Last year Quinns gave a 40 minute talk at UK video game festival GameCity, designed to teach people about what’s happening in board games and why gamers the world over MUST get involved.
Hear Quinns' caramel baritone as he provides evidence of why board game sales are rocketing up, three deadly arguments for why video gamers need to be playing board games, and even some jokes. Yes, JOKES.
[Introducing friend of SU&SD and games journalist Leigh Alexander.]
Quinns: So here’s what happened.
Leigh: OK.
Quinns: A while back some SU&SD readers joked that we should review Tease: The Liberating Game for Couples and Groups. I got in touch with the PR
Leigh: Oh, I’ll bet you did.
Quinns: I GOT IN TOUCH WITH THE PR, who said she wasn’t sure they should send a game to a site that would probably just make fun of it. Which was a fair cop. I just wanted to do a video where four men play Tease and are forced to give one another massages.
Except then they sent me the game anyway! And… it’s… pretty good!
Paul: How’s your tux?
Quinns: A little tight. How’s yours?
Paul: I went with the dress. It was cheaper. HELLO, ladies and gentlemen, boys and antiboys. It’s time for our top 5 games of 2012, which will almost certainly be as well-organised and halcyon as our top 10 Upcoming Games of 2012 feature, which ended up being 14 games, none of which we agreed on.
Quinns: Step this way, banishing all preconceptions from your mind, AND ALSO any thoughts that this feature is three months later. And let’s kick things off with…
Quinns: While iTunes and RSS feeds are beyond us, as the stars are beyond the humble antelope, I’ll tell you what! Paul and I can totally put a mic on a table and shout at it for 60 minutes.
Poor mic. Hit play!
Alternatively download the fourth SU&SD podcast right here!
That is, if you’d like to hear us talk about The Resistance: Avalon, the X-Wing Miniatures Game, Libertalia, Eclipse, Puzzle Strike 3rd Edition, Descent 2nd Edition, Spartacus, Core Worlds and The Cave!
That is so many games! You couldn’t even carry them all at once!
Quinns: You know when you buy a game, and you know it’s going to be good… and it is?
Space Cadets is a game where 3-6 players fly a Star Trek-like space ship together in real time. That makes it a lot like SU&SD favourite Space Alert, but where that game compresses your flight (and the game’s jewel-like puzzle) into a brown-trousered 10 minutes, Space Cadets’ flight fills a whole evening.
It also has everyone manning different stations. We’ll be doing a full review when we’re a more competent crew, but for now, let me just walk you through each station. I can’t think of a better way to persuade you why you need this box in your life.
You know when you buy a game, and you know it’s going to be good?
"This will be a great time," you announce to your cactus or spouse. “I have been convinced by this game’s art and premise that I will enjoy myself."
Your coat’s still on. You pick up the phone. “Barry?" You say. “It’s me. Would you like to come over and have a great time?"
I was convinced Robinson Crusoe was the game for me. Guess what!
Quinns: Think to get flickering lasers and evil Empires you’d have to play the X-Wing Miniatures Game? Think again, mister! Or miss. Sorry miss.
Paul: No, it’s me, I am a mist-
Quinns: Say hello to Fortress: America (and imagine it responding to your greeting with an excitable 21 gun salute).The ENTIRE WORLD (made up of three players) is invading near-future America (controlled by one player). I’m talking bombers over Boston. Hovertanks in Houston. APCs in… in, uh…
Paul: In Annapolis! This may well be the ultimate in what we call Ameritrash, big flashy board games with lots of components.
Quinns: I’m meeting a lot of board gamers here in New York. It’s like Christmas, and I’m Santa, except they gift me with a game and only rarely sit on my lap and you know what this analogy doesn’t work at all
Today I was walked through WONDERFUL post-apocalyptic tactics game Neuroshima Hex!, released in 2006 and since expanded by a untidy bag of army packs. My friend took out this game, taught it to me, and promptly put it away again.
"We’ll play on the iPad," he said. “It’s better on the iPad."
My face promptly crumpled up like a plastic bag in a strong breeze. Worst part of it is, he was right.
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