Abstract Fetish

I never used to like abstracts. And considering the abstracts I knew, such as Checkers, Dominoes, Tic Tac Toe, Connect 4, and so on, fair enough. I still don't like those games. I still don't like Chess much either, but I can see that it has some interest, I just find the movements of the pieces too complex. But then I played Blokus and liked it. Then my mate from Funatical loaned me a copy of DVONN, and I liked that too. And then he loaned me YINSH. And then I realised that I might not be so down on abstracts after all, and collected the complete GIPF series. And it has continued from there. With brother-in-law as a usually willing opponent, and occasionally the kid, I've played a lot of abstracts this year.

One of the advantages is that they're usually quick. If you've got half an hour for a game, you can fit at least one and sometimes 3 plays in. Gobblet and Quoridor play very quickly. They're also easy to explain. You can explain and play Gobblet twice in the time it takes to explain Hameln. That's not to say it's not worth the effort to play harder games, but it's certainly easier to keep the interest of a casual gamer if the rules explanation is quick.

Recently, my interest in abstract games has turned into a complete fetish. I looked at Stephen Tavener's ratings and examined all of his 9s and 10s. I looked at all the games that Clark Rodeffer may be interested in trading for. DAYS later my wishlist had grown bigger than my belly. And because many of the games are out of print, so had my want list. Then came the want-list purge as described in an earlier posting, and most of the abstracts survived. Why? Because good abstracts do get played. The kid and I can fit a game in most evenings. I'm much more confident that if I buy Kris Burm's new game SHMESS that I'll be able to play it a few times. I don't feel so guilty about buying games that will actually get played.

Abstracts are also often pretty. I have 3 of the Pin International Collection on a rack in my living room, I have two of the very beautiful Gigamic wooden games, and all of the GIPF Project's beautiful bakelite. I need more places to display all of these games, but I do love to look at them. Oh yeah, and beautiful glass Chess and Backgammon boards that I bought in a set for $A20. There's something mathematically enticing about abstract games.

So my wishlist now contains 26 or so abstract games, from a total of 87. Yeah, I still can't get past the amusing card games and chunks of plastic, but that's a lot of abstract games that I want. And I know I can't trust Santa...

BTW, for those who are wondering what has happened to Scrabblette: she's visiting family overseas and taught her nephew Blokus Trigon last night. She shares many of my fetishes.

What Makes a Really Great Game?

Some games are fun. Some games are interesting. Some games are more than that. I tried the other day to explain to an email correspondent why I like games, and I think I had an insight - games are a world in which players can interact in ways that are not permissible in the real world, and a great game is a game that supports richness of that interaction. The game is an abstract lens through which players can see each other as they could be.

What does that mean? Take Carcassonne as an example. It's often the case that I have a tile that could be played to help you or to hinder you. I can choose to be nice or nasty. In the real world, I would choose to be nice. In the game, I can choose to be nasty and you won't resent it in the real world. I can also choose to be distant from you, or in your face. Our relationship in the game may be quite different from our relationship in the real world. The game lets us interact in ways we never would in real life.

I play many abstract games (Gipf series, Gobblet, Quoridor) against by brother-in-law BIL. In those games I often find a particularly cunning move which lets him know that I've seen what he was up to and I've found a foil to it AND I've backstabbed him at the same time. His inevitable comment is "Oh, you bastard!" And he sometimes does the same thing to me. As abstracts are particularly easy to make stupid mistakes in (Gobblet has a rule that if you touch a piece you must play it), we also act much stupider on average in the game than in real life.

In a game you can be aggressive, nasty, annoying, nice, tricky, cunning, aloof, bizarre, and in general behave in ways you can't do in real life. Citadels, which I played again last night, allows for a large range of nasty and tricky behaviour which you wouldn't otherwise get away with. It's a great game, though emotions do tend to seep into real life a little.

I find two player games to be particularly good, probably because each player has more control and can express more of their personality through the flow of the game. Even Scrabble (which must be played two player to be at its best) supports all the things I've mentioned. I've been known to play a fairly poor word down the side of the board mostly with the intention of keeping my opponent away from the Triple Word Score. Nasty, but accepted behaviour. And if my opponent didn't do it to me I'd wonder what she was up to.

The GIPF Project games are great, but I find them a little too abstract to express a great depth of player emotion, which is why I haven't rated any of them a 10 despite having very high regard for them. I think you just need a little more complication, such as you find in Trias or Domaine or Citadels, to be a really great game.

I think I'll eventually explore this idea further. Opinions?

Love in the Time of Carcassonne

CyberKev has been bitching that I've been in a blogging drought, to which I have the answer he should have expected - there's a woman involved! And if at any time there's not a woman involved, it's the lack of a woman that's causing trouble. In any case, my life is as finely balanced as a game of Puerto Rico - there's only 168 hours in the week, and you can follow the Love Life strategy or the Game Geek strategy, and the more you do of one the less you do of the other. Maybe I should rename this blog "Sex and the Single Gamer". But that would be misleading :-(. Anyway, CyberKev should be grateful that he has managed to hijack my love life and turn it into a quest for a 4th for Tichu.

So, on Sunday I went to visit my sister who has introduced me to hardly any of her single friends. I wanted to play a game with her and the kids, but Dogville was too long and Escape From Atlantis only takes 4, and there's 5 or 6 of us depending on whether BIL is playing. In desperation as I rushed out the door I grabbed Carcassonne. It's like going out on the prowl and having nothing to wear but a faded pair of jeans. So embarrassing to be seen playing something so dowdy.

Of course, my sister hadn't played it before, and it was completely new to the kids, so I had to teach them how to play. Out of respect for the newbies, there were no such things as farmers, not even lying-down ones. Anyway, it was disturbing seeing people who didn't know how to play Carcassonne. It was new to them. It was like seeing someone discover the sky was blue, or that you could drink water. Or that chicks really dig faded jeans.

Anyway, son and sister conspired to build a big city. I could see myself getting shut out of the game, so I tried to invade and they blocked me. I tried to invade again and succeeded in preventing them from completing the city. Meanwhile, I started a small city and was joined by 5yo nephew. As there were no farmers, I invested in a lot of roads as well - I had my guys out working for me! Son could have played better by taking small points with his extra meeples, but he just doesn't get that every point counts. Oh, and everybody loved doinking - you can't knock a game where doinking is taken seriously.

My attacks on the big city succeeded in keeping son and sister out of the winning position. Niece played respectably but didn't get involved in any major cooperation. Nephew made enough points out of our city to get into second place, but I beat him by about 5. They did seem to like the game - building a city, meeples, doinking - it does have a lot going for it. And finally they know what my Meeple People shirt is about.

On the same evening BIL and I played a few games of Gobblet, yet another of my underplayed two player abstracts. It's a very good game as well, though not quite as popular as Quoridor. We'll have to play more because we're still not out of the "losing due to stupid mistakes" skill level.

Anyway, enough blogging. I've got a strategy to execute.