This week, Paul looks at the notorious Tammany Hall, a game all about the not-entirely-pleasant, not-completely-wholesome New York political machine that was cranking its way through the second half of the 19th Century.
Is it a cynical game for cynical times? Perhaps, but the reprint was certainly a terrific Kickstarter success. The much more important question is… just how good is Tammany Hall?
Here’s your answer!
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Paul: If you’re a Gold Club member or donor, first of all, let us again say thank you for your support. Thank you! You are terrific and you’ve made us sustainable and better as a site, as well as happier and much less stressed as people. You’ve enabled an awful lot of fantastic things to happen with and to Shut Up & Sit Down.
It’s been a while since we last billed our subscribers. We’re going to be doing it again at the start of December, but on a different, monthly schedule. We wanted to make sure you knew what was happening beforehand as a) you might be surprised to be billed for the first time in a while and b) you might also wonder why we stopped in the first place.
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Silas: Yeeee-hawww! Hello, pardners. My name is Silas McCoy and I’m here to tell y’all about Colt Express, a game of action, danger and the free life of a train-robbing outlaw. Yeeee-haw!
Brendan [exhausted]: Ah. Ho. Ho boy. Hi, everybody. I hope this man didn’t frighten you. This is Silas, a fictional character I invented when I realised I was going to be late for the review. I sent him ahead with his horse, which I also created. Such is the power of the board game journalist. Phew. But now that I have arrived, I can-
Silas: Stick ’em up.
Brendan: What? Hey, that’s my wallet! No, Silas! Come back here, or I swear I’ll… Hey! Stop riding around on that thing. And stop firing your gun in the air, it’s irresponsible. Don’t make me invent a sheriff, Goddamn you!
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Paul: Hello, viewers, and welcome to another edition of Games News! On this week’s show, our contestants are Sven, Lucia and Juanita! Let’s also welcome back Henry, who is returning from last week’s show mostly intact. Wave your stumps, Henry!
All right, everyone, you know how the show goes. Let’s get things started with the Quickfire Round! First question: What’s the new game from Love Letter creator Seiji Kanai that we should be getting all amorous about?
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This week’s review must be one of the most colourful games we’ve tried this year. It certainly has more purple wizards than anything else we’ve ever played.
The vibrant Lords of Xidit Lords of Xidit is a game of fantasy questing, of bard songs, of wizard towers and of programming your way in front of everyone else. Does that sound like a rather strange mix of ideas? Just wait until you see what Quinns and Paul come up with when they try to put their spin on things.
This review is presented with profound apologies to David Bowie.
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For our 23rd podcast Paul and Quinns discuss board games past, present and future. That sounds more hifalutin than it probably is. We begin by discussing the consenting tentacle sex of Consentacle, and how our next live podcast will be an excuse to review Cat on Yer Head. We fret about Prophecy, chat about Tammany … Read more
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Quinns: Morning everybody! Our cover star today is Boom Bokken, which sounds and looks just lovely.
This is a hand management game with the theme of ninjas throwing a bomb back and forth where you’re trying to play gentle cards to at your team mate (“play a card higher than this 4, Paul!”) and hardball your opponents (“play a card lower than this 2, Brendan.”).
Blue cards can also be played that intercept a card being played between to other players, and there are a few clutch “emergency stop” cards in the deck. Best of all, players who fail to play the card expected of them are blown up, leading to dramatic dodgeball-like finishes where the one member of your team still standing takes on a whole team of three. In other words, it’s a game where every play could literally blow up in your face with plenty of room for heroism. Doesn’t that sound like our kind of thing?
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Oh my goodness, you’re looking sharp! Yes you, the one reading this! I don’t suppose you came here looking to buy some kind of board game, did you?
Well it just so happens we’ve got one for you. It’s called Chinatown, an absolute classic that just got reprinted. A classic, I tell you. A game all about the art of the deal set in 1960s New York. But you probably knew that already, didn’t you? A savvy shopper like you.
You’ll take two? Fantastic, fantastic. You’ve made the right choice. Who’s next?
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Thrower: Vietnam. Sex, drugs and terror lurking in the tropical night. If even half of what you read about it is true, then this was the war to end all wars: the war of America against itself. The Viet Cong were just along for the ride.
This was my generation’s World War 2, the conflict from which 80’s society forged martial myths of heroism. Yet, hard as it tried, pop culture couldn’t quite scrub the filth away. Always there were undertones of dirty warfare, of eventual failure. It wasn’t ideal hero material, but it was all we had. For me, that complexity made it all the more compelling.
Then I read Dispatches. This account of a journalist’s experience in the conflict is the finest book on war I have ever read. As well as the history, there is an important lesson. Dispatches taught me that war can be both beautiful and terrible at the same time. That it was okay to hate war and love militaria. To be a pacifist and to play wargames. Reading it made a piece of distant history into a personal thing, a hot piece of literary shrapnel lodged close to my heart.
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Quinns: A lot of people come up to me and ask “Quinns, what’s the secret? How do you always have amazing stories for the Games News?” And I swing my Armani shoes up onto the desk, light a cigar, and I tell ’em “Well, I start by checking blogs. Basically you… you check some blogs. Is that coffee ready yet?”
Our cover game (seen above) is the absolutely beautiful The Ancient World, which might reach shops just before Christmas. Remember 8 Minute Empire, that lovely little area control game we reviewed? The Ancient World is designer Ryan Laukat’s next game. It tasks you with developing a pretty little civilisation, while finding time to slay the terrible titans striding the earth.
Dare you to take one look at what a completed city looks like and not be 100% sold on this game.
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