After settling in to the rhythm of Airecon on the Thursday, Friday was the first full day with exhibito hall open events running, and games galore to be played. I did a lot of the latter.
Meeting up with Tim for a coffee post breakfast, we headed down to the halls expecting queues to get in. Being members of the Press, don’t you know, we were let into the exhibitor hall entrance a little early and Tim immeditedly gravitated towards the Asmodee stand and a game that had been getting a lot of interest, Flip 7.
This is a pure push your luck game that gave me the vibe of Can’t Stop in a deck of cards, while feeling kind of like Uno but with more player agency. Effectively you are just asking for cards to be dealt, trying to not get a pair in front of you or you pust. Each numbered card has that many of the card in the deck i.e there are 10 cards with the number 10, 7 cards with the number 7 etc. When you stop taking cards you score points and over multiple rounds you are looking to hit 200. Throw in some special cards here and there and you have a pretty fun little game, if very light.
I had brought with me a chess board. Not to play chess though. To play Fake Chess. Fake Chess is played on a chess board but you do not need to know the rules. Instead you are crossing off pieces on a grid like a roll & write. When you cross of an unshaded square you can move that type of piece anywhere on the board. When you cross of a shaded one, you can perform a capture with a piece (we did this with normal chess moves but the rules were a little unclear as to if that was the case). In addition you can ‘roleplay’ elements of a chess match to make special moves. Insult your opponent, compliment them, name the last move etc. It was really strange, but a lot of fun.
Both Tim and I are fans of Photograph and other games by the team of Saashi and Saashi. Tim had their latest game Remember our Trip. This is a game of collective memory sharing as you make shapes on your personal board then place those shapes on a common board in the middle. As you are both doing this at the same time, it means you can block your opponent and do all sorts of clever things in order to boost your points. it is fiendish and charming at the same time as you both wrestle with where exactly the monastery was and how big that restaurant you went to actually was. I really hope we can play it again over the course of the convention.
Tim and I got a quick game of Builder’s High in which was a sort of tableau/engine building game that really requires you to accelearte fast. I didn’t quite get the hang of it and Tim put me in my place quickly, but I could see the potential of the various cards and the variety of powers the different buildings you could build would get you.
After being joined by Sam and Doug we played some Torchlit, which was a trick taker I hadn’t managed to get to the day before and was really keen to try. Sam, Doug, and Tim were good enough to accomodate me and I had a blast. It’s the kind of trick taker where there are lots of options on your turn that I really like, no obvious plays. Effectively you are bidding on how far you can get in the dungeon while also trying to make sure the spot you want to get to is filled with cards from tricks. The lowest played card gets to decide where some cards are played, but the highest card gets to move. There are trump suits and other considerations thrown in, just to muddy the waters.
Tim headed off to play some Blood on the Clocktower and I went and did a little wandering. I eventually settled down on a table with Richard and Luke from We’re Not Wizards and their friend Paul. I spent the afternoon playing games with them including Can’t Stop, Strike, and Prey another Day. Regular readers will know of my love for Can’t Stop that Richard has a magical ability to be really good at. Strike is a wonderful dexterity game of dice chucking into a small arena, thematically meant to be gladiators in the arena. We played a few games of it as it was just so easy to play and a great laugh. Prey another Day I was less keen on. It is basically a bluffing game where you are trying to hunt everyone else out of the round with your creature in order to get points. It felt very incidental to me, but the company was good which helps a lot with that kind of game.
Richard, Luke and I ended up going to the ‘party’ that was being held for press and exhibitors after the trade hall closed. It was good to be introduced to some new folk from the Staying in podcast and I had a long chat with Sam (I think that was the name, terrible memory sometimes) about the current state of RPG criticism and the games he was into. I also chatted with some of the smaller publishers inlcuding Kathrine from No Drinks on the Table. It is always a pleasure to talk to folk who are passionate about the hobby and I hope to get a chance to try Kathrine’s games out today (Saturday).
The folks from Beyond Cataclysm had expressed an interest in playing some Slugblaster and I met up with them up the party with beer in hand and pizza to share. They popped out for some bonus chips and I ended up running the game for Chris and Dave over about an hour and a half. It was really good fun and an interesting experience to run for only two players. We chatted a lot about the different games that Chris and I like and the merits, and flaws, of systems that more mechanically push certain story elements versus more freeform games. Do check out their stand if you are into your RPGs as you are bound to find something you like.
I rounded off the evening meeting back up with Sam, Alice, and a new person to me called Pickles. We played the latest Reiner Knizia game Rebirth. With a map of Scotland to play on, how could I not. This was a very Reiner game with tile placement giving you invcreasing points, a smattering of control and conflict over who gets to place the rather nice castle pieces, and some hidden objectives for good measure. I lost by one point! It was also my first time handling the re-wood material that CGE developed last year and I have to say it certainly feels like a plastic equivalent. How actually environmentally friendly it is I don’t know.
I rounded off the day by teaching Photograph and then it was time for bed. I hope to get a chance to show some RPGs to more folk today and go to a talk or two, but other than that I am footloose and fancy free for the day. See you at the show I hope!
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