Gameblog

Month: February 2005

  • Pirate’s Cove

    I wrote a review of Pirate’s Cove (in Finnish; review number 92!). I like Pirate’s Cove. I like the fancy bits (I think it’s one of the prettiest games I’ve ever seen), the theme is great and the game is simply a blast to play. However, I’m still rating it as 7. The game’s main…

  • Queen’s Necklace, Samurai and Höhlengrölen

    I’ve been busy writing reviews. I have already 91 reviews on my web site — I hear the 100 review mark calling my name already. That’ll take some time, but soon, soon I’ll be there. I’m not going to write long reviews of these games now; I’ll just summarize my thoughts shortly. Links are to…

  • Translation of Don

    I wrote a Finnish translation of Don. Enjoy. I noticed the exchange variant in the rules — has anybody given it a go? Is it any good?

  • About reviewing games

    A typical subject for discussion is how many times a reviewer should play a game before reviewing it? I know I’ve lowered my standards as I’ve written more and more reviews and I’ve even written reviews based on one play of the game (and even part of one play, as was the case with Time…

  • Flowerpower

    I’m churning out review after review… This time I did Flowerpower. Flowerpower is a relaxing little game in the Kosmos two-player range. Designed by relatively unknown authors Peter Haluszka and Angelika Fassauer, Flowerpower is often mentioned as a good couples game. It certainly has some good qualities: it’s a two-player game, easy to learn, easy…

  • Einfach Genial

    Another review I wrote: Einfach Genial aka Ingenious aka Mensa Connections. Einfach Genial is a clever game by master Knizia. It’s an abstract game, a rare thing from Knizia whose games are often fairly thinly themed, but still have at least some theme. Some have questioned if Einfach Genial would’ve won the Spiel des Jahres…

  • Dune

    I wrote a review of Dune (in Finnish). I haven’t played Dune in ages — there’s not a mention of it in this blog, for example, and I haven’t missed many sessions since I started writing. Usually if I own a game and don’t play it, there’s a reason. With Dune, the reasons are obvious.…

  • Bad rules of Victory & Honor

    Peter Sarrett writes about bad rules, mentioning Victory & Honor as an example. He’s spot on: Victory & Honor has probably the worst rulebook I’ve ever seen in a good game. I practically threw the rule book across the room three times while explaining the rules. It took us MUCH longer than it should have…

  • Ambition

    Those reading rec.games.board or rec.games.card might have noticed a thread called truth about church’s ambition. It had nothing to do with church, it’s in fact about Mike Church and his card game Ambition. For some reason there’s a flamewar of sorts going on around the game. Why, I have no idea, but the thread, especially…

  • Rush Hour

    I bought myself a Rush Hour puzzle set and all three extra card sets. It was a total impulse purchase, I just thought it would be interesting to try. I’ve tried Lunar Lockout, another puzzle from the same company and enjoyed that (that one is very much like Ricochet Robot), so I thought Rush Hour…