Podcast #200 - The Top 10 Games You "SHOULD" Play!

9 posts were split to a new topic: Mottainai or The Language Discussions

The Twilight Imperium felt like everyone was just bored of the argument to put it in by just Matt and thought “aaaah fine”

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I thought it was a very good discussion over all and enjoyed the episode a lot. I was inspired to make my own list–being a software dev I am used to making lists type-safe–and so I had to make a list where all games conform to the same type of expectation. The SUSD list really kind of needs the whole episode for context.

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Finished listening now, as a caveat I think it was a broadly interesting discussion and a lot of good games were brought up.

However, as someone who has been losing arguments to a more eloquent, persuasive and argumentative best friend since I was 9 I think that Quinns and to an extent Matt railroaded the list where they wanted to go.

It’s a fun thing and it really doesn’t matter but personally I found parts of it difficult to listen to.

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Yeah Ava and Tom really felt junior here to me. I think Tom at least got a sop with Bohnanza but I can’t tell what Ava’s was.

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I agree, but I also think the format made it very difficult to give everyone equal weight. I didn’t find it awkward, even if it was biased.

On an unrelated note, anyone else feel like they SHOULD play Roads & Boats?

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Right, I managed to listen to the podcast last night, and although I have only played 3 of them, I can see what they sort of wanted to get at.

  1. Pandemic Legacy Season 1
    Never played it, but I have played a fair bit of Pandemic, and I see why it is here. If I’m honest, Legacy is not something that appeals to me (the thought of destroying components of a game really horrify me) but seeing how most gamers agree is the best there is, I can see why it is on the list. I would replace it by Spirit Island, though.
  2. The Mind
    Played it, don’t own it, and I don’t intend to. Great description of the experience. You don’t know what it is, but from a simple concept a whole meta-thing develops out of thin air, which can be quite magical. I definitely agree with it being on the list, to be tried at least once.
  3. Twilight Imperium 4th Edition
    Would love to play this in real at least once. As I would Eclipse, or any space opera. Or any sandbox game The problems to do so are two, who to do it with, and where to get the time to do it. I have not been committed enough yet
  4. Crokinole.
    Too expensive to feel enticed by it, plus space issues. My answer here goes in the same direction as Roger, I’d rather not try it. If I knew somebody that owns it, close by, I would definitely give it a go.
  5. Bohnanza
    Played it and really enjoyed it. But I didn’t think it was such a game that everybody needs to try at least once.
  6. Tigris & Euphrates
    I must admit this does not appeal to me one bit. And if after all that time you can end with one point, I know it is a game I would end in negative score. Thanks for making clearer that it will not be a game for me…
  7. The King’s Dilemma
    Great concept, would love to play it. But I have the same problem here that I would have with Captain Sonar, you need a large group, and you need that group to commit for a period of time. Nearly a dream. In fact, I would have put Captain Sonar on the list instead.
  8. A Feast for Odin
    Played it, loved it. Actually, the two only Uwe Rosenberg games I’ve played made the list, funny that.
  9. Skull
    Never played, but would love to. Although if they compared with Cockroach Poker, to me it needs to be really good to beat that.
  10. Roads & Boats
    We were all thinking of pillbox when this came up. I’m surprised it beat the Brass games, although I’ve never played it, I would have Lancashire instead…

I did enjoy the backs and forwards on the podcast, and I think they should do things like this more often. Even though I agree that Tom and Ava had the junior treatment to a degree.

PS: By the way, where did Blood on the Clocktower end up?

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Aside from the fact that it is great and “SHOULD” be tried, you can’t score negative. You just score whichever of 4 colours you have least of, plus the wild colour (treasure) split evenly between them. Put more thematically, if you just do a ton of religious wars and temples and end up with 20 red, neglecting your farms, markets, and legal infrastructure(?), your score is still going to be low. You get a point for every tile you place in a kingdom that is attached to your corresponding leader.

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I must admit I did not have a clue about the scoring. I was just kidding, and knowing how bad I am at euros in general, I am very capable to end on a big fat 0 then… I stand corrected. It’s just that Knizia has other games that I find way more appealing, like Through the Desert, or My City, for example.

I think (from vaguely remembered podcasts) this is a game that Quinns soured on hard after his initial enthusiastic review.

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Do we know why? Bad experience or just “done with it” ? I could imagine that when this game doesn’t click with a group it falls flat “hard”.

Why do we sour on games?

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Competitive speed games are weird. The first and only time I played Sonar, the other team were just so ridiculously fast they seemed to be skipping the process somehow (I forget exactly how) so our guy trying to track them was understandably totally overwhelmed. It just got messy?

I’ve had problems with many speed games - the process gets elided out by people optimising as much as they can (Escape), or fumbling the bits just feels like it gets in the way (zombie 15).

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Ooo hard disagree :see_no_evil:
Not because I’m not especially fond of Spirit Island (although I’m not), but because I think Pandemic Legacy isn’t just about being a good co-op, it’s about affecting the structure of the game and building a story over time with a group of people.

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As I said, I have not played a Legacy game yet, so I cannot really compare, but for telling a story within a simple game and for better game mechanisms (amongst other things, like not having a consistent group that would commit to something like that) I would rather have SI there. But it is just my humble opinion.

If the list needed to have a Legacy game wedged in (although that implies committing to a series of games) I agree that probably the highest ranked one makes sense to be there. But in the end no social deduction games made it, while two card games did (Bohnanza and Skulls) so there you go. And as @lalunaverde says, not a single train game?? Outrageous :slight_smile:

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I was thinking what to put, but I found trains with shares to be very dry, even the light accessible ones!

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Skull feels like half social deduction though.

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In a way, I think it is something you should try at least once. My itch with the 18XX is length (I’d rather they were shorter, or I’d rather play a space opera for that long a time) and there are games out there that even they simplify the concept (Brass or PanAm come to mind) they can give you an idea of what the genre is like?

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While I don’t wich to disagree with your reasons for not being pro legacy, they do add a whole extra dimension if done well. For me it was Betrayal Legacy that was my highlight one. Betrayal at House on the Hill is wobbly but makinga joined up campaign meant the poor games mattered less in themselves as it was building up to quite a cool story and artefact.

I think it was an interview with Rob Daviau about Risk Legacy where he said that Legacy was intended to get a game played more in it’s life time than average. I think the initial intention was for non-hardcore gamers but in a setting with lots of new hotness always hitting the table a decent legacy game would be more likely to keep hitting the table. In my experience this has some truth, Gloomhaven and Betrayal legacy both were all that got played until campaign completion with my friend who purchase the most games and repeatedly wants to keep trying his new purchases. From that point of view I think they create less waste.

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Betrayal and Risk are definitely two Betrayal games that actually I find attractive, if for different reasons. If Risk Legacy would have been around when I used to play it often at home with my brother in the 90s, I am pretty sure we would have loved the concept, and it would have rivalled Hero Quest big time.

And Betrayal is my second favourite horror game behind Cthulhu: Death May Die, so I can see how Legacy could make it really interesting. Although I have to look more into it and how they justify it thematically, I cannot see how you would justify entering abandoned Houses on Hills every other Thursday :stuck_out_tongue:

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Fortunately the in game story sensibly had that covered! You don’t have to play entering abandoned, possibly haunted, building addicts

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