But does the game include a plastic Jeremy Irons on the top floor?
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I enjoy The Networks and Iām glad I have a copy, but if I had to prune my collection hard it might well end up going.
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I honestly donāt feel Iāve played them enough to offer recommendations for someone to spend $100 on a game based on my advice! Iāve been concentrating on my doctorate for the past 2 years so havenāt had the time to play these long heavy games in quite some time (Escape Plan and On Mars are on my shelf of shameā¦). Theyāre certainly on more of the Aspirational Collection end of the spectrum. And now Covid.
From vague memories, I loved Lisboa for its balance of mechanics and theme - I found it quite unique in theme and how itās applied. Probably the most āLaCerda-yā of the three Iāve played: Vinhos, Gallerist, Lisboa.
Plan is to crack them all out once all this is over.
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This is a good video ranking Lacerda games
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Iād guess that this is because Hova tried to Kickstart it with plastic buildings the first time but failed. He put it back on Kickstarter for a lower price and cardboard buildings, and it succeeded, but this third Kickstarter makes me think he was probably quite attached to the plastic buildings heād planned.
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My favorite overall Lacerda (and Iāve not gotten to play any of them much) would be CO2: Second Chance, because itās coop - the first Euro coop Iāve ever played, too. I mean, yes, technically itās also got a competitive mode, and thatās even what the original edition was exclusively. But even in that mode thereās a very-easy-to-hit shared loss condition, so youāre recommended to play the coop mode first so you have some idea how to manage not losing before you try winning all on your own. And Iāll probably just never move on to that mode because I donāt like competitive games nearly as much.
The Gallerist is so far my favorite of his competitive games, but thatās not saying very much. Theyāre all good.
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Thatās great to hear. Iāve asked for this as an Xmas present because I think tackling our first Lacerda as a team will be a good way to find out if his style is our cup of tea.
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Extremely interested in this one. Seems to be getting tons of positive feedback from a lot of credible people, most of whom I follow.
The only thing holding me back right now (besides the cost), is that Iām not sold on it working well as a co-op vs as a solo game.
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It definitely sounds to me like it plays ācoopā like Dawn of the Zeds Third Edition or Nemoās War 2nd Edition do: just split up the decision-making to player roles. which isnāt really a coop game. Itās a solo game where multiple people are talking about how to collectively act, and one person has final say over any given decision. Thatās fine and all, but I think it feels pretty silly to spend limited social time playing something like that when I could play a coop game thatās actually designed to give each player a separate point of access to the game.
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Thatās what Iām thinking. It mentioned āplayer rolesā which have specific jobs, but all use the same resource supply. Mike of One Stop Coop Shop said that they plan to develop it more, so Iām planning to keep an eye on it, but my hopes arenāt high.
Iād love to be proven wrong, as everything else about the game sounds fantastic!
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I jumped on the new Cartographers stand-alone / expansion today as soon as it launched. Thatās one of my favorite of the current run of roll and writes (or flip and fills in this case since cards not dice) and this looks to add a good deal of variety.
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Oh damn. 
And just when I thought I could pause my game buying. 
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I generally find One Stop Coop Shop and/or other playthroughs very helpful when deciding whether to back a game, but my pet peeve is basically anyone doing preview playthroughs for coop games seems to play them solo. And like, fine, that is a thing that can be done in most coop games. But itās not how Iām intending to play it, and itās especially unhelpful in a context like this when one is trying specifically to gauge if itās really just a solo game.
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I pledged but talked myself out of it. Itās an easy one to put on my wishlist for a birthday or other occasion.
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Presumably, if it can be played solo, itās really just a solo game.
I think that really depends on the genre. In the case of something like Frostpunk (with no assymetric player abilities/actions), Iām leaning towards yes.
On the other hand, many tactical coops (Too Many Bones, Street Masters, etc) tend to actually scale with player count, and the game changes when playing solo vs with others.
Fortunately for me, I tend to prefer the latter. Though I do still love Pandemic and the like.
Not at all. Almost every coop game I own can be played by one person provided theyāre willing to take on the overhead of running multiple player positions. Butā¦they have multiple player positions. They are built assuming that different people will be running those positions. Those positions have different powers, perks, inventories, etc. Whereas my solo games, like Hostage Negotiator or Black Sonata (or, although they try to pretend otherwise, Nemoās War and Dawn of the Zeds) are built assuming one person will be running them and make no distinctions or assignments of pieces or mechanics between players.
Nemoās War has a ācoopā mechanic where admin of certain parts of gameplay are assigned to particular players, but which just spreads the gameplay thinner instead of giving more players more things to do. That sounds to be what the ārolesā are in Frostpunk. But itās not really clear to me, because nobody in the playthrough videos is using them.
(And, to be clear, I do buy solo games sometimes and might consider Frostpunk even if thereās no reason to play it with my friends. But I donāt play them very often and Frostpunk is $90, soā¦)
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My remark was a bit flippant. Certainly there are games like Space Alert that can be played solo, but are obviously very different games when you do so. I can see how solo playthrough reviews of such games are pretty useless if you want to know whether or not it makes for a good coop game.
That said, the majority of ācoopā games I have played are just solo games with multiple hands, or similar.
Thatās a perspective Iāve seen elsewhere but strongly disagree with. I think thereās a pretty clear difference between games that are designed for coop play, even if they can be soloed, and games that are designed for solo play, as I outlined above. Iām willing to play soloable coop games solo sometimes, but itās absolutely way more fun with friends. Dawn of the Zeds we tried coop and having more people just brought nothing to the table at all.
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I donāt like co-ops as a general rule (I have a whole rant about it), so take my comments with a huge bucket of salt. If all information can be shared completely, then it could be played solo. But if the rules force a lack of information sharing, like Hanabi, then there is no way to play solo without cheating.
Games like Mysterium are co-ops but are entirely based on the lack of clear communication between players (or one player and the rest). These require at least 2 players, but whether having more than 2 adds or detracts from the game can be debated.
Semi co-op games with a known or potential traitor can turn into more of a social deduction game than a true co-op. Doing these solo doesnāt make sense, unless there is a mode without a traitor.
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