Managed to spend a Saturday afternoon mostly playing games with a large group for the first time in a long while.
- Flip 7. Very enjoyable as a push your luck filler game while waiting for other people to arrive. While it says “up to 18 players”, this would be far too slow to be fun. We played with six and it felt about right - it could probably support a couple more and still be good.
- Rebirth. We split into two groups, and I played in a four-player game of all new players. I really liked the way the game felt so open at the start but claustrophobic at the end. The game plays fast but is still long enough that it felt like I’d accomplished something by the end. The castles in particular give it a really nice table presence. I won by a single point. The slightly weird, but presumably thematic, tie-breaking rules meant that if the second placed had got an extra point then the third place player would have won because they controlled Stirling Castle. Would happily play again.
- Dying Message. You have to make your own message to point towards one of six suspects by arranging up to 15 cards that have symbols on them. My summary would be that it’s a much quick and more portable, but significantly worse, version of Mysterium. Would not choose to play again.
- Tacta. Card laying game where you are trying to place and protect dots on your cards while covering other people’s dots subject to placement rules surrounding lines on the cards. The game itself is fun and fairly fast… up until you have to do scoring at the end, where you are trying to count how many dots you have. All the dots are white, with the background colour determining who the dot belongs to, and when each of the six players has ~40-60 dots it’s tough to not lose count. It might actually be quicker to keep a running tally and update it after every move. Or create an app that gives you the final score from a photo.