Tag Archives: caylus

The Problem with Game Length

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Once upon a time, a game called Caylus (2005) was released, and it was quickly lauded as the best game ever. It soon climbed the ranking charts on BGG, and there was much hysteria about whether it would surpass Puerto Rico (2002) as the new #1. (Spoiler: it did not.) And so when I sat down to play it on December 14, 2005, I had high expectations.

They were not met.

OK, I’ll admit, I didn’t understand at the time that the hype was over the worker-placement mechanism, which created a whole new industry of eurogames, including ones that I quite enjoy such as Agricola (2007), Le Havre (2008), and A Feast for Odin (2016) — which seems to suggest that I particularly enjoy the somewhat smaller Uwe Rosenberg worker-placement game industry. But I also love Viticulture (2015) and much of Richard Breese’s Key series, depending on how you define “worker placement”. I mean how many games can say they were the basis of a mechanic tag on BGG? (Dozens, I suppose, with pointless arguments over whether a game was “first” or not, when it’s really a question of whether it was “inspirational”*.) And how many games can say they created stupid arguments over terminology started by people too lazy to understand the words they’re using? Continue reading →

Defining Worker Placement

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Would worker placement by any other name smell as sweet? Perhaps. But there’s power in names: they allow us to develop a common vocabulary, so that we know what other people mean, permitting us to set our own expectations.

That means that a big kerfluffle about naming conventions is significant, such as when a notable board game show says that a non-worker-placement game is one of the top games in that category of play. Because it muddles our meanings, it impairs our communication, and it sets incorrect expectations:  if you loved worker-placement games and picked up the game in question based on a recommendation, you might well be disappointed (or not: it’s a great game otherwise).

So this week I wanted to give my own definitions of worker placement, starting with a look at its history. Continue reading →

The Multiplayer IGA Nominees: 2006

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There are, over the gaming year, five different major awards. The first two are the German awards, the SdJ and the DSP. Then there’s the RPG industry award (the Origins) and finally the American mass-market award (the Games 100). It’s pretty easy to pigeon-hole each of these:

  • The SdJ is a German award for a casual or family game.
  • The DSP is likewise a German award for more serious games, though the results have been getting more casual as they’ve started to let the masses vote.
  • The Origins board & card game awards are, first of all, more beauty contests than anything else — where people vote on companies as much as products. In addition they tend to award American take-that style play. If you’re looking for a new Munchkin, look here. (Since splitting into the Origins award & Choice awards, Origins proper has gotten somewhat better, while the Choice awards continue to be about what you’d expect.)
  • The Games 100 are a very eclectic mix, centering on ultra-casual strategy-light games that’ll appeal to the (American) mass market, but extending somewhat to more gamist games, thanks primarily to the fact that they get to name 100 picks.

… and then there’s the IGA, the International Gamer Awards.

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Last Season’s Hot Games: A Top Ten from Essen 2005, Part One

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Last year I worked up a list of the top ten games to be released at Essen 2005. Now that several months have gone by, I’ve actually had the time to play through all of them (other than no-show Tempus). As a result, this week and next I’m going to offer up a summary of my opinions about the best (and worst) games from my list.

This week, the top five games, which I grade between an “A” and a “B+”, all well above average.

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The Year in Review: 2005

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Another year is behind us, and as January slowly dawns over the horizon of the twenty-first century, our ever-human instinct is to look back and reflect upon what the previous year brought.

It was, in general, a year of growth and change for the gaming industry. I’m not convinced that any true classics were produced last year. I think that Caylus will ultimately prove too long to support its continued rating as a top-10 game. However, there were a decent number of good, gamer’s games which I’m happy to own and which will continue to occasionally hit tabletop for many years.

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Games to Watch For: Essen ’05

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October is inevitably a good month for German games thanks to to the hundreds(?) of new releases at Essen. Word slowly trickles over to the States about the best, and in the weeks and months that follow the games trickle over as well.

What follows is my listing of what I think are the games coming out of Essen with the most potential. It inevitably ended up being a list of gamers’ games, not card games or fillers, no matter how deserving they might be. Some are actually reprints, or games otherwise being made widely available to America for the first time, but the main point is this: for most people they’ll be new.

I’ve offered up my best representation of each game, but I actually haven’t seen any of them yet (except Elasund), so I can’t guarantee accuracy, especially not for the “Like:” area. Feel free to add your own thoughts or comments below.

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