Kris Hall: Looking Back at 2008

One of the joy’s of being a regular columnist is being able to write a favorites-of-the-year essay and pretend that I am a real expert.  My opinion is worth no more than yours, but that won’t stop me from listing the games that impressed me the most over the last twelve months.  Please note that this is a list of favorite games—not games that I claim are the best of the year.  I don’t trust my own objectivity when dealing with styles of games that I don’t care for (pure abstracts or pure card games) so I will avoid the use of the word “best.”

This list is also tricky in that I include games that were published prior to this year, but which only became widely available in the United States over the last twelve months.  Agricola may be very old news to those who can afford to jet to Essen each year, but to us lesser mortals it is a 2008 game.

As Tom Rosen has noticed, this was a great year for cooperative or semi-cooperative games.  Pandemic, Ghost Stories, and Battlestar Galactica made strong impressions, and I hope they will be the grandparents of future generations of fascinating cooperative games.

As Shannon Appelcline also noticed, this year was notable for the growing popularity of Martin Wallace and his games.  Maybe it is merely my own pro-Wallace prejudice that skewing my thinking, but I seem to have read quite a few comments about folks who have been newly impressed with this year’s crop of Wallace games.  Two of these games have made my list of favorites.

So without further preamble, here are the games of the year that impressed me the most:

Agricola

This really is a good game in spite of the excessive amount of hype.  Agricola is a fine moderate-complexity worker-placement game about having kids and improving one’s home and business.  In other words, real life.  The fact that the game is set in medieval Germany is almost beside the point; players instinctively identify with the goals of the game.  Buy the game once and own it for a lifetime.

Times Up!

I never thought that I would put a party game on this list, but Times Up! is funny and fun enough to earn a spot.  Teams of players have to make their partner guess the name of a famous person or character using words or gestures.  Later rounds eliminate the words and leave only gestures and sound effects (and some of these are almost always comical).  This is one party game that I don’t dread playing, and that is high praise from me.

Pandemic

The first of the cooperative games on my list.  In Pandemic, players are scientist/doctors trying to save the world from four virulent diseases.  The long-term goal of finding a cure must be balanced with the short-term need to prevent new outbreaks of contagion.  Each player has a special power, and learning to use these abilities most effectively can be the key to success.  As the disease cubes pile up in various cities, and threaten to overwhelm whole continents, the game generates a surprising amount of suspense.

The Price of Freedom

I still dabble in wargames occasionally, and moderate-complexity grand-strategic games are usually what I focus on.  The Price of Freedom is one of the few quality moderate-complexity grand-strategic games of the American Civil War, and it is a card-driven game to boot.  From what I can glean from the internet, The Price of Freedom has a small but devoted following.  If you like card-driven wargames, you should give this one a look.

Tinner’s Trail

The first of two Martin Wallace games on this list.  Tinner’s Trail is a moderate-complexity economic game in which players are mine owners in southwest England trying to extract copper and tin from water-logged mines.  An auction mechanism and a simple method of simulating the costs of extracting water from the mines gives players plenty of tough decisions.

Through the Ages

Boardgamegeek lists Through the Ages as a 2006 game, but it only became widely available in the US in 2008, and so I feel justified in adding it to this list.  Through the Ages was inspired by the Sid Meier’s computer game Civilization, and the resemblance is obvious.  Through the Ages may be the most complex game on this list, and the one that takes the longest to play.  This is not a gateway game, and those who most appreciate lighter games should steer clear.  But if you enjoy heavier strategy games, then there is a lot to like in this civ-building game.

Wabash Cannonball/Chicago Express

The train game Wabash Cannonball attracted a lot of favorable attention when it was published by Winsome Games.  So much so that Queen Games decided to purchase the rights to the game, and republish it as Chicago Express.  While Wabash Cannonball was a no-frills game as far as components are concerned, Queen Games went all out for their edition.  Chicago Express is a beautiful game, and has probably the most attractive components of any game on this list.  In this moderate-complexity game, players bid for shares of various railroad companies and try to manage these companies for maximum profit.  While this is description may sound familiar, Chicago Express manages to play in less than two hours—something that many other railroad games with auction mechanisms fail to do.

Steel Driver

Steel Driver is the second Martin Wallace game on this list, and one that makes an interesting companion game to Chicago Express.  Both games feature railroad building, and both have auction mechanisms in which the successful bid becomes the railroad’s operating capital for that turn.  I think Steel Driver’s rules are simpler and more accessible than the rules of Chicago Express, but I am happy to own both.

Ghost Stories

Of all the 2008 games, the one I have played the most is Ghost Stories.  My young daughters have repeatedly asked to play it, although I have to help them with the strategy.  Even my wife likes this game.  Ghost Stories is a cooperative game in which players are trying to defend a Chinese village from an assault by a host of supernatural spooks and monsters.  Each turn a new ghost card is drawn and added to the assault, and some ghosts even trigger additional draws from the ghost deck.  This constant offensive by the forces of evil generates a lot of suspense.  The game is surprisingly tough to win even at the most basic level, and I hope any future expansions will include ways to modify the difficulty level so that my daughters can experience at least one victory with the game in their lifetimes.

Battlestar Galactica

Each year, the Appalachian Gamers get together on the first Saturday in January for an afternoon of gaming.  This event features a prize table.  This year, for the very first time, several gamers offered the same game as a prize: Battlestar Galactica.  I take this as an indication of the level of interest in this game both within our group, and in the gaming world in general. 

My own appreciation for BG has grown over time.  I was impressed when I first played a demo game at Gencon in the summer, and my admiration for this semi-cooperative game has only increased since I purchased it for myself. 

In case you’ve been visiting another star system over the past year, Battlestar Galactica the game is inspired by the television series of that name.  Players represent characters from the show who are defending the human space fleet from an attack by the mechanical Cylons.  The twist is one or more players in the game may be android Cylon agents who are working against the other players.  BG takes the spot-the-traitor mechanism that was used in Shadows Over Camelot, and takes it to the next level.  In Camelot, the secret traitor often didn’t have many options, but in BG the Cylon players have a variety of ways to throw monkey wrenches into the human defense mechanism.  In a recent game, Travis Reynolds was a secret Cylon agent.  He managed to become both Admiral of the Fleet, and the Human President, and he proceeded to throw true human players into the brig. 

Battlestar Galactica has more interesting player interaction than any game on this list (with the possible exception of Times Up!).  It is my personal Game of the Year.

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