Gulf Games pictures

[Ed Rozmiarek]

Hello from Florida. The hotel has high speed internet access in the
business center so I have been able to upload pictures from Gulf
Games. Pictures for Wednesday and Thursday are up for your Friday
time wasting pleasure. Sorry, only a few captions, I'll catch up next
week on those. Enjoy.

[Ed Rozmiarek]

On Fri, 20 Feb 2004 09:05:04 -0600, Ed Rozmiarek

Post by Ed Rozmiarek
Hello from Florida. The hotel has high speed internet access in the
business center so I have been able to upload pictures from Gulf
Games. Pictures for Wednesday and Thursday are up for your Friday
time wasting pleasure. Sorry, only a few captions, I'll catch up next
week on those. Enjoy.

Sorry. Forgot the URL:
http://www.rozmiarek.info/gallery/GulfGames13

[Phil Alberg]

Post by Ed Rozmiarek
On Fri, 20 Feb 2004 09:05:04 -0600, Ed Rozmiarek

Post by Ed Rozmiarek
Hello from Florida. The hotel has high speed internet access in the
business center so I have been able to upload pictures from Gulf
Games. Pictures for Wednesday and Thursday are up for your Friday
time wasting pleasure. Sorry, only a few captions, I'll catch up next
week on those. Enjoy.

http://www.rozmiarek.info/gallery/GulfGames13

Welcome back, GGers!

Thanks for sharing your photos with us, Ed. Looks like it was a
splendid time -- wish I was there!

Since you haven't written many captions yet (I know they're
coming...), I tried to play the Identification Game, whereby I tried
to identify both people and games played. I did just so-so. One
game in particular has me stumped: in photo 113, the game that James,
Stven, Susan, and Michael are playing looks like an old game that's a
cross between Monopoly and Clue (?), but I can't seem to place it.
What is it? Was it fun?

What was the "big hit" of GG?

- Phil

[Chris Comeaux]

One game in particular has me stumped: in photo
113, the game that James, Stven, Susan, and Michael
are playing looks like an old game that's a
cross between Monopoly and Clue (?), but I can't
seem to place it. What is it? Was it fun?

That's Careers. Can't say if it was fun, but given
the people that are playing it, my money is on "yes."

What was the "big hit" of GG?

Attika, Oasis, and Tongiaki got a lot of table time.
Although personally I was already somewhat tired of
Attika and my single playing of the new Uberplay games
fell a little flat. Oasis had a little too much luck
in the card draw for me. Tongiaki had a lot of action
between your turns which affected your position
greatly that you could do nothing about.

My favorite "new" game was Santiago. Nothing
earth-shattering; in fact, it's a liitle like New
England - pay more to get a good crop tile early.
Then there's a cool round of bribing Paco to irrigate
your crops. But that's just one guy's opinion. I'll
give you everyone else's opinions if they don't chime
in soon.

[Bobby Warren]

Post by Chris Comeaux
That's Careers. Can't say if it was fun, but given
the people that are playing it, my money is on "yes."

Isn't it great that playing even an okay or bad game is fun when you
are playing with the right people?

Post by Chris Comeaux
Attika, Oasis, and Tongiaki got a lot of table time.
Although personally I was already somewhat tired of
Attika and my single playing of the new Uberplay games
fell a little flat. Oasis had a little too much luck
in the card draw for me. Tongiaki had a lot of action
between your turns which affected your position
greatly that you could do nothing about.

Yeah, comments about both Uberplay games has me wanting to try them
before buying them. I've played "Attika" a lot of late and I have
enjoyed it.

Post by Chris Comeaux
My favorite "new" game was Santiago. Nothing
earth-shattering; in fact, it's a liitle like New
England - pay more to get a good crop tile early.
Then there's a cool round of bribing Paco to irrigate
your crops. But that's just one guy's opinion. I'll
give you everyone else's opinions if they don't chime
in soon.

I liked it the one time I played it. Now that Rio Grande seems to
have delayed releasing it, I am leaning towards ordering the Amigo
version...

[Susan Rozmiarek]

Chris C replies

Post by Chris Comeaux
That's Careers. Can't say if it was fun, but given
the people that are playing it, my money is on "yes."

Yep. That's Stven's 1956 (?) version. It was a hoot, in no small
part due to the players. The game itself isn't all that bad, either.
It's a "roll and move," but there are cards that can mitigate the
luck of the rolls. Plus, each player tweaks his victory condition,
and thus can approach the game with different strategies. I'm
definitely going to keep an eye on eBay for a cheap copy. An OLD copy
as I don't think a new version would generate all the laughs.

Post by Chris Comeaux

Post by Phil Alberg
What was the "big hit" of GG?

Attika, Oasis, and Tongiaki got a lot of table time.
Although personally I was already somewhat tired of
Attika and my single playing of the new Uberplay games
fell a little flat. Oasis had a little too much luck
in the card draw for me. Tongiaki had a lot of action
between your turns which affected your position
greatly that you could do nothing about.

What he said. With Attika being the current darling of our group, I
avoided it. I did like Oasis more than Chris, but several people were
unhappy with the luck of the draw and were proposing tweaks for it.
It had plenty of fans, though. I didn't care much for Tongiaki. I
felt more like I was watching a game rather than playing one. It
seemed like more people liked it than not, though.

In addition to the ones Chris mentioned, the lone copy of Railroad
Dice (Greg's) seemed to be in play often. I haven't decided how I
feel about that one and need to pay it again. I'll probably purchase
it if I get the chance. If nothing else, it uses dice in a very new,
unique and clever way.

In the party games department, I saw a number of Taboo and Coyote
games going on. I even got roped into playing both.

Post by Chris Comeaux
My favorite "new" game was Santiago.

What he said. It went straight to the top of my "buy" list.

Post by Chris Comeaux
I'll give you everyone else's opinions if they don't chime
in soon.

Hey! If I want my opinion, I'll ask for it!!


A very, very tired SusanR

[Michael Chapel]

Post by Susan Rozmiarek
What he said. With Attika being the current darling of our group, I
avoided it.

Yeah, I didn't see you in any of the Attika pic's , so was unable to
comment on your signiture move. Curses!

We played Tongiki last week while you guys were away. We all thought
it fun, but we also thought it was a bit luck driven.

Post by Susan Rozmiarek

Post by Chris Comeaux
My favorite "new" game was Santiago.

Really looking forward to playing this one.

Glad you guys are back. Even though you guys are probably burnt out
of gaming. whoah, made myself snicker.


Mike C. -- Needing a settlers fix.

[jmhuber_2000]

Post by Susan Rozmiarek
In addition to the ones Chris mentioned, the lone copy of Railroad
Dice (Greg's) seemed to be in play often. I haven't decided how I
feel about that one and need to pay it again. I'll probably
purchase it if I get the chance. If nothing else, it uses dice in
a very new, unique and clever way.

Which reminds me of my favorite random event from GG13...

Friday afternoon, Greg, Larry, Jeff and I sat down to play Ur 1830
BC. As I went through the rules, Greg's eyes grew larger & less
focused, until he finally decided that he couldn't handle it. So
while I finished up the rules and we started in, Greg sat down
behind us and taught Railroad Dice. Larry commented that he'd seen
that game go really long sometimes.

So we played, and after ~2-2.5 hours called the game because the
result was clear. Had we continued, it would have taken another 20-
40 minutes to finish. 60 minute later, having just finished
Flaschenteufel, I looked around - and saw the Railroad Dice game
finishing up.

Joe

[Phil Alberg]

Post by Chris Comeaux

One game in particular has me stumped: in photo
113, the game that James, Stven, Susan, and Michael
are playing looks like an old game that's a
cross between Monopoly and Clue (?), but I can't
seem to place it. What is it? Was it fun?

That's Careers. Can't say if it was fun, but given
the people that are playing it, my money is on "yes."

I feel a wee bit deprived, as I have never played Careers. No wonder
why I didn't recognize it.

Post by Chris Comeaux

What was the "big hit" of GG?

Attika, Oasis, and Tongiaki got a lot of table time.
Although personally I was already somewhat tired of
Attika and my single playing of the new Uberplay games
fell a little flat. Oasis had a little too much luck
in the card draw for me. Tongiaki had a lot of action
between your turns which affected your position
greatly that you could do nothing about.

I've only played Attika once, and although the company was super, I
thought the game was lacking. For me, I found it difficult to locate
existing buildings of a given type -- I wish they used different
background colors to make the tokens easier to discern. I've played
Oasis once, and didn't feel there was too much of a luck issue, as
you get to choose cards from multiple sources, and can alter the
selection cycle by choosing how many cards to offer others. I
thought the game was OK, but it's a go-with-the-flow game rather than
a strategic planning kinda game, so it has to be played with the
right group. I've not played Tongiaki, and although it looks cool
I'm kinda skittish about getting it based on lukewarm grumblings that
I've heard.

Post by Chris Comeaux
My favorite "new" game was Santiago. Nothing
earth-shattering; in fact, it's a liitle like New
England - pay more to get a good crop tile early.
Then there's a cool round of bribing Paco to irrigate
your crops. But that's just one guy's opinion. I'll
give you everyone else's opinions if they don't chime
in soon.

I really enjoy Santiago, and cheerfully introduce it to others
whenever I get the chance. It provides a good balance of tension,
and hosage, and at about an hour to play it really hits a sweet spot
with me. This is easily my favorite game from Essen'03.

Thanks!

- Phil

[Chris Comeaux]

Post by Phil Alberg
I've only played Attika once, and although the
company was super, I
thought the game was lacking.

I think I may have been misunderstood. I love Attika
and feel it's worthy of the hype, but I played it a
lot before I got to Gulf Games, so I had little desire
to get in a game. Plus I know my group will be
willing to play it anytime.

Post by Phil Alberg
I've played
Oasis once, and didn't feel there was too much of a
luck issue, as
you get to choose cards from multiple sources, and
can alter the
selection cycle by choosing how many cards to offer
others.

My problem was my offerings were usually very similar
but a little worse than another's. This means I go
last a lot or I offer a 3rd card to sweeten the deal
and have little flexibility in the future. A few of
us wondered if looking at your card stack to make an
offer would fix this without breaking anything else.
I thought having each player lay one card at a time
instead of all at once might be a neat twist as well.
As long as this game was in development, I'm sure this
was tried. It's also quite possible I got a run of
extremely bad cards not likely to occur again that has
soured me.

Post by Phil Alberg
I've not played Tongiaki, and although
it looks cool
I'm kinda skittish about getting it based on
lukewarm grumblings that
I've heard.

Well, some people loved it. I think Jay played it 87
times in 3 days.

I forgot to mention Railroad Dice. I'm not sure if I
liked it or not, but I really admire the design. I
enjoyed my time playing it, but winning may have
helped a lot. I don't know if I deserved to win - if
Ed had purchased one more share of my precious yellow
stock he would have run away with it. I think I heard
it plays better with 3 and I'm pretty sure someone
played it with that number. Maybe they can enlighten
us.

I'd love to put up a full report, but I doubt I'll be
able to given my schedule this week. Suffice to say I
had a blast.

[Jon Theys]

Post by Phil Alberg
One
game in particular has me stumped: in photo 113, the game that

James,

Post by Phil Alberg
Stven, Susan, and Michael are playing looks like an old game that's a
cross between Monopoly and Clue (?), but I can't seem to place it.
What is it? Was it fun?

Looks like Careers to me.

[Ed Rozmiarek]

I have completed uploading the rest of my pictures from Gulf Games 13
and have added captions to all of them. Stop by for a look when you
have the time.

http://www.rozmiarek.info/gallery/GulfGames13