I guess Monday is just the regular day I post these now?
This week in development
The Lion & The Unicorn is ready for the wider world!
After a couple of 2-player sessions using the new rules, I’m satisfied with how it works. I’m going to put together some print & play files (including creating some reference cards and illustrative icons for the card powers) and the game should be available later this week.
I’m also looking towards UK Games Expo this year. They have various developer-focused events happening and I’m considering whether to attend any. Am I ready??
This week in games
Wednesday was a 2-player affair. Other than TL&TU, I took the chance to try out another variant of The Lady and the Tiger. This time, we went with Labyrinth and found it just as good as the other variants.
We also got in a couple of games of Okiya, though two out of four ended in a draw.
On Friday, I was completely ready to spend my night under a blanket, hiding from the cold, but then games were suggested! So I once again braved the snow to to go see Alex for a session of 2-player games. Because nothing should get in the way of games!
We started off with Beyond Baker Street, which I think was the first time we got the rules completely right. Maybe now we could move on to playing the full game with character cards and everything??
I think it’s not so great at 2-players though. You end up in a loop of [1: give clue] [2: play card] until you get stuck and have to make a random move to shift the loop to start with the other player.
Then we had my first play of Istanbul, which was a lot of fun. I think I definitely prefer Concordia, but Istanbul is a bit lighter and doesn’t have to be as thinky. My only complaint is that because of the way you score, you do end up in a situation where there’s no point playing the last couple of turns because they’re a foregone conclusion.
After a play of TL&TU and an aborted attempt at Catan (where we realised after set up that it requires 3 players), we moved on to The Lady and the Tiger (I do own other games, I swear). This time we tried out Doors, the original game it was designed for.
I’m really impressed with all the games included. I was expecting some to be kind of “filler”, but they’re all good. It’s a great box to bring along to a games night and then you can pick a game based on how many players you have.
Then, I jumped at another chance to play Thunder & Lightning as it’s always a lot of fun. Our first playthrough ended quite quickly, but then our second ran for about as long as it could.
It ended with Alex unable to use all his actions as I had one card left in my battlefield, but it was a shield wall that he couldn’t destroy as his card opposing it was also a shield wall, which can’t attack.
We finished off with Carcassonne as it’s something we could basically play in our sleep. Alex took a good lead, but I managed to pull it back by getting just the right pieces to finish off a couple of difficult cities.
Final scoring took me to just one point ahead with a cunningly-placed farmer, until we realised we’d missed an unfinished city tile that gave Alex one point for a spectacular draw. Although we then realised my farm actually extended further to score another couple of cities, but I liked the draw better.
This week in everything else
I really need to get more reading done. On Saturday I finally got Gods of Love finished (it was all right), so I started something new on Sunday: The Refrigerator Monologues by Catherynne M Valente.
It’s not long, so I’m already a third of the way through. I’m undecided yet whether the obviousness of which characters are being referenced is a good or bad thing.
Other than that, I also used Sunday as an opportunity to check out Taika Waititi’s commentary on Thor: Ragnarok, which is just as enjoyable as you’d expect from Taika.
I love everything about this film. Even the menu music on the blu-ray is phenomenal.