Mass Market Moment – Blokus

Blokus is a family of games that started in the hobby gaming world and crossed over to the mass market, assisted by the purchase of publication rights by Mattel. The game won many awards, including a Mensa Select award. (Don’t tell the kids, but it also won a Teacher’s Choice award in 2004.) It them spawned several additional versions: Blokus Duo (aka Blokus for 2 and Travel Blokus), Blokus Trigon, and Blokus 3D (aka Rumis). With a simple set up rules and colorful pieces, it draws in potential players, appeals to children, and makes the whole series a set of excellent abstracts.

Photo by Tom Rosen

The original game Blokus is a four player game in which players alternate placing one of their geometric shapes on a board, covering as much as the board as they can by game end. The shapes are made of squares starting with one square and continuing up to every shape which can be built with five squares. The catch is that one player’s pieces can only touch at the corners, which makes it difficult to fence an area off from opponents. At the end of the game, players receive a negative point for every square (not piece!) that is not put in play. Positive points are received for using all of your pieces and for using the one-square piece last. Highest score wins. Stepping back from the board after the game is done shows a pretty mosaic that leaves observers saying, “That looks cool!”
Blokus 3D, originally known as Rumis, also won several awards. The objects are now three dimensional, as might be guessed. The scoring is different, with each player scoring positive points for the number of cubes visible from directly above the board. Negative points are earned for cubes left over as before. Since this is the one game in the series I haven’t played (though we do own it), I can’t say much more.

The two player rules for Blokus have each player using two of the four colors, as if there were two teams of two colors. A better approach is taken by the next game in the line to be published, Blokus Duo, which originally was named Travel Blokus. It is also sold exclusively at Target as Blokus to Go, which allows the pieces to actually snap in place for play in a moving vehicle. Regardless of the name, the difference between Blokus and Blokus Duo is merely the number of players and the start location. Duo is strictly a two-player game. This is my favorite form of the game. The board is smaller and makes for a very tight game.

Blokus does not play well with three players. Play starts from the corners, which means one player has an opponent on both sides; the others have opponents on one side only. The player in the middle is squeezed, and will nearly always do poorly. Blokus Trigon attempts to address this. The board and pieces are made of triangles rather than squares, which results in some strange shapes. The overall board shape is hexagonal, which allows three players to evenly space themselves out. There is equality with four players too, but the game tries to be a little too much. I, for one, have trouble visualizing what I want to do.

I can hear some of you thinking, “I need to buy THREE games, Blokus Duo for two, Blokus Trigon for three, and Blokus for four?!” No. Unless you really want to travel with it Blokus Duo isn’t needed. Many people play two player Blokus by using one color per player, and using a third color to fence of the board, reducing it to the size of Blokus Duo (14x14). Similarly, Blokus Trigon can be played with two colors and the two outer rings of spaces marked off on three sides. As for playing with three players, I would still play Blokus. Blokus Trigon is just too oddly shaped, and while it might be a more even game, it isn’t any more fun. Just buy and play the original Blokus with the strongest player in the squeezed position, or rotate through that position in several games of match play. Since the game plays in roughly 20-30 minutes, that’s a possibility. Therefore, while all of the variations are good, the original Blokus is the purchase to make.

Gaming – Opening Moves

My re-acquaintance with boardgaming came about four years ago when my son received a copy of Ticket to Ride for Christmas. I had received a copy of Lord of the Rings before that, when the movies were in the theatres, but my own prejudices had kept me from playing it. With Ticket to Ride, I started down the path into the gaming hobby.
We had our share of mass-market games on our shelves: Monopoly, Balderdash, Taboo and Uno. There were also children’s games like Hi, Ho Cherry-O! After playing Ticket to Ride and then Settlers of Catan, I started looking for other games, and stumbled upon the BoardGameGeek website. This website supports an online community of gamers around the globe. With around 50,000 games in the database, it opens up the boardgaming world. After joining in January 2008, I have used this site to find games I love, received answers to questions on rules, and thoroughly enjoyed the hobby beyond just playing games.
Most of my friends and family, though, do not share this passion. Many of them play casually, socially, and it is for them (and you!) that I write this blog. The question many ask is, “What would be a good game for my family and friends to play now and then?”
The first step is to figure out what you have and start playing! Monopoly, Risk and Trivial Pursuit, amongst other commonly found games, can make for memorable evenings even if they are not everyone’s favorite game. (Did you know that stealing is not against the rules in Monopoly? I found out the hard way, and we still tell the story in our family!) As you play, you will start to see what types of games are better for you family. Are there little ones in the family? How much confrontation can the game have before tempers flare? How long can the game be and still keep everyone interested? How complex can it be?
It sounds complicated, but that’s why I am here. In fact, I am going to open up this topic with my first, all-purpose, suggestion: Forbidden Island. It is a cooperative game, which means all players are team up against the workings of the game. For most people, this is a completely new concept, but it is becoming more popular in the gaming world. Players form a team of adventurers, looking to recover ancient artifacts. A long-dead civilization placed these mystical items on the island to keep them from falling into the hands of enemies, and with safeguards in place to keep the artifacts from being taken. Once someone sets foot upon Forbidden Island, it begins to sink into the sea. The players must recover the artifacts and fly off the island before it sinks to win the game. Each player has a unique role on the team, and a corresponding ability, which will help the group in its efforts. Using these different abilities effectively is critical to win, and keeps the game fresh.
This game plays in 30 minutes with up to four players of nearly any age. Because everyone is playing as a team, children can be coached by parents within the spirit and rules of the game. Kids don’t feel like “the loser”, since everyone wins or loses together. It is certainly not a “kid’s game” though; adults will find themselves challenged to win. Forbidden Island will certainly promote a lot of group interaction without confrontation (though there might be some passionate debates!). The artwork and game pieces are wonderful, and it comes in a nice tin box. It is priced very reasonably, and shouldn’t be too hard to find. Bookstore chains were carrying it at Christmas, and online gaming stores will have it in stock.

In upcoming posts I will discuss Ticket to Ride and other good games to start your play.
Roll On!

Angola

This past weekend was the annual trip our Scout Troop takes to Angola, IN. We spend a few hours on the iced toboggan run of the nearby state park as the focal point of the weekend – 35mph worth of fun! Since it’s a three hour drive, though, we go up Friday night and come back Sunday morning, which leaves quite a bit of time for games. We have a big gym available to us at the National Guard armory where we stay. Much of the gaming is dodgeball and other physical games, but there is some boardgaming that goes on, too.
Typically, the Scouts play Magic: the Gathering, Axis & Allies, and a few other games. Apples to Apples seemed to be big this year. It’s always interesting to see what the Scouts bring themselves, and to see where there interests lie.
I brought an assortment of games that I consider travel games. Those are games that, at least individually, would easily fit in a briefcase or backpack for playing on the road or trail. Of the games I brought, two made it to the game table:
Hive. This game has been a hit for a while now in the Troop. In fact, two other leaders have copies now, so it gets played fairly regularly on outings. It is an abstract strategy game for two players in which you move your different “bugs” around the hive in unique ways in an attempt to surround your opponent’s queen bee. There isn’t much theme, much of a storyline, in this game. It has been described as “the new chess”. I won’t go that far, but it does have the same strategic elements as chess: time, space and material. The rules are few, the components are great (you can wash them in the sink if they get dirty!), and it is a LOT of fun. There is a bit of “brain-burn” to it, but not too much. I would say more than checkers, but less than chess. Hive may not work for kids younger than 10 years old.  It takes around 30 minutes to play. 
 
No Thanks! This is not a new game, but it is new to me. I had just recently purchase it, and was eager to play it. The game is a reverse auction, in which you pay to not take a card. Each card is worth points, and you are aiming for the lowest score. Very light on rules, they only took a minute to read, understand and teach them. No deep thought is required. The components are cards and small chips, which is perfectly appropriate for this game. This game doesn’t even pretend to tell a story, but is great fun. It played in about 15 minutes, so we played nine times! No Thanks! Is designed for 3-5 players, but we stretched it to six for a couple of games without an issue. This game should work pretty well with younger children.  This was a great purchase!

I also played a game brought by one of the other leaders. I only managed to play it once, but it proved to be a lot of fun:
Abalone. This is another 2 player abstract strategy game, in which you place a group of marbles on a hexagonal board across from your opponent. You then attempt to align your marbles so that pushing a line of them (maximum of three marbles) against a smaller number of your opponents pieces shoves them off the board. This was a good, solid game, again with few rules but some thought needed. I personally enjoy Hive a little more, but Abalone is probably a little bit easier to grasp.  It would be a great introductory abstract for children. Playing time is roughly 30 minutes.

Roll On!