Funny Family

On the weekend, Scrabblette, the kid and I went up to Bundaberg to visit baby psychotic tornado sister and Uncle Pete. The drive up consumed 6 hours of good gaming time, punctuated only by a visit to the kid's cousins where we played Make'n'Break. Baby Sister likes games but Uncle Pete is not so keen unless there's fighting in it... here's the story we made up about him.

"When Baby Sister met Pete he only knew three verbs. He could make sentences like PETE EAT (if he was eating, or hungry); PETE PUNCH (if he liked you) or PETE DECK! (if he didn't like you). Pete's Mum could tell Pete liked Baby Sister because she was allowed to take food off his plate. When you asked Pete to describe what he did at night when his eyes were closed he would either tell you PETE EAT! meaning he'd been dreaming about eating, or PETE NOT EAT! meaning he'd had a dream-free sleep."

There's more, about how when Pete was born he looked like a potato, and the visit to the bookshop on Sunday where Pete correctly identified books as "things Pete use to make table not rock", but that's not the point of the story. Pete was so worn out on Saturday night that he didn't even eat all of his dinner, and when I explained Funny Friends he didn't follow at all.

I wasn't sure how the kid would go with this game, but I gave him the benefit of the doubt. When I was explaining the puberty cards and I showed "Parents Separate" (get a sadness and a money), he said "hey, just like real life! I got a bike and a TV in my room!" and I knew that he would get something out of it. Scrabblette had played before (less than a week after I met her), and when Baby Sister started trying to help Pete I knew she was getting it. So apart from Pete, we were off to a flying start.

It was very interesting playing this game with non-gamers... well that's a poor description... people who didn't care so much about winning. In many of the auctions the result was negotiated before the auction happened, resulting in the card being sold for 0. For example... you can take that and let me be your girlfriend because I need to get that... and then I'll take that because I need a broken relationship. Many times we were able to find a compromise which benefitted all parties. I'd say only about half of the auctions in the game involved time being spent.

An interesting development came when Baby Sister took "It was just one time" (you must be a virgin, you get a relationship, sex and a baby). At first she tried to make her partner Scrabblette until I pointed that homosexual relationships did not produce babies in this game (unless you get the card that does that). So the kid volunteered instead. He stayed happily married to his aunt for a long time, and they had 5 babies and 5 sexes together. We ran out of sex markers so Baby Sister started sharing hers around. When I asked the kid at the end why he needed so many babies he said "because it was funny". Oh, OK, games are meant to be fun, I've heard.

Apart from the productive relationship with his auntie, the kid also scored some anonymous sex. With a man. What have I raised here? However after a few more homosexual encounters the kid was able to play his "Coming Out" life goal. At least with that card, he didn't let the theme interfere with the pursuit of victory. I wonder if he'd spent less time making babies with his aunt would he have achieve more life goals?

After doing drugs, smoking, drinking, being fat, sad and wise, and so on, I'd achieved 4 of my life goals (Game Designer, Emotional Cripple, umm...). Baby Sister and Scrabblette were laying down life goals right behind me, clearly in pursuit of victory. I needed to achieve enlightenment which required drugs when there were none to be had. For the first time ever I chose to exchange goals and drew Celibacy instead. That was an easy one to achieve, and I won the game shortly afterwards.

We finished up about 11pm after laughing ourselves silly for about 3 hours. Funny Friends is a very fun game with the right crowd, and it turns out that crowd can contain even my 10 year old. And what happened to Uncle Pete? PETE NOT EAT.

They Have Some Really Good German Games In Germany (Part 2)

More games from the Magnus-Spiele catalogue.

Chinagold - this is a two player abstract that looks very pretty and that I'd really like to try. Only 26 Euro! Must be real gold, I guess.

Digit - is an older game where you draw cards that have stick patterns, and you have to adjust your current stick pattern to match what's on the card. Maybe something like Make'n'Break in Flatland? Only 9 Euro.

Dschamál - those wacky Germans are at it again with this one! You have a bag of bits. Two players simultaneously put their hands in the bag and try to find the bits they need. There's a camel-shaped bit and some other shapes and colours and you get points depending on the set you collect. Sounds interesting in the same way as Bamboleo and Bausack. For 25 Euro I expect the camel will clean up after itself.

Fragile - I'm a sucker for nice bits, and this game has got me sucked in Big Time. It's gorgeous. It's about dock workers in Shanghai pushing boxes around. I just can't stop looking at the photos. Only 44 Euro, but oh, so pretty!

A Long Weekend

In our part of the world we've just finished a three day weekend, during which I played a lot of games. That's what life's all about, n'est-ce pas? Here's notes on a few of them.

Gulo Gulo - I was sitting around at BIG wondering what to play next, and there was a little girl wandering around too. I got Gulo Gulo out of the car, grabbed non-cyber-Kevin, and we played three games. Kevin won all three games, which wasn't very nice to the poor little girl! Anyway she said this game was much better than rolling the dice for Dad, and I promised to bring it again next time which will be in August as the kid and I are going to ConVic next month.

Lord of the Rings: The Confrontration - The kid surprised me by suggesting a game of this at BIG. We played, and I remembered what a truly excellent game it is. I won as the light. The kid remembered why he didn't like it. I played another two times against Ozvortex the next day, and it was still great. I upped my rating on BGG to a 10, I love this game. BTW, Ozvortex and I both won as the light, with Frodo slipping through both times.

The Adventures of Harley - played twice with the kid and the niece and the nephew. We lost both times! OK, not as simple as I thought. We might even try it again.

Hive - Ozvortex brought his new Hive over to show us, and he and the kid and I played each other. The kid defeated me, Ozvortex defeated the kid, I defeated Ozvortex. I quite like it, and the bits are magnificent. It's a bit disturbing that there is no board, but it gets you thinking. I like the grasshoppers, and don't like the spiders. Funny story - the kid hates grasshoppers. I had him sweeping the back deck and a real grasshopper jumped off the broom onto his leg causing a major panic screaming attack. I took it off him and while he gasped for breath told him that Wayne had brought along a nice game about insects that we were going to play...

Give Me the Brain! - Another one Ozvortex showed us. Pretty silly, but not too silly to play. I'll have to get the colour version. When my nephew can read he'll love it.

Make'n'Break - I have been looking at this one for a while. Pauli has a copy, so we played that. It's a pretty decent dexterity game, better than I thought it would be. I think I'll buy it as a present for someone.

Memoir '44 - The kid and I had a game using the winter board. He had a lot of Finnish ski troops whom I blasted fairly quickly. Must get the Pacific expansion.