Monthly Archives: November 2013

My Kickstarter board games: The Bad, the Worse and the Ugly

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A while back I wrote two blog posts about the awful Kickstarter experience I’d had with Glory to Rome: Black Box Edition. Concluding the second of those posts, I said that I’d do an update post when I finally received the game - this is that post.

  • Note 1: The game arrived ages ago, not just recently, so don’t date this as such. The reason for the lateness of this post is that I wanted to wait until a trilogy of Kickstarter disasters had run their course. They haven’t, but a (nice) comment here by Cambridge Games Company’s (CGC) Ed Carter prompted me to do this now.
  • Note 2: I don’t hate Kickstarter: I am talking here very specifically about three instances where I’ve had crappy experiences with items I’ve backed on it. I have backed a few other things via Kickstarter and am sure I will do so again. However, the likelihood they will be board games is very slim indeed.

So with those caveats out of the way, on with the show.

The Bad: Glory to Rome (Black Box Edition)

I’m not going to go over this again; you can read about it first here, and then here, for the gory details. However, I will add a bit of a conclusion (and no, I’m not going to comment on the various stories about CGC and its staff).

As suggested in the conclusion of ‘Part 2’ linked above, I haven’t returned to my local games store. I’m more than happy with a combination of my FOGS - friendly online games store, Board Game Guru - and Amazon or eBay; plus game stores I find on my travels.

As for The Black Box edition of Glory to Rome, I never played it (despite it being everything they’d said it would be). It sat staring at me from the shelf for a month before I traded it away. In its place I got the rather silly Leaping Lemmings. The original Glory to Rome, with the Kickstarter expansions, is still on my shelf - but also unplayed since. Will I also trade this one away? Very probably.

The Worse: Fallen City of Karez

While the Glory to Rome experience was bad, it was made worse by two factors: it being my first Kickstarter game, coupled with high expectations of the product itself. This meant anything coming later was going to have to go some to beat it - I think Karez has done so.

The game funded on Kickstarter on October 7, 2012, smashing its $7,500 goal in one day and going on to a whopping $66,087 pledged by 960 backers. A ridiculous 18 stretch goals were met during its rise, from miniatures to dice to fiction to box inserts. And Essen pick-up was available - which was a month after the closing date…

Golden Egg Games said from the start those backing the game with miniatures wouldn’t get them at Essen (I didn’t go for them anyway). But we were led to believe the base game was always going to make it, even if some stretch goals wouldn’t (they’d be sent later). Here’s a timeline from the game’s Kickstarter page during the project:

  • September 26, 2012; Update 9: Apparently the rulebook, box design and art were now ‘finished’. They also had dice ‘samples’ - not exactly promising with less than four weeks to go until Essen.
  • October 12, 2012; Update 19: One week before Essen and one after the campaign closed, came the Essen pick up survey. They even quoted the “insane” deadlines in this post, but also said “…we just started producing the very first copies of the game!” There would be “a very limited amount”, reserved for backers at Essen.

This was a game I was pretty excited about, so I headed into the bowels of the higher numbered halls on the Thursday to grab my copy. On arrival, I was told that the shipment hadn’t arrived - try again tomorrow. The same thing happened on Friday, but they were sure Saturday would be the day - and sure enough, it was!

But on Saturday, I was asked very politely if I wouldn’t mind not collecting my copy. They had very few and I’d be doing them a big favour. Please? We’ll post it for free soon, they said, when the bulk of them arrive. Well, I’m nothing if not patient…

  • November 9, 2012; Update 20: The first update since before Essen tells us: “I got my first sample copy 10 days ago, I examined it thoroughly and had some crucial corrections for the printer, as some of the components do not match our benchmark of quality.” Lucky I didn’t grab one at Essen two weeks earlier then… The new plan - delivery in early December.
  • December 9, 2012; Update 21: Oops! Missed it again: “The games are currently being shipped to our distribution facilities in the US and Europe (by sea freights) and should arrive in mid January. The other rewards should be finished by the time the game arrives, so we expect that most of you will get your rewards by late January till mid February. ” There goes Christmas.
  • January 19, 2013; Update 22: That’s one SLOW boat: “I cannot give an exact date but I estimate that we can expect to get the main shipment at our warehouse this late January till mid February.”
  • March 5, 2013; Update 23: Perhaps with oars, guns, drugs and illegal immigrants? “The Chinese shipper is holding up our container at the Chicago port terminal.”
  • March 15, 2013; Update 24: The game arrives in the US warehouse! 7,000 miles down, only 3,000 miles to go…
  • April 22, 2013; Update 25: Six months after I could’ve collected a copy at Essen and counting: “We are still in the logistic phase of shipping the base game throughout the world…European backers…will receive their games soon.”
  • June (yes, June) 6, 2013; update 26: “Most of you already got shipping notices, which means that your copies are making their way to you.” Hilariously, this update also included the announcement of Golden Egg’s second Kickstarter project. Funnily enough, I didn’t back it.
  • July 3, 2013; update 27: “European shipment update: …the new estimated date for the shipment to arrive at Amazon’s depot is by July 20. We can expect the games to go out about a week after they are received.”

The base game arrived late in August, with no expansions, 10 months late. I picked a mini expansion up at this year’s Essen but I’m pretty sure I’m still waiting for more bits to arrive - but I’m past caring.

Talking of expansions, another problem was the impression (true or false) they were being designed and altered on the fly; hardly what you want from a game that had a clearly hard to balance semi-coop idea at its heart. Lines like “I’ve redesigned the expansion…”; “I managed to adapt the…expansion to fit…” - separated by a few days each time - did not inspire confidence!

I’ve played the game only once since its arrival, so can’t fully comment, but an average Board Game Geek rating of 5.3 to date seems a little harsh - but not too harsh. The rulebook is terrible, there are serious balance issues, the board (while lovely) is far too busy, and it seems to overstay its welcome. More plays will tell, but I’m not holding out much hope.

And while Golden Egg was apologetic and informative throughout, as CGC before them were, they’ve gone the other way in dealing with game complaints since its arrival. I haven’t heard anyone except them claim the rulebook is good, for example - something they seem to be defending to this day. Guys - the rulebook is a shambles.

So while the delays were probably on a par with Glory to Rome’s, at least that was a good game. I’m still hopeful we can make a fun game out of Karez with some more play and some house rules, but after a year of waiting it was a crushing disappointment.

The Ugly: Ace of Spies

But whatever I may feel about the previous two games, there can only be one winner in the battle of the shitty Kickstarters - the customer service disaster that was Ace of Spies.

While I still have no intention of buying anything from CGC again, or probably from Golden Egg, I’d buy 10 of their most expensive products before I’d buy anything from Albino Dragon, the outfit behind Ace of Spies.

Some 461 backers pledged $21,054 by June 20, 2012, comfortably beating Ace of Spies’ $15,000 goal. Not a huge amount, but plenty for a small box card game. Again, Essen 2012 collection was my shipping option.

  • July 10, 2012; Update 14: “… for now it looks like we’re still on schedule for October.”
  • September 22, 2012; Update 19: Here we go again: “What I can do is apologize for the wait and tell you that we are doing absolutely everything we can on our side to make sure there aren’t any delays. I’ll send out updates for every major milestone such as going into pre-production, deposits paid, finishing pre-production, first prototype, etc.” I’m guessing (because I wasn’t told) Essen is out then?

Essen simply wasn’t mentioned. It came, it went. They had no booth - so how was it ever going to be possible to collect? We were never informed. No apology to Essen backers, no explanation. Delays are one thing, this kind of poor service is a bit more.

  • November 28, 2012; Update 25: Still no apologies on any updates since September. “We approved the last file today so Ace of Spies is now approved to start production. To give you an idea of what that means as far as timelines, we’re looking at the game being completed in mid January.”
  • January 16, 2013; Update 28: Still no apologies. “We’ve just been notified that our games should be here between February 11-18.”
  • February 16, 2013; update 30: Apologies? Nope. “Ace of Spies should be in our warehouse by Wednesday so that we can begin shipping the games out.”
  • February 17, 2013; Update 33: An apology! But not for the four months of delays - for the fact they’d managed to make the game essentially unplayable (without putting stickers on your cards - because that will look great) by cocking up eight of the cards. They’ll be shipped later. I’ve waited four months - how much longer can it be?
  • March 4, 2013; Update 35: “We’re waiting for Michael Fox and Mark Rivera to get their copies of the game so we can make sure we didn’t miss anything…” So, more than two weeks after the problems were spotted, they haven’t managed to get the designers copies of the game..?!
  • May 12, 2013; update 39: “The international shipments will go out with our international shipping bundle which should be at the end of this week.” This was the final update. And of course, there still wasn’t an apology.

More than a month later, my cards arrived - guess I got lucky. On July 7 one of the designers, Mark Rivera, posted on the Kickstarter page: “Michael and I, the designers, are still waiting for the fulfilment of the replacement cards. Such a shame.” Unbelievable. As another commenter noted, “If we ran our games business like this, we would be out of business by now”.

The game? It’s pretty good actually; definitely worthy of its 6.55 average rating. The producer, Albino Dragon? no comment…

Conclusion

Well, I guess there’s one obvious one - I won’t be backing a board game in this way on Kickstarter again. I don’t care who or what it is, its simply not going to happen. And I’m not just listing my worst three; these have been my only three Kickstarted board games.

However, I see this as the fault of the way board game companies (big and small) have gone about using Kickstarter. They make idle promises they have no way to guarantee they can keep, give dates that are fictional at best, and then wonder when everyone is disappointed when they crash at every corner.

And the average quality of the games coming from Kickstarter is poor, at best. Sure, some are pretty good, but the really good designs are still almost exclusively going through the traditional distribution and design channels: if your design is good enough, tested enough, and you make the effort to get it in front of publishers, it is likely to make it.

If not, enter it into competitions, make it print and play, playtest it more, hawk it to every reviewer or name you can find. And find out why it isn’t making the step to the next level. Is it too long, poorly themed, unoriginal, over complicated, aimed at the wrong audience, unbalanced? If so, but you’re still determined to stick with it as-is, then maybe go to Kickstarter - but ask yourself why you’re doing so and have a pretty damned good answer!

And if you do, be realistic. Start a company, say you’re going to be making a particular project as quickly as you can while getting it right. Seek every piece of advice you can about components, shipping, distribution channels - EVERYTHING. And then do it all over again, taking into account (or even expecting) the worse case scenario; people aren’t going to mind a better produced game than they expected arriving early!

Making a game like this is not a game, as it were; this is people’s money and you shouldn’t be taking that fact so lightly. It’s a business - just because a bunch of people you have never met decided to bankroll it, it shouldn’t let you think you can go into it half-arsed. You have a responsibility to each and every backer to try your best to fulfil your promises - so make those promises realistic.

Becoming St Ivian, part 5: Feeling like a fan

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Despite having a season ticket, the fact I go to most St Ives Town games on my own means I haven’t really felt part of things.

While everyone I’ve spoken to is friendly, St Ives is the kind of town most people seem to have lived for at least three decades, rather than three months; everyone knows everyone.

Don’t get me wrong - I’ve been enjoying the games. In fact its nice to have the radio on and listen to the overblown drama of the Premier League while watching proper football; I often stroll around the pitch, watching from here and there, having a sit down every now and then. Mostly, its been a very peaceful experience (which is odd for football).

But in mid October the Saints played Potters Bar Town at home in a league game. It was on the back of two heavy league defeats on the bounce that had started to put the great start of the season in perspective. But Dunstable and Rugby were looking like contenders for the title, unlike Potters Bar who were seemingly more mid-table. As the table began to settle down, this looked like a truer test of where St Ives were in the great scheme of things.

Just one minute in, literally as I walked through the turnstiles, Potters Bar Town took the lead. My heart sank a little, as to their credit St Ives had (in my limited experience) the tendency to go blazing off for an equaliser - leaving big holes at the back. Worth a try, but at this new level it seemed to backfire more often than pay off. But attack like mad they did.

Ten minutes later, the saints equalised during a spell of pressure that simply had to result in a goal - and they kept it up for another 15 minutes until the second one went in. Panic over - this was going to be a rout! Yeah, because that’s how football goes…

It should’ve been more by half time, but wasn’t, and in the second half Potters Bar were immediately back into a better rhythm. As the minutes ticked by St Ives got deeper and deeper, which didn’t seem likely to end well after recent weeks. But despite time passing slower and slower, they held out.

About three hours later (or so it seemed), the final whistle blew. I was exhausted. I just stood there, breathing sighs of relief. They’d done it; they’d survived a real test of character against the kind of team they’d need to beat to stay in this league - and better still they’d done it when they were most likely low on confidence, especially at the back.

But for me it was equally significant; I’d really cared. For the first time I wandered home feeling like a fan. Next stop, the newsagent, to arrange to have The Non-League Paper delivered…

(Image borrowed from the Extreme Groundhopping blog - will replace when I’ve got one of my own, promise!)

CV: A four-sided game review

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CV is a pretty small dice/card game in an infeasibly large box that was released at Essen a few weeks ago. It works well two, three or four-player and should play out in under an hour, but can generate quite a bit of chat and go a little longer (depending on the group).

It certainly wasn’t one of the big releases of the show but it’s probably the one that has (so far) left the biggest impression on me, so I wanted to review it as soon as possible. For me it creates a unique play experience, which is still making me smile a lot after five plays (with two, three and four players - the game’s limits).

While oversized the box has a good insert and is used well to show off the game’s wonderful artwork. Each of the 87 cards is individually illustrated by Piotr Socha who has a wonderfully whimsical and comical style, reminiscent a little of the style used in Dixit crossed with that of your typical children’s book. There are also seven custom dice, a small board and some tokens - plus a scoring pad and pencil.

Set up is very easy. The cards have five different card backs: you deal the ‘starting’ cards to all players, ‘goals’ to each player and onto the board (some are individual, some contested) and then place the other three stacks (representing early, mid and late life) on the board as draw piles - and away you go.

Teaching

If you like a strong theme that feels perfectly aligned to the gameplay and components, look no further. And best of all, this makes CV a very easy game to teach.

It also helps that you’re dealing with two very simple gameplay mechanisms: set collection and Yahtzee. On a turn, players will role four (and later more) dice and then have the option of two rerolls (one result, unhappy faces, cannot be rerolled and too many may lead to a disaster, adding a nice push-your-luck element).

The resulting icons on the dice are then used to ‘buy’ cards from the board, which are then replaced from whichever deck is active (early, mid, late life) before the next player’s turn. The cards come in five colours representing relationships, knowledge, health, work and possessions: only one card of each type will benefit you at any one time, with the rest making a stack below it.

The three Essen promo cards

These cards give benefits to you in later rounds, such as ‘free’ symbols (as if you’d rolled a certain die face); extra dice each round, or the ability to pretend one symbol is another. Once all the three card decks are depleted, give or take, the game ends.

Scoring is again thematic; if you have the ‘Hard Worker’ goal you’ll need lots of jobs, while the ‘Successful Person’ will need two possessions for each job card they have to score bonus points - and the ‘Renaissance Man’ needs a good mix of everything in their life.

The four sides

These are me, plus three fictitious amalgams drawn from observing my friends, and their respective quirks and play styles.

  • The writer: The theme shines so brightly. The dice symbols (happy, sad, money, health, knowledge, relationships) make sense in both which are used to ‘buy’ a card, and what benefit that card then gives you. You will need a relationship and money for a child; once you have it, it will cost you money every round - but will add both a relationship and happiness symbol. No money, and your child will be taken away!
  • The thinker: Once I’d realised there was very little here to actually think about, and no need to try and win, I started to enjoy myself - but then half an hour later I started wishing we were playing a ‘proper’ game. You can’t deny the production quality, but this is really complicated Yahtzee with a social element and for that I think it slightly overstays its welcome. There’s just a bit too much ‘working out’; less symbols and fiddliness would’ve helped it no end.
  • The trasher: Don’t tell anyone, but I actually enjoyed myself playing CV. It’s obvious from the off that what you’re doing is all a bit silly and with the right crowd it’s a nice way to wind down after some serious gaming. There is zero player interaction, and loads of luck, so you just end up helping each other on your turns - until near the end. Then you start nailing those end-game cards to try and get the win (I can’t help myself). Not every game needs confrontation; and if I’m not going to be fighting, don’t give me orcs and spaceships and world maps to get my hopes up with!
  • The dabbler: This could be my perfect game! Its social, with plenty of talking points every round, which tend to be both gamey and funny. The art on the cards never gets boring, while CV really easy to teach and doesn’t outstay its welcome if its played in the right spirit. If people are chatting and laughing during the game, they’re not playing it right - get it off the table and to some other players!

Key observations

My collection from Essen, with CV taking pride of place

This is one of the earlier reviews of CV, so there are not an awful lot of talking points around yet! On the negative side the cards have a pretty nasty chemical smell to them, but I’m sure that will fade it time. But what else?

I guess the only other real fear some will have with CV is replay value; a concern that has been raised by a few people on BoardGameGeek already. Personally it hasn’t been an issue yet, but then I’ve played almost exclusively with different people each time (except Zoe, who luckily likes it as much as I do).

While 87 cards isn’t that many, and you’ll see them all in every game, with four players you’ll not get the chance to draw an awful lot of them each game. You’ll also be going after different cards too, depending on your goals, and what happens in the early game can really alter what you look out for.

‘But Chris’, I hear you cry, ‘you said it’s about the experience and not the game’. Well, that’s true as well - and for me, after five games, I’m still looking forward to the next story my cards will tell. Will I be a scientist jogger with twins who still rides a scooter? Or a games designer turned celebrity with my own factory but no relationships? I can’t wait to find out.

Also, both the box size and game style leaves CV open to a myriad of expansions; something I’ll buy in a heartbeat (at the right price) and that will certainly add to the shelf life if my enthusiasm does start to wane. The most obvious one that comes to mind is pets! This game would really benefit from some dogs, cats etc and they’re the perfect subject matter for the artist.

Conclusion

I’m not sure how easy it will be to find, but if you’re looking for a social family game that’s light on rules but does offer a level of thought I can’t recommend CV highly enough.

From the art and component quality to the rulebook and general presentation, it gets top marks.

I’m currently rating it an 8.5, which puts it just outside my top 10; and the highest ranking I’ve given to any game that’s less meaty than my usual favourites (which tend to be medium weight euro games).

If it does start to lose a little lustre with another five plays I’ll come back to the review and amend my mark, but for now I’m quietly confident that this will continue to hit the table with all kinds of folks - especially once Christmas come along. I just hope it gets the kind of distribution circulation it deserves (I can’t even see it on Amazon yet).

Top 10 Essen Spiel 2013 wishlist: The aftermath

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After a surprising number of views of my initial Essen Spiel 2013 post a few weeks back, I thought it would be a good idea to follow it up.

My second trip to Essen proved to be every bit as fun, and successful, as the first. With the exception of a slightly fraught boarding process on the return Eurostar at Brussels, all the trains and accommodation went without a hitch (except for the Wi-Fi, or lack thereof - more on that another time…). But did my top 10 pan out the way I’d expected?

Essen Wishlist Top 10 Revisited

  1. Concordia: “This will be a definite buy for me.” And it was, although it wasn’t as definite as it could’ve been. Once I’d started to pick up some bargains I decided I’d only pick up one 30+ euro game, which Concordia was at 35. So I had a good look at quite a few competitors before finally caving in on Saturday morning after a sadly fanboy chat with designer Mac Gerdts. I’ve now played it twice and its looking like a great decision; it plays much like you’d expect from a Gerdts game (short turns, tight play, tricky decisions) and the usual lovely components (including history lesson).
  2. Snowdonia expansions: “Again, these will be definite purchases.” Actually these didn’t turn out to be purchases, as designer Tony Boydell generously gave me them for nothing (I presume for the help with play-testing, rather than me being an upstanding guy…). Due to the wealth of new games sitting on my table Snowdonia hasn’t yet hit the table, but my experience of one of the expansions previously (Mt Washington) means I’m already pretty sure I’m going to love them. I just have to get all the other shinies played first.
  3. Bargains! “Games at crazy discounts – already on the list: Dakota and Artus.” After reading this a friend generously offered to give me their copy of Dakota in return for a copy of The Empire Engine - even more of a bargain! I did pick up Artus for just five euros, while also grabbing a German edition of The Little Prince: Make Me a Planet for only 10 euros and Briefcase for 14 euros. Best of all was grabbing two older games I’d really hoped to find: Rosenkonig for 11 euros - quite the Grail game for me as its been unavailable since I first played it on Yucata.de several years ago - and Nefertiti (plus expansion) for 15 euros. Lastly I got the very poorly rated Anasazi for only two euros - figuring it has nice bits, so if it’s as bad as people say I can cannibalise it for prototype parts!
  4. Warlock: “Auctions/bidding, deck building, tile placement/tableau building and hand management – it ticks all the boxes.” We managed to get a demo of this one and it did seem to tick all of those boxes. However my friend Matt was just as enamoured with it as I was, so I let him make the purchase. It means I won’t get to play it that much, but it wouldn’t have fitted in the suitcase anyway! And our demo was pretty confused, so it will need some more plays before I make a final opinion on it.
  5. Dice games: “Two are standing out for me at the moment: Blueprints and CV.” My research certainly seemed to pay off this year, as both of these games ended up coming home with me. I’ve played Blueprints three times with eight or nine different people and they’ve all loved it; it’s quick and thinky with a surprisingly small amount of luck for dice game. CV is simply charming and my two plays so far have again been enjoyed by all participants. The artwork is remarkably comical and whimsical, while the marriage of theme to the game really helps set it apart.
  6. Gritty sci-fi games: “Our group likes gritty sci-fi, so why not give them what they want?” While I still stand by this statement, while looking at both Infamy and Enclave I just kept thinking, “Why should I? Its my money and they won’t appreciate it”. And that’s not a knock on the players - they’re simply not into the hobby as much as me and in their eyes we have more than enough games to play already. Infamy looked OK but just sat on a table and wasn’t being demoed whenever we went past. We did get a play of Enclave but it turned out to be an enjoyable if unremarkable euro with a tacked on sci-fi theme - Waterdeep in space, perhaps. OK, but not 30+ euros OK.
  7. Card games: “Yes, there will be hundreds.” And there were, but the two I’d noted didn’t come home with me - three others did instead. I’m pretty sure Cheaty Mages didn’t make it (we found the stand, but it wasn’t there) while we couldn’t get a demo of S-evolution, which at around 20 euros was too expensive to get on a whim when surrounded by so many other bargains. Instead I found a game Zoe had wanted for ages (Nicht Die Bohn! - or ‘not the bean game’, as it’s known) and paid 10 euros for this year’s two games from the Austrian Spiel Museum: Handler der Karibik and Sissi! The former is a nice light push your luck card game, the latter a new take on the classic Bohnanza - the actual bean game. Strange coincidence!
  8. Nice looking euros: “These are my Achilles heal, so I’m bound to come home with at least one other fascinatingly themed gem.” Well who’d have thunk it - I didn’t crack! Our Craftsmen demo was disappointing, while the tables for both Yunnan and Rokoko (which sold out) were permanently packed. Both Madeira and Bruxelles 1893 also looked really good, but my resolve held. I predict one of those four will find its way onto my shelves some time in the near future, but then I said that about Terra Mystica and a few others last year.
  9. Silly racing games: “Both will need to shine to see me part with any cash.” While The Sheep Race won on cuteness, there was hardly any game there at all - especially for the crazy 30+ euro price. I had a test of Banjooli Xeet and that was enough to sell me on, especially as it was under 20 euros. We’ve only played once so far and it went a bit wonky at the end, but hopefully a little rules tweak will make it sing. The art and components are great, as was the first half of the play, so I’m sure we can make this one work.
  10. Mining games: “Not a topic I am drawn to any way…” but luckily I was travelling with a geologist! Again we failed to get a play of Rockwell, which did look really interesting, but on the other hand we didn’t hear a single report from anyone about it either. We did get to play Coal Baron though and it was excellent. Again I left it to Matt to buy, and then we thrashed him into last place that evening! It’s a really great euro though, so he got the last laugh - and he did the same to me at Concordia.

Of the other games I mentioned I just didn’t get a strong enough feeling to take a punt on Origin, but another friend picked it up so hopefully I’ll get a play soon. Lewis & Clark is also still on my list to play, but sold out, while Nations got a very lukewarm reception.

Matt also bought A Study in Emerald and we got a chance to play on the way home in Cologne. It clearly isn’t meant as a two-player game, but we both saw enough to think it’s going to be a lot of fun with more. Crazy, swingy fun perhaps, but fun nonetheless.

In the end I spent the equivalent of £150 on 13 games and more than 10 expansions and promos - pretty good I reckon! I’ve already played and been very impressed with eight of those, with only the cheapest ones left to come, so I’m going to call it as a win. Now, time to start looking for a hotel for next year.