Gen Con Tips
- If you plan on going to Gen Con, get the tickets in advance. It's usually available in January and will get sold out by June/July
- Look into other paid events they have going on. These get sold out as soon as they are available.
- Book a hotel half a year in advance. The cheap good hotels get sold out fast! The hotels in downtown will definitely get sold out.
- If you like board games and enjoy learning new games, then it's a must go!
Day 1
Here I am, driving to Gen Con again. The drive to Indianapolis was ~3.5 hours, but I forgot to account for the time zone difference. So the arrival time was 11 am. Ann and I started at the booth 3000 and made our way down. The very first game we played was Gruff and it was rough. After that, we played 5211. Strategy and simplicity are similar to Coloretto.
Era
The first great game we tried was Era. It was definitely really fun, but I just couldn't justify $70 for a new game. The game consists of a variety of special dice and building placement like Patchwork. Different buildings will give a different die. It's also resource management and attack/steal resources from other players type game. Great mechanic! The dice rolling aspect is the same as Yahtzee.
Klask
My first bought game is Klask. It is similar to ice hockey, but with magnets to hit the ball. It's quick, easy, and a blast!
Misery Index
The last game I bought that day is Misery Index, quite a miserable game lol. Think Timeline, but you get a card if you guessed the misery index correctly. First to 10 card wins. I won the demo :D
I have to admit, this day wasn't the best day since it was mostly startups and unpopular companies displaying games. I finished 2100-3000 and only bought 2 games. Then, we met up with Hysam, Cait, Mark, and Nadine for dinner and talked about our day 1 experience. It was also Cait's first Gen Con experience! Ann was still jetlagged from her Belgium trip, so we went home around 8 pm. I studied more games, but eventually, went to bed and had a good night's sleep!
Day 2
Shadows of Brimstone: Other Worlds - Forest of the Dead
Ann and I started with a dungeon crawl board game, Shadows of Brimstone: Other Worlds - Forest of the Dead which took an hour. Ann absolutely loved it! There was no DM needed for this game as everything followed an algorithm. I was dreading it a bit since I'd rather try other games.
Root
We stumbled upon Root. Everyone keeps saying how great of a game this was and there was a long ass line for one table. The demo is about 30 minutes, and I just couldn't afford to demo this game. Each board gameplay is completely different, which makes it hard to learn the game and teach everyone. I will definitely watch a youtube video.
Godsforge
I was observing Godsforge and then asked everyone at the table how the game is after they are finished. This one guy said it's really good and he bought the game immediately. So I jumped on the game and it is an amazing game! I wished it was a 1.5-hour game as opposed to 30 minutes. The casting cost of each card is based on the die number that you roll (4 dice). Roll, play 1 card simultaneously, attack player to the left, defend to the right, cycle 2 cards, and then rinse/repeat. Really fun engine-building game.
Architectura
Another decent and affordable game I played was Architectura. Everyone has the same deck, but you draw 3 cards to start. You place a tile either on the rightmost of an existing tile on a row, or bottom leftmost of the last row. Each tile has 4 numbers, indicating the score for that player based on the color (each player dedicated a color) of the tile. Each tile has a special ability that can manipulate the board or events. When a tile is placed, it looks at the tile on the left. If that left tile is smaller, then it gets depreciated in value by rotating clockwise.
Mystery House
If you like escape games, then this one is a very unique one: Mystery House. You can look into this 3-d object box and look at the pictures based on what is visible. Then you interact with the app saying, I wanna check out that vase on the card E-3. It will give you hints if exist, otherwise, nothing of value. Sometimes, the door opens and you see more rooms inside. It's a very interesting concept, but $60 for 2 campaigns is steep. This game was sold out!
Planet
I'm still in debate if I wanna buy this game, Planet. It's really engaging and fun, but very difficult to look into the future and determine which tile and placement are best. There is a list of cards laid out which tells you the combination of land touching each other that will generate points. Each round, players choose a tile and place it on their magnetic globe. You score immediately at the end of each round for the specific card. That's it!
Letter Jam
At the end of the day, Gen Con was too much for Ann. So she decided to go home. Gen Con 1, Ann 0. I then met up with Darren and Kelsey and we went to the Czech Games room. We played Letter Jam and that is a very, very good game! It is like Hanabi and Codenames. We all work together to unscramble our letters based on a series of hints each round. Everyone must contribute to giving clues, and everyone must be able to unscramble their own letter at the end of the game. Hardcore coop!
Through The Ages
Me and Jason A. Holt, the guy who wrote the instructions for all Czech Games manual! He's teaching how to play Through The Ages 2nd Edition, one of my all-time favorite game :) This is a game of civilization which includes technology, actions, military, food and money, and population. This game requires a good balance between each of these elements. There are 3 Ages, and each age just gets more fun.
I cleared out booths from 1300-2100. My memory is a bit blurry, I can't exactly remember how this night ended. Gen Con really beats up ur brain.
Day 3
Darren, Kelsey, and I decided to go early around 9 am to hit the Czech Room. There was already a line to buy games in the room. We played Letter Jam again and I bought it as soon as we finished playing. This game was sold out every day.
Trapword
Then, we decided to play Trapword. It's kind of like Taboo, except, each team creates its own trap word for the other team. There is no time limit, but you can only guess one word. This is definitely an interesting game, more in-depth than actual Taboo.
We waited in line for the door to open and then hit up AEG first. We tried a number of games there, including Curios, Point Salad, and Atelier. They are decent games, but I wouldn't buy it. Point Salad reminds me of Sushi Go, but drawing cards instead of drafting cards. Curios is pretty decent, but I'm not sure how the replayability is. After waiting around for AEG games, Darren and Kelsey looked bored. So we split.
Hadara
The game Hadara reminds me a bit like 7 wonders, but longer and different. You can buy cards based on coins you currently have, and beef up your stats of 4 colors. Each color means something different. It's not as complex as it looks, nor is it simple. Great game! This game was sold out!
Just One
My Gen Con strategy is to look for big groups surrounding a game because it must be fun to attract such a crowd. I joined a friendly band of people and jumped in mid-game of Just One. How the game works is that one person has a card that they need to guess. Everyone will write a clue on their easel in secret. When clues are all written, we compare our hints. Any duplicate words will be erased. The clues are then revealed to the guesser and they have one shot to guess it right. This is a very addicting and fun cooperative game!
7wonders - Armada
I walked by 7wonders and I just had to check out Armada. The expansion is really fun, but I'm not sure how balanced it is. When you play one of the colored cards, you move up that tracker by one and it gives some kind of benefit. You not only battle on the ground, but also on the seas. So there are more benefits to red cards. Yellow taxes other players who don't have enough tracks on yellow. Green gives the ability to draw a special card and blue is straight-up victory points. There are also additional cards, adding an extra round. I feel like going the Yellow or Red route overpowers the blue. Green is decent as well. I just didn't want the game to end up like the expansion Babel. I was quite uncertain if I wanted to buy it. However, the only way to know if it's balanced is if you play it multiple times.
Super Punch Fighter
Super Punch Fighter is a very unique game. It's kind of like King of Tokyo, but with ability cards and button cards (think Playstation). You can press buttons that can block, attack, or move. You score points based on awards on display, making a guy lose 4 points of life or KO someone. But if you are in the center of the ring, you are a target of everyone else. It's very cool, but I'm not really feeling it. People who played this game loved it!
Corinth
There are a lot of rolls and write games. That seems to be the theme of the year. Basically, you roll a bunch of dice, and then your mark off on your paper based on dice activation. While it was fun, these kinds of games just aren't for me. In case you are curious, I tried Corinth. It was fun and engaging. But it's all about rolling and writing.
Horrified
At the end of the day, we went to the bigger hall and played Horrified. It reminded me of Pandemic, but much better. There were no drawing bad event cards. There were multiple goals in this game, and the mechanic differs slightly. It's a great game, but these kinds of games aren't for me. I definitely recommend it! This game is sold out at Gen Con, but you can find it at Target for the same price of $35.
Obscurio
We then met up with Hysam's crew and played Obscurio. It reminded me of Mysterium, but better. It fixed lots of Mysterium's problems. The set up is really fast, the hint giving is really fast, and you get to put 2 cursors on the picture. There is a traitor in the party that's trying to sway the group on which is the correct door. If I didn't have Mysterium, I might have purchased this game. But it doesn't make sense to own 2 very similar games.
I was able to finish between 600-1300. However, there is so much around 1100, that I didn't fully finish them all. This is where all the major companies are at, including Fantasy Flight, Z-Man Games, TMZ Games, Repos games, etc.
Day 4
Hysam's group was going to leave after breakfast. The Gu's were gonna leave around 12:30 pm, which means I would lose 3.5 hours of gaming if I left with them. So I bought a bus ticket that will depart at 6:05 pm on Sunday. In the morning, we stopped by Hysam's hotel and dropped off all my games and luggage. Gen Con starts again :)
Ragusa
Darren keeps bragging about Ragusa, created by Capstone Games. So we head over to that table. A father and son kinda cut us and took 2 seats, and I let the Gu's play. I just sat aside and listened. The instructions sounded very bland. After the instructions were finished, the father and son got up and left lol, so I took one of the vacant seats and played. The more I played the game and asked more questions, the more intriguing the game was. By the end of the game, I was absolutely sold! All you do is place 1 building per round in turn order. After all of the buildings are placed, the person with the most victory points wins! When a building is placed on a hex, everyone takes their turn for each building in the hex-based on the ability of the hex. Each building overlaps multiple hexes. In order to place a building into specific hexes, you must have the required stones based on the buildings you own in each hex at the end of your turn. Cool, ain't it? There is also a concept of supply and demand for 3 specific resources. As you buy a specific resource, the demand goes down and the card is replenished with the next card which ups that demand. There is just so much variety to this game. The gameplay is like a crunch. You can't tell it's good until you actually play it and it gets progressively better!
Quacks of Quedlinburg
This is one of my favorite games of Gen Con: Quacks of Quedlinburg. It's drawing tokens out of your bag and is kind of like a deck-building, but with tokens. There isn't much synergy between the tokens, so less calculation when drawing a token. The strategy and thinking come during the buying phase in which you are planning out your engine and deciding which token you should buy. During the potion phase, every player plays on their own, with no turn order. You keep drawing until you stop, or explode with 8+ points. Only the white tiles are calculated. Other colored tiles do not count toward ur potion limit. Each token has a specified number which indicates how far you move on the track. The further the track, the more money and victory points you gain. I'll leave it at that ;) When I bought this game, there were only 5 copies left.
I managed to clear 100-600 and tried many other games. Nothing else really intrigued me at that point. By 3:30 pm, most of the booths stopped demoing games and started cleaning up or finished the remaining demos. The shops are flooded with people buying games. At 3:45 pm, the Rio Grande store has a crazy sale! Power Grid and Puerto Rico were $20 each! Some games were $5!
I was waiting at the bus stop for Megabus to come at 6:05. It came around 7 pm. Instead of a 3.5-hour ride, it took 4 hours. The bus was very cold, like a refrigerator. Never will I take this bus again. Overall, great experience. I love Gen Con!
Gen Con Crew
Kelsey and Darren
Ann
Hysam
Nadine
Mark
Cait
