Social Afternoon with Games – 26th October 2010

This session saw four new games being introduced to the group, the return of Peter S, one of the earliest members of the games group in Crowborough and the first visit by Mary and Julia.

The first game introduced was Dixit played the previous night at the games evening and described in a little more detail here.

Then we moved onto Bausack a new acquisition in Germany, only days before, and one that I am sure will prove popular with a wide range of people across the age range.

Bausack (Age 6+, 1-10 players, 45 min playing time)

The Bausack box contains a mass of well made wooden object in natural and red of interesting and non uniform size, none of which are designed to aid you building a tower and that is the nature of Bausack. A box containing 4 distinct games where you aim to build towers in a variety of ways which depending on the game provides opportunities to buy good pieces and pass the rubbish to your
neighbour or add increasingly precarious pieces to a tower built by all the players with the hope that the next player will cause it to fall. This is proving to be a very popular game (see later post on a Family Weekend with Games) and was only let down by the bouncy nature of the church hall floor which was not designed for such games! This game saw people young and old have a great laugh competing to build the highest tower including a guest from the local library service who had come along to see how the games might work in her sphere.

Whilst this game was in progress Crispin and I had a go at Kamisado (which I had uncharitably described as a bling chess). This plays very quickly and is more about blocking and reaching the other side of the board than taking pieces. It has a very colourful board and pieces, where your move dictates which of your opponent’s pieces must move next. Initially we didn’t get this one but on the last game it all fell into place and we both suddenly went ‘Oh I get it this is really good isn’t it’. But it was at that moment that more people arrived so we didn’t get a chance to complete our exploration of this excellent two player game.

Qwirkle (Age 6+, 2-4 players, 45 min playing time)

With more players ranging from the sprightly 80+ to a youthful 9 year old we got out Qwirkle, you could describe as like Dominoes and then spend 5 minutes explaining how it differs. Essentially there are a series of wooden blocks. These have one of six images on them in one of six colours. The idea being to complete lines of 6, scoring points based on how many blocks arte in your line. This results in a very colourful game and one that more than held the interest of all the players.

Peter L came armed with one of the games he picked up in a local charity shop. This is his third game via this route and another success; sadly I didn’t get its name. But both Peters played this game. He has already bought Carcassonne and Lord of the Rings both good games, for around £2.5 each.

So whilst our numbers where not large I believe the resent additions to my games collection all proved very successful and added to the enjoyment of the afternoon. With possibly another convert to ‘games are fun’!

Mary had mentioned to me that she didn’t really like games and came along for the young girl in her charge. However as she left she said how much she had enjoyed the afternoon and how these games were so unlike anything she had ever seen before.