Your Ticket out of Monopoly-ville: Ticket to Ride

Your Ticket out of Monopoloy-ville: Ticket to Ride

Overall Rating: 7 out of 10

Type: Board game

Suggest Ages: 8+

# of Players: 2-5

Playing Time: 30-60min+

Replay-ability: 6 out of 10

Expansions available: 1910 Expansion Pack (Cost = $15)

Cost: Approximately $36

Ticket to Ride is train building game filled with strategy and little geography (though the cities are not necessarily in the right spot--that is Chicago is sort of in Indiana). There are 5 different colors to play (black, blue, green, yellow, and red) each player receives 45 plastic train cars in their color to start the game. They also receive 3 route cards of which they have to keep at least two, and four colored train cards. 

Route Cards!

Route cards have a brown backing and contain two cities that you have to connect with your trains and a number amount that you receive at the end of the game for making that route. If you don't make the route, you get negative points! 

The colored train cards are used to claim parts of a route. There are eight different colored cards plus wild cards. During each turn, you can either draw two colored train cards, one wild train card, take more routes, or claim parts of your route. 

If a section of a route has three yellow boxes, a player must play three yellow train cards or a combination of wild train cards and yellow train cards to claim that section. If they do this, that is the only thing they can do per turn. If there are a number of gray boxes, say two, then a player can play any color of train cards but it must be two matching for example to two blue cards or two green cards, etc. 

Usually you want to try to complete a 20 point route because these are some of the longest, highest value routes, but you can complete a lot of smaller routes if you'd prefer. When picking your first routes, it's best to choose routes that you can complete with one line of trains. For example, try to avoid perpendicular routes or parallel routes because that makes it harder to complete the routes and uses up more of your limited train supply. 

There is also a bonus of 10 points awarded to the player with the longest continuous train. I really like to finish my routes early and then work on getting the longer train. It makes me feel accomplished even if I don't end up winning. 

Overall, this game is easy to learn, fun to play, and not as stressful as other board games. Though the Europe version (which I also own) is more complex and more stressful with tunnels and ferry routes. I like this game a lot and would recommend it. I have played at least 25 times (probably more) and I still really love it. I think it might be time for me to get the expansion pack because I now know all the routes and that's a somewhat unfair advantage. I do think this game has a learning curve as you learn the strategy that works best for you, but it's worth it! 

Extreme Babysitting: Evil Baby Orphanage

February 4, 2015

Extreme Babysitting: Evil Baby Orphanage

Rating: 6 out of 10 

Type: Card

Suggest Ages: 13+

# of Players: 3-6

Playing Time: 15min+

Replay-ability: 5 out of 10

Expansions available: Yes

Cost: Approximately $15

I should start by saying that this game isn't for everyone. In order to truly like the game, you have to be willing to embrace the bizarre dark humor. The premise of the game is that each player is a Time Nanny who uses their ability to travel back in time to adopt evil babies. For example, the Baby Deck is made up of evil babies ranging from baby Hitler to baby Guy Fawkes. They adopt these evil babies before they grow up and become horrible people in the hopes that they can turn them into less horrible people. (Nature vs. Nurture, maybe?)

There are two decks for this game. One deck is the Baby Deck which is made up of all the evil babies. Each baby has a different set of actions that it takes if it is unsupervised during a player's turn. The most common of these actions are Bite, Bully, Grab, Creep, and/or Babble. Although some cards have no unsupervised actions and some have special unsupervised actions such as the Unabomber who allows you to use your good toys are bad toys. (We'll get to toys a little later.) 

The unsupervised actions are show by the different symbols within the circles or with text explaining special actions. Due to blurry photo the babies from left to right: Robespierre, Joseph Stalin, Lizzie Borden, and Elizabeth Bathory.

The second deck is the Nanny Deck which contains special nanny cards. One card, the "Trail of Cookies" allows players to lure a baby away from another player. Another, the "Musical Chairs" lets a player choose either another player or themselves and whoever they choose has to place all of their babies under the baby draw pile and select new babies from the top of the draw pile. This card can be dangerous to play because the player could draw higher mischief point babies and be closer to winning the game. (I'm getting to the winning, I promise!)

Special Nanny Cards and also two "bad toys": Sippycup of the Damned.

But first, the toys! Good toys such as the "puppy-sized elephant" allow a nanny to supervise their babies, nullifying their unsupervised action. For example, Lizzie Borden is a biter baby but when you give her the puppy-sized elephant, she does not bite during that turn. Supervising is an important step because it allows you to keep your babies or prevent your babies from helping other orphanages. 

So how do you win? A nanny wins when she/he has ten mischief points at the beginning of their turn. Each baby card has a set number of mischief points, signified by the number in the top right corner of the card. It can be tricky to win because the other players have all of their turns to knock down your score and steal your babies.  

This a typical hand of cards. This player has 6 mischief points, three good toys, and two special nanny toy cards that let me steal a certain type of baby from their opponents.

Overall, this game is very fun and quirky. The art is fitting and adorable. I wouldn't recommend this game for younger players because of the violence displayed with guns, but for a mature group of people with the right humor, it's a great game. The game is often short (though it can stretch for a while if all the players remain on their toes) and so this game is a nice break from more complex, intensive strategy games. It also has a nice variety of cards so that the replay-ability is better than some other games. I have played multiple rounds of this game in one night without getting bored or annoyed because you receive different babies and nanny cards and so the game is altered. 

If you have any questions, feel free to post in the comments below!

Goodbye, Monopoly!

Introduction

Monday, January, 26th 2014

Say goodbye to Monopoly. I know you've had fun riding on the Reading Railroad, passing Go, and buying out properties, but I have had it with the greedy, math-heavy, take-forever-and-a-day game play that is Monopoly.

Since I outgrew Mouse Trap, my favorite game as a child, I have been searching for exciting games that I can play with my friends and family. 

I will be using this blog to review various board games. I plan to talk about some co-operative games, some games that are mostly cards (though not standard card games), and other games that require some strategy. 

My hope is that I will convert some people away from Monopoly and get them hooked on other board games. Below is picture with some of the games I will be reviewing later on.

These are some awesome games. I promise.

If you have any suggestions of game you would like to see, please comment!