less interesting when you had to translate it first. Gallia divisa est in partes tres… I very much preferred the “Asterix und Obelix” variant of warfare
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I’ve come to find that I have very little tolerance for memoirs – hearing a one-sided story is just less than interesting. Admittedly, most of the content I’m consuming is probably greatly informed by The Conquest of Gaul, but hopefully with more sources of truth considered.
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Are you trying to suggest that the great Caesar himself was less that completely truthful in his dispatches? I am shocked.
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Funny, I just got in the first stab in on Caesar the other night in the video game I am playing. For being less than truthful.
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Whether that’s true or not (I’m sure we all have opinions about politicians, regardless of the century in which they politicked), there’s even the problem with lenses through which people perceive events – a person being 100% truthful may not know the truth.
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Just to be clear I was being sarcastic. His despatches are well known as being propaganda.
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Branching over from the “Has anyone played…” thread, I went ahead and ordered Stephenson’s Rocket as well as Deus, as both are pretty well reviewed and they were ridiculously cheap. After shipping, the order was still under $30.
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So despite umming and ahhhing over a low interaction Euro I scored a new in shrink KS Shikoku:1889 for £65 today.
Happy with that for an exemplar 18XX in my collection
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Hit this up on BGA! It’s been on my “curious” list for a long time.
And I just bought @Pillbox’s copy. It’s a club.
Separately, I’ve posted elsewhere that I’m on a complete buying hiatus, but the pre-orders and such are still trickling in (like Shikoku there).
Recently received Steam.
For those unfamiliar with the history, Martin Wallace made Age of Steam back in 2002. It was meant to be a kind of traditional board game that drew heavily on 18xx mentality. As such, there’s enough rope to hang yourself any number of ways and a bunch of fiddly rules that give you permission to be a jerk to your opponents (such as spinning your monetary lead into camping on unusable actions to deny your opponents and keep them in the stone age).
In 2005, Railways of the World came out which was a more family friendly take on the concept. You can’t go bankrupt, there’s no competition for actions, and there’s a market of cards making needed actions more accessible.
It seems Wallace wanted to iterate on Age of Steam but the publisher wouldn’t let him, so he took Steam: Rails to Riches to another publisher. This last iteration (the one I got), came with two modes - there’s a basic mode which is pretty much SdJ level complexity (ligher than RotW) while still cramming in economic tension and a meaty fight over cubes and map hexes, and the standard mode which is pretty much Age of Steam with the bastard edges sanded off. The game is 90% the same with a handful of key differences that make AoS fans hate it.
For the chance to get two games in one, a SdJ level game I can table with anyone and a near-Age-of-Steam implementation I can play for special occasions, it became the clear choice. Also, Age of Steam and Railways of the World are owned by Eagle Gryphon. So, with Steam, I got the base game and 5 expansions for about the price of one Eagle Gryphon box. Can’t argue with that either.
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Ah, you mean the fun 
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My 2024 goal is one planned purchase. Iron Rails game #4 and the deep Ride the Rails box.
El Grande has finally been dispatched. And then I have Haggis, Bacon and Lunar small boxes coming.
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A few games which arrived for my birthday: Verdant, Flamme Rouge: Peloton, and Those Pesky Garden Gnomes. The latter is a trick taking game which will be appearing in the boxes of air thread…
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I was gonna wait till after Christmas, but I saw a cheap damaged copy of Unmatched Adventures and decided to grab it.
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Finished my Christmas shopping by buying Exit: the secret lab for my brother-in-law (who loves escape rooms) and Akropolis for my parents.
My husband couldn’t leave a board game shop without a new game, so he bought Deception: Murder in Hong Kong
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I don’t think I’ve played DMIHK since the pandemic hit. Might work as a PBF, mind you…
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After declaring it as my GOTY 2023, I bought Stationfall from Zatu. Also bought MicroMacro 3, 4, & the Bonus Box
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Lidl once again had Exit games in as some of their Christmas gift offerings, so I grabbed the couple I don’t have (Kidnapped in Fortune City and The Cursed Labyrinth).
Maybe I’ll play a couple over Christmas with my partner.
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I was weak this weekend. A fellow local gamer was selling his copy of Destinies + expansion for only 100 NZD, so I went for it. Second game I buy this year, and probably just third addition to the collection if I count KS received.
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Bought MicroMacro: Crime City Bonus Box, which I only realised today was a thing. Wanted to buy the latest game too (Showdown), but can’t see it in English yet. No hurry I guess, haven’t completed the first game yet, yet alone the next two. I did start playing it with my group, but I don’t think they were really into it.
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