I recently attended Lobster Trap, an annual invitation-only convention held just north of Boston. I’ve been going to this convention since it started many years ago with just a few people getting together in a friend’s art studio; it’s now 100 plus people in a hotel ballroom. While it has grown, it is still a friendly event that is just big enough to feel like a convention but not so big that you can’t see everyone. It starts on Wednesday and goes through Sunday. Unfortunately for various reasons my time was limited to just 3 days this time around, but I managed to play 15 games with 19 people in that short time. Here are some of my highlights.
TIPPERARY
So clearly this is not a hot new release; this game came out last fall. However, I don’t feel like it got the attention that it deserves. It’s a great tile laying game from Gunter Burkhart. There’s a spinner in the middle of the table that has a symbol for each player on it; there are two tiles in each slot. A player spins and all players choose one of the tiles next to their symbol to place to build their own Irish village. You score for the way tiles are placed, both shape and color/type, so you have to decide how to place the tile to maximize your score. Plus there are cute sheep; so how could you go wrong?
BARCELONA WITH PASSIEG DE GRACIA EXPANSION
Okay, so this is also not a brand-new game, but it is still kinda new, and since we played with the new Passieg de Gracia expansion it totally counts. One of the highlights of my Lobster Trap experience every year is getting to play a game with Phil, and while I love Barcelona I had no idea there was an expansion, so I was doubly excited. You can read our review of Barcelona here. With the expansion the game plays much the same, but you now have new action options on the Passieg de Gracia; moving on this track rewards you for things you have already done on the main action track as well as gives you the chance to earn some bonuses. It was another way to continue to care about things that have potentially already scored as well as to further make progress in your own agenda. I continue to enjoy this game quite a bit and the expansion definitely added to it; I will plan to pick this up.
BEYOND THE HORIZON
One cool thing about the event is that there are always a lot of newly-released games available to be played; some of the organizers go to Essen every year and come back with the latest and (sometimes) greatest for the library. Usually they are just boxed up and in a couple of stacks in the main ballroom, but this year the organizers decided to make a Hot Games Room, where many of the hottest new games were left set up so people could just sit down and play them. I was skeptical at first; I thought it would be hard to find people to play with and that it would feel too removed from the event. It turns out I was wrong; the room wasn’t far away and was near the snacks, so there was plenty of traffic and it turns out that when games are on the table already it is pretty easy to get people to play. That’s what happened here, I was just standing in the room with my spouse when Brian and Kevin wandered in, and they were interested in giving this a try so we sat down and learned it.
I did not know when we sat down that this is a sequel to Beyond the Sun, a game that falls squarely in the “not for me” category after 2 plays over the past year. That might have affected my decision to play, but in the end I am glad to have tried it. It does have a technology track that is quite similar to Beyond the Sun, but instead of space you are building territory. Based on my limited experience with both games I can’t offer much expert opinion, but I enjoyed my play of this well enough. It was interesting to hear other people who are fans of Beyond the Sun and their opinions of this; it seemed split fairly evenly as to whether they would want to pick this up as well or whether the original was superior or at least enough. Either way, this still hits the not for me category; it is too dry for my tastes.
ENDEAVOR DEEP SEA
Fun fact: If you were to ask me if I had ever played the original Endeavor later in the evening after a delicious dinner and a couple of beers with Joy and Kevin, I would tell you that I definitely had. Readers, I can tell you that I assuredly have not. I was definitely thinking of a different exploration game. I am told that many of the same mechanisms have been adapted to fit this new submarine exploration theme. I can neither confirm or deny that, but I can tell you that I quite liked this one. You are a researcher/explorer who is trying to explore new locations and dive sites as well as save the environment. You start with a small, inexperienced team that you will develop over the rounds of the game. You use the team members to take actions in the ocean – explore new tiles, take conservation efforts and investigate dive sites. You need to set yourself up to be able to do the things you want to do, and you have to balance between exploring the ever-increasing depths while not neglecting the things you want to do closer to the surface. I am really looking forward to trying this one again. I think the next time I would prefer to play with only 2 or 3 players instead of 5, though – there was a lot of down time and it did feel like the game was too long with that number.
SALTFJORD
The other nice thing about the hot games room was the ability to see a game I might not otherwise have heard anything about; that was the case with Saltfjord. I own and like Santa Maria, but it almost never hits the table and there are people who don’t like the theme. I had just been thinking I needed to get it back to the table soon when I saw this and a friend explained that it was a re-theme remake of Santa Maria, so I was excited to try it. I would say it is very loosely based on Santa Maria; the dice drafting mechanisms are similar, but the rest of it has a different feel. The theme is well-integrated and the graphics are clear and attractive.
BOMB BUSTERS
While talking with my friend Joe about games he had enjoyed he mentioned this one, so we decided to give it a go. It’s a cooperative game where players have to work together to diffuse a bomb. Co-op games are not always my thing, since I have had too many experiences with an alpha player just trying to run the game, but that isn’t possible here. Players randomly get some wire tiles, which they put in their handy holder without showing them to other players. Each player then takes turns trying to make matches with other players by asking them if a particular tile is a number that they also have a tile of. If you match, you remove those tiles – which is what you are trying to do. If you don’t, the bomb ticks a little bit faster. The game starts out with some tutorial missions that are pretty easy and them ramps up. Some special abilities and tools come into play, too. It’s was very fun, well, at least until someone accidentally blows everyone up. (Sorry about that, friends. . . . .)
GALILEO GALILEI
I had not heard anything about this game prior to seeing it set up on the table, although to be fair various life events conspired to keep me from doing much research on new games at all, so I don’t know why I was continually surprised by all the games I didn’t know. We were intrigued by the telescope (which my spouse thought was a cannon until he realized the theme) so sat down. We were learning it from the rules when Rachel came along and offered to teach – thanks, Rachel! Players are astronomers who are exploring the starts while building more powerful telescopes. On your turn you use your telescope to select one of five available actions to you; each action will have two parts – one permanently printed on the board and one randomly-placed tile. There are many possible actions and lots of things that will earn you points –do you explore? Or teach? Or maybe you want to build up your telescope and resources first. I really enjoyed this one; there was a lot happening, but it was pretty easy to follow and understand your options, and there were a lot of cool, unique mechanisms happening. I look forward to trying this one again once it is released in the US. As I write this I have Galileo by the Indigo Girls stuck in my head, much like I did during the game.
OPINIONATED EATERS AND DRINKERS
The hotel provides a snack and beverage bar for a few hours every day, and this year the organizers decided to add a specialty cocktail to the menu – the Lobster Trap. I have completely forgotten all of the details, but it involved gin and blueberries, and it was delicious. As usual I brought treats to share, but I completely forgot to take pictures. My selection this year included coffee cardamom, mocha chip, and rainbow rave cookies as well as some bourbon caramels. Gotta keep my co-gamers caffeinated and happy!
