousin, with very few exceptions (from what I have read; have not played the tabletop version myself, although I would like to).

The future of tabletop board games coming to the Android platform lokks bright. One title that is very welcome, and that is already available on iOS, is Neuroshima Hex. From what I can tell, it will hit the Android Market really soon, hopefully during January 2012. And then we have Victory Point Games. They have some really great tabletop board games (many solitaire titles), and with their entry into the Android development and one title released so far, I'm hoping for more, especially a release of one of their States of Siege(TM) titles.

Save the Princess - Lego game created on the fly together with daughter!

Save the Princess - click to enlarge!

Me and my eldest daughter (5.5 years) created a cooperative Lego game a few days ago. We named it Save the Princess, and it was all about saving a princess from a bunch of bad monsters!

We created a board consisting of areas. In one end there was a castle (with a princess), and in the other end, monsters were spawned. And for each turn, those monster moved one area closer to the castle. Me and my daughter had one hero each, which we moved around and fought the monsters so that they ran away, i.e. protecting the castle and the princess. If a monster would reach the castle, the game would end in a failure for the heroes.

We used this simple turn sequence:

1) Spawn new monsters. We draw small colored Lego pieces from an opaque cup. If the color just drawn, matched a color indicator in a 'monster spawn area', we put a new monster there. If no match, no new monster entered play that turn.

2) Heroes move/fight. We moved our heroes. Up to one area for my (slower) hero, and up to two areas for my daughter's (faster) hero. If a hero ended up in an area with a monster, a fight was initiated. My hero fought with a D8 (a little stronger), and my daughter's hero with a D6 (a little weaker). As the initiators of the fight, a D4 was added in their favor. Monster always fought with a D8. Highest total sum of all dice on each side (heroes vs. monsters) won the fight. If the monster(s) won, the hero(s) backed two steps towards the castle (shortest path). If the hero(es) won, the monster(s) ran away and was out of the game.

3) Monsters move/fight. All monster moved one area towards the castle (shortest path). If a monster ended up in the same area as a hero, a fight was initiated by the monster, meaning the monster would get the extra D4 die.

We ran the game until all monsters on the board had ran away, and there were no new monsters to spawn. Took about twenty minutes. It was a lot fun! Bothing building the board and play!

I will tweak the rules a little bit for the next game round. Make a little bit harder. Make the monsters win the fights more often. It was a little bit too easy during this first play-through.

Board game Tournament 2011 [ended]

I have ran a board game mini-tournament with one of my friends during the year. It ended yesterday. I lost.


15 wins for him, only 9 for me.


Since I lost, I had to buy a board game for him (of my choice). I bought Call of the Cthulhu: The Card Game (an LCG) from Fantasy Flight Games. We had discussed that game for a long time, so we are both interesting in trying it out.


The last 10 games rounds in our tournament, was Warhammer: Invasion - my current favorite board/card game! I really like the idea of the LCG concept.


It was fun running this tournament, and I'm pretty sure we start a new one for 2012. It makes the gaming a little bit more tense and nail-biting!

Backed the "D-Day Dice" Kickstarter project today!

Yep, today I went in as a backer of the Kickstarter project for the upcoming board game D-Day Dice. You'll find the Kickstarter page here. And the BGG entry here. (For all solitaire gamers out there, this is a 1-4 [base game] player game, which is a big advantage.)

D-Day Dice started as a print-and-play game. I wanted to give it a try for a long time, but never took the time to do so. But I was lucky, I didn't have to waste my printer ink and time in assemble the game, because it was picked up by an established publisher (Valley Games) and a Kickstarter project was started to finance the production of the game.

First I was disappointed though, since the international shipping was $50. I have bought a lot of games from North America throughout the years, but never at this shipping rate. Usually shipping is around $35. So, I was actually not going to support the project... until...

...more and more extra stuff was added into the project. Stuff that every backer will receive when the game is shipped in March 2012. Everything from special dice, extra cards etc, and even a nice-looking bag for carrying the game! And even more stuff might be added, depending on new total pledge levels the game reaches. It has already reached the number one most funded board game in the Kickstarter history!

So, go pledge, and more stuff will be included in the total package!

Fury in P500 at GMT Games

One of my all-time favourite two-player boardgames are Manoeuvre from GMT Games. It is a fast-playing wargame of the 19th century battlefield. I have mentioned it in an earlier post, that the Manoeuvre designer, Jeff Horger, is working on a fantasy version, based on Manoeuvre. I'm excited!

GMT Games has put it up for P500 pre-ordering at $45 (USD). So far 78 orders. Since I love Manoeuvre, I'm pretty sure that I will put in an order within a few days (just need to convince my wallet!). This is game I don't want to miss.

There is actually one thing about Manoeuvre that I'm not so fond of, and that are the map boards. The art/design of those are extremely dull. The box, the counters, the cards and the rule book, all have nice and good-looking art. But the map boards, they are really uninspiring and plain boring. I really hope GMT Games invest in a full makeover of those boards for Fury. Nevertheless, Fury will be a great game, I am sure! =)

Board game Tournament 2011

I'm running a board game mini-tournament with my most frequent gaming buddy. We play various board games throughout the year, and each win is equal to one point.

The one with most points at the end of the year, will be 2011's grand winner! The loser buys a board game (of the loser's choice) to the winner!

So far, after 13 board game "matches", starting from January 2011, up until now, the score is as follows:

Me: 5 points
My opponent: 8 points

Looking fairly okay for me. Still plenty of time to catch up.

We have mostly been playing Smallworld, Race For the Galaxy and Manouvre, but other games will most likely be a part of the competition before end of the year.

Manoeuvre

Played an exciting game of Manoeuvre (from GMT Games) last night. I lost. But the game was really intense, and ended in a fairly even Nightfall Victory in the favour of my gaming buddy (he = 10 points; me = 7 points).

Manoeuvre is a game that I highly recommend. Probably one of the best two-player games I own.

The designer, Jeff Horger, is currently working on an expension, which includes new armies: Japanese, Chinese, Swedish and Indian

Really looking forward to that expansion, especially the Swedish army, since that is my country! =)

And there is even a fantasy adaption of Manoeuvre coming out, called Fury. Work in progress, by the same designer. Have to read more about this game before (pre-)ordering.

Solo Tabletop Gaming Appreciation Month -- should I join or not?

Official logo of the Solo Tabletop
Gaming Appreciation Month.

I'm thinking of commiting myself to the Solo Tabletop Gaming Appreciation Month (initiative by Solo Nexus) which will set off in November 2011.

The idea is that you undertake some kind of solo tabletop related project during this month. Since solo gaming is something I do a lot, this shouldn't be a problem. However, if I join, I want to do something special, not just a regular play-through of a random solitaire game (which I regularly do anyway).

So far, I have come up with these candidates for a potential project:

* Re-learn the solitaire board-/wargame Fields of Fire by GMT Games, using the new version of the rules (second edition). I currently own the first edition, and have spent a numerous number of hours learning the game to a degree that I was able to play through the first couple of WWII missions. However, the (first edition) rulebook was lacking a lot of details, so while playing, I had to do a lot of forum posting/searching, reading FAQs, go through examples etc. That took away much of the fun/tempo of the game -- a game that certainly has a huge potential. Now, a second edition rulebook has been released, and perhaps I should go for it, and give the game a new try.

* DVG (Dan Verssen Games) is a little game company that makes excellent games, especially solitaire boardgames. One is called Field Commander: Napoleon -- the third game in the Field Commander series (the first two are Rommel and Alexander). The game is a solitaire board-/wargame, where you take the role as Napoleon. I have it on pre-order, since it is not available yet. But it has just recently been sent to the printer, and is expected to return in 12 weeks, plus a few weeks for shipping (so it should hit my desk well before November). Playing through a big campaign and write a nice/special/beautiful AAR (After Action Report) could be a perfect project for the Appreciation Month.

* Another DVG title named Phantom Leader is one of my absolute favourite solitaire board games. A Vietnam air war simulator. I'm thinking that I might run through the biggest campaign and write an innovative AAR (don't what it would look like though, just brainstorming).

* Use the Mythic GME together with some standard RPG (e.g. Call of Cthulhu or FU RPG), and run through a solo role-playing adventure. Have to think about this...

* Read the Strands of Fate rulebook (own the softcover version, but haven't read it yet), and make it work with the Mythic GME for the purpose of solo role-playing. Have to figure out a clever way of dealing with FATE Points etc, in a solo environment.

I need to think about these candidates for a few days or weeks. Perhaps I will join the November solo fun! =)

First post

Hi there,
and welcome to my blog - Mono Desire!

What you will find in this blog, are articles covering my interests. No personal or emotional garbage. Unfortunately, my interests are quite many, but time is limited. This blog is an attempt to keep myself focused on a limited number of hobby related projects at any given moment.

What you will see in this blog, are board gaming related articles (not only about playing board games, which is a big hobby of mine, but also board game design), tabletop role-playing game posts (experimenting playing solo adventures, as well as playing simple scenarios with my young daughters), electric guitar playing and music production stories (using my home recording studio, based on Propellerhead's Reason and Record recording software), drawing and painting fiasco attempts (preferably using water color), video game articles (mainly Nintendo DS/3DS/Wii, because these are the platforms where I currently play games), writing related stories (where I talk foolishly about my fiction writing failures), photography posts (showing what I like to do with my SLR camera), programming articles (since I, occasionally, enjoy writing Java code in my spare time, even though my full-time employment circles around programming), comic book reports (of my slow progress of reading, mostly comic books), and more.

Have a nice stay!