Match Report 21st December 2011

Merry Christmas

With only days to go to Christmas it was probably unsurprising that we had lost some our regular gamers but in the upside we were the grateful recipients of:

a. A 500g slab of Mississippi Mud Pie from Hotel Chocolate, courtesy of Ben, one of the regulars sadly unable to join us.

b. Some of the reindeer munchies that regulars of this blog will have seen last Christmas - thank you again Natalie - they were just as good this Christmas!

c. Crispin’s stunning Christmas cake. This is the 3rd year he has been kind enough to bake one of his excellent Christmas cakes for Gwen & I (in return for a donation to a charity to help the homeless). It is absolutely yummy - a cake lots of fruit and cherries, no nuts but extra brandy. I am very tempted to be uncharitable and hide it away before my brother-in-law arrives since I am sure my wife favours her brother over me when cutting slices!!

Review – Kalimambo

3-7 Players, Aged 8+ with a 20-30 minute playing time

A review copy of Kalimambo, designed by Antonio Scrittore, was kindly provided by Zoch GmbH.

Kalimambo is an amusing family game where an unwitting group of amateur explorers (the players) are led through the jungle by Kali (a newly discovered species - our group though that it was an African land based seal!), trying to avoid stepping in elephant dung and all the while being chased by Mambo the large and very fast rhino

When Mambo catches you he inflicts a number of damage points, if he catches Kali then the slowest explorer receives the damage, if you tread in the elephant dung you get negative points and if Kali steps in the elephant dung then the slowest explorer again gets the points. There are no ways to get positive points this is a game of damage limitation and trying very hard not to land in the ‘brown smelly stuff!’

What follows is an overview of the game broken down into 5 sections: The Game Components, Setting Up The Game, Playing The Game, What Did We Think? and finally Who Do We Think Will Like It?. So if reading the whole review doesn't appeal just scan down to the headings that do.

Match Report 5th December 2011

Racing, digging, chasing and then a party with woodland friends!

Last night saw us change venue for the first time in nearly a year and thereby have the opportunity to involve Daniella’s 3 wonderful youngsters - they told me to write that!

With Malcolm off at a Christmas Party and Gwen resting her weary feet (recovery from the operations is proving to be a long process) we nevertheless mustered 5 of the usual suspects: Natalie, Crispin, Ben, Daniella and obviously your scribe.

Match Report 21st November 2011

An evening playing with spices, chocolate and elephant dung!

Monday night saw another gathering of our games team with on this occasion, Malcolm (with photo’s of his MG project), Natalie (with scrummy chocolate and orange buns), Ben (with news of his new job at Hotel Chocolate - we do wonder if they will have to announce a profits warning having such a chocoholic on the staff - for Ben on the other hand a dream job), Crispin (with his good looks and charm!) and obviously Gwen and myself.

As the conversation was beginning to slow and Natalie trying hard to balance her lack of interest in the photos of Malcolm’s car with not wanting to appear rude (with a car mad father she has I suspect seen all the photo’s of engines and wheels she will ever want to) we repaired to the dining room.

First up was one of our current favourites Fuchs and Fertig a silly but very funny push your luck game where the players need to guess if the next card they are going to turn over will show an animal larger smaller or the same size as the last card; the winner being the first player to get rid of all their cards.

As I sat out of this game I was able to observe at close quarters