Diamonds

04/14/201504/14/2015 - Will Bain Leave a comment

A good deal of my down time in college was spent playing card games. At lunch we would play Hearts and Euchre. After dinner we played Spades and Bridge. And during [Post-Colonial Comparative Ontological Super-Symmetry] lectures we played a raucous home-brewed game that combined the best elements of Speed, Pit, and what we called “Go Fish Yourself.” We never actually went to class so please feel free to insert any course title inside the brackets.

Had Diamonds existed 25 years ago, I feel confident in saying that we would have welcomed it into our busy schedule of card games, role-playing games, board games, and video games. Even now, when I find myself a putative adult with parenting and career responsibilities, I would gladly make time for a game or two of Diamonds. It has nice strategic depth like Spades and just a little meanness like Hearts.

In short, Diamonds is a trick-taking card game. The deck consists of 60 cards divided into the four traditional suits: Clubs, Spades, Hearts, and Diamonds. One player leads a card and the others follow suit if they can. The highest value card of the lead suit wins the trick. There is no trump suit.

The game comes with a big mound of plastic gems that are piled in the center of the table (called “The Supply”). Players earn diamond tokens each trick and these diamonds determine the player’s score at the end of the hand. Diamonds can be stored in one of two places: behind a small screen called “The Vault” or in front of the screen called “The Showroom.” At the end of the hand, gems in the Showroom are worth 1 point each and gems in the Vault are worth 2 points apiece. How you earn the gems and how they come to be in your Showroom or Vault is the clever aspect of this game.

Each suit allows you to take an action that will help you accumulate diamonds. The diamond suit allows you to take one gem from the supply and put it in your Vault. Hearts allow you to take one from the supply and put it in your Showroom. Spades allow you to move a gem from your Showroom to your Vault. Clubs allow you to steal a gem from another player’s Showroom and place it in your Showroom.

You get to use these actions in several situations. If you win the trick (you have the highest card of the lead suit) you get to take the action. If you do not have the lead suit and must play something else then you also get to take that card action. For example, if I lead Hearts and you don’t have one, you can play a Diamond and then take a gem from the supply (putting it in your Vault). At the end of the hand, players count up how many cards they have of each suit. The player with the highest in each suit also gets to take that action. Finally, if you take no cards (no tricks) the entire hand, you may take 2 gems from the Supply and put them in your Vault. You can earn a lot of points this way.

One of the things we really like about the game Diamonds is that you almost always score something during a hand. Heck, several players can score in the same trick. It is very difficult to play a hand and score nothing. As a way of keeping players involved and invested, this is brilliant. There is also a great tension that builds through the game because you might not know how many gems a player has behind the screen.

As is suggested by the name, the suit of diamonds is the best suit as it allows you to put gems directly in your vault; however, the other suits are effective and fun and make for exciting gameplay. In a four-player game, only 40 cards are dealt so it is possible that there might not be many diamond cards in circulation. If that’s the case, hearts and clubs are the only way to earn gems and you need spades to get them safely into your Vault. And because we at Major Fun have mean little hearts, there was a good deal of glee had when we could use clubs to steal diamonds from each other.

Diamonds is a Major Fun twist on standard card games. It is certainly the safest way to be a diamond thief.

2 – 6 players. Ages 8+

Strife: Legacy of the Eternals

10/28/2014 - Will Bain Leave a comment

Strife: Legacy of the Eternals is a lot of game in a very small tin. The version that we at Major Fun played has 35 cards (20 characters, 10 locations, 4 score cards, and 1 quick guide), 1 ten-sided die, and a single sheet for the rules. The game is currently near the end of a spectacularly successful Kickstarter campaign and it looks like more cards will be added thanks to their stretch goals; however, the basic game boils down to 10 characters vs 10 characters battling over 10 locations.

Players start with the same 10 characters. These characters (fantasy epic stalwarts like Barbarian, Necromancer, and Paladin) each have 2 special abilities: a Battle Ability and a Legacy Ability. These abilities determine who wins a confrontation. These confrontations occur in Locations. These Locations provide points for the players. These points determine who wins.

A game starts with a face-up Champion in front of each player—this is the Legacy Champion. Each turn, a player chooses a Battle Champion and places it face-down on the table. The Champions are numbered 0 – 9. When they are revealed, the highest number goes first—that player can choose to use the Champion’s Battle Ability or not. The lower Battle Champion may then go. The players then activate their Legacy Champions in the same way—high number goes first. After the battle abilities and legacy abilities have been used, they player with the highest Battle value wins the location and takes the points.

The Battle Champion is moved to the top of the Legacy Pile (become the new Legacy Champion) and the players choose new Battle Champions.

What makes the game so enthralling—and Major Fun—is the way in which the abilities interact with each other to produce surprising results. Some abilities increase battle value. Some abilities allow Champions to be swapped. Some abilities cancel abilities. It is not enough to have the Champion with the highest battle value. The Battle Champion and the Legacy Champion must work together to win. Players must be clever and patient: each character will be a Battle Champion ONCE in a round. You have to play your cards wisely because at some point you will have to use each one.

Strife is a perfect information game in that each player starts with the same cards, and each knows what cards are being held by their opponent. The only mystery is when Battle Champions are placed face-down at a location.

There are almost no random elements in the game. This is a deeply strategic game. There is also an incredibly clever way to resolve ties. I won’t go into it here, but it uses the die (and rolling is not involved).

The art is distinctive and reminiscent of the painted illustrations in pulp fantasy magazines (the more family friendly ones—not the really lurid ones). The instructions are concise and clear. Your first game will take a while as you figure out how the abilities interact but within a turn or two the basic mechanics will be second nature and you can focus on what is really important: how you are going to stop that Barbarian and Necromancer from demolishing your Ranger.

2 players. Ages 10+

Masters of the Gridiron

08/20/2014 - Will Bain Leave a comment

Given my previous post about GenCon, it is only appropriate that the Major Fun Award goes to a game about football. Let me introduce you to Masters of the Gridiron: the card game that can unite casual gamers and football fans all across our fair land.

One of the things that I really love about games is the way the designers take events and activities in our physical world and translate those situations into cards and dice and tokens and the vast panoply of game mechanics. In many ways I think this is the most artistic aspect of game design (as opposed to the graphical art that decorates the box and cards and etc). There is a fascinating, understated beauty to this process of simulation and representation.

Sports Mogul took on the daunting task of representing the game of American football and in the process, created the accessible and engaging card game. Each player has a deck of cards that represents a specific pro team from a specific year (we played with 8 teams from the 2013 season). The cards are divided into three categories: offense, defense, and playbook. Offense and defense cards depict actual players. The top half of the offense and defense cards contains numbers you will need for the card game while the bottom half contains vital statistics from the 2013 season (these are not vital to playing Masters of the Gridiron). The playbook cards represent different types of scoring drives and which players work best in those situations.

The game ends after each team attempts 9 scoring drives. Your scoring drive consists of one playbook card and one offense card. Your playbook card tells you which what to look for on your offense card and which players receive bonuses. In general you look for the player that has the highest rating for the play you have chosen (high numbers win). Once you reveal your offense, your opponent gets to choose one defense card. The play card says what kinds of defense work against the play so your opponent wants to choose a player with a ranking that is higher than your offense. If offense is higher, you score. If the defense is equal to or higher than offense, you fail.

Each player gets to be on offense and defense nine times. In between plays, the teams get to draw cards to replace the ones that were used. At the end of the game, scores are tallied.

There are some complications, but they are rare and are handled very well in the slim rule sheet. In the end, Masters of the Gridiron is very simple and yet offers a lot of interesting choices. You have to manage your resources (players cannot be used more than once) and you have to choose between going for touchdowns or kicking field goals.

For those who want more, there is a great deck building and drafting mechanic that allows the players to draft their own teams. Each deck comes with additional cards that can be swapped with others in the deck. It is also possible to combine different decks into a dream team. Each player comes with a salary. If you play one of the deck-building games you have a pool of money with which you can build your team. Now you have to decide between drafting a few top end players (and having many lower players) or having a more solid (if less exciting) team.

We had fun just playing with the teams out of their boxes. After the first series of plays, the game is very intuitive and does a great job of evoking excitement of football without requiring any detailed knowledge of the game. Casual gamers will appreciate the laid-back strategy of the card game and football fans will have a lot to discuss as the games unfold.

GO COLTS!

2 players. Ages 8+

GenCon 2014 – Strife at Trade Day

08/13/2014 - Will Bain Leave a comment

Strife Creator - Chris Hamm For those who don’t know, this weekend is GenCon in Indianapolis– one of the largest gatherings of game enthusiasts in the world. Here are some pictures from Trade Day which is the day before the official festivities commence.

I met Chris Hamm at one of the seminars. Chris is from Indianapolis and is the proud creator of the game Strife which he is debuting at GenCon. Strife is being published by V3G Games which is also right here in Indianapolis.

Check out how beautiful this game is!! (my crappy phone camera doesn’t do them justice) Chris demoed Strife for me. I can’t speak for all our game tasters but I would love to see it submitted for a Major Fun Award (I’m talking to YOU V3G!!)

Strife Also check out Chris’ blog “Life in Games” for more information about Strife and other games that Chris loves. He’s part of an active game community that was instrumental in bringing this project to life. Chris and Strife will be with V3G (and their game Incredibrawl) at booth 2727. Make sure you say hi.

More pictures and posts from GenCon to come…

Spot It! Freeze

07/01/201406/30/2014 - Will Bain Leave a comment

It has been well established that Spot It! is Major Fun.

For evidence, you may look here…

…and here

Although it seems like we have sufficiently covered this point, I don’t think it can be over-stated how clever the basic game is. You have 55 cards. Each card has eight images. Any two cards in the deck have exactly one image in common. Games revolve around trying to find which one is the match. Spot It! Freeze adds a timer to the mix. The electronic timer has two modes: countdown and random.

I’ll admit that most of us at Major Fun were skeptical that a timer would add much to the game. After all, the point of Spot It! is to be fast. Surely a timer couldn’t help much.

We were wrong.

Blue Orange has come up with some great games that utilize the two types of timer to great effect. The most basic game requires the players to collect cards from a pile in the middle. Play proceeds as normal until a player successfully makes a match with one of the blue images (cold-based images like ice and snow are always blue). When that happens, that player yells “Freeze” and the countdown timer is started. The player has 10 seconds to play solo—no one else can interrupt. When the 10 seconds is over everyone else can jump back in.

Playing by yourself is an advantage, but not nearly as great as you might first imagine. The countdown adds pressure that tends to interfere with your ability to spot the similar images. It breaks the flow and it also gives your opponents time to look at the card and jump in at the end of the countdown.

Another variation involves the random timer (a loud ticking sound) that plays like Catchphrase. Each player has a stack of cards they are trying to get rid of. A card is turned face up in the middle of the table and the timer is started. One player flips their top card up and tries to make a match. Once they do, play moves clockwise to the next person. If the timer stops on your turn (before you can play a card) then you take two cards from the middle pile. You can also reverse the order by matching a blue item and saying “Freeze.” You don’t have to reverse things but you can.

This is a great game variation for a wide range of players. It equalizes things quite a bit. My daughter is fantastic at the basic Spot It! Far and above the best player in our group. She can consistently take on and beat all the rest of us COMBINED. This variation (called Flash Freeze) means that she still has to wait for the rest of us and it is possible for us to keep her from playing (or at least give her very little time). I’ll admit that it seems petty and cruel to keep my 12 year old daughter from playing her cards, but short of gouging out her eyes, I’m not sure there is any other chance the rest of us have.

And she has lovely eyes.

Spot It! Freeze is a great expansion of the Spot It! universe. It is the only one to not come in a round tin but the timer is also a compact box for the cards. It is clever and bright and fast and oh so Major Fun.

2 – 8 players. Ages 8+

Machine of Death

06/27/201406/30/2014 - Will Bain Leave a comment

So if you haven’t checked out the Major Fun book review for Machine of Death, I’ll give you a moment to read it here…

[whistles through teeth…]

Take your time. It’s really good. The book, I mean. Go read it too.

[pulls out iPad and plays… er… does some research…]

Oh hi!! So now imagine a story-telling game based on the premise of The Machine of Death. Wicked cool, right?

You didn’t read any of the previous stuff did you. [Sigh] OK, so in a nutshell, a machine has been invented that, with only a drop of your blood, will predict how you will die with 100% accuracy. You get a piece of paper with some words on it: “steamroller” or “autoerotic exsanguination” or “French press.” Doesn’t say when or where. Doesn’t give any more details. And the machine might be said to have a highly developed sense of ironic humor so “French press” might mean a coffee maker or a bunch of Parisian journalists or perhaps a riot at a particular World Cup soccer match. Try to avoid your death and you’ll just find out how devious the universe can be.

The answer is always the same. The answer is never wrong.

In the game, you play a company of assassins. The Machine has made your profession very tricky, especially when your target has consulted the Machine. You are given four targets and a handful of items that must be used in order to bring down your intended victim. As a group, you have to come up with a plan that would make Rube Goldberg proud and then change it on the fly if something goes wrong.

The base game is cooperative. Each target comes with a description that provides your troupe of killers with a location and some personality quirks that you can use to your advantage. You also get your target’s Machine of Death card as well as three Black Market Gift cards that you must use in order to “establish the truth” about your target (learned that particular euphemism from Tim Power’s excellent novel Declare). The gift cards are redeemable for things like “something that floats” or “fancy pants” or “a public domain character.” All players work together to come up with a plan that utilizes all of these items.

For each Black Market item involved, the group must assign a number to it that indicates how likely it is to succeed in the plan. 2 means virtually guaranteed and 6 is nearly impossible. Once the plan is set, the group starts the 90 second timer and starts rolling the included die for each element of the plan. If each element is successful, the target is killed. Huzzah! If any element fails (you roll lower than the assigned number) you must draw a new Black Market item, discuss how it will change the plan, assign it a difficulty, and then roll for it again.

Your original plan can take as long as you like but once the plan gets going you have only 90 seconds to make changes. This keeps the action moving and adds a level of urgency to the proceedings.

You win the game if you eliminate all four of your targets. You lose if you run out of Black Market cards (you start with 20) or if you fail to kill a target. Along the way you can pick up special cards to help you, but the basic mechanic stays the same: come up with a plan, assign difficulty, roll for results.

There are also several alternative games that can be played with the same cards. Some of the variations are competitive. Some are more like a traditional role-playing game. One is a party game like Apples to Apples. This party game was popular with our large group. The variations are quite distinct which demonstrates two things to me: the strength of the concept and the considered design-work of the creators. If your group has never played a story-telling game before, start with the party game. Ready for some more role-playing but without the pressure? Play without the timer for a while. We had fun coming up with elaborate plans in much the same way that we would have fun building a city out of boxes and toilet paper tubes.

The story-telling game takes a very specific mindset to make work. It is much more about telling a funny story than winning or losing. In some ways it reminds me of an activity like writing an exquisite corpse. It also reminds me of collaborative role-playing games like Fiasco in which the dice are there to shake up the story-telling rather than win or lose a fight.

The Machine of Death is morbid and often bizarre but also Major Fun.

2 – 4 players (many more with some variations). Ages 15+

Stop ‘n Go

02/26/201403/06/2014 - Will Bain Leave a comment

We have a soft spot for speed games here at Major Fun. That soft spot is generally the tips of our fingers and we will gleefully bruise those soft spots if it means that we get a chance to slap a card down just before our neighbor does. Speed games are loud and frenetic and there is never any down time.

Granted, this kind of fun isn’t for everyone and speed games can often be unforgiving to those who are inexperienced. Or lack hand-eye coordination. Or are too old. Or are too young. Or have a heart condition. Or play nice…

…but they are fun!! And Talicor’s Stop ‘n Go does a great job of providing us with a slappy shouty speedy game that pauses every so often to give you time to regroup.

Players are dealt 15 cards (the rest are placed to the side for later) and the object is to get rid of all cards in your hand. The cards are held face down. Each card has a combination of four basic colors: red, green, yellow, and blue. Each player turn one card face to the table in front of them. When the dealer yells “Stop and Go” each player flips over a card and tries to match it to one of the cards already face up on the table. When a player sees a match, he or she rushes to slap their card on top of that pile and flip over another.

It’s all very intuitive. Speed color matching.

There are also three special cards: Zap is yellow, Pass is blue, and Stop n Go is green and red. When one of these is successfully played to a pile, everything stops and the special card takes effect. Zap allows the player to give each opponent 2 more cards (from the ones set aside). Pass forces everyone to pass their hand to the right or to the left. Stop n Go allows the player to play 3 cards while everyone else has to wait.

This is not a highly strategic game. There is a good deal of luck involved. But the pace is fast and the interruptions due to special cards allow everyone to regroup and prepare for the next onslaught. The game rules suggests that at the end of the round (when someone goes out) you count your cards and record that number. When someone reaches 30 the game is over and the lowest score wins.

We had a blast just playing to see who would go out each round. And betting on who would walk away with a broken finger.

The rules are short and largely intuitive. The cards are well designed. We were laughing and shouting and bruising our fingers like a rock n roll bassist. It’s Major Fun.

2 – 6 Players. Ages 4+

Goblins Drool, Faeries Rule

12/17/201312/17/2013 - Will Bain Leave a comment

Such a beautiful, wee, fae game.

At first blush, it would be easy to dismiss Goblins Drool, Faeries Rule as a kids game. That kind of “kids game” like Go Fish and Old Maid that makes an adult look longingly at itemized taxes as a way of escape. But do not make that mistake. Like all things fae, the cuteness is but a glamour that belies a thing of great elegance and power.

And fun. It’s not all pomp and circumstance you know. It’s Major Fun.

The game, developed by Game-O-Gami and published by Game Salute, consists of 20 double-sided cards. Each card is unique and depicts a faerie on one side and a goblin on the other. The faeries have names like Snowflake Shelley, Vanilla Scoop, and Morning Dew while the goblins have names like Full Moon Moo, Cuckoo Clock, and Vermin Vermicelli. Take a moment to notice that some of these names rhyme. That will be important later. Each card also has a pair of symbols. Cards with frogs on one side will have toadstools on the flip-side. Cards with suns on one side will have moons on the other.

One of the great strengths of this game is the artwork. The faeries are whimsical and the goblins are silly. We spent a lot of time just passing the cards around when we first opened the game.

The game starts with all cards arranged so that the goblin side is up. Players receive 4 cards that they keep on the table in front of them. When all players have their cards, 4 more cards are placed in the center of the table (this is called the faerie circle). Extra cards are set aside. Cards are never hidden in this game, but you can only see one side (no peeking at the side facing the table).

To win you must either collect 6 faeries or have no goblins.

On your turn, you take one card in front of you and move it into the faerie circle. Any cards that rhyme with your card are flipped over (goblins become faeries and faeries become goblins). You then collect any cards that have the same symbol as your card (moon, sun, frog, toadstool), BUT your card stays in the circle.

Navigating these two simple aspects of the cards is wonderfully complex. It surprised me just how difficult it was to think about the rhyme AND the symbol. My guess is that the mental processes of keeping track of a rhyme (an auditory skill) and keeping track of a symbol (a visual skill) are different enough that my brain had to scramble to allocate resources.

To make matters even more complex, some sides of some of the cards have stars. These special cards flip over ALL cards in the faerie ring, regardless of the rhyme. All these features created an intriguingly strategic game. Knowing when to play a card because it would help your cause and when to play one so that it would harm your opponent was a big part of the decision process. All cards are visible so you can make plans for yourself as well as plans to thwart your rivals.

The game also comes with instructions to play solitaire. We had a blast with four people, and I can see how the mechanics would lend themselves to thoughtful solo play.

2 – 4 players. Ages: 7+