Adorable can sometimes give a game the edge

 I picked up the files for Pocket Puffins because our son has a lifelong love of penguins and aren’t puffins and penguins kind of alike? (Little bit of basic research later: They are very distantly related, live in completely different biomes and puffins can _fly_?!) Okay, penguins and puffins are only very superficially alike. Birds who both like fish.

At any rate, Pocket Puffins is about rearranging a line of puffins wearing nifty anoraks and building igloos for them.

It’s a micro game that breaks down into two decks of cards. Twelve double-sided puffin/goal cards and six action cards. The puffin side of the puffin/goal cards show a red, yellow or blue puffin and the right or left half of an igloo. The goal side shows a row of nine penguins, each in a specific color order.

Pretty sure you can see where this is going.

Randomly draw a puffin of each color to make a goal deck and shuffle the rest into a line. Each action card shows each color and a movement of one to three, different for each color. Each action card lets you move one puffin X number of spaces.

So you have to move puffins around to make them match the goal cards. It’s a mechanic that I’m pretty sure we’ve all seen before.

There are two touches I quite like. One: every time you have to reshuffle the action deck, you discard a card. Run out of cards before you complete all three goals. You lose. Two: every complete igloo you make when you complete a goal is a point. 

When it comes to solitaire games, I like ones that have more than just beat your best score, where there is a win-lose condition. I love Palm Island but Palm Laboratory adding the goals made the experience better. Pocket Puffin has that.

I will admit that I think actually getting the puffins in order isn’t that difficult. Getting igloos built, man, I haven’t figured out how to do that to get a score worth a darn.

With that said, while the mechanics are solid, Pocket Puffins really needs its theme as well. If I was trying to get squiggles, circles and squares in order, I wouldn’t be engaged. Cartoon puffins in anoraks are necessary to reel me in. That touch of adorable makes a big difference.

Pocket Puffins is a quiet, cute little solitaire. It has several touches, both mechanical and thematic, that make it fun and keep me putting it in the table.

Roll and Safari lives in a dog-eat-dog world

 Roll and Safari is a Print-and-Play Roll-and-Write for one to any number of players. At the moment, it’s free to download. 

 

The idea is that you are driving around the Savana in a jeep on a photo safari. The actual game play is drawing a path in a hex grid. Every game is going to have some level of abstraction and Roll and Safari doesn’t do badly theme-wise for one sheet of paper.

The core idea is that you roll three dice each turn. You pick one for the direction the jeep is going to go, one to determine the distance and one to determine what direction the camera is pointing when you reach your endpoint.

Any animal you land on gets scared away and is out of the game for good. You start out with a camera that can go three hexes but as the game continues, you can get bonuses to expand that. And, other than the first round, each round has a specific animal that you get to mark down twice per sighting.

Each animal track has bonuses if you check off enough boxes. These are things like treating a distance or direction die as wild or getting bonus watering holes (which get you points) or camera lenses. 

The game ends after thirteen rounds. You add up the number of animals you’ve seen, along with watering holes and unused bonuses and that’s your score. 

Roll and Safari’s roll for direction and distance is not a new mechanic for Roll and Writes, although it isn’t filling in a grid which I have now seen more times than I can remember. The mechanics fit the theme pretty well and the game is easy to understand.

The biggest problem that Roll and Safari has is that it exists in the same word as Voyages. Voyages uses the same core mechanic of rolling for distance and direction as Roll and Safari but is a better, deeper, richer game. Honestly, it’s a top tier R&W and Roll and Safari can’t help but suffer in comparison.

With that said, on its own, Roll and Safari is a clean, streamlined game. It has a family friendly theme and would probably work with youngish kids. And it’s free, not that Voyages is pricy.

If you are looking for only the best in your games or if you are only playing with ‘serious’ gamers, then, yeah, Voyagers is what you are looking for. But if you are looking for variety or something for a younger audience, Roll and Safari isn’t a bad game to add to the library.

I never expected the Goblin Reservation to be a comedy

 Clifford D. Simak’s Goblin Reservation is a smorgasbord of fay creatures, ghosts, time travel, intergalactic travel, extraterrestrials and biomechanics. Oh and it’s also a slapstick comedy.

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Seriously, Goblin Reservation is a wild ride. Any one idea, including many of which are just off the cuff references, are what other authors have build entire books around.

Professor Peter Maxwell returns from an interstellar teleportation trip to find that he’s dead. But it’s not a time travel gag but duplication by transporter. And this alternate but still living Maxwell has to make a deal with an elder race of extraterrestrials for vast knowledge but the elder race left out all the details. Fortunately he has the help of Alley Oop the time displaced Neanderthal, a ghost named Ghost and time travel faculty member Carol with her biomechanical Sabre-Tooth Tiger Sylvester.

It’s a hoot.

Carol and Sylvester are clearly an homage to Bringing Up Baby, although Carol has more of the Cary Grant role since Oop, Ghost and even Maxwell are all wackier than she is. And, as I’ve already mentioned, there is plenty of slapstick. Bar fights, parties with silly hijinks and museums getting trashed. Why hasn’t there been a film adaptation?!

While the Goblin Reservation is a fairly short book, there are some major subplots, including one about William Shakespeare and another about a mysterious painter. I won’t say anymore because that would really be spoiling the game but either one would easily make for its own book. And we never see the subplots fully resolve themselves. We only see them when they intersect with Maxwell’s story.

Honestly, between the diverse fantastic elements and subplots, it would have been easy for The Goblin Reservation to be an utter mess. Instead, Simak somehow ties everything together to not only tell a coherent story but imply a much wider world than we get to see.

When I decided to actually try and read Simak, I wanted to read City, Way Station and the Goblin Reservation. I’m not saying those are his best works but they are considered notable. I felt if I read them, they’d make a good Simak primer. And they have left me planning on continuing to read his work.

And each one has been very different. I can’t say what the best one is but the Goblin Reservation is easily the most joyful.

Pentaquark was worth revisiting

 I tried playing Pentaquark about seven or eight years ago. And I did not like it.

I found it frustrating and counter-intuitive. I found the process of the game preoccupied me and I couldn’t focus on the actual playing of the game. It was a major disappointment in my experiences with Button Shy Games.

 

However, when I was reminded that Pentaquark existed, I decided that I should give it another chance. I learned it when was I still relatively new to PnP and solitaire games. In the time since I tried it, I have played quite a few solitaire or solitaire friendly games.

Short version: I liked Pentaquark more the second time around. And a lot of that comes from the fact that I have better idea of what the game is doing. 

Pentaquark, while definitely acknowledging its quantum physics theme, is really a game about card sorting. Which is basically card solitaire 101. And I understood that back in my first go.

And I firmly believe that using tried and true mechanics is not a bad thing. Insisting on reinventing the wheel leads to square wheels. It’s what you build on that foundation that matters.

And I know see that how whole suites in Pentaquark exist for you to be able to sacrifice them, to manipulate the tableau to get what you want. That the need to plan around how the deck will flip every round is a feature, not a bug. How the end goal is very specific, not arbitrary.

Mind you, I now actually think Pentaquark is actually harder to win than I first thought. But it makes sense to me. And that makes a big difference.

It isn’t my new favorite game. It feels more intuitive but it also feels pretty dry. However, I think, as I grok the game more and more, I could develop mental muscle memory that would make the game relaxing.

And I have found that Pentaquark has a whopping four expansions and a campaign mode. Either a lot of folks liked it more than I did and/or it is a serious passion project.

Pentaquark was worth giving it a second chance.

This Mars Vacation is sadly not out of this world

I printed out two of Alexander Shen’s games at the same time, Trap Construction Corp and This Mars Vacation. Of the two, I had higher expectations of This Mars Vacation.

Spoiler: I was wrong.

This Mars Vacation has you trying to create enclosed areas on a ten by ten grid while meteorites destroy squares. 

Each turn, you outline a box, representing walls. Scoreable blocks must be completely enclosed in walls. You score enclosures every turn before

rolling for meteorites.

You roll two ten-sided dice for each meteorite, determining where it will land on the grid. Meteorites will destroy walls or render enclosure spaces worthless. And if they land on a space that’s already been hit, they expand the damage to every orthogonal space. More than that, you roll for more and more meteorites each turn.

After seven turns, you score your board one last time and total up your points.

Now, while I said that I like Trap Construction Corp more, there are elements I do like about This Mars Vacation. Oddly enough, some of them are also why I don’t see playing it much.

First off, it takes at least four turns to score any points, which is half the game. And, even if meteorites don’t destroy your precious walls or enclosures, you get points very incrementally.

And the random nature of meteorites falling means it’s very hard to effectively plan ahead. All you can do is hope for the best. Particularly since there will be six meteorites on the last turn. One hit can destroy your entire game.

BUT that’s also the best part of the game. The random rain of meteorites is what gives the game any tension and makes it interesting. Take that away and all you have is a solitary variant of Dots.

There are Shen games I pull out all the time. They have a proven track record for making bite sized, coffee break games that are actually good.  I don’t think This Mars Vacation is one of those games but I do think it’s an interesting game.

Old Gods of Appalachia- where folklore and cosmic horror shake hands

Old Gods of Appalachia was recommended to me after I expressed my enjoyment of The Magnus Archives. It is another horror podcast that also has some cosmic horror elements.

Old Gods of Appalachia blends the traditional folklore of the Appalachians with some Lovecraftian horror. If you like Manly Wade Wellman’s Silver John stories, Old Gods will be right up your alley.

And given that the creators of Old Gods are very familiar with Appalachian folklore, they have to be familiar with Wellman’s work. With that said, Old Gods has its own darker, distinct flavor.

The core concept of the setting, which is pretty introduced at the start, is that the Appalachians are a cage for the Inner Dark, eldritch abominations. Humanity was never meant for the Appalachians but humanity came. And that isn’t good for humanity.

Old Gods of Appalachia is a patchwork quilt, moving from time periods and from different people and phenomena, often circling back around. The fact that this approach actually works really speaks to how well done the podcast is.

It can be argued how ‘Lovecraftian’ the podcast is. You don’t have to namecheck Cthulhu to be Lovecraftian and the Inner Dark definitely check off many Great Old One elements, being alien to humanity as well as beyond humanity. Old Gods of Appalachia’s rural Appalachia has some similar notes to Lovecraft’s rural New England. Well, they do depict Appalachians as human beings, unlike Lovecraft.

And, unlike many works of Cosmic Horror, there are some honest to goodness victories on the part of humanity. Despite the horror, some of which comes from the descriptions of actual historical events, Old Gods of Appalachia has strong elements of hope.

Old Gods of Appalachia blends hope, folklore and cosmic horror. Even if you only like two out of those three, you will get something out of it.

Time versus space when it comes to solitaire

For the last several years, I have focused my play on solitaire games, particularly micro games and Roll and Writes. And I have been aware that part of that has been limits on time and space. 

Then I asked myself what was actually the bigger deal, time or space?

I had kind of assumed the answer was going to be time. After all, I have become a fan of Alexander Shen who specializes in games that you can finish before your coffee gets cold. However, I realized that it was actually space.

If the whole family is playing a game, I don’t mind  dedicating the dining room table to it. However, I don’t want to hog the biggest table in the house if it’s just me.

On the other hand, I realized that I don’t mind playing longer Roll and Writes games that I can play on a clip board. With a game situation like that, space ceases to be an issue and I can take my time.

Honestly, this is kind of a happy realization. Back when I was a bachelor, playing long games that sprawled over tables was part of the experience. And that also makes me wonder if we were all posers back then lol

Still, my shift towards shorter, smaller experiences sometimes makes me wonder if I’m dumbing down my gaming experiences. Which isn’t an unfair truth. 

However, I also know that I am adjusting my gaming because my life and my priorities have changed. And knowing that space is a bigger constraint than time or complexity is nice. I am willing to think. I just know that I need to make space for everyone.

Ham Fisted does something I don’t like pretty well

Ham Fisted is an In Hand game which is all about trying to hold a grid of cards in one hand. Honestly, having to hold cards in funny ways is one of my least favorite forms of In Hand games but Ham Fisted does make it manageable.

Each card is a three by two grid. Each square is either blank or has one of four different anthropomorphic meat products. They are also small, basically half-size cards. Oh, we will get  back to that.

Draw six cards (the deck is eighteen cards so up to three people can play before needing another deck), keeping them in your hand. Flip over one card at a time and hold them in your hand, making sure they all fit within a five by five grid. Tucking and overlapping isn’t just allowed but essential. When you’ve played all six cards, you have to pinch the grid and flip your hand to make sure nothing falls.

Each meat product has a different scoring requirement. Bacon and ribs have to be in groups of two and three respectively to score a point (I believe one point per group). Every four sausages anywhere on the grid scores a point. A ham is worth a point if it isn’t in the same row or column as another ham. Most points wins.

Now, I was part of the recent play test of Downtown Las Palmas, another In Hand game that has a dexterity element. And I don’t want to comment on that since it’s still in development but I will say Downtown Las Palmas is superior in almost every way.

Ham Fisted’s saving grace is the relative ease of the dexterity element. Having tiny cards and only using six at a time makes it very manageable. And I’m not great at dexterity elements so that makes the difference of ever wanting to play Ham Fisted ever again.

I am a big fan of In Hand games. Playing space is often very limited and In Hand can mean playing a physical game is even an option. Palm Island was a watershed event for my gaming life. In Hand games are now always a part of my travel bags.

But making a game physically difficult to play as a design goal goes against why I play In Hand games in the first place.

The fact that I’m willing to keep playing Ham Fisted probably counts as high praise. The dexterity element is manageable. It’s simple enough that it wouldn’t work as a table game but keeps it from being overwhelming as a dexterity In Hand game.

If you are looking for an In Hand dexterity game, Ham Fisted is a good choice. And if you aren’t, there are plenty of other In Hand games out there that won’t give your thumbs cramps.

Is Lobster Johnson an homage or deconstruction of pulp fiction?

I have been reading the different books in Mike Mignolia’s Hellboy-verse off and on pretty much since it began. I was lucky enough to have friends with taste recommend it to me early on. (One of the same guys who introduced  me to Catan, come think of it) 

With that said, bingeing the Lobster Johnson books has been a weird experience. In part because they are not as weird as the rest of the Hellboy-verse. 

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First off, the title character is just called the Lobster. Apparently the Johnson part of the name was added, _in universe_, by pulp writers after his death. His ‘actual’ adventures take place in the 1930s before Hellboy was summoned/born. Honestly, the in-universe pop culture history of the character is the most fascinating part.

The Lobster is a guy who wears a leather jacket and goggles and goes around shooting bad guys with a pistol. That covers so much of the total description of his character that it’s not even funny.

At first, I felt that the Lobster Johnson stories were pure homage to classic pulp fiction. However, as the stories progressed, I changed my mind, that it is a subtle deconstruction.

As I mentioned, the Lobster is breathtakingly one dimensional. However, the people around him are not. He has a ragtag band of misfit assistants who are much more fleshed out than he is and I sometimes wondered why they kept hanging out with him.

Another standup example is Wald, a crime boss who is active in the first story and is in the background for several more volumes. His journey of madness and failed redemption makes him a lot more interesting than the Lobster.

Ultimately, I am gojng to argue that the real protagonist is Cindy Tynan, a reporter who is a reluctant and critical ally of the Lobster. She conveys how he is both a hero and total lunatic. And her arc ends with her walking away.

A touch that I find fascinating is that the Lobster routinely loses fights and takes ridiculous amounts of damage. At one point, someone even tells him that he’s not very good at this and it felt valid. I feel like the underlining message is the Lobster thinks that he is more of a pulp hero that he really is.

In true pulp fashion, though, he is always able to still walk and breathe after each adventure. After he survives a Zeppelin crash, I was starting to wonder if he was actually human.

While Lobster Johnson is no Hellboy, the pulp action hides a slow burning story that has some hidden gems.

Post Script: Couldn’t find a good way to add this in to my main text but I wanted to cover this. While Mignolia is on writing duty for these comics, the art was handled by other artists.  And they do a bang up job of creating a world made up of mostly shadows, particularly Tonci Zonjic. It’s still very much in Mignolia’s line and I can’t help but think of Will Eisner, who was a master of shadow and lights.

My January Gaming

I didn’t learn too many games in January. However, I think I managed to hit a couple of interesting themes and ideas.

I learned:

52 Realms: Adventures

Trap Construction Corp 

For the Northwoods 

Downtown Las Palmas

52 Realms continues my exploration of Postmark Games. It’s a card-driven dungeon crawl. Dungeon crawls are not my favorite genre (My love of Dungeons and Dragons is apparently driven by collaborative story telling, not fighting monsters)  but the mechanics balance being light with being enjoyable. There’s a lot going on for a short time of playing.

I always try to learn a Roll and Write every month. Trap Construction Corp by Alexander Shen was January’s. And while it is very light and very abstract, I still got drawn in by it. Another example of how Shen makes games that look like anyone could design it are actually quite clever.

I actually have had the untrimmed laminated sheets for For the Northwoods at the ready for months. The game itself is quite interesting. I remember when a two-player trick taking game was extraordinary and now we have solitaire ones.

Downtown Las Palmas has me going back to the playtesting forum for Button Shy. I have found that I need to pace myself when it comes to playtesting. It feels like the easiest form of gaming for me to burn out. Downtown Las Palmas has been a good experience for me.

A lot of my gaming time in January was spent prepping Print and Play projects to make for the rest of the year. (And, yes, new projects will always show up) So I think February will see more game learning.

My January PnP

 While January wasn’t a heavy month for making Print and Play projects, it did somehow manage to hit most of the keynotes that I seem to have developed. A larger project, a few minimal work games and playtest copy.

I made:

For the Northwoods

This Mars Vacation 

Trap Construction Corp

Journey to the Pond

Downtown Las Palmas (playtest copy)

For the North Woods was my big project and, by my standards, was actually a big project. Instead of a micro game, it’s a full deck of cards. And I managed to get a play in too, which doesn’t always happen.

And Downtown Las Palmas was a fun return to playtesting after taking a little break. It was fun to make and has been fun to run through.

With that said, most of my print and play crafting time was spent printing out and cutting projects that had piled up. Metaphorically. Because I had to make the physical elements before they could pile up for real :) I find that, every January, I get projects started so I have stuff to finish for the rest of year lol