Gamzee Blog

Really great post from game designer Dave Sirlin on the Olympic badminton controversy, and how the rules that led to this are really, really flawed:

http://www.sirlin.net/blog/2012/8/1/playing-to-win-in-badminton.html

Game Night last night was a fun affair, with a mix of “quick” games (I’ll say why that’s ironic in a moment). We played a five-handed game of 7 Wonders, and I finally won. Going technology (or whatever the green cards are) proved to be key, due to the cards-of-the-same-type-squared scoring formula. I had 25 points for 4 of the same type (16 points), plus 7 for one of each type, plus 2 for the other two cards. And that let me win by a lot.

Then we played Cards Against Humanity, which again is a brilliant game. Some folks remixed Apples to Apples, making a much more fun version with a whole bunch of really inappropriate cards. Sure, you can’t play it with kids (well, you shouldn’t), and the designers and writers seem to have an odd obsession with Glen Beck. But making a pseudo-haiku with cards like “fiery poops” and “Robert Downey, Jr.” really fulfills my innate immaturity. Jordan won that game by a lot, doing a great job of adapting his awful/hilarious answers to the person judging each round.

And we finished the night out playing Munchkin Booty. This was the second game of Munchkin that we played that took over two hours to finish. While it’s still fun, Munchkin tends to get exhausting when it drags on this long. We had a couple people drop out of the game due to getting killed/reset. And a lot of folks hung out at 9/10 levels for a really long time. Somehow, I eventually managed to win, due to some major buffs. And despite losing the three ships I’d acquired in my role as a Level 8+ Navy dude.

We’d love to find more quick games. Most of the stuff we have that we really like takes well over two hours to play (or requires an exact number of people). We usually wind up playing a Munchkin set or 7 Wonders or Small World. And while those are all good games, some more variety would be nice.

We’re trying to keep this blog updated. Generally failing in any reasonable sense of the word “udpated,” but we are trying

We had a small game night last night, just me, Sean, and Jordan, our new(ish) QA guy. We opted to try out Fiasco, a “storytelling game,” I purchased a digital download of last week. Fiasco aims to replicate a kind of loose, short-session Dungeons & Dragons, only with far less rules and no Dungeon Master. Drawing from small-time caper films where something goes horribly wrong (BLOOD SIMPLE, A SIMPLE PLAN, THE KILLING, FARGO, etc.), players take on various roles, have relationships with one another, and then most of us try to do something stupid, with the end result being catastrophe. The goal being to simulate in about two hours one of those caper films. Our first play session went reasonably well. We chose an Old West scenario, with Sean playing a grizzled ranch hand (Billy Bahb) and partner to Jordan’s ranch hand (Skeeter Montana). Years ago, a drunk Billy Bahb tried to convince Skeeter to purchase his railroad pushcart and goaded him into taking it down to the haunted mine, where Skeeter found old pirate gold (no idea why there were pirates in the Old West, but hell, it’s our first time playing). Back to the present of our story, and Billy tries to convince his no-good stepson Bobby Bahb (me!), a janitor at the hotel Skeeter owns with part of his gold proceeds to rob the hotel safe and get the gold back that should be rightfully his. Bobby sleeps with Skeeter’s wife after nailing him into the outhouse. Billy Bahb tries to (unsuccessfully) burn the outhouse down with Skeeter in it (Skeeter rocks the outhouse over on top of Billy Bahb). Billy Bahb’s wife, Dolly, tells him she slept with someone else, setting off a drunken rampage where he beats Dolly.

Billy Bahb asks for Bobby’s help again, with Bobby agreeing. Skeeter overhears and becomes paranoid. In the second act, Skeeter sends goons out to beat Billy Bahb and Bobby up and tie them up. Dolly comes in with a gun, shoots her husband in the leg. The Bahbs get free and open up the safe with Dolly’s help (she had the key due to her relationship with Skeeter; and of course, I have to sleep with her again). Bobby turns on his dad and knocks him unconscious. He and Dolly get the gold. Billy Bahb shoots his son in the head, Dolly shoots her husband a few more times, and Billy Bahb rides off on the handcart with the gold, down to the old haunted mine. Skeeter dies of his wounds, Bobby ends up mentally handicapped, working as a janitor in the new hotel in town, no longer a ladies’ man, and Bobby haunts the mine. Dolly winds up with the gold that conveniently fell off the handcart and takes over the town.

Fiasco was a lot of fun, and even with people who aren’t the strongest at improv, the suggestions and twists gave us a decent little story. Rules are fairly limited, which lets you craft a story fairly easily and also adds some tension and complications. I’m interested to try the game again.

We also played Small World, with Sean edging me out by a single gold coin at the very end (120-119). What a frustrating way to lose!

On to actual Gamzee product news. We’ve been working hard away on a few things. First is the iOS version of DownWords, which we actually finished and were ready to release. But then we realized we should wait, because we’re also adding some cool multiplayer features to the game that will make it that much better.

And we’ve also been working on our mysterious third game, which is seeing great progress. I can’t say what it is, but can say that it’s a very social, multiplayer game that should appeal to people who like things like Words With Friends and Draw Something.

But first, some news…

We’re in the home stretch on mystery game #1. It’s looking very nice. Stay tuned for more news.

Last week’s Game Night marked the debut of BANG!, a Spaghetti Western-themed card game that we’ve had in our office for around five months. We finally got around to playing it. BANG! is kind of a cross between Mafia/Werewolf and maybe a really dumbed-down Magic: The Gathering or Dominion, sans deck-building.

Players take on a secret role, except for the sheriff, and try to kill or help each other out secretly. The hidden role dynamic, variety of cards (we played with a super-set with several expansions), different characters, and other bits make for a fun, quick game. Plus, all the cards are in Italian and English, so you can practice your fancy accent.

This week, we brought out Small World again, for a four-handed game. It was the first time playing for Michael and Tom (Web Designer). But the great thing about Small World is that it’s pretty simple to pick up, a quick play, and fun. Despite some inadvertent cheating on my part, I managed to win the game, just barely. This was the first time I’d played any games with Emily where she didn’t win (although she did come in second).

It was Emiley’s first Game Night with Gamzee and she came out swinging. We tried Small World, a game I recently picked up and played a couple of 2-player rounds of with my fiancee. It is a game that I highly recommend. As board game fans know, good board games are expensive. Small World’s no exception, costing $49.99.

But Small World’s worth it. Aside from the gameplay (which I’ll get to in a moment), it features beautiful art, four different boards (for 2-, 3-, 4- and 5- player variations), nice thick cardstock race tokens, and nicely-designed and robust money, turn marker, custom pieces like mountains, heroes, a dragon, and fortifications, and a custom die (turning a 6-sided die into one that shows 0-3).

Gameplay is great. Unlike a lot of Eurogames, your time investment is limited due to the turn marker (8-10 turns, depending on the number of players). And the designer took time to craft four different boards for the varying amounts of players. It’s a very fun, well-balanced game with a clear strategy and a good amount of variation. The goal is to get the most victory coins, mostly through conquest, utilizing one or more races with different abilities and randomly-selected special powers.

Emiley cleaned up, winning handily.