Convention Report: GAMA Trade Show 2006 - March 15, 2006 - Part 1 (Day 3)

By Rick Thornquist
March 15, 2006

Here’s the first part of my report for Day 3 of the GAMA Trade show.  In this part I report on my playing of play Cleopatra and the Society of Architects and chat with some publishers about what they have coming up.

After getting up, I headed down to the open gaming area where I ran into Larry Whalen of Face2Face Games and my Vancouver friend Darcy Paulin.  Larry had a prototype of Ted Alspach’s that he wanted to give a whirl so we gave it a go.  Unfortunately, I can’t really say anything about it except perhaps that it’s more of a gamer game than Seismic.

After finishing up the prototype, we had lots of time before the exhibit hall opened so we broke out a copy of Ticket to Ride - Marklin that I had borrowed from Days of Wonder for just such an occasion.  Again I really liked the game.  Darcy beat us all by a mile which is unbelievable considering he wasn’t there for half of the game!  He had to leave in the middle to go to the bathroom and we just drew two cards from the deck whenever it was his turn.  When he came back he had a pile of cards.  He then went on to win the game!  I’ll have to remember this clever strategy for future games.

Cleopatra and the Society of Architects
Just as I was finishing up Marklin, the Days of Wonder boys - Mark Kaufmann and Eric Hautemont, wandered into the open gaming area.  They had a prototype copy of Cleopatra and the Society of Architects with them.  Eric asked me if I wanted to try to game.  Oh, yea!

We played a prototype copy of the game, but it looked like rules, graphics and pieces were final.  We played a full four player game.

Cleopatra is a building game where the idea is to get resource cards to build various structures in a temple.  The resource cards are artisans, wood, marble, lapis and other things.  Some of the resource cards are also special cards that allow you to do things like steal stuff from other players, etc.  The structures available to build are columns, walls, sphinxes, obelisks, etc, and these are all rendered as quite big plastic pieces.

On your turn you can either draft resource cards or you can build.  When you build, you give up the resources for the item you wan to build and then put the structure on board.  When you build something you get some money, depending on what it is and other factors (proximity to certain other pieces, etc).

When you use some of the better resources or special cards you are required to take corruption points.  You collect them during the game and put them in a cardboard pyramid in front of you.  You’d better not take too many because the player with the most corruption at the end of the game automatically loses!  If you’ve taken a lot of corruption there are ways of getting rid of it, though.

At the end of the game, the player with the most money wins (unless that player had the most corruption, then the player with the next most money wins).

When I previously talked to Mark Kaufmann about the game he said that it plays like a family game with 4 or 5 players but with 3 players it becomes more of a gamer game.  Our game had 4 players and it did feel to me like a medium weight family game.  The game has strategy, but it is not really heavy and should appeal to family category or to gamers looking for something more middle weight.  I liked it, though not as much as I liked Marklin (which I felt had more strategy).  Oh, and as is par for the course with Days of Wonder, the production is beautiful.

Rio Grande Games
After finishing up Cleopatra, I headed to the exhibit hall.  On the way I ran into Jay Tummelson of Rio Grande Games who had come to the show for just the day (he didn’t have a booth - Out of the Box was handling his games).

I chatted with Jay for a few minutes about his upcoming games.  He noted that he had just updated his website with his newest release schedule.  New to the schedule are Celtica, the new Wolfgang Kramer / Michael Kiesling game from Ravensburger, Fiji, the new Friedemann Friese game from 2F-Spiele, and Augsburg 1520, the new Karsten Hartwig game from Alea.

Titanic Games
I started wandering the exhibits and quickly ran into game designer James Ernest.  We chatted both about his newest venture - Titanic Games - plus his upcoming games from Cheapass Games.

As you may know, Titanic Games is the brainchild of game industry veterans James Ernest, Mike Selinker, Lisa Stevens, and Bob Watts.  They intend to publish a number of games with high quality components and the first game out of the gate will be a spiffed up version of Kill Doctor Lucky.  James has changed the rules slightly, but the gameplay is mostly the same as the previous version.  The box and components are to be top shelf.  The game is due to be released in August 2006.

Cheapass Games
James then went on to talk about what’s coming up from Cheapass Games.  Enemy Chocolatier is their next game out of the gate.  This game is about players controlling neighborhoods around a chocolate factory, trying to earn points and complete secret recipes.  It will be a 6 US$ envelope game and is to be released on June 1, 2006.

Next up will be Dead Money, another in the Friedey’s series of games.  This one features zombies in the old west and James characterizes it as a sort of a Poker version of Give me the Brain.  This one should be available at Gencon.

The next game was previously called Necrophonic Saves the World, but James says that name will be changed.  The new name may have something to do with the band Beatnik Turtle - the Chicago-based band, which the game will be based on.  The game will include also include a comic and a CD.

After finishing up with James, I went through the exhibit hall aisle by aisle to catch all the rest of the publishers on my list and perhaps find some surprises.

Twilight Creations
My first stop was Twilight Creations where I found out about what they have in store.  News to me is a second edition of Zombies!!! with updated art, a bigger box, some revised art, and revised and updated rules (there aren’t any rule changes, just clarifications). The game also features a new female zombie miniature (see the picture below).  This new version is compatible with current expansions.  This one is to be released in June 2006.

After Zombies!!!, Twilight is going to be releasing Easter Island.  This is a mostly abstract game that plays with two players.  This one is due in August (don’t let the picture below fool you - the box and board say Moai, but it has been renamed to Easter Island).

I was told that Zombietown is now being released in October and Hidden Conflict 2 has been put on hold for now.

3am Games
My next stop was 3am Games.  I’ve been keeping my eye on these guys for a while - they have a couple of games out already and while I haven’t played them yet, they look interesting.  They were showing two upcoming games - It’s Good to be the King and Nazca.

I played a few rounds of It’s Good to be the King.  This is a light card game where you score points by winning a hands.  The cards are characters - princesses, friars, knights, and in each round the characters are ranked according to their power (the ranking is different each round).  Some of the cards also have special powers.  A hand is then played and whoever wins gets the most points, etc.  It’s quite light but it looked pretty good to me - I’d like to try a full game sometime.  This game is due to be released in early June 2006.

I had a quick overview of the boardgame Nazca.  In this game you become a Nazca (Peruvian) village leader assigning your villagers to tasks such as making pottery, working stone, etc with the ultimate goal of creating Nazca Lines - designs on the board.  The art is beautiful and it sounded quite interesting.  This game is due to be released at Origins.

Face2Face Games
Next I met with Larry Whalen of Face2Face Games.  Larry was proudly showing off the new graphics and miniatures from his upcoming game Winner’s Circle - the new version of Reiner Knizia’s Royal Turf (see the pictures below).  The board is significantly bigger than Royal Turf and the horses have morphed from small flat plastic pieces to much larger miniatures.  Larry’s expecting this one to be in stores in early May 2006.

I asked Larry about the rest of his production schedule and he says that it’s still the same - Genesis and Dragon’s Secret is set for the summer and Wizard’s Brew is set for later 2006.

That’s if for part one of today.  Part two will have reports on a more publishers plus a report on a playing of Rocketville.  Stay tuned!

Pictures - Click the picture for a larger version
	Cleopatra and the Society of Architects prototype game in progress
	Twilight Creations
	New Zombies!!! Miniature
	Easter Island
	3am Games
	It’s Good to be the King
	Nazca
	Larry Whalen of Face2Face Games
	Winner’s Circle board art
	Winner’s Circle miniatures

© 2006 Rick Thornquist

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Comments:

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Rick - I notice the starting circles on the “Winners Circle” board. Does this mean they are changing the random start order rule? Posted by David Fair on Mar 16, 2006 at 01:13 PM | #

David, Unless Larry Whalen has changed something since January 2005, when I edited the rulebook for Winner’s Circle, the random start is still there, but in a different format. The black horse isn’t Othello, for example; it’s simply the horse whose card is in gate #7. Here’s the section from the rules circa Jan. 2005: “Entering the Gates” “Place the pace chip on space 18 on the track. Determine which seven horses are running as follows: Draw the top horse card from the stack and place it next to the first betting area on the board (in gate #1, as shown in the picture); place the horse that matches the color of the gate on the first empty space behind the gray start/finish line, space 36. Draw a second horse card, then place the card in gate #2 and the appropriate color horse on space 35. Continue drawing and placing horse cards until all the gates are filled and seven horses are lined up on spaces 30 to 36 on the track. Note: To ensure a wider variety of horses in a race (sprinters vs. plodders) you might consider the Royal Turf variant presented at the end of these rules.” In Winner’s Circle, there are four horses of each type and under the basic rules, you could end up with multiple Othellos and Earl Greys in a single race. The Royal Turf variant is simply the placement used in Royal Turf—only one horse of each type in each race. I haven’t seen the finished graphics, so I don’t know whether the color of the horse cards matches the gate colors or not. I’m looking forward to seeing the final product as much as anyone else. Posted by W. Eric Martin on Mar 16, 2006 at 09:59 PM | #

Thanks, Rick. I was prepared to be depressed at what looked like a bad change, but your explanation shows this is likely, if anything, a bit better the Royal Turf, at least as far as starting horses goes. Thanks for the answers. Dave Posted by David Fair on Mar 16, 2006 at 10:04 PM | #

The name is close, but I’m not Rick. He’s probably still gallivanting around Vegas at this hour… Eric Posted by W. Eric Martin on Mar 16, 2006 at 10:18 PM | #

Oops, sorry. It’s late and I didn’t look at the byline closely enough. Thanks, Eric. Posted by David Fair on Mar 16, 2006 at 10:28 PM | #

Interesting.  I see no mention of Stonehenge in any reports so I’m assuming it’s not there.  Too bad too, as I’m interested in hearing about it. Posted by Jonathan Greisz on Mar 17, 2006 at 10:26 AM | #

Jonathan - Titanic didn’t have a booth - I just talked with James Ernest and Lisa Stevens.  They had information on Doctor Lucky but didn’t mention anything else (I probably should have asked, though). - Rick Posted by Rick Thornquist on Mar 17, 2006 at 10:48 AM | #

Interesting, with a summer ‘06 date they should be showing it.  So looks like it’s going to be late.  :( Posted by Jonathan Greisz on Mar 17, 2006 at 10:55 AM | #

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