PinkFae Archives #46: Party Gaming: The Dangers of Playing with Non-Gamers

This week's entry is another one from the PinkFae Archives. Today's article focuses on playing 'party games,' or perhaps 'games in a party context.' It was originally published on 18 December 2016.

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I recently went to a November holiday party. We played The Red Dragon Inn and a few other games. I became quite angry during the course of the evening, as people were playing the game wrong.

OK, that's not really a fair statement. Technically, there's not a wrong way to play a game, as long as everyone is having fun. But, of course, I was not having fun. And that can be the problem with playing games at a party. People play games for different reasons. The problem comes in when those reasons are at odds with one another.

This is not to say that board games have no place at a party. Rather, that the decision to play a game depends on several factors. Not least of which is the people with whom you are playing.

PinkFae Archive #44: Board Game Review: Widow's Walk for Betrayal at House on the Hill

Today's entry is another PinkFae Archive. This one is another board game review, but unlike most of the reviews I've written, this one is a review of an expansion. It is thus far still the only review I've written for an expansion. It was originally published on 3 December 2016.

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Back in 2004, Avalon Hill released an innovative board game called Betrayal at House on the Hill. A friend had a copy, and I got to play it, and loved it so much I bought a copy. It became popular, and many of my friends loved playing it. It soon went out of print, though... but demand increased. So in 2010, they released a second edition, with improved parts and corrections. It continued to be popular. So everyone continued to wonder why such a popular game had no expansions. Earlier this year, they announced the first expansion: Widow's Walk.

This review is going to be a little different. Instead of reviewing the game itself, I'm going to review an expansion. If you're not familiar with the base game, you can read my review over on my other site.

Transgender Representation in Board Games

I recently found an article on Transgender Representation in Board Games. When I first saw it, I thought, 'I'm not sure how to represent any particular demographic in board games. For example, when I play Power Grid, there are different coloured pieces for each player. There's no gender involved in that in any way!'

What I was forgetting was story-driven games, such as Betrayal at House on the Hill. Apparently, I still suffer the old person mindset of someone who grew up in the 80s with games like Balderdash, Scotland Yard, and Trivial Pursuit, along with still-popular classics such as Monopoly, Sorry, and Scrabble. These games have only colours, no characters at all. Even games that did include characters, like Cluedo/Clue, the characters were not a big part of game play. Although I always knew that the yellow pawn, for example, represented Colonel Mustard, it never felt like I was playing him as a character in the game. The disassociation between the characters and the game itself was pretty strong.

The only game I can think of that really involved gender at all was Life, which boiled everything down to incredibly abstract concepts of 'pink pegs and blue pegs.' There were a lot of games that used characters from existing franchises, such as Star Wars and other movies.

So perhaps I can be forgiven for not immediately thinking of character-based games.

Why do I like the games I like?

I have joined the writers at Pinkfae.com. I will be posting weekly articles over there as well as what I write here. Some of those articles will be duplicates of what I've written here (sometimes, I'll be writing about a topic I've covered before on this blog, and other times, I may just copy an article directly to that site).

I just submitted my second post to that site. As I was working on it this morning, I was contemplating the question, 'Why do I like the games that I like?' Most of the games I enjoy playing are of what I call the 'thinky-thinky' variety. They involve a lot of careful thought, weighty decisions, deliberate planning, and consideration of the actions of your opponents (and how those actions might totally hose you if you make a mistake!).

But then there are those games I like that do not involve much thought at all. Games like Panic on Wall Street, or The Red Dragon Inn. Why do I like these games that don't require the use of grey matter?

This got me to thinking. So I sat down and made a list of my favourite board games (and one roleplaying game that lasts a few hours at most, because it seems to fit better in this category than with traditional roleplaying games). Then I sorted those games into the different reasons why I like them. Here's what I came up with:

Worker Placement Games

Last night was the Backer Party for the Loot & XP Board Game Cafe. It was a blast! I had so much fun hanging out with awesome people, playing great games, and even making some new friends and reconnecting with some that I haven't seen in years!

In addition to playing Sushi Go and The Red Dragon Inn, I also ended up playing a game called Alchemists. I may do a proper review of that game later, but I just wanted to share a few thoughts I had as a result of playing that game last night.

I described the game to a spectator as a worker placement game with elements of Clue and just a soupçon of Compounded. I stand by that description. The core element of the game is a deck of eight alchemical ingredients (including toads, mandrake root, and raven's claws), each with specific alchemical properties. The exact properties are randomised by an app on your phone, and you have to spend a large portion of the game combining ingredients to see what potions result from them, and then using that information to deduce the alchemical properties of the ingredients.

Co-operative Board Games

A couple of years ago, someone published an article over at cracked.com entitled '6 Board Games That Ruined It For Everyone.' The article describes six of the most well-known board games that suck (I don't necessarily agree with the author that they all suck; I still have a soft spot for Risk, although I will agree that that's better played as a solitaire game on the computer for the same reasons that the author lists for why it sucks). For each, it offers an alternative that does what the listed game tries to do, only better.

Three of the alternatives, I hadn't heard of. The other three are excellent choices. Even the three that are new to me sound like excellent choices. But there's something I think they should have mentioned in this article: co-operative board games.

In most board games, there's a single winner and the rest of the players lose. Some board games use teams, like Pictionary or The Resistance. But in co-operative board games, all the players win or lose together.

Board Game Review - Betrayal at House on the Hill

At long last, I have internet at home again. This means that I can start updating this site again. I'll try to maintain my rigorous schedule of one post every Sunday.

So for my return post, I'll review Betrayal at House on the Hill. This is nominally a horror game, but I always prefer to think of it as an adventure game. What appeals to me is not the horror genre aspect, but the surprise twists of the scenarios.

First, let's get the statistics here:

Strategy: 2
Randomness: 4
Complexity: 4
Humour: None.
Attractiveness: Pretty.
Expected Length of Game Play: one hour.

Board Game Review - Labyrinth

Oh my goodness... has it really been three weeks without a post? Bad, bad Game Dork!

I'm really sorry. I'll try not to let it happen again.

So for this week, let's go with a really simple review of a great board game: Labyrinth. As always, the rating system is right here:

Strategy: 2
Randomness: 2
Complexity: 1
Humour: None
Attractiveness: Useful
Expected Length of Game Play: 30 minutes.