Latest / Pick Up and Deliver / Ulterior Design; Let’s Go! To Japan; Disney Villainous; Snakesss (revisited)

Transcript

Ulterior Design; Let’s Go! To Japan; Disney Villainous; Snakesss (revisited) · Pick Up and Deliver

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Welcome to pick up and deliver the podcast where I
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: pick up my audio recorder as I leave the library
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: and delivering episode to you while I walk home. Well,
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: good morning, listener. It's a lovely day here in suburban Chicago.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: It's sunny, it's clear, it's pretty during cold, but I'm
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: having a good time anyway. I'm walking home from the library.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: I got a couple books in my backpack. Actually have
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: one movie in one book, and it's gonna be a delight.
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: So today I am going to talk to you about
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: three games I've played recently. These are all still from
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty four. I'm not into the twenty twenty five
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: games yet, but that would be pretty impressive if I
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: had caught up that quickly, since I played like seventeen
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: new games or nineteen new games in seventeen I think
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: new games in December of twenty twenty four, and I've
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: only just started talking about them with you. So here
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: they are. For those of you new to the podcast, Welcome.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: This is a board Game Espresso episode. I do these
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: maybe one out of three or sometimes every other episode.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: I'll talk about games I've been playing recently and what
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: I think of them. Generally it's games I've tried for
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: the first time, so I only have one or maybe
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: two plays under my belt, and it gives you an
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: opportunity to give you a first impression, let you know
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: whether I'm planned to keep the game or play it more,
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: or whether it's just going to be sort of a
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: one off and done. But that's kind of the approach.
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: Let's get started. The first one I want to talk
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: about is Let's go to Japan. This is Postion in
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty four designer Josh Wood. There are several artists credited,
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: so I'm not gonna try to name them all. You
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: can go look at board Game Geek. I'll offer a
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: link to that in the show notes. Apologies to those
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: artists for not naming you individually. This is published by AEG,
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: where Josh Wood is a developer as well as a designer.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: I've played another of Josh Wood's games, Santa Monica, which
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: I enjoy. It's a nice lightweight, light to medium. It's
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: lightweight tableau builder with a very cute theme of being
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: on the Santa Monica pier. I feel like I let
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: myself down this year by not pairing that with the
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: movie Mixed Nuts, which is about people living in Venice Beach.
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: I think it's Venice Beach, which feels very Santa Monica like.
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: And you could totally see the characters from Mixed Nuts
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: on the boardwalk in Santa Monica. But this is not
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: about Santa Monica. This is about let's go to Japan.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: Like Santa Monica, Let's go to Japan. As a card
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: drafting game, you are taking cards and you're putting them
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: in a line, and that line indicates the things you're
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: going to do while you're on vacation in Japan. My
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: understanding is the person who showed us this game said
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: the story behind it is that Josh Wood was working
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: on this game when the COVID happened, and he and
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: his fiance were going to take a trip to Japan
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: and it got canceled because of the pandemic, so they
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: designed a game about planning a trip to Japan instead.
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: In the game, you're taking a series of cards and
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: those cards are going to go in online and they
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: represent the things you're doing. I think you do two
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: cards per day, and you're doing seven days. I might
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: have some of the numbers wrong, but you get the idea.
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: Each card takes place either in Tokyo or Kyoto, and
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: the idea is that one of the things you have
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: to do is account for the annoyance of riding the
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: train back and forth. If you do the fewer train rides,
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: you do the better because you don't have to spend
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: some of the resources you borrowed or you earned paying
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: for the aggravation of taking the train back and forth.
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: If you can kind of split your trip evenly, or
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: even do one the whole trip in one place, then
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: you can save those resources for other things. The game
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: is very much about sort of collecting icons and having
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: those icons then pay off in different ways. When you
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: do different kinds of activities, you get these different icons
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: on the cards, and then having those icons on the
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: cards will let you score things or advance idea, advance
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: your marker in one of a number of ways. Markers
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: then payoff in different ways. So it's a tableau builder
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: with sort of combinations of symbols. Is the main thing
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: that you're doing. It's recently fun. It's definitely more crunchy
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: than Santa Monica, perhaps because of the ongoing payoff that
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: Let's Go to Japan has with regard to the multiple
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: tokens and such, whereas once you're two, two or three
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: spaces away from a card in Santa Monica, you can't
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: do anything more with it except move people across that perhaps,
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: so like I feel like it's a lightweight. That's also
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: the scoring is more complicated, so there's more to think about.
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: This was pretty fun. It's very well designed. The art
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: is beautiful. This is a lovely game. It feels like
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: if you just wanted a lovely game about Japan, you
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: could pair this with Tokaido very easily and have just
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: a lovely one too. Taking a trip in Japan kind
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: of game day well worth a look if you have
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: a chance. That's Let's go to Japan by Josh Wood.
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: Next up we have Andy Bell Design in twenty twenty
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: three ulterior design instead of interior design. It's ulterier ear design,
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: like you have ultierior motives. This is a pretty simple
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: tableau building card game in which you are laying out cards,
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: and the cards sort of half overlap, so you're constantly
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: covering up stuff to set up the ideal design for
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: the judges who are from a magazine that are coming around,
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: and the whole idea is fashion is constantly changing, and
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: so what is marked as good design is constantly changing,
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: and your goal is to have your tableau match as
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: closely as possible the current priorities of the judges. When
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: the scoring round starts, you are allowed to play cards
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: onto other people's tableaus, so you can mess them up
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: as easily as you can add to your own thing.
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: But often, especially we played in a two player game,
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: it's often push pull. You know, me messing you up
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: is the same as me doing better for myself. They
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: just they work together. It's a pretty silly, light game,
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: pretty fun, even though the gameplay is very different. It
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: reminds me a little bit of Bunny Bunny, Moose Moose,
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: which is another game about trying to get your stuff,
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: in this case your hands into the correct position to
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: score the most points based on the constantly changing scoring tableau.
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: Ulterior Design is plays up to six, which I can't.
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: It must be really fun and chaotic at six. I
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: played it at two. It was really cool, but it was,
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: like I said, a duel, and I bet it's just
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: pretty funny shenanigans to play at these higher player counts.
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: That's Ulterior Design. From twenty twenty three designer Andy Bell,
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: artist Tim King's Lime and I believe this was published
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: in New Zealand. Next up, I have a game that
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: I got out of the dust. This is one of
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: the iconic big Potato games. It's not the one everybody
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: knows Chameleon. It's the one everybody knows less Snakes, which
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: I think is actually just as good as Chameleon, maybe
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: even better. So in Chameleon, you are trying to deduce.
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: If you're the chameleon, you're trying to deduce which of
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: the sixteen clues is the correct answer. And if you're
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: the other people, you're trying to tell everyone else that
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: you know which of the clues is the right answer,
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: but you can't reveal it. In Snakes, there is one
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: card on the table that has three answers. One of
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: the answers is right, two of the answers is wrong,
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: and they're all really weird questions, and the people around
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: the table, about half of them know the answer and
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: are trying to get the group to pick the wrong answer.
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: One person is being truthful, and you can tell they're
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: being truthful. That's kind of the game. The idea is
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: you want to try to pick the right answer. The
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: snakes are trying to get you to pick the wrong answer,
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: and you know you can trust one person. They are
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: the Mongoose of Truth. It's a very cute game, really fun.
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: As far as social deduction games go. It's really really
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: good because there is a thing to do that sort
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: of defies the social deduction part of it. But if
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: you're convinced by people, then that can be really amusing too.
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: Like someone convinced you to change your answer it turns
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: out they were the snake. It's great. The designer of
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: this game I discovered when I looked this up for
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: this podcast is Phil Walker Harding. I didn't know this
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: was one of his games, and not surprising. He's amazing
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: Phil Walker Harding. I mus have to go add it
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: to my list of games by him because that's out
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: of date. And then art is by Ben Drummond. It's
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: in the style of the Big Potato look and it
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: works really well, very iconic and fun. The Mongoose of
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: Truth figure is particularly amusing. That's Snakes from twenty twenty one.
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: Finally I got a chance to play Disney Villainous The
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: Worst Takes it All. This is designed by Prospero Hall
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: and oddly Aaron Donnagh. I've never seen a Prospero Hall
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: design that also had an individual person's name on it,
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: so I'm not sure the relationship of those two. For
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: those of you who don't know, Prospero Hall is a design
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: collective that I believe has been dissolved but did a
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: lot of really interesting work for several years for a
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: lot of brands, Disney in particular, but I think they
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: were owned by Funco for a while, and so all
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: the Funco Pop games or fun Co games were designed
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: by Prospero Hall. Really interesting stuff, good designs, but very
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: mass market friendly, Disney villainous. In this game, you are
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: one of the Disney villains. The base game comes with
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: four different villains you can be. Are six different villains
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: you can be. You could be Ja'afar, the Queen of Hearts,
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: Captain Hook, Prince John from Robin Hood, Ursula from The
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: Little Mermaid, and Moleficent. Each one has their own sort
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: of thing that they're trying to do and heres they're
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: trying to stop them, and you're each sort of playing
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: on your own board. The way that you interfere with
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: one Another is one you have some cards that will
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: let you benefit when your opponents do a thing, and
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: two you can take actions to cause them to have
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: fate interfere with their plans, which is generally characters from
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: the story. This is a very mean game. If you
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: didn't realize Villainous would be a mean game, I think
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: you're not reading the package right, but yes you are.
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: If you see an opponent who is on their way
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: to winning, you have to spend some of your time
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: trying to make them stop winning. So that part is
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: frustrating if you're not ready for it. Some who are
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: players that we played. I played it twice and some
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: of the people I played it with really did not
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: like that, even though it's at the core of the game.
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: I feel like if you know that's what it's going
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: to be going in and can have a sense of
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: humor about people attacking you, you can have a lot
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: of fun. I really like the esthetic design of the game.
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: My main problem with it is it's so slow, Like
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: playing this at five or six players would be a
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: nightmare because the downtime is interminable. Like I said, they
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: do have these cards that you can play on other
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: people's turns. They give you something to do while those
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: other people are having their turn, but mostly it is
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: really really slow when it's not your turn. So I
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: liked it. I don't know if I would buy any
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: of the expansions straight up, but I certainly would if
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: I found them at Goodwill, buy them to add to
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: my collection. I'm going to hang onto this for a
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: while because I did think it was a good time.
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: That's Disney villainous, the worst takes it all well. That
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: brings me to the end of my Board Game Espresso episode.
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: We are here in twenty twenty five now, so this
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: is a good time to let you know. I would
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: really love here at the end of season seven to
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: hear a bit about what you think about the show.
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: Where do you think are its high points? Where do
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: you think it could use some work, or we could
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: say it's low points. What are the things that I'm
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: doing that you would enjoy hearing more of? What are
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: the things I'm doing you would enjoy hearing less of.
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: Do you have ideas for episode topics? Any of those
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: things I would love to hear. The best way to
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: get a hold of me is sending me a message
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: in Board Game geek Wombat nine two nine. You could
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: also email me Brendan at rattoboxgames dot com, although I
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: don't check that email as much as I should, and
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: you could post in the guild. We could have a
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: conversation about this in public. I'd be happy to have that.
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: That's guild three two sixty nine over on board game Geek.
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: Probably the easiest way to do that find that it's
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: to go to ratoboxgames dot com, click on the show
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: and follow the link from there. Well, that's about it
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: for me today. Thanks for joining me on my walk today.
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: I hope your next walk is a pleasant mind was
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: good bye brought to you by rattle Box