That… Seems like an unnecessarily large box
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I just don’t get it. Do publishers think we love huge boxes?!? Surely anyone who sees that is going to be intimidated to hell and back!
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They want you to be able to easily find it on the shelf at your local store.
And for many people, there’s a sort of satisfaction knowing that 1 box contains everything you could want for that one game. In my experience, the big box is more likely to trigger the “Oh, god, I can’t put this on the table, it’ll scare away all my friends!”
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I mean, I understand it for the El Grande Big Box. That has a huge board and a tower and stuff. But they could have just made the Quacks box twice as deep, it’s not like it needs a complicated storage layout.
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They’ve paid for that cover artwork, so it needs a big old box to display it.
Given you could fit everything in that box in the Herb Witches expansion box (after punching), slapping ‘BIG BOX’ on the original box would do.
I find it odder that this was released without the Alchemists expansion.
I played 18MS online and found it lacking, since 1862 was suggested it looks genuinely more interesting but less 18XX
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Correct on both counts.
Agree. It is more Euro-y.
I’ve grown a shout out on the 18XX area of the local discord
We talked a bit about this in the latest podcast - apparently the whole store presence thing still really matters even now, and if you have a small box your game lands on the Small Box Shelf and people say “why does this cost €30, it’s on the small box shelf where games cost €15” and so on.
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It’s a good point.
Slap down a big box on the shelf with a price tag of $60 on it and people will say, “Ooooh, what is this incredible value?” Put the same game in a small box and mark it at $30 and people will look at it and scrunch their nose.
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I bought fleet the dice game (I’ve had my eye on it for ages and victorvipers play through inspired me to look for it in some shops. Had a go solo and just went under the worst level of “ranked” score but I was watching a movie at the time too.
At the same time i bought Feirabend/Finishing time which is another of those worker placement games where the workers are workers. The theme seems kind of fun - you play as workers who have to manage their post daily work acitivities between some relaxation or working more to get better conditions at work (equal pay between men and women, holidays, wages and so on). The theme is kind of cool and it was less than £40 so worth a punt while I wait for some other stuff.
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Score aside, how did you enjoy it? I ended up introducing it to my partner and she really liked it, so it’s probably going to end up getting purchased (I can’t bring myself to use too many of my friend’s sheets!).
Meanwhile I finally brought home a copy of Aristeia! today after finding a copy of the “all-in-one” bundle (includes multiplayer) locally. This won’t get played much for the time being, but I’m hoping it won’t be too hard to get some games lined up in the future.
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Oath arrived, and it’s very shiny.
I’m kind of more looking forward to being able to play it on Vassal though, and that’s all a matter of how much programming/development time I can get.
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I actually nabbed a couple of games (Startups & Metro X) second-hand through a local facebook buy/sell group. Normally I’m late to see the posts and the games I’m after are always gone by the time I get there - but not this time! I’ve been looking for a copy of Startups for over a year, it seems to sell at stupid prices new in Aus, so super thrilled to get my hands on it for a reasonable price (and unplayed to boot!) And Metro X was a nice little bonus.
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It is but the insert needs replacing and my mat is still stinky. I have washed it and aired it. But after a game I still have a sore throat… the game itself though… and I love the tutorial game. It really shows off all the concepts.
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I don’t seem to have either problem, which is a relief.
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Got Onitama and the Sensei exp from eBay. I didnt like the app, which result in me not liking the game much. It seems like a game of which one screws up first.
So I bought it and see if it’s better with a more intelligent human opponent!
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I liked it. I got a better score in a second game which is always heartening (this time breaching into the first proper rank) but it was interesting how different the game was (I got hammered by the bot continually getting markets the second time).
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A thing I particularly like about Onitama is that it’s small enough that the time span from screwup to game over is generally quite short; there isn’t a protracted phase of “I don’t think I can win, but maybe I can pull something out so I should keep playing”.
Must work on my 3d-printable travel Onitama set. Hinges are hard.
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