Technorati Tags: 
Family Game Night, Now with More Family
Due to changes in my daughter's schedule, we're now able to have dinner together on Tuesday nights. This means, of course, that she's going to start joining me for Family Game Night at the Little Shoppe of Games. She's been very excited about this ever since we first talked about it, doubly so when she found out I scored a copy of Killer Bunnies for my birthday.
Naturally, her first choice for playing was Killer Bunnies. Having only the basic blue and yellow expansion decks made for a very different game from how I'd played before. I'm used to a deck four times the size of mine, with all kinds of special cards to protect or recover from some pretty devastating attacks. At one point, I had both the nuclear missile and the black hole, both of which would pretty much kill every bunny on the table for a small three player game, and I didn't dare run them through to play. There was also only Kaballah's market open for carrots, cabbage, and water; no way to buy back used weapons or dead bunnies. It was a lot of fun to play a much simplified version of the game, but I did keep eying the expansion sets on the wall behind me. I think Brianna and I will be getting a lot of enjoyment out of the game for years to come.
In the end, I bought the last carrot from the market to end the game. However, when we went through the deck of carrots to see which one was the winner, Brianna turned out to be the one holding the magic carrot.
After we packed the Bunnies deck away, Jessica brought out her copy of IGOR, which she'd picked up the same night she bought Killer Bunnies for me. It turned out to be every bit as fun as I had hoped. It's felt kind of like a primitive precursor to Privateer Press's Infernal Contraption. Brianna started out the game with us, but her ride home came about halfway through and she had to take off. Jess, Jill, and I continued playing after she'd gone, and had a really good time with it. It's much more complex, of course, than the simple rules pamphlet implies, especially once you start completing your devices. Each one you complete gives you certain extra abilities. I had a titanium lock and a pair of mind control glasses, which gave me some measure of protection when Igor came to steal parts from me. Jess had some kind of power inverter that let her use one of the powers of one of the other completed devices on the table. Jill build a Working Prototype, but it turned out not to have any extra abilities at all. I suppose you'd expect that with a prototype. We were all running neck and neck when Lane's table finished up their game of Betrayal at House on the Hill, after which I managed to give Jess a winning blueprint when she sent Igor to steal a card from me. She got the last two victory points she needed to win, and we got to move over to the other table with Lane.
I knew he'd been wanting to play ÜberChrononauts something fierce, ever since I had introduced him to the original Chrononauts game. Since I had bought the Early American Chrononauts expansion earlier in the month, I was able to help make that a reality. Each of the two Chrononauts sets is a full stand-along game. But they can be combined into a single huge timeline for a game called ÜberChrononauts. The game mechanics are only slightly changed. All the pivot point and lynchpin cards are laid out into a single large timeline. Each player receives two identity cards and a mission card. They win if they complete any one of those three. Play goes around the table as always, but each player draws two cards, plays one, and discards the other. The timeline can still be destroyed by having 13 paradoxes appear, but only if those 13 are within the same four rows of cards.
It was a lot harder at the beginning, since I needed to keep track of a whole other win condition, but I think we all fell right into it. In the end, it was Lane's friend Dave who pulled off the win, without actually making any progress toward it himself. Instead, the rest of the players managed to turn over and patch the pivot points he needed to complete one of his IDs. Doh! it was a lot of fun, and I think we'd have all liked to play another round if it weren't so late. I made sure to leave the two Chrononauts decks mixed for now so when can try it again on another gaming night.
Naturally, her first choice for playing was Killer Bunnies. Having only the basic blue and yellow expansion decks made for a very different game from how I'd played before. I'm used to a deck four times the size of mine, with all kinds of special cards to protect or recover from some pretty devastating attacks. At one point, I had both the nuclear missile and the black hole, both of which would pretty much kill every bunny on the table for a small three player game, and I didn't dare run them through to play. There was also only Kaballah's market open for carrots, cabbage, and water; no way to buy back used weapons or dead bunnies. It was a lot of fun to play a much simplified version of the game, but I did keep eying the expansion sets on the wall behind me. I think Brianna and I will be getting a lot of enjoyment out of the game for years to come.
In the end, I bought the last carrot from the market to end the game. However, when we went through the deck of carrots to see which one was the winner, Brianna turned out to be the one holding the magic carrot.
After we packed the Bunnies deck away, Jessica brought out her copy of IGOR, which she'd picked up the same night she bought Killer Bunnies for me. It turned out to be every bit as fun as I had hoped. It's felt kind of like a primitive precursor to Privateer Press's Infernal Contraption. Brianna started out the game with us, but her ride home came about halfway through and she had to take off. Jess, Jill, and I continued playing after she'd gone, and had a really good time with it. It's much more complex, of course, than the simple rules pamphlet implies, especially once you start completing your devices. Each one you complete gives you certain extra abilities. I had a titanium lock and a pair of mind control glasses, which gave me some measure of protection when Igor came to steal parts from me. Jess had some kind of power inverter that let her use one of the powers of one of the other completed devices on the table. Jill build a Working Prototype, but it turned out not to have any extra abilities at all. I suppose you'd expect that with a prototype. We were all running neck and neck when Lane's table finished up their game of Betrayal at House on the Hill, after which I managed to give Jess a winning blueprint when she sent Igor to steal a card from me. She got the last two victory points she needed to win, and we got to move over to the other table with Lane.
I knew he'd been wanting to play ÜberChrononauts something fierce, ever since I had introduced him to the original Chrononauts game. Since I had bought the Early American Chrononauts expansion earlier in the month, I was able to help make that a reality. Each of the two Chrononauts sets is a full stand-along game. But they can be combined into a single huge timeline for a game called ÜberChrononauts. The game mechanics are only slightly changed. All the pivot point and lynchpin cards are laid out into a single large timeline. Each player receives two identity cards and a mission card. They win if they complete any one of those three. Play goes around the table as always, but each player draws two cards, plays one, and discards the other. The timeline can still be destroyed by having 13 paradoxes appear, but only if those 13 are within the same four rows of cards.
It was a lot harder at the beginning, since I needed to keep track of a whole other win condition, but I think we all fell right into it. In the end, it was Lane's friend Dave who pulled off the win, without actually making any progress toward it himself. Instead, the rest of the players managed to turn over and patch the pivot points he needed to complete one of his IDs. Doh! it was a lot of fun, and I think we'd have all liked to play another round if it weren't so late. I made sure to leave the two Chrononauts decks mixed for now so when can try it again on another gaming night.
