Okay, I realise it's been a while since I wrote a post.
It's not that I haven't been playing Malifaux, I have, but I've been playing other games a lot too, and then stuff gets all jumbled in my head and I forget to post.
So, recently I've played the following:
Fury of Dracula
Pandemic
Pandemic: Contagion
Dead of Winter
Black Fleet
Letters from Whitechapel
The first and last are surprisingly similar to one another, but different enough that they are very distinct games.
Fury of Dracula is set a number of years after Bram Stoker's novel finishes. Dracula is once more abroad, but this time people are ready for him and are chasing him across Europe to try and kill him once and for all. It's a fraught game where each turn it gets harder to track him down and during the night turns Dracula is at his strongest. Some stand out moments were when one of the players (using Van Helsing) was beaten to death by a duo of Greek women in a port, when we had Dracula pinned down on two separate occasions but the devil managed to escape, and alas we didn't get to finish the game due to time restrictions.
Letters from Whitechapel is based on Jack the Ripper. Each player plays either Jack or one of the investigating officers and they need to track down and arrest Jack before he returns home after each killing. The game is brilliant, simple in its basic form with added elements that can be used to make it more complex. I have proven to be far too efficient as Jack the Ripper in this game, and continually make it home.
Pandemic is a co-operative game where each player takes on a specialist role within the CDC in a race against time to find a cure for four deadly diseases that threaten to wipe out the population of the world. Each role has its own special ability, like the contigency planner who can place an event card on the table for anyone to use at any time (the card is then removed from the game) or the medic who can treat all diseases within a city for a single action (removing up to three cubes for 1 action instead of a 1:1 ration) and just needs to pass through a city with a cure to remove them for free. There are three ways to lose the game but only one way to win, find a cure for all four diseases. All too often I find we get caught up in trying to eradicate a disease instead of finding the cure for those remaining.
Pandemic: Contagion sees each player take on the role of a disease and work towards destroying the population of the world. It's a simple game that is fun and relatively quick with events each turn to help or hinder the players.
Dead of Winter is a zombie horror survival game that I feel deserves its own write up, so next time I play I shall make detailed notes and write it up.
Finally, Black Fleet is a pirate game where 3-4 players ply their trade across the seas of the Caribbean to trade, loot and out-pirate their opponents. Each player has upgrade cards that are purchased throughout the game to improve their pirating before buying the hand of the governor's daughter. The production quality of this game is excellent, you get 10 plastic ships of 3 different sizes, 4 pirate ships (the smallest), 4 Merchant ships (the middle sized ones) and two naval ships (the largest ones). The artwork is very reminiscent of Monkey Island, a computer game I loved when I was younger and the plastic box insert is in the shape of a skull and crossbones (an excellent level of detail to add more flavour to the game). And finally, the game comes with metal doubloons for use during the game!
Hope you enjoyed reading this. As always, comments, etc. welcome.
