With it being Easter weekend we didn’t have time to open a new board game so we revisited an older favourite.

Created by John Yianni, Hive is a portable strategic game that can be played on virtually any flat surface. Most easily described as chess with bugs, Hive is a two-player game comprised of 11 white and 11 black pieces with different bugs printed on them. The pieces make up the board as they are placed. The goal of the game is to surround your opponent’s queen bee piece by moving the other bugs of which all have unique movement patterns. Having your queen bee surrounded seems like a difficult feat until you realize, like Ryan did in his game against Joee, that your own tiles around the bee count towards your opponent’s victory. For those that are strategically challenged, like myself, this game is a quick and painless way to hone your opponent reading and perfect your scheming skills as it takes only 5-20 minutes to play. After few games, I still lacked the foresight to escape from Joee’s experience in strategic maneuvers, but the games were close; came down to one piece more opportunistically placed than another. Whether it be a quick game at work during lunch or at home during a homework break with the kids, Hive is great for rejuvenating the mind and getting the kids to think analytically; great for teaching how to think ahead and anticipate what is to come. In short, it is great for the whole family.
With expansions of the mosquito and the ladybug pieces make your game even more challenging and exciting!

This week we have cracked open Sid Meier’s Civilization the board game. This is the second such game with the first coming from Eagle Games. Eagle Games is known for their giant boards (Age of Imperialism is four feet by three feet) and their less than great game play to go along with those boards. This one comes from Fantasy Flight which is already a good sign.

If you have ever played any of the Civilization games on the computer and enjoyed them, you will probably enjoy the board game as well. It comes with so many pieces and markers that even on the box it says “hundreds”. You will need a lot of time to play this one but we found that it’s hard to get bored of a game when there is so much you can do.

You start the game being one of the great civilizations from the computer games. America, Russia, Germany, Egypt, China, and Romans. There are four ways to win the game. You can win with a technology, military, culture, or economy.

Our first complete game we played had Sheryl as America, Donny as Egypt, A J as China , and myself as Russia. Each civilization has different abilities and starting technologies. Russia started with Communism which increased production.

There are a million things I could write about that happened during the game but I am going to cut to the final couple turns. A few hours in it was very close between all of us. I was very close to getting a tech victory, Sheryl was close to an economy victory, AJ close to culture as well as Donny. I researched Atomic Theory and got lucky enough to find uranium to nuke one of AJ’s and one of Donny’s cities. Also, moved some armies into Sheryl’s zone to cut off coin supply from her banks. Finally researching space flight to get the victory.

All in all, this is a great game. We have played it at least five times since we’ve opened it. It IS a time consuming game but it’s very satisfying as you play it. The cost is $64.99 but with all of the pieces you get, and the fact that it is a different game every time you play it, it is a very solid purchase.

Store copy available if anyone would like to try it.

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Last night myself and a few others opened up a copy of Mayfair’s Automobile. Now, I know anytime I open up a Mayfair product I’m going to enjoy it. I mean, Settlers anyone? The box says 120 minutes for game length so I figured we were in for a long night with the learning process.

The premise of the game is that you are brought back into the era when cars were first being built. You sell, build, and advertise in hopes of making the big money. The player at the end of the game with the most money is declared the winner.

The game is played in four turns which I enjoyed. I have played many other games that were similar with a set limit of turns. However, I did not expect each turn to be comprised of 9 different phases, and a few of those phases to be broken down into different actions.

First turn started off with us selecting our characters for the turn (Ford, Sloan, Kettering, Chrysler, Howard, and Durant) Mitch building a factory on a mass-production tile, myself building on a premium class tile, and Kim, Becky, and Donaven building mid-range factories for our first action. We all built cars on our factories for the second action. And our third actions were varied with some placing salesmen and some gathering R & D cubes. At the end of the turn Becky, Kim, and Donaven all scored points but Mitch and I both took losses because what we didn’t realize was that only mid-range cars were scored on first turn… oops.. my bad.

The rest of the game continued with me trying my hand at only premium cars and everyone else diversifying. The only problem we had was when we mixed up the demand tile rules and the guys got got hosed yet again.

Overall the game is very well put together even though at first glance it is very daunting. The rules are very clear once you read them through and the only time we really referenced the book after we played a couple of turns was to see what each character did. I highly recommend checking out this game. Just make sure you aren’t playing with a friend who is out to get you!

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We have brought in the new set of WoW TCG Scourgewar. This set is the first expansion with Death Knights in it. We will also be starting up a play group for the game. Dane and Joee are both sanctioned to run events for the game. We will be starting this Sunday with a learn to play day. We also brought in Risk Godstorm, Naruto : Foretold Prophecy boosters, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplaying Core Kits, and finally…. Deck Sleeves!!

We will be holding a weekly tournament starting this Tuesday, for the new Warhammer Invasion Living Card Game. It is a great new card game created by the folks at Fantasy Flight based in the fantasy world of Warhammer. With great factions such as Orks, Chaos, Dwarfs and Empire it is sure to have a faction that you will enjoy. Not sure how to play? Stop by the store and we would be happy to teach you the rules. There is also a very helpful video on the invasion website.

Every Wednesday we have HeroScape night here at GameSpark Cafe. Our “experts” come in on Monday or Tuesday and setup the map for the weeks event. Every week we will be showing you guys what the players have to work with. These are this weeks photos. Make sure to come by on Wednesday and check it out. Remember we have prizes for all of our events!