6 Games I Played So You Don’t Have To - with Tom Vasel

[@TVez17]

14:12 Hello Tom, thank you for your time playing Landomy and having shared your thoughts about it. However, I'd like to point out that the video shows some incorrect rules (for the people watching this and looking forward to try the game): the only way to remove pieces is activating the specific action (move and combat)-while the video shows removing every time a piece enters another island; another is that the players can play the map only adiacent to an island in which there are miniatures of their faction. I don't know if those rules were "simplified" for the video, and if this clarification can change your perspective about the game, but, again, only to clarify those points. Thank you again, sincerely 😊

[@jbringas9582]

Where is Jimmy Vasel’s counterpoint video? We need balance!

[@jmlitwiller]

🔥🔥🔥🔥

[@godofzombi]

I see we're still doing that whole "add cool minis to a game that doesn't need them to help it fund on kickstarter" thing.

[@godofzombi]

@boardgamebobby The ones that actullay use miniatures such as HeroQuest for example. Or a game that has two dimensional standees for the regular version but full miniatures for the deluxe version. Cube monster is all cubes and then you have these minis that look like they belong in another game. They are actullay clashing with the design of the rest of the game.

[@bricelory9534]

My problem with these minis is they really don't make sense with either gameplay OR theme - there's no combat, so why does my character have a giant axe?? Thanks crowdfunding, I hate it.

[@bensgoogle]

I love how it has the minis but the main resources and crux in the design just stayed as “Cubes” lol. The epitome of faux theme wrapped in overwrought Kickstarter Kandy.

[@darkmaster022003]

Refuge feels like you walked out of your house and somehow walked into a Looney Tunes cartoon with all the random bad stuff happening to you

[@ptss5284]

Thanks for the eBay Game callback on the Nocturne review, one of my all-time favorites. God, we're old!

[@CultureVulture42]

Eyh! I've learned so much in a year, and still have so much to learn... wish I'd skipped Nocturne. I got caught up. Biggest lesson learned, wait for you to play them so I don't waste money!! :D

[@bakerudall]

The first great theme park game will be Park Nova

[@swimprincess2]

Me and my brothers enjoy Nocturne. I gave it a 7.5 because I definitely enjoy playing it, but wouldn't exactly always suggest it over other games, so it fits right between a 7 and 8. I find that it has some interesting decisions, and I had never played a game with that type of bidding mechanic, so it has a place in my collection.

[@seraphiccandy21]

I talked to the guy doing the demo for Nocturne at Spiel last year and he said most people thought it was kinda "meh". " Very forgettable and kinda average" was the feedback apparently.

[@randalladkins7452]

I remember seeing theme park mania on Kickstarter and thinking I wanted it to be good, but the how to play video just made it look a mess. Feel like there were a few good ideas that were not fixed and made worth while through play testing and openness to feedback.

[@MussoGames]

15:38 “But is it fun?!” Is the question I often find asking myself when playing some games these days. You can give me the most balanced, beautiful game ever but if it’s not fun… who cares?

[@TVez17]

Hello! What's your definition of "fun"? Or better to say, what let you enjoy a game the most?

[@MussoGames]

@ first, your name sounds like you’re Tom Vasel’s alt account 😂. Second, being able to do cool things in the game that feel good or make me feel clever. Memorable moments in a game where you have that perfect roll or perfect combo on a turn. Or just some silliness like in many dexterity games. It’s hard to describe what makes a game fun but I’d rather it be fun first every time. Cleverness only gets you so far.

[@TVez17]

@@MussoGames 🤣 yeah, but I'm not him. thank you for your answer, now it's clearer. By the way, if you'll be able to, give Landomy a try anyway - if you enjoy to outsmart your opponent. 😉

[@MussoGames]

@@TVez17 I love 2P games and idk if I would agree with Tom or not on Landomy cause I haven’t played it. I was more so just agreeing with the question “but is it fun” which is a thought I often have when playing a game. I’m definitely open to trying it, for sure. :)

[@TVez17]

@MussoGames yeah, I understand. Sometimes something don't click on me either, but also it's needed to say that maybe I'm not the target or I enjoy other aspects and emotions in a game. Anyway, we are enjoying a wonderful hobby, don't we? 😉

[@peterevensen]

Live Tom’s description of Refuge!

[@karadj4801]

Maybe if you lay the frogs and critters flat instead of standing up?

[@CmotDribbler]

You can, but there seems to be bonus points for standing up

[@darkmaster022003]

​@@CmotDribbler Maybe they're bonus points cuz they don't expect people to do it normally

[@olanmills64]

I saw Refuge at one of the conventions last year. I thought it looked neat, but I only played a turn just to see how it works. I'm not doubting Tom's overall assessment of it, but his explanation of why he thinks it's bad didn't really mean much, imo. The things he said could apply to pretty much any bag builder. I didn't really hear the distinguishing aspect that makes Refuge bad (as opposed to beloved games like Quacks, for example, where I believe all the things Tom said could still apply; there's a lot of luck, you could fail to pull the fancy tiles you bought, your round can end quickly, etc)

[@CosmonautZer0]

Quacks' theme reinforces the zaniness, a buncha half-baked alchemists throwing fistfuls of magic into a pot leaves us kinda hoping to see some explosions happen. I heard Tom saying that those aspects clashed with the theme for him here, he was primed for a cute lil walk so randomly getting hit by lightning and losing points getting mauled by critters felt jarring. One mechanical difference is the shared bust track, I heard Tom saying it was an aspect that lead to runaway games. Like, if a player has a fully dead turn that's already pretty punishing but if other players can further capitalize on that to gain more from their own turns because of the shared luck aspect, I could see how it could put too much weight on too few randomness events without much opportunity to prepare for it or mitigate it. I haven't played Refuge at all, this is just what I took away from the review. I'm curious to try it for myself, I tend to mind luck in games less than Tom does :)

[@bricelory9534]

I think part of it is that other people are pushing your luck as well in Refuge, rather than just your own bust trigger. And in Quacks, as an example, the negative of busting isn't nearly as punishing as it sounds like it is in Refuge, which has a very counter-intuitive punishment: the further you go out, the worse your negative points are for busting. Which means there's a lot less incentive in pushing your luck, since not only do you lose the points you could have made, you make negative points for how many tiles you have in front of you. That makes it a high risk - medium reward game, which is totally off balance for a push-your-luck, where the incentives need to be high enough to tempt you to gamble. But if the punishment is higher than the incentive, that temptation (and thus the interesting aspects of the game) are gone.

[@Kerstin7807]

We enjoyed playing both Refuge and Nocturne. In Nocturne the solo player mode works quite well, too.

[@bricelory9534]

Landomy: why in the world would you have those tile elevating X's? Do they affect the gameplay at all? If not, it feels like it would actually hinder gameplay over just having the tiles on the table.

[@RainwaterGames]

You're wrong about Cube Monster! That game is great!

[@vm9964]

Agree

[@aloharay]

Refuge plays okay on BGA. Bag building and push your luck. Not very deep.

[@ryanpost1155]

Nocturne is one of the best filler games of the year.

[@MussoGames]

I haven’t played the game so idk if I’d like it or not but I’d never call a 45min game a filler… 😂

[@Troy-gu5vu]

the art is the laziest part of theme park mania, its just AI so its not even worth the praise

[@fonz111222333]

Disagree of you’re review of refuge that’s the part of what games like these are

[@ShuffleUpandDeal32]

Can barely hear the video

[@bricelory9534]

Volume is fine on my end.

[@danacoleman4007]

try listening to the audio instead

[@godofzombi]

I dunno: gamer version of stacking game kinda sounds neat.

[@WafflestheJohn]

I don't think he touched on this in the review, but, unfortunately, the pieces don't really lend themselves to being an interesting stacking experience either. We messed around after we finished playing trying to see what interesting builds we could put together and the shapes of the ingredients mean that almost everything you do needs to be uniform to actually get any significant height going. The cheese is swiss cheese and has holes in it, which we tried to use to offset the different shaped critters and whatnot, but they were all sort of the wrong size to do anything interesting with the cheese. It seems like everything was designed around your sandwich falling over rather than being able to stack in cool ways to mitigate weird/difficult dice rolls.

[@MussoGames]

Pretty sure people would say Menara is the gamer stacking game

[@fonz111222333]

So you don’t like simple games or complicated games ok then

[@fonz111222333]

You played theme park mania so wrong didn’t play it right it’s y you didn’t like it