0:00

Hello everybody

0:02

and welcome to a very, very,

0:04

very special episode

0:08

of the Shut Up and Sit

0:11

Down

0:17

podcast, a podcast all about board games, board

0:20

games, and the people who love board

0:22

games. My name's Quintin Smith and I'm going to be joined

0:25

on this rather special pod odyssey by

0:27

a rather normal man, Tom

0:29

Brewster. How's it going, Tom? Firstly, ouch.

0:31

But secondly, I was kind of surprised

0:33

at how many varies you put on that special

0:36

episode. It's quite a normal episode of the podcast,

0:38

isn't it? That's rude. It's not because usually

0:40

we have to talk about, have to, I mean,

0:43

we kind of do have to for business

0:45

and financial reasons, talk about games that are new,

0:47

games that have

0:49

been sent to us by publishers, games

0:51

that people on Reddit are like, oh, I can't

0:53

believe they haven't. If you're on Reddit, that's what

0:55

you sound like. Don't deny it. I can't

0:57

believe they haven't reviewed,

1:00

I don't know, Nidavellir

1:02

or whatever. But on this episode of

1:04

the podcast, Tom and I have said no.

1:06

No. We just had an entire day

1:09

of games that we played with some friends

1:11

because we wanted to, because they were good.

1:14

Because Tom said, Quintin, why don't we ever

1:16

play good things anymore? And I was like, that's a

1:18

good point actually. And I curated

1:21

four games from my

1:22

historic board game collection that you

1:25

simply hadn't played and neither had your friends. Yes.

1:29

And it was rather special. Those games we're going to be talking about on this

1:31

podcast, four little classics, in my humble

1:33

opinion, Tom might disagree. We'll find out live

1:35

on this podcast. I brought a couple of classic

1:37

Reineck Nizier games. I brought

1:40

Taj Mahal, a game of traveling around

1:42

India and plopping down little plastic palaces.

1:45

And I brought Samurai, a game of traveling around

1:47

Japan and plopping down little

1:49

cardboard armies. And

1:52

then I brought a couple of card games. As we decamped

1:54

to the pub, I brought Mundus Novus,

1:57

a deeply colonialist game about

1:59

trading

1:59

trade goods like, you know, tobacco

2:02

and potatoes from the new world in

2:04

South America and taking them back to Spain

2:07

for the king and country or whatever. I

2:10

don't know. It's colonialism. So if

2:12

I'm kind of hazy on the theme, it's partially through

2:14

white guilt. And then we played

2:17

parade again by a Japanese designer.

2:19

That's about trying not to collect characters from

2:21

Alice in Wonderland, unless you do

2:23

collect them. And we'll get into the weeds of that later.

2:26

Tom, did you have fun? I had lots of fun,

2:28

although I am. I'm sort of realizing

2:29

that our day

2:32

of games that we played to not make

2:34

content about them, because we just wanted to play fun games,

2:36

has turned into content

2:39

once again. Well, yeah, no, that is

2:41

depressing. But you know what the good part

2:43

of turning this into content is, is we can announce

2:45

to everybody the little special twist

2:48

I put on this day of games. Would

2:52

you like to describe to the people at home what

2:54

happened? Quinn's brought a tiny

2:56

little wooden treasure chest to

2:59

this selection of board games that we started about

3:01

like two o'clock, ended maybe like

3:03

eight or nine or 10 p.m. in

3:05

the evening. So it was a long day of games and Quinn's

3:08

was closing. So

3:09

it must have been like 11. Yeah, it was a late

3:11

one. And Quinn's bought this tiny little treasure

3:13

chest with him. That

3:16

was the prize for whoever won the most

3:18

games or whoever placed the highest

3:20

across all of the games. We realized that all of the games that

3:22

you could that you brought,

3:24

we could have a winner and then a second

3:26

place and a third place and a fourth place because they all kind of like

3:28

cut that way. And he brought this little treasure chest.

3:30

I think you enticed us with the idea that inside

3:33

the value of whatever was inside was 20 pounds,

3:36

which got everyone very excited. Slightly

3:38

more than 20 pounds. Yeah. But I wouldn't

3:41

let you have a peek inside my treasure. No,

3:43

you had to win to do that. And then who got

3:45

to peek inside my treasure? Tom,

3:47

you did Quinn's.

3:48

I didn't need to because I knew what was in there.

3:51

Yeah, I won. I got first place, second

3:53

place, first place, second place, which was enough

3:56

to secure me the day's treasure.

3:58

So like first off, you sound really cool.

3:59

right now. But secondly,

4:03

I couldn't believe that

4:05

you wouldn't let us have a little peak in the treasure chest.

4:08

And then you floated the suggestion as well

4:10

that if we did this again, you would actually put something

4:13

else in the treasure chest or not even bring a treasure chest,

4:15

bring something else. And it made like multiple

4:18

of us like actually scream at the table, except

4:20

for Luke, Luke was very chill with it. He sort of managed

4:22

to, he didn't mind. We had so much

4:25

fun that yeah, I raised the idea that if we do it again

4:27

and I brought four other new games you hadn't seen, I would

4:29

place the pre-existing treasure chest

4:31

inside a larger box that was also filled

4:33

with treasure. And then it's a rollover

4:36

at that point. It's also frankly monstrous

4:38

behavior that you brought four games

4:40

that none of us had played, but you had and

4:42

then beat us at like half of them and

4:45

came second in the other half and

4:47

then took the prize away. One might

4:50

think that you would exclude yourself from the

4:52

prize giving ceremony as you had natural

4:54

advantage, but no disgusting

4:57

behavior. We've discussed this

4:59

since

4:59

and I, because I hadn't played

5:02

any of these games in at least three years. That's,

5:06

I'm not going to say it's the same as having never

5:08

played them, but I like, if

5:10

you had to play a game you hadn't paid for three years, the

5:12

advantage you would have would be minimal.

5:15

And I would say that if you came into a casino,

5:17

you would expect them to have like a house advantage, but

5:20

you might also expect to walk away. I think I

5:22

modeled that capably

5:24

with the games that I brought. Like is, cause

5:26

Quinn's got a small advantage. Yes. Could we

5:28

beat him? Yes. Like don't tell me

5:30

that you weren't optimistic that you were, one

5:32

of you was going to clean shit in the games

5:35

that you won. You won because

5:37

you've played the game before. I disagree.

5:40

I think that's 10 years of board

5:42

game experience letting me let's

5:45

not rehash this argument, but this time live,

5:48

let's get into the games and what

5:50

you thought of them.

5:53

So the first game we played on our big

5:55

day of fun only games

5:58

was Taj Mahal designed by.

5:59

Rhinocanitsya, we played the FFG

6:03

Euro Classics version of this, I think,

6:06

in its lovely regal red

6:08

box.

6:10

So this game's kind of hard to explain.

6:12

Thematically, it's like yet another Rhinocanitsya

6:15

game that could kind of be anything.

6:17

It could be about anything. You're like, are

6:19

you merchants in this game or are you building?

6:22

No. The king of

6:24

Mughal India is touring India

6:26

to look at the land that he controls

6:29

and you are part of his entourage. You're

6:31

traveling round 12 distinct regions of

6:33

India and then every time you get somewhere,

6:35

there's a series of auctions as you all try and buddy up

6:37

to the kings, like I don't know, the king's

6:40

general and the king's elephant. Yeah, absurd,

6:43

to be honest. The layers of remove

6:45

that the game is from the theme is crazy.

6:49

Looks nice though, doesn't it? Not that this edition that I

6:51

have that you can't buy

6:52

anymore. It looks gorgeous. It does look really

6:54

nice. I think we talked about this. This

6:57

has been mentioned a few times about Taj Mahal, but the

6:59

fact that its colors are just lovely. It's got

7:01

such unusual, like it's got kind of

7:03

typical colors for a board game. It's got red,

7:05

it's got blue, it's got green and it has

7:08

yellow, but they're all just like a bit different,

7:10

you know? Yeah. The Pantone like

7:13

catalog has been flipped open and they've picked a

7:16

really good yellow and a really good red in

7:18

a way that honestly makes me stunned that more

7:20

board games don't do that.

7:22

I've been forced to play primary

7:24

color red how many hundreds

7:26

of times when I could have been playing this like lovely

7:29

sort of slightly

7:31

richer ruby color? Just kind of jewel like,

7:33

oh, wonderful. Wonderful. Amazing. Anyway,

7:36

let's get into the rules. So each player starts

7:38

the game with a handful of these differently

7:41

colored cards that have two different icons

7:43

on them. You might have an elephant and

7:46

a man or a man and an

7:48

elephant. The game is going to be this

7:50

series of auctions where you're playing cards

7:52

from your hand to have the most of these icons

7:55

at any given time. Each auction

7:57

takes place on a specific region of the board

7:59

and each region and auction at the rounds

8:01

of the game. In each auction, players bid

8:03

any single card from their hand and will sort of declare

8:06

what symbols they have showing on them. So I might say, I've

8:08

got two elephants and the next person will play and

8:10

they don't have to like follow in that sort

8:12

of currency. They'll just play whatever card they

8:14

want from their hand as well. When it gets back

8:16

to you, if you have the most of any

8:18

number of icons, if you've got the most elephants,

8:20

if that one elephant is more than anyone else around

8:23

the table, then you can do one of two things.

8:25

You can add more cards, continuing to up

8:27

the bid so that you have the most of more symbols,

8:29

or you can

8:29

withdraw from the bidding and take

8:32

the reward that's associated with having the most

8:34

of that icon. And most of those victories

8:36

will let you place these little palaces on the board. So

8:39

if you have like the most of this sort of blue

8:41

noble, which is one of the symbols, then you get

8:43

to pick up one of the little palaces and put it on the

8:46

board. And if you had the most of the blue

8:48

noble and the dancer, you

8:50

could place two palaces onto the board

8:52

the moment that you withdraw from that auction. The

8:54

exception to that is these elephants, which will

8:57

let you take the sort of token for the round, which

8:59

will give you some trade goods

8:59

that have like,

9:01

is it, it's not triangular scoring, it's just the more

9:03

of them you have, the more points. I don't think either

9:06

of us right now on this podcast can remember exactly

9:08

what triangular scoring is. But basically your

9:11

first t caddy gets you one point, your

9:13

second t caddy gets you two points and so on. Yes,

9:15

exactly. So most of what this game is, is

9:18

a game of like sunk cost fallacy,

9:20

or more a game of like pulling out of an auction

9:23

at exactly the right time. Like if you're

9:25

ahead in something, it's whether you or

9:27

like, let's say you played a card that has one

9:29

blue man and one green man, and then

9:31

someone else around the table plays a card that gives them one

9:34

green man. And in that moment, you've got

9:36

like, you can either be like, well, take the

9:38

green man, I'll take the blue man and I'll leave. Or

9:41

you can try and like, just gently irritate

9:43

your opponent by playing another card. Now you've got two green

9:46

men and two blue men. And then you have this weird

9:48

tension where because you're all bidding in these currencies

9:50

that slightly overlap, when you're

9:53

playing, you're trying to block multiple people at once,

9:55

or you're trying to get the edge in multiple fields at

9:58

once. It's a very unusual auction.

10:00

It's really peculiar. There's nothing in my collection

10:02

quite like Taj Mahal, which is why I've hung onto it. The

10:05

key thing to add to all of this is that when you're

10:07

bidding these cards for auction, you're actually not

10:09

just bidding, you are spending them. So if

10:12

I play a card with the dancer and the general

10:14

on, and then another player plays a card with the general,

10:16

and another player plays a card with the dancer, then it gets back to me. I've

10:19

kind of just spent that card and got nowhere.

10:23

So then you have to decide what do you stop or do

10:26

you keep fighting these players? And

10:28

so what I would say is the emotional core

10:30

of Taj Mahal

10:30

is you play a card going, Oh, I really hope I

10:32

get the elephant this round. And someone else plays

10:34

a card with an elephant and you look them in the eye and you go, don't

10:37

do this. Because

10:39

you don't get like, there's no refilling your

10:41

hands between auctions. And in fact,

10:44

you get one or maybe two

10:46

cards unless you drop out without

10:48

playing any cards at all, then you maybe get three.

10:51

So players are

10:54

like

10:55

getting into a bidding war with anybody

10:57

else is just inarguably awful

10:59

for you both. And the rounds that just

11:02

make you feel like this is the best game ever is when you play

11:04

a card, sweat beads on your forehead as it

11:06

goes around the table. No one else bids

11:08

the same thing as you and you can pull out.

11:10

And so you've spent one card, you draw two, you

11:12

got what you wanted and you are the happiest

11:14

person in India. Yes. And then the flip

11:16

side of that is that thing that you talked about where you play

11:18

a card where you think you're going to try this round. You're going to try this round to

11:21

swing multiple auctions at once. And then everyone

11:23

just somehow steps on your toes and then

11:25

you end up wasting tons of cards

11:28

on something that you don't really need or

11:30

maybe even don't get because people sneak out

11:32

the wind from under you because you

11:34

can't like stay ahead in all the currencies at the same

11:36

time.

11:37

Yeah, super, super peculiar. Rana

11:39

Kontalitsia proving with this game

11:41

from the 90s that like he's such

11:43

a singular designer because he makes games that

11:45

are so excruciatingly clever

11:48

and then just fills them with like random

11:50

charts in emotional bullshit. Like

11:54

Taj Mahal is such an intelligent game when you look at the board

11:56

with this wonderful grid of cities and like,

11:58

you know, this really delicate card game.

11:59

And fundamentally, it's not

12:02

a game of engaging with either of those things. It's a game about

12:04

hating the other players at the table and

12:06

trying to spook them out of auctions by going,

12:08

do you know how much I have the capacity

12:11

to make you suffer? Like thumbing through a massive hand

12:13

of cards. It's really interesting. There's stuff that we haven't even

12:15

touched on, like the fact that all of the cards

12:17

are of different colors and you can

12:19

only, once you start a bid with yellow cards,

12:22

you can only continue to play yellow

12:24

cards on top of that. And so there's this really

12:26

fantastic like game of chicken that you're playing

12:28

where you can see how big someone's hand is,

12:31

but you're trying to guess what proportion of

12:33

that hand are even cards they can play right

12:35

now and whether you've got the sort of arsenal

12:38

to beat them.

12:38

And then on top of that, if you, when you pull

12:41

out of the auction, not only will you like take any

12:43

rewards that you get then and there, there's a

12:45

sort of market of cards that you'll be drawing

12:47

from to then add to your hand to draw up from

12:50

and you get first pick of that as well. And

12:52

so there's this really nice, like there's,

12:55

if you're playing this game and it's like upper

12:57

levels, you've got two considerations.

12:59

How much do you want? What's on the board and how much do you

13:01

want? What's in the market or how much do you not only the person

13:03

who only gets to pull one card at the end of the round?

13:06

Cause there's an uneven number. It doesn't go round to all

13:08

players. And also on top of that, like I just,

13:11

I can't get over how much I enjoyed the

13:13

way that the bids in this game was so

13:15

sort of like

13:16

conversational.

13:18

They're not just like one number going up. It's

13:20

not just like five, six, seven, and just people

13:22

just jacking up a price and looking each other in the eye. It's

13:25

like you have these different icons

13:27

that make them sort of like less readable

13:29

as auctions, perhaps less immediate, but very

13:32

like nuanced and fiddly. And there's lots of room

13:34

for like play and strategy in there.

13:37

Yeah. It's a lot of someone plays a card

13:39

and you look at it and you go, Oh, that's fine. And then

13:41

you look at your own card and realize that no, actually

13:43

you were bidding on the same thing as them. And

13:45

then you go, Oh no. So

13:47

like we're probably making this sound like it

13:50

is phenomenal. Cause we're both being excited and

13:52

we're talking about nice colors of which there are really nice

13:54

colors. If

13:56

you're then thinking, listening to this podcast and thinking you might

13:58

scramble over to eBay.

13:59

or some board game marketplace and look

14:02

for a second-hand copy of Taj Mahal. Tom

14:04

and I might disagree. This game is really

14:06

in my collection for two reasons. One, it's kind of peculiar.

14:09

It's all right. And it looks gorgeous with

14:11

the version that Winter Rider Games or FFG did

14:13

when they rebooted it in the noughties. Or

14:17

the tens, I'm not sure when that was. Pretty about

14:19

five, six years ago. Anyway, I don't

14:21

think it's that good. But Tom

14:24

is awfully excited. Have I got you right,

14:26

Tom? I think that

14:29

this might have been either this

14:31

or maybe Mundus Novus was

14:33

my favorite

14:34

game that we played.

14:35

And I think it's, and

14:37

I don't know how much Taj Mahal will bear repeat

14:40

play, but I just think that I found

14:42

it really like,

14:44

I don't know. I just found it compelling in a way that I didn't find

14:46

the other games. And I think that like, I was thinking about

14:48

this, you know how we had

14:50

our predictions podcast where

14:53

we were thinking about the rule being

14:55

whoever wins gets to pinch a game from someone else's

14:58

collection. I was about to say that five

15:00

minutes ago. I think this is a good candidate for

15:02

a game you will rip out of my collection if

15:04

you win the predictions podcast. And I don't

15:07

know if you'll miss it tremendously.

15:09

I might not. I

15:12

yeah, I might not. I have got a list

15:14

that I've been assembling on a little post

15:16

at note next on my monitor recently, which is games

15:19

that I feel I'm missing from my collection. Yeah. And we

15:21

talked about on the last podcast that I'm missing a Ryan

15:23

Courtney game. And it's probably curious

15:25

cargo, maybe, which is just

15:27

by the way, for the record, not a Domino's game.

15:30

I think it is. I think

15:32

it is. It's a double sided.

15:35

It's a card of two segments. We'll get into this.

15:37

Oh, I've got this next year ready for

15:39

the for the next year's podcast. But

15:41

I'm also missing an Azul and

15:44

my I'm pretty tight for space. So,

15:46

you know, if you take Taj Mahal, oh, well, I mean, also

15:49

I've taken the company's copy of Alman Ray,

15:51

which arrives, which we'll play for the first time tomorrow.

15:53

Oh, hell yeah.

15:55

So, so there's, you know, Taj Mahal and Alman Ray

15:57

could swap. That can be

15:58

cool. We got so many good

15:59

to talk about though. Shall we move on? Yeah, let's move on.

16:02

Let's move on. Let's talk about samurai or maybe you

16:04

should tell us about samurai.

16:06

I'm going to take you into the land

16:08

of the rising sun, which

16:10

is to say Japan or some of Japan,

16:13

because the first thing you'll notice about Ryan Ignacy's

16:15

samurai, one of his, what was referred

16:18

to in the 90s as the tile laying trilogy,

16:20

which included Tigris and Euphrates

16:23

and, oh,

16:24

through the desert.

16:26

I would say that samurai is not as good as

16:29

through the desert or Tigris and Euphrates, but I do

16:31

really like it and I cut myself off. The

16:33

first thing you'll notice about it

16:34

with this new Wind Rider games, FFG edition,

16:37

when it got rebooted about again five, six

16:39

years ago, is this

16:41

lovely modular board. So whether you're

16:44

playing samurai with two, three, or a full four

16:46

people, as we did, you're going to jigsaw

16:48

these pieces together to create a Japan

16:50

sized board that is like

16:53

just massive and really peculiar, because

16:55

it's all hexagons and you have to like jigsaw it

16:57

together. So we played with the full

16:59

country of Japan. So you're looking at this,

17:02

this lovely sort of like white

17:04

and blue board, all made up of hexagons.

17:06

And what players are doing once you've, you're first, you

17:09

cover the board in these little plastic pieces

17:11

depicting either rice

17:13

bushels for farmers, buddhas for

17:16

monks, I think, or religion.

17:18

And then finally, little castles

17:20

representing the military. Now, samurai

17:24

is one of those running into your games where it's much

17:26

harder to teach than it is to play, because again, it is

17:28

so idiosyncratic. And this is one of the game, this is one

17:30

of the reasons it stays in my collection.

17:32

To win samurai, you're going to be

17:35

basically spending the entire game placing little hexagons

17:37

of your color on the board. And when you surround

17:39

one of these statues, you trigger a little battle

17:41

and you look to see who has placed the

17:44

highest numbers around it, the highest set of integers.

17:47

And then whoever put more numbers into that fight

17:49

takes the statue and puts it behind their screen.

17:51

To win the game, you have

17:53

to have the most

17:54

of more kinds of statues than your opponents.

17:57

So in a two-player game, that's easy, you just need

17:59

to be the player.

17:59

that wins the most of two of the

18:02

three shapes and statues but as ricin castles.

18:04

In a four-player game, it becomes

18:07

interesting because to win, you basically

18:09

need to have the most of one type. So

18:11

one of the players is eliminated because they didn't have the most. And

18:15

then you go to the like sub

18:17

victory condition because the tiebreaker is, like

18:19

let's imagine I have all the rice.

18:22

That's actually really bad because I'll have the

18:24

most rice, thumbs up. But then the

18:26

tiebreaker is how many of the other

18:29

kinds of statues do you have? So

18:31

samurai has this really peculiar puzzle of you

18:33

want to have the most of something, but just

18:35

barely and then put all of your attention

18:37

into collecting other kinds of statues, which

18:39

is hard because all the statues go behind screens. Like

18:42

high society, this is a writing

18:44

a game that theoretically would

18:46

advantage players who can memorize stuff. And

18:49

Tom and I had a little discussion there of like Tom,

18:51

like me, when I was younger saying, this

18:53

seems bad.

18:55

And because I don't like memorizing, it's not fun.

18:57

And I pointed out that

18:59

that is a valid criticism when he has played this game

19:01

with someone who memorizes, which I have never done. You

19:03

know what I mean? Like yeah, high society theoretically

19:06

is a game that falls apart if you play with someone

19:08

who can count cards, but I've never played with someone

19:10

who can count cards. So is it really a problem? I

19:13

don't

19:13

know, but certainly some people in board game, keep comment

19:15

threads. Tom, would

19:17

you like, I've rambled for a bit. Tom, would you like to describe

19:20

how the system of the hand of cards,

19:22

which is to say the hand of little hexagons works

19:24

in this game, the sort of how you actually play?

19:26

Tom

19:27

I think that the thing I liked about samurai, maybe

19:29

the most was the fact that it is like a very, very

19:31

direct and quite like simple teach and that

19:33

there's sort of no hidden

19:35

information at the start of the game. Other than the contents

19:38

of like your hand, you basically draw

19:40

a hand of five tiles. Everyone

19:42

has exactly the same set of tiles. So

19:45

it'll have like a four of Buddhas, a three

19:47

of Buddhas and a two of Buddhas. They'll have a five

19:49

of samurai, a four of samurai or whatever. They'll

19:51

have these exact same set of tiles, but the

19:53

order in which you draw them is obviously going to be different for

19:55

everyone. And then on your turn,

19:57

your whole action is just take a tile from behind

19:59

your screen. and place it somewhere on the board and

20:01

then potentially cause a conflict if you've

20:03

surrounded that piece, which is like it's dead

20:05

simple. And then well, the game ends when the whole board

20:08

is full or when everyone's spent all their tiles. Like

20:11

it's just such a

20:13

simple teach that follows on

20:16

from games like Through the Desert and games

20:18

like Babylonia, Yellow and Yanksy and Tigris

20:20

and Euphrates as well. You can see all of this sort of like design

20:23

lineage come out in this game.

20:25

Well, this is the start of that lineage,

20:28

I suppose.

20:30

I like this game, but

20:33

I didn't love it because

20:35

I think I'm

20:37

not smart enough for it.

20:43

Maybe, maybe you're like,

20:45

no, I don't, I, to me, it's like

20:47

almost like going shopping. Like it's almost

20:50

like how I play deck builders. I look at the board and then I look

20:52

for something that's like a little vulnerable and

20:54

I go, you know, go in there. I'm looking

20:56

for bargains when I play Samway. I go,

20:58

I think I could get that castle for cheap. Yes.

21:01

And then maybe a player swoops in or not. I'm

21:04

also looking for moves where I can

21:06

place down a hexagon, which seems, this

21:08

is maybe where it gets a little more cunning. I look for,

21:11

cause especially in a four-player game, you're going to place

21:13

a hexagon and then three players have a chance to jump

21:15

in and ruin your stuff. Like if you're setting up to

21:18

win a battle, a player can just jump in and

21:20

place a higher tile, for example. So I

21:22

would look for moves where I would place a tile

21:24

and it seemed so innocuous that players wouldn't

21:26

notice that then the next statue over

21:29

is now suddenly one tile away from being filled up.

21:31

Something like that. Yeah. I do

21:33

think

21:34

one of the things that I really like about this game is how all

21:36

the tiles are unique. And

21:38

I also, but I also like the way that melds with the fact

21:40

that you have this sort of limited hand that

21:42

means that the decision-making process is much less

21:45

like agonizing. Like cause you'll look

21:47

at the things you have and you'll, and you'll put something down the board

21:49

and you'll immediately be like, oh, well, maybe that

21:51

wasn't like the best possible

21:54

use for that tile in that moment. But it's

21:56

what you had at the time and you couldn't have foreseen,

21:58

you know, what was going to come out next. and you couldn't have foreseen

22:00

what your opponent has. So it is this really like

22:03

nice sort of like soft mesh of strategy

22:05

and tactics where you just have to sort

22:07

of literally play the hand you're dealt and you can only

22:09

sort of like reach for the plays you have at the time, which

22:11

means that like rarely in this game did I

22:14

feel like super full of analysis paralysis,

22:16

because it's so abstract. I thought this game

22:19

would be kind of like unfriendly to

22:21

like play, but I was kind of pleasantly

22:23

surprised by the fact that it was quite easy going

22:26

and maybe more easy going than like some of the other

22:28

sort of abstract tire-lays

22:29

sort of games in this sort of right in the connoisseur

22:32

vein. Oh yeah, absolutely. I think you're

22:34

onto something there. I think it hadn't

22:36

occurred to me before, but every time I've played samurai,

22:38

everyone at the table has had a pretty good time.

22:41

I think you might be the person who's liked it the least. Yes.

22:44

It's an it's actually a really rare thing. It's

22:46

an abstract game that is crunchy,

22:48

but isn't going to sear your brain, you

22:51

know? It's because,

22:52

I don't know, you're collecting just one statue at a time.

22:55

Everyone's going to go home with some statues.

22:57

Like in our game, you know, the person who came first

23:00

only had like two or three more statues than the

23:02

person who came last. It was just all about which statues you

23:04

collected.

23:05

So everyone goes home with something. It's

23:07

got like a kind of what if an abstract game

23:09

had the vibe of a friendly little game show? That's

23:13

maybe, but one thing we didn't

23:15

play with that I think would make this game mega crunchy

23:17

is there's one tiny little rule in the manual that

23:19

says if you're an advanced player, or if you're familiar

23:21

with the game, you can decide what your

23:23

opening hand is. So out of the 20 tiles that

23:26

everyone starts with, which includes some cool stuff like move

23:28

a swapper tile or swap a statue or boats

23:31

that go in the sea splash around Japan and

23:33

can surround tiles that are on the coast.

23:35

I think if you were to pick your own starting

23:37

tiles, you could get into

23:39

some really fun stuff really quickly because Luke won

23:41

our game partially by just surrounding

23:44

Tokyo because he had the tiles for it. Yeah.

23:47

And I think if everyone had their opening hands

23:49

to like either go for Tokyo or

23:51

swap out tiles that had already gone

23:53

for Tokyo and bung them somewhere useless. I don't know.

23:56

I think you get into some really good crunch there.

23:58

Yeah. Some really good crunch and some absolutely.

23:59

brain melting crunch as well. I think

24:02

that even the decision of what to put in that

24:04

first hand will be, it'd be

24:06

gross. I mean, nasty. Yeah,

24:09

yeah. But also then the game is so fast. It's over

24:11

in like 30 minutes, 45 minutes. Yeah,

24:13

that's great.

24:14

I think, I don't know. I would describe

24:16

Samurai ultimately as slick.

24:20

I think the rules are so small.

24:22

The design is so cute. Like

24:25

it's quite a smooth puzzle. I think you've encountered,

24:28

you had a harder time with it than anyone I've met.

24:30

Everybody goes home feeling like they achieved a little something

24:32

and could do a little bit better next time. I think this

24:34

is just a very solid

24:37

game. The kind of game that shows Nitzi is like

24:39

design backbone and how strong

24:41

it is. The thing that I, here's my point

24:43

of comparison between these two Ryan Knitsi games

24:46

that we played. And I like both of them. I just think

24:48

I prefer Taj Mahal. I think

24:50

that Taj Mahal kind of felt like a

24:52

contemporary art exhibition. There's

24:54

like lots of angles. It's

24:57

a little confusing. It's very like

24:59

colorful

25:00

and like you can interpret it in lots

25:02

of like fun ways. Samurai

25:05

was like a marble bust,

25:07

like a head, like a big marble head.

25:10

And like, it's really cool. I

25:12

can like really appreciate the craftsmanship on

25:14

show. I think it's very sleek and very like,

25:16

oh yeah, it looks good. But I'm not gonna spend that

25:19

much time thinking about it afterwards. And I didn't

25:21

think about Samurai much after I played it. I went, mm,

25:24

nice. And then kind of just like very

25:26

quickly evacuated it from my brain because

25:28

it is this game that has, because

25:32

it is a sort of, I don't

25:34

know. It's kind of just like very smart

25:36

and clean and that's all to me. And

25:38

I couldn't agree more. It's also a little bit forgettable.

25:41

Like there's a reason that I've had Samurai in

25:43

my collection the entire time I've known you, but I was like,

25:45

ah, Tom, have you seen Through the Desert? Ah, Tom,

25:47

have you seen Tigris and Euphrates? Ah, Tom, have you seen Modern

25:49

Art? Like my city, like all these

25:51

Ryan Knitsi games, which are just truly great. Samurai

25:54

isn't truly great. I'm just glad I have it

25:56

because I think it's, it's a nice marble

25:58

bust to have in my collection. And the addition.

25:59

I have is really nice. I just

26:02

like even just the mention of like Tigris and

26:04

Euphrates just made me think about how much more

26:06

like zesty and spicy

26:09

Tigris and Euphrates is. It's so much less intellectual

26:11

as a game. Like it's just it's there's

26:14

more like... You think Tigris is less intellectual?

26:16

Yes, yes. I think Samurai is

26:19

like it's like a classical composition and

26:21

Tigris and Euphrates is kind of

26:23

like it's like free jazz baby. It's like free

26:25

jazz.

26:30

The third game that we played on our big day

26:32

of games was Mundus Novus. This

26:34

was the game that we brought to the pub. This

26:37

was a game where Quinn's had to sequester himself away

26:39

at a separate table to learn the rules. It

26:42

was a game that we might have made a bit sticky

26:44

with our with our fingers full of food. You

26:47

did the thing which is inevitable

26:49

now when one of us goes into a corner to to

26:52

learn rules, which is you take a photo of them

26:55

reading lonely in a corner looking

26:57

stressed. It's like a shut up and sit down tradition.

26:59

It's fun. It's very fun. And so is

27:01

Mundus Novus. How's that for

27:04

a cool segue? This is designed by

27:06

Bruno Cathala and Serge Legette who

27:09

created games such as Shadows of a Camelot.

27:11

The first ever

27:13

social deduction hidden

27:15

role game, right? Or close to the first

27:17

ever or popularized it. Serge Legette

27:20

sadly passed away early this year in

27:22

January and will be missed. Contributed

27:24

lots of great games to this hobby. Mundus

27:27

Novus is one of those great games and it's a really

27:29

great collaboration between these two designers. It's

27:31

old. You can't get your hands on this game anymore.

27:33

I don't think. And I know that because I

27:36

checked straight away after playing

27:38

it. Oh really? I had a really lovely

27:40

time with this game and I think that it's

27:43

not perfect. It's not like

27:45

sort of the greatest thing I've ever played. But we

27:47

hit on this pretty early that it's kind of a game of

27:50

being relaxed around nice

27:53

people who you like. There is just

27:55

enough thinking in this game and there is just

27:57

enough

27:58

doing as it like passed

27:59

cards and exchanging cards and

28:02

like looking at each other and making not deals

28:04

but little mini trades. There's lots of exchanging

28:06

going on and I think that makes it a sort of very

28:09

warm and cozy game that

28:11

I just sort of felt very at peace playing

28:13

even though it's super colonialist.

28:16

Yeah, that's what I was about to say. It's so funny

28:18

hearing you describe it as like, you know, there's

28:21

just enough of everything. It's just fine. It's

28:23

just fun. All of which is true. And

28:25

the theme is like properly just rape

28:28

and pillage the new world. You are playing proper

28:30

conquistadors,

28:32

like literally card depictions

28:34

of conquistadors that you're acquiring and then you're

28:36

sailing boats to South America. Then each

28:38

round you kind of come back with cargo holds of

28:41

different stuff. The one

28:43

thing like this game came out before,

28:45

you know, like

28:46

very sensible discussions about like, hey, this

28:48

seems like kind of weird to have, you

28:51

know, like sort of the destruction of an indigenous

28:53

people that

28:53

were considered subhuman at the time. It's like a fun thing

28:55

for a board game. But the one thing

28:58

it does have going for it in the back of the manual, when

29:00

you draw a card and it's like, you know, oh, this

29:02

is Francesco, whatever famous

29:04

real life colonialist. You

29:07

can turn to the back of the manual and where his power

29:09

is explained, there's also an italicized

29:12

paragraph telling you the history of this person. And

29:14

almost all of them are like

29:16

end with like, was killed in a rainforest

29:19

or was torn apart by hungry dogs. They

29:22

all came generally. A lot of them came to

29:24

bad ends because

29:26

it was a dangerous job. But

29:29

yes, so deeply problematic theme,

29:32

very strong game. Tom, would you like to describe what

29:34

you do in Mundus Novus? It's a hard one

29:36

to explain, but basically the way

29:38

this game works is you're going to have a hand

29:40

of different goods range from one

29:43

to ten and the ten goods typically

29:45

better than the one goods. And the

29:47

higher a good is, the more useful it is

29:50

for buying things from a market and

29:53

potentially being the first in turn order. That's

29:55

the general rule for these cards. So you draw a

29:57

hand of cards and then whoever the harbor master

29:59

or quarter master is for the round. Trade

30:02

master, I don't know. Trade master will

30:05

declare how many cards

30:07

are going to be exchanged or swapped

30:10

or traded by all players in this

30:12

round. Each player will... So they might say

30:14

two cards this round. Each player then takes

30:16

two cards from their hand and places them

30:19

face up in front of them. And then everyone will

30:21

do these sort of trades where you will

30:23

take a card from someone else and then that

30:25

person you just took a card from will then get to take a card

30:27

from someone else. And the person they took a card from

30:30

then will take a card from someone else until all the cards

30:32

are gone and you've sort of rebuilt your

30:34

hand back up to five

30:35

cards again. Really odd little dance

30:38

that happens in this game where you draw a hand of five

30:40

and you sort of like bin off a bit of it and then

30:42

get it back again. It's really strange.

30:45

It's one of the moments of design alchemy

30:47

that like, you know, you'd think that

30:49

that just sounds like a rule you have to teach, right?

30:51

That like, you know, oh this round trademark

30:54

else three. So I put down a vanilla and a tobacco

30:56

and Inca idol

30:58

and then players pick it up and I pick up cards from

31:00

them. That sounds like busy work, right?

31:03

But card games are weird in play.

31:06

That feels fantastic. It's

31:08

so smooth. You

31:10

do it. It's such a simple process. You can do

31:12

it while having a conversation about something else and

31:14

like you're collecting things from other players. And every

31:16

time you do, you give them the opportunity to

31:19

collect something else. So it just feels

31:21

really warm, especially so because

31:23

then what you do with these hand of cards is you make

31:26

sets. You can either have a set of all the

31:28

same cards in order to acquire a

31:30

permanent upgrade from the market, which is like,

31:32

you know, which is where you get these can kiss the doors from that will give

31:34

you special rules. But you can get special merchants.

31:37

You can get warehouses to store cards between rounds

31:39

or boats that give you more cards at the start of

31:41

a round, which is very exciting. So

31:44

it's the way I pitched it to some of his friends

31:47

is it's like a card, a sort of card

31:49

game of set building plus

31:51

Eurogame. Like it's got like permanent upgrades

31:54

that you get. And then the other thing you do with these hands of

31:56

trade good cards is if you don't make sense of the same number, you

31:58

can cash in sets of all different.

34:00

It felt real good. It did feel real good. But

34:03

then like next to me, like Kathy

34:05

was playing, when she was playing the game next

34:07

to me, her whole strategy was revolved

34:09

around playing this sort of weird kind of slot machine

34:11

thing where there are these three cards in the

34:13

middle of the table that you can always trade with. And

34:16

if she could line up the same number or sets

34:18

of numbers in that shop, then she would get a little

34:20

payout. And that was something that everyone was kind

34:22

of aware of. So weird and so awesome

34:25

that like, you know, and occasionally we started like

34:27

trying to nudge the slot machine to make it harder

34:29

for her to make money.

34:30

It's super funny. And then I can't remember

34:32

exactly what Luke's character was, but he had some weird

34:35

stuff going on that I didn't quite, was

34:37

slightly inscrutable. He was the event man.

34:40

He had this nonsense. Yeah, he could, if there

34:42

was no event that round, he could call an event.

34:44

He could, you know, he

34:46

had the insane ability of being able to ignore the

34:49

trade master. So if the trade master goes, we're

34:51

all trading four goods, he's like, no, it's

34:56

just bizarre. And then I had lots

34:58

of boats. Lots and lots of boats.

35:01

So at the start of each round where you all got five

35:03

guards, cards, I had eight. Which

35:05

again, like very characterful, very

35:08

peculiar. And also I love the

35:10

fact

35:10

that the more boats that you have, the slower

35:12

you are, cause it's like a big fleet. So it's

35:14

like if like Luke had like one boat that

35:16

was very fast. And so he would just be able to nab

35:18

the first thing from that little shop of options.

35:21

Whereas you had like, yeah, like five boats or whatever,

35:24

all just sort of. Which means I got the five, yeah,

35:27

that could not fit onto the dock at all. So

35:30

I got whatever five cards were left. While

35:33

after everyone else with boats had hoovered up

35:35

all the gold and vanilla and crap

35:37

from the stocks. Very silly. I

35:39

got, you know,

35:40

some potatoes and some tobacco. It's like

35:42

cool.

35:44

It's good. It's just good. And

35:46

now that Bonanza's, you

35:49

know, re-theming has been announced with, it's

35:51

Bonanza, but instead of beans, you're trading poppies, which

35:54

Charlotte Pissit-Dan has mixed feelings about, because we, anyway.

35:57

And

35:58

now the ethnos is being reprinted.

35:59

as well, right? Another game with a questionable theme

36:02

that is getting a new good theme.

36:04

Maybe it's Mundus Novus' time.

36:07

Maybe Mundus Novus, someone,

36:09

some publisher listening to this, should pick up the rights for Mundus

36:11

Novus and do a version which, I

36:13

don't know.

36:14

Is even more colonialist. Yeah,

36:19

that's exactly what should happen. That's what I was going to say.

36:22

And finally, I close out Tom

36:24

and My Game Day by introducing to a

36:26

Japanese game from 2007 called

36:29

Parade, which was picked up by Z-Man

36:32

Games. And I think that was a very smart

36:34

move, because I think this game is good.

36:37

Board Game Geek does not. Board Game Geek

36:39

gives it 7.0 out of 7,000 ratings, which I think is absolutely outrageous.

36:43

This is

36:45

a design by a titan of the

36:47

Japanese board game design scene, Naoki Homa.

36:51

And it has a pretty

36:53

cursed Alice in Wonderland theme that has not

36:55

changed since the original 2007 printing.

36:58

And I kind of like that just for confidence

37:00

and commitment. If you can find the Z-Man

37:02

Classic Card Games version, which is purple

37:04

and really distinctive looking, it's

37:07

pretty handsome. Although, yeah, Tom

37:09

had some... I

37:11

brought out this really nice box, the Parade box,

37:14

and I brought out this card. And the card back is gorgeous.

37:16

This is the same line of games that brought out the original Arboretum.

37:18

If you

37:19

remember how beautiful that was. And then I dealt

37:21

Tom a hand of cards and he looked at those cards and Tom,

37:24

how would you describe how you felt when you saw the art on

37:26

the front of these cards? Yucky. Or

37:28

actually maybe not yucky, just a little disappointed.

37:32

Because those card backs are gorgeous.

37:34

They're so sumptuous. The box is lovely. And

37:36

you look at the cards and you go, oh, a

37:38

little bit. Yeah. It's like a really gross

37:41

Humpty Dumpty, a slightly

37:43

troubled and gross white rabbit.

37:45

There's Alice looking not

37:48

great. The Cheshire

37:50

Cat looks fine. Everyone's looking a bit worse

37:52

for wear. Yeah. It's

37:54

like everyone's hung over and they just were

37:56

like woken out of bed by a fire alarm, which

37:59

is kind of how the game is.

37:59

makes you feel honestly. In

38:02

this game, in the game of Parade, there's

38:04

a parade happening in Wonderland. And

38:07

on your turn, you're going to take a card from your hand, which is always

38:09

one of the six Alice in Wonderland characters

38:11

in the game. They run from zero to 10. So

38:14

it's zero to 10 in each of six characters for 60 cards.

38:17

Everyone has a hand of five cards and on your

38:19

turn, you play a card onto the end of a parade,

38:22

which is a big snaking length of cards

38:24

in the middle of the table, as if all the characters are like

38:26

doing a conga line. Except

38:28

it's a conga line you do not want to get involved

38:31

with, because when

38:34

you're God explaining this game. So

38:36

let's imagine I played a five of Humpty

38:39

Dumpty onto the end of the parade. Ridiculous

38:42

sentence. I know I kind of enjoy teaching

38:44

this game for how dumb it is. But

38:46

it's really good. So you play a five of Humpty

38:48

Dumpty. First off,

38:50

Humpty Dumpty is on the end of the parade, right? So then

38:52

you count five cards in from Humpty Dumpty because you

38:54

played the number five. One, two, three, four, five, five

38:56

cards in. There are probably more than five

38:58

cards in the parade. All the remaining

39:01

cards enter what is called removal

39:03

mode. So if you play a 10 and there are 10 cards

39:05

in the parade, you're safe. You don't have to remove anyone

39:07

from the parade because everyone you remove

39:09

from the parade is potentially negative points for you. Well, they

39:11

are negative points. It just might be better or worse.

39:14

So let's stick with our example. We play a five

39:16

Humpty Dumpty. Let's say there were five other cards left in the parade.

39:19

Any cards left in the parade that are in

39:21

removal mode that are Humpty Dumpty I take.

39:24

And any cards that are equal or lower to

39:26

five I also take. So if I

39:28

play, to give you another example, a zero

39:30

dodo onto the end of the parade, because the

39:32

number is zero, every other card in the parade

39:34

is in removal mode. So I'm going to take

39:37

all the dodos and I'm going to take all cards that

39:39

are number zero or lower. So

39:42

we're going to do this going around the table until the deck runs

39:44

out. And we all have a variety of reprobates in

39:46

front of us who we couldn't avoid picking up. All

39:49

of those cards are negative points and worse,

39:52

the points they are is

39:54

whatever the number on the card is. So if you pick up

39:56

a nine Alice, that is nine negative

39:58

points. There are only negative

40:00

points in this game to clarify. So

40:02

like the more points you collect, the worse you're doing.

40:06

However, at the end

40:08

of the game, what the players are gonna do is they're gonna look and

40:10

see whoever has the most of

40:13

each person. So if I have the most Alice's,

40:16

for a total of like, I don't know, negative 41 points,

40:19

because I have the most Alice's, I'm gonna turn them all

40:21

face down and each card only

40:24

counts as one negative point.

40:26

So there are two ways to get a good score in Parade. One of which is

40:28

to by and large, which is avoid picking up things for the duration

40:30

of the game. That's however, is very

40:32

risky. Cause if at the end of the game, you have to

40:34

pick up cards, you're probably not gonna have the most of them,

40:36

you're screwed. It's exactly what happened to me.

40:39

It's exactly what happened to Tom. The other way to play

40:41

is to go, I don't care, I don't

40:43

care, give them all to me and then

40:45

just really bank on having the most of particular

40:48

people. However, the unfortunate thing

40:50

about this strategy is it's very risky because

40:52

if you, you know, aim to collect the most

40:55

Alice and have tons of them, and then another player just pips

40:57

you out at the end of the game, you're screwed because

40:59

you don't flip all your Alice's and you've got, you know, negative 400

41:02

points or whatever. So

41:04

that's Parade. It's a long, rambly discussion

41:06

of what is ultimately a pretty simple game. I basically taught

41:08

you the entire

41:09

game though, to be fair. There's no real

41:11

additional rules to that aside from,

41:13

at the end of the game, you can, of the four cards

41:15

you've got left in hand at the end of the game, you can pick

41:17

two that you must add to your scoring area. So

41:19

there's a bit of hand management there as well, because you wanna

41:21

surprise a player who thinks they have like the most dodos

41:24

by suddenly, you drop two dodos

41:26

into your scoring area and that player

41:28

just punches you in the mouth because you've

41:30

made a farce of their game. As

41:33

is their right. As is their right, yeah. That's

41:35

Parade. Tom, what did you think of Parade?

41:38

I liked it.

41:39

I thought it was good. It's good. It's

41:41

good. It's better than a seven board

41:43

game geek. I will say, I think this

41:45

is, this is one of the only things I've got written in my little notes

41:48

that I've written for Parade is bringing it back

41:50

to the start of the podcast. Of all of the games

41:52

we played, this is the only one where I really

41:54

did feel like you had an advantage of having played it already

41:57

because you immediately pursued

41:59

that strategy of.

42:00

gathering loads and loads of different animals

42:02

or Alice in Wonderland characters so

42:05

that you had the most of them. Because I don't think any

42:07

of us had clocked that you could possibly...

42:09

Like, it's going to be pretty much impossible to play

42:11

the game without picking up anything. And

42:14

so it's about what you try and strategically

42:16

pick up over other players. And I think that

42:18

strategy serves you really well, where like the rest

42:20

of us were kind of being like, oh, I'm going to try not

42:22

to pick up anything at all. When really the best option

42:24

is to like choose two characters that you're just going to

42:26

gun for, for maybe like the whole game.

42:29

Yeah. Outside of that, I

42:31

had a really pleasant time. I would

42:33

argue that if I was playing with people

42:36

who were... I might use the word intelligent,

42:39

Hany. Yes. They might have looked at the

42:41

size of the deck, done a couple of sums in their

42:43

head and realized...

42:45

And all the... Or dude, just watch

42:47

the experience play a start playing a certain

42:49

way and gone, I can

42:51

use common sense to determine that

42:54

this is the way to play. However, you guys,

42:56

a bunch of... I've had several fights.

42:58

Dare I say it, drunken cowards did

43:01

not fling yourselves into the teeth

43:03

of negative scoring. So actually,

43:05

I don't think you saw Parade at

43:07

its very best, because Parade at

43:09

its... If two players know kind of

43:12

that this is the strategy, this is

43:14

what you do, the moment one of you

43:16

takes a bunch of a particular color, then

43:18

it's kind of like the starting gun firing, because the

43:21

other player can then be like, well, I'm going to hoover up all

43:23

that character as well. And then you're playing

43:25

Russian roulette, where one of you has to lose.

43:28

And if you've

43:28

got a table of five players doing that, then it's

43:30

just... Then, well, also, then it becomes...

43:33

If you lot had actually decided

43:35

that collecting the most of particular colors was good,

43:38

Parade is a flexible enough game that then

43:40

a player who decides not to collect anything might

43:42

have been able to do that. Because if all the players are racing

43:45

to collect certain colors, suddenly, maybe it is

43:47

possible to go the game without collecting any colors.

43:49

I really want to play this game again,

43:52

is my sort of main takeaway

43:54

from it, because I think that I had

43:57

a very, very, very pleasant and fun time playing

43:59

it.

43:59

I think that there's a really, like, it's a really

44:02

odd strategy to kind of like tack onto, I

44:04

think. I always find it really interesting when a game is only

44:06

negative points and it's about trying to avoid them

44:08

in some way. It's such a stupid psychological

44:10

wrinkle. Yeah. I know, absolutely.

44:13

And I think that like, I think that it's in

44:15

sort of, in terms of its simplicity, I think lining

44:18

up with those other sort of like the, the Zedman games

44:20

in the sort of same box size, I don't know if both of these

44:22

games are in the same line, but comparing

44:24

it to Arboretum because

44:27

it's in the same line, same sort of size,

44:29

Arboretum is a little bit too complicated.

44:31

It takes up too much table space, a little bit fiddly to

44:33

teach. And then Arboretum is

44:36

like the, I don't know, it's the

44:38

game equivalent of a meal that has like 14 steps

44:40

that when you have it, you're like, this is delicious, but can

44:43

you be bothered to cook it? Can you?

44:45

I don't think you're going to make this more than once every two years.

44:47

I love Arboretum, like every single time

44:49

I play it, but teaching it to people is kind of agonizing.

44:52

And the other game is agonizing. What are you

44:54

talking about? Teaching it like every turn

44:56

in Arboretum is like an aneurysm. That's

44:58

very true. And then on the other end of the spectrum, I was

45:00

thinking about archaeology as well. Archaeology,

45:04

one of my like darkest toys, favorite

45:06

games, no one likes archaeology

45:08

except me, including you. And

45:10

I know you played it wrong, but like, you're like,

45:13

oh, we played it this way and there wasn't much to it. It's

45:15

like, Tom, there's not much to it whichever way you play

45:17

it. Even if, even if you don't have the ability

45:19

to visit the landmarks, does it happen when you play? I

45:21

love archaeology. I think it's really cool. Archaeology

45:24

again, but right. And also after like

45:26

a few pints, I think. Archaeology

45:28

is a great game to play with everyone putting like

45:30

a pound coin into the park and then the winner takes

45:33

all because it's just, it's really just gambling.

45:35

And I think the thing that I was thinking though is like

45:38

archaeology, a little bit too simple,

45:41

Arboretum, a little bit too complex, Parade sort

45:43

of sitting perfectly in the middle as this game

45:45

that has like the luck and it has silliness

45:47

and it has groaning that is present

45:50

in all three of these games to be quite

45:52

frank. But it's also like

45:54

the simplest to teach and the sort of the most like

45:57

thought provoking without being like, you

45:59

know, thought dis-

45:59

destroying in the same way that Arboretum

46:02

is, where it's found that your brain is being

46:04

pushed through a blender. Describing, describing Arboretum

46:06

as thought destroying is really good, but I'm just actually

46:08

going to ask you to stick a pin in that particular decision,

46:10

because while parade is a really happy

46:13

medium between the idiocy of archaeology and

46:15

the phenomenal strategy of Arboretum,

46:18

next time we do one of these game days in which you have

46:20

one more opportunity to win my treasure,

46:24

I'm going to introduce you to Lords of Scotland, which

46:26

sits between Arboretum and parade,

46:28

which isn't the same Zedman classic Argos line.

46:31

Lovely. It sits between Arboretum

46:33

and parade in terms of complexity, and you

46:35

play Scots, having a

46:37

fight.

46:38

That was really convincing, that accent there. I know.

46:41

It was, wasn't it? I'm always surprised

46:43

by my hidden depths.

46:49

Do you want to out-tress? I do want to

46:51

out-tress, but first I want to apologize for that Scottish

46:53

accent, because I know we have lots of Scottish

46:55

listeners, and I'm sorry. You

46:59

did the wrong. I'm going to Scotland soon. I did. I'm

47:02

going to... My wife is American, and she's never been to Scotland,

47:04

so Scottish people, you should know that I'm

47:06

going to Scotland to leave some money

47:09

smeared around your tourist industries. That's good. And

47:11

if you don't agree that it's good, then maybe you can find me and we

47:14

can have a fight. That accent is staying in Brighton

47:17

while you go to Scotland. Oh, no.

47:20

Tom, I'll be going to Glasgow. I'll be going

47:22

to Aberdeen. They won't understand me

47:24

unless I do that accent. Actually, that

47:26

accent very much has to come with me. And

47:29

they'll be like, are you from around here? And I'll say, I'm

47:31

actually not. That has been

47:33

the Shut Up and Sit Down podcast, everybody. What

47:36

do we have coming up on the YouTube

47:39

channel? On the YouTube channel.

47:41

We should very soon have a big

47:43

video review of Frosthaven coming

47:46

soon. Wow. The massive

47:48

box that Matt has taken a big

47:51

chunk of the review for. I've done some little segments

47:53

for it and I think they're very silly.

47:55

So I'm quite looking forward to that. One

47:57

of them is very silly. One of them is just like a buyer's guide.

48:00

But the other one is very silly. Did you do that thing

48:02

where you reviewed the inlay? Yes, yes sir. Nice,

48:05

nice. Who knows if Matt will include

48:07

it, because it's pure nonsense.

48:10

Well, now you've said

48:12

that, if it's not in the video, Matt's going to be the

48:14

villain of this week on Shut Up

48:16

and Sit Down. Yeah. We've got another big box

48:18

review coming a little bit after that, but I'll keep

48:20

a lid on what that is. I'll be secretive

48:23

about that, what it is. I mean, actually, I haven't been secretive

48:25

about what it is. You can find out if you

48:27

watch the Twitch. On every Tuesday

48:29

we do Twitch streams. So you just talk

48:31

about all the secret stuff. I just spill the

48:33

beans, yeah. Live on

48:35

air.

48:36

So yeah, that's what's coming up on the YouTube. And

48:38

then I think podcast wise, we've got some pretty

48:41

fun ones in the pipe as well. You're going to tell us about Girding's

48:43

Game Gulag.

48:44

The next... Oh my God. Yeah, the next

48:46

episode of the podcast will be, hopefully, Tom

48:49

and Matt grilling me about my

48:51

time in Ohio

48:52

in Alan Girding's Game Gulag, aka

48:54

Cab and Con, aka Board Gamers of Greater

48:57

Acrons, Meetup, in which, I'll

48:59

tell you right now, Tom, one of the players

49:01

got a concussion because of the game.

49:05

So if you want to hear...

49:08

The game was boxing. The

49:10

game was just leathering one another. No,

49:12

the game was a spin-off of Werewolf and

49:14

a player almost got

49:15

hospitalized. So

49:17

to find out about that, do tune

49:19

into the next episode of the Shadow of the Stone podcast. Take

49:22

care, everybody. Bye.