George asked this question:

So how does this coincide with Hasbro's Axis&Allies D-Day release?

I believe they will both be released about the same time - in June to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the D-Day landing.  I think the games will be quite different though.  I was fortunate enough to playtest A&A D-Day (strategy articles available), and I think it is quite good.  It is very similar to the large-scale A&A but simpler - smaller scale, no economy, and less playing time.  But the basic ideas are similar (movement, combat system).  And it is just D-Day.

Looking at Memoir 44, you will see a more generic game system with a variety of scenarios (ala Battle Cry).  So you'll have less geographic detail, the scale will be smaller, but you'll get more flexibility. 

Will it be possible to not purchase this game?

Julie and I are cat people.  Dogs are cool, we love them, but they are way too restrictive and high maintenance for us.  So here are our cats.

Wrigley (left) is about 13 years old.  Julie and I bought her about 1 month after getting married.  Sammi is half bengal and going on 2 years old.

Finally some gaming! I was in Seattle/Redmond today on business, so I drove up last night for some late-night gaming with the Microsoft (and Boards & Bits) folks.  This was the first time I sat down for some face-to-face gaming since before my Asia trip.  Thanks to Tom Powers and crew for inviting me, and thanks to Microsoft for providing the space.

Manga Manga

Two word review on this game: crap crap.  I like manga art as much as the next guy, but believe me this game is in no way related to the theme.  Quick summary of rule mechanics: real-time game, slap down the right card so that the color in the little circle in the upper left-hand part of the card matches the color of the shield on the card at the top of the discard pile.  Think speed or slap-jack.  The first player to get rid of his hand wins a prize token; whoever has the most cards in his hand gets a consolation token.

There are serious human factors issues with this game.  I'm starting to notice this more and more with games I play, mostly related to color choices and the inclusion of distracting elements that make it difficult to quickly determine type information about game pieces.  Every game designer should study Edward Tufte.  In the case of Manga Manga there are a few major design flaws:

• The Manga artwork on the cards only distracts from the game play by making it difficult to determine the colors (top-left and shield).
• Some of the colors (namely blue and purple) are too close and hard to distinguish.  Or maybe it is just my adult onset color blindness.
• (I could get used to this) When looking at the top of the discard pile, it can be difficult to focus on the shield as the target color and not the circle.

Even without these issues, I wouldn't enjoy this game.  Too light, too reflexive for my tastes.

Ticket to Ride

There has been quite a bit of hype about this game, so I was eager to try it out.  I opened my own copy (we made a bulk order of about $500 worth of games with Boards & Bits and this was one of my purchases) and we started laying our track.

It is easy to make initial comparisons with Transamerica, and there are certainly some similarities.  The primary way you score points is by building track segments between cities to connect more distant cities.  Since its an Alan Moon game, you might also think there would be similarities to Union Pacific.  Other than the train theme, there really aren't any similarities to that game, other than the mechanic used to draw cards.

I think this might be a really good game.  The components are nice, though it would be cool if the trains weren't plastic.  Then again, they are cool detailed little locomotives so I can live with them.

The game includes a number of different mechanics - hidden goals, set collection, and connectivity and route management.  They play together well, and there was a ton of tension while playing the game, mostly relating to the tough choice of drawing more cards or laying down track now before somebody blocks you.

I hope to play again this weekend and I'll give another report.  Tom thrashed us all, scoring in the 130s.

Ali Baba

I ran to get some dinner so the rest of the crew played Ali Baba, an interesting memory game that looks like it might be fun for kids.

Schrille Stille

For our last game of the night, I opened my new copy of Schrille Stille to teach the crowd.  This is basically a party game, but I love it for the fun and the coolest mechanical gadget I've seen in a game since Mouse Trap.

Each player owns a record label and works to influence the popularity of artists on their (and others') labels.  This is done using a secret voting and tabulation mechanism that looks like a turntable.  This is not a strategic game - it is pretty random but players that are good at tracking group-think can do well in this game.  I highly recommend this game for gamers and non-gamers as a light party game.

Amazon currently has some good deals on a few Mayfair games, particularly the crayon rail games.  There were a few that had been on my list, so at 50% off they were impossible to resist.  Just purchased:

• Empire Builder [Amazon link]
• Silverton [Amazon link]
• Iron Dragon [Amazon link]

I finally got around to posting some photos from my recent trip to Kuala Lumpur and Beijing.  Now that I'm using the Digital Rebel, the photos files are quite large.  Rather than trim them down and post them here, I'm going to try out the Ofoto service for a while.  When you click through the album links below, Ofoto will ask if you'd like to join.  You are not required to join to see the albums, so feel free to opt out.

• Photos from Kuala Lumpur
• Photos from Beijing, including the Great Wall, Tiananmen Square, and the Forbidden City.

This is mostly just an entry for me to remember where to find the stuff, but here is the best place to find the list of Tivo hacks for modifying default settings.  Every once in a while we reset the Tivo and I need to reset some things to my desired state.  Most usefule is the 30 second advance feature (Select-Play-Select-3-0-Select).

Made it back home safely yesterday, flying from Beijing to Tokyo to Seattle to Portland.  Quite a bit easier coming back than flying out (shorter, less hassle).

I'll be posting a gallery of photos from the trip shortly.  The trip overall was very successful from a business perspective, and by extending my stay by a day I was able to take in some of the sites around Beijing including the Great Wall and Ming Tombs.

We safely made it to Beijing today, arriving about 7am after a restless redeye from Singapore.  Given the choice between catching up on some sleep and seeing a few sights before our 2pm meeting, we chose to head to Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City.  Our rooms weren't ready in any case, so this was an easy decision.

There's a lot to say about Beijing - more than I have time to write tonight.  A few random thoughts are in order though:

• The weather is brisk, sort of like a late winter / early spring day in the midwest plains (like Omaha).  Today the skies were clear blue but it was very windy.  In the summer, these winds often result in sandstorms from the Mongolian plains.
• Compared to Singapore and KL, Beijing is very culturally homogenous. We stand out like sore thumbs here.
• English is clearly not a priority here (nor should it be for most, of course) - taxi drivers in particular speak zero to little English.  The kind hotel stuff were helpful here, writing down instructions in Chinese for us to hand to the tax drivers.  That still didn't help in one case as we drove around for over an hour looking for our partner's office building.  The driver had to ask for directions four times.
• There are cranes everywhere - perhaps in preparation for the summer Olympics?  Reminds of when I was in Barcelona in 1990.
• There's lots of greenery in the city - for example, many of the major thoroughfares are lined with trees.
• Bicycles are everywhere.  I read that over half of the world's bicycles can be found in China.
• These folks understand capitalism.  I'll explain later how efficient they are at separating tourists from their RMBs.
• Summary - this is a beautiful city, with beautiful people, and I'd love to have more time to explore it in depth.

Tomorrow is all-day business meetings, and I'm staying through Saturday to allow time to see the great wall.

I am sitting in the Singapore Air lounge in Singapore right now, waiting for my flight to Beijing.  It is about midnight here, and we arrive around 7am.  Things went well in KL - we had a great customer conference and I was able to spend some valuable time with our integration partner based in KL.

The days and nights were fairly busy after the first day, so the tourist activities were limited to one evening spent wandering around Chinatown looking for some good shopping deals and having dinner.

Depending on how much rest we get on the flight to Beijing, we may be able to go see the palace before our first business meeting at 2pm.