Quarantine : Theme hospital it is not

I made them wait for too long....

Now like any good gamer, we have played our share of "Theme" games, like Theme Park, Theme hospital for example and when I saw Quarantine being released, it reminded me of Theme Hospital which I enjoyed. Trying to manage my own hospital, taking care of the patients and researching new technology was quite fun for me especially when the patients reacted with all these funny animation. How does Quarantine feel compared to this?

Guildhall: Job Fair. Taxcollector is so realistic ;p

Tax Collector is so powerful!

So the new standalone expansion for Guildhall is out and while I have the base game and do enjoy it (though I won't play it with more than 3), I was eager to try this out to see if its a must buy for me.
Essentially its the same game but with new professions to try out. It feels that the standalone has a different feel to the game. There is a lot of screwage still and that is quite prevalent in our game with a lot of cards switching guildhalls. The tax collector also seems to be pretty powerful and thus requires other players to ensure that it is not abused too much which brings to another point that players cannot afford to ignore what opponents are doing otherwise they can win pretty handily. Not sure if Tax collector is overpowered but with more plays I will be able to determine that. So far it seems that its a profession not to be ignored.
We played with 3 and it did take longer than I expected (maybe 45 mins or so?). I did try to go by tax collector route and grabbed the early few points lead but closed off my tax collectors too early. Then there was a lot of switching of cards around and the discard pile is now even more important because of the Hunter card. Nearer the end though, Jillian managed to have 3 collected sets and with the tax collector as the 4th set, she pretty much had the game in hand. I tried to stop it by robbing her card but she peddled it away from me during her turn.
Not a bad game but jus tlike the base game, it may not be for everyone. Try before you buy!

Guilds of Cadwallon: Is that it?

I did not do very well....

New game that Roy brought along to our gaming night. We have never played the other game this is based on (City of Cadwallon I think) as none of us have it so I was interested to see what this game provides.

Wrong Foot out of the Gates – Incorrect Rules Explanations

I recently taught ( on hindsight, more like, attempted to teach ) Eric and 3 others how to play Stefan Feld’s “In the Year of the Dragon”. Early on in the game ( after the first round ), we discovered that I left out 1 or 2 important details. Not too bad I guess, the game went on smoothly after that. It’s great that we caught it after the first round out of twelve rounds.

But to my horror, when I went through the rules the day after, I realized that I had gotten 2 or 3 more rules incorrect. Bummer. Big time bummer. Small mistakes, but mistakes nonetheless. It irritates me a lot, and that’s what I deserve when I haven’t touched the game for awhile and when I didn’t come prepared.

This brings me to a topic I thought I would like to write about – Incorrect Rules Explanations.

Frank's Ark: Thematic rules but tricky to master

So shy animals cannot be placed here....

I requested Tina to bring her game to office so that I could give it a go. Usually its me bringing my games and this time I wanted to play something I don't have and new to me.

Through the Ages : Simple game mode

Simple game mode. Its been some time...

Its been quite some time since I owned a copy of Through the Ages, played it once before I let it go because it wasn't going to see a lot of gaming time. That was when I was still transiting to being a heavy euro gamer. So I was eager to give it another go again just to see how my tastes have changed, if any. Now I have played this a couple of times since then online and let me say that playing online is way way faster especially when both players (mostly played with 2 online) are online at the same time. Things get resolved pretty quickly and there's not a lot of pushing discs around.
We played the simple game because we were expecting more of our friends to turn up and let me say that I much prefer the longer game. There is war and agression to be had and that makes up half the fun of Through the Ages I must say. The simple game seems to be an introduction to the game and will serve its purpose as a warm up to the actual longer game. Will I still want to own a copy? Not anymore I am afraid. Nowadays quite a lot of the longer civilisation games comes with a little bit more bling (plastic pieces) that enhances the experience and doesn't feel as dry. Through the Ages is essentially a card game with a lot of little discs. Its elegant and clean but I crave just that little bit more jazz to my games nowadays. I won't say no to playing the full game though but I think I will prefer playing it online than in person. With 2 I will be fine, with more it will be a bit more challenging. Try before you buy.

Goblins Drool Fairies Rule : All that rhyming lol

Nice art, excessive rhyming.. 

Jason's kickstarter copy arrived and I was surprised he backed this because he's usually a heavy euro gamer. He mentioned that he got it because of the art and looking at the game I can certainly see the art is pretty cool. How does it play though?