So I’m back in the UK after a long, turbulent and ache-inducing flight. A necessary evil when dealing with international travel, of course, so I’m not going to complain too much.
Andie and I both fell asleep for a bit in the early afternoon once we got back. I know they say that’s a bad idea but we were both exhausted to the point of mild delirium. I awoke a short while later relatively refreshed but still zombie-like, had a shower and prepared to head off to my good friend Sam’s abode for some board gaming goodness. His wife is away, so he wanted to take advantage of the situation with a “boys’ night”. Our definition of “boys’ night” doesn’t involve drinking and going out on the pull; it involves playing board games until 3AM.
And that’s what we did. We got in some good time with a number of new titles, including Last Night on Earth and 7 Wonders.
The latter was a pleasant surprise. Many building and resource management games are very time-consuming and complex, but this one is very straightforward. The relatively simple mechanics belie a wealth of strategies, and the card-based nature of the game means that there’s a pleasing element of randomness.
Last Night On Earth is at the other end of the spectrum — “Ameritrash” to 7 Wonders’ “Eurogame”, if you will. (For the uninitiated, “Ameritrash” refers to board games with strong thematic content but simple mechanics that are light on the head-scratching strategy, while “Eurogames” are the opposite, focusing more on mechanics and strategy, often presenting their thematic content in a somewhat abstract way. Both are fine uses of your time, despite the disparaging implications of the word “Ameritrash”, but many gamers typically gravitate towards one kind of game or the other as the situation demands.)
As it happened, Last Night on Earth is a good game for the end of the night. Its mechanics are simple and straightforward, but it encourages you to imagine the movie scenes of the virtual zombie horror that you are playing out on the board in front of you. Instead of simply collecting cards and following movement rules, you’re imagining, say, Jenny the farmer’s daughter fleeing for her life through the cornfields as she is pursued by a relentless horde of zombies; Sheriff Anderson boldly protecting his son from harm by blowing a zombie’s head off with a shotgun at point blank range; Jake the “drifter” stumbling around in the darkness, barging shambling zombies out of the way. (Kudos to the game for covering all the zombie movie tropes along the way, too, including a card which implies two opposite-sex player figures inhabiting the same space will want to shag each other, causing them to miss their respective turns.)
Now it’s 3.27AM and I should sleep. There’s more gaming to be done tomorrow. And then more sleep. Lots more sleep.
Oh, also, I’m now officially into my third year of daily blogging. Go me!
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