THE ANCIENT AND VENERABLE ART OF TIPPLING (#37)
REVIEWER NAME: Brian Hollenbeck/Kuma Pageworks
1) CREATIVE AND EFFECTIVE INCORPORATION OF RULES (1-10): 4
Feedback: Tippling gets high marks for the creative use of the word 'glass', making what might be the world's first 'roledrinking' game. (I'll note that the author advises the use of a beer stein, which are traditionally made of ceramic, however.) As for 'ancient' and 'emotion', only 'emotion' is integrated into the game - 'ancient' only makes it into the title.
As for the time limit, the stated use was '1 two-hour session', which is good because otherwise this game might lead to alcoholism. Again - other than staving off alcohol poisoning, there's no real need to conform to the time limit.
2) CLARITY (1-10): 6
Feedback: The game fits on the side of a beer stein, and even at that, it does a remarkable job of being well-written. It's brevity, however, keep it from scoring a 7 - there are some parts of the rules that could use further explanation. Overall, though, thumbs up to Josh for being as clear as he was.
3) COMPLETENESS (1-10): 9
Feedback: The game is quite complete - there are only a few points that need to either be revised or clarified. One is whether you score an empty simply by tippling or fending off protests. Currently, the only way to score is to go 'Bottoms-Up'. Given that, there's no real reason for a player not to do that instead of being forced 'Into His Cups'. Other than being completely blotto.
4) ESTIMATED EFFECTIVENESS IN PLAY (1-10): 8
Feedback: Eminently playable. I sense mayhem at pubs across the world.
5) SWING VOTE (1-10): 7
Final Feedback: An excellent effort, particularly considering that Josh has a whole 'nother entry in the contest. Great game!
TOTAL: 34 Average: 6.8
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HEART OF GLASS (#38)
REVIEWER NAME: Brian Hollenbeck
1) CREATIVE AND EFFECTIVE INCORPORATION OF RULES (1-10): 2
Feedback: This game appears from the outset to have been horned into the contest. The stated ingredients are glass, ancient and emotion. Of those three, only emotion has been addressed in any real way. Glass is in the title and inserted gently into the text on the first page, but it doesn't impact the game whatsoever. The same applies to ancient - the Dragon around which the game is based is very old, but that doesn't really come into play either, other than as an adjective to describe it. Lastly, the time constraint is based, I think, around the idea that this is a casual game - but other than that, there's no real integration of the central theme.
2) CLARITY (1-10): 3
Feedback: The rules and the economy of this game are complex (complex enough to require a big-ass table!), and the game doesn't go to too many lengths to explain them well. Most of the game is written in bullet points and short sentences, making for a very tough read. One other minor quibble - the bullet points don't have periods at the end of them, even if they're complete sentences. Again - just something that made the game very hard to read.
There are examples in the text, and that's good - because otherwise I wouldn't have been able to make heads or tails out of the main game mechanic. The mechanic involves comparing played cards (from a standard deck of 52), which are evaluated by suit and face value. To make things more complex, there's a heirarchy of suits (hearts, diamonds, clubs, spades) and differing effects on the stats of your character (a Minion of the Dragon), and the Dragon's stats. The author provided a Rolemaster-sized table to help with these evaluations, but it's hard to read as well.
I have to admit to not getting the entire gist of the game, although with a little play it might be clearer.
3) COMPLETENESS (1-10): 6
Feedback: Certainly the game is complete, but the document, as presented, seems like the outline of a roleplaying game instead of the whole enchilada.
4) ESTIMATED EFFECTIVENESS IN PLAY (1-10): 5
Feedback: I'm pretty sure that you could play this, as written. The heirachy of suits bothers me - I think that it may be a broken part of the game. Essentially, if you play a heart, the lowest of the suits, you're almost guaranteed to get it trumped by some other facet of your character - making it either a bad idea of invest in the lower suits or necessary to dump all your tokens (yes, there are tokens as well - mainly as stat markers) into the hearts/diamonds stats.
Again - I'm really, really unclear on how this would play out.
5) SWING VOTE (1-10): 5
Final Feedback: It's an interesting take on a 'My Life with Master' kind of game, and the card mechanic might actually work out - but there's not enough meat here for me to really jump into the game. As written, it doesn't make me care about my character, other than the fact that it's my character - there's no real way to grab a hold of the game and fit into it.
With some serious re-writing, explanation and expansion, Heart of Glass might redeem itself.
TOTAL: 21. Average: 4.2.
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CHAMPIONS OF THE GODS (#39)
REVIEWER NAME: Brian Hollenbeck/Kuma Pageworks
1) CREATIVE AND EFFECTIVE INCORPORATION OF RULES (1-10): 9
Feedback: The stated ingredients were ancient, committee and emotion. It scores well on all three counts, although 'committee' is a bit weak, given the context. The emotion ingredient is the key to the game, and it rocks. Easily the best use of emotion that I've seen in the games thus far. The time rule was very well followed, with each of the four two-hour sessions being one year closer to the first Olympics.
2) CLARITY (1-10): 9
Feedback: This could easily be a published game. I'd only suggest that the author include a couple of diagrams with the game to illustrate the exchange of Debt tokens. It's counter-intuitive that you have a big pile of your Debt (tokens) in front of you, and you're giving it away when you ask for help, only to get it back when the other God calls in their marker.
Add to that the other piles of debt from the other players, and some diagrams to show the flow would have helped me grok the game better.
3) COMPLETENESS (1-10): 9
Feedback: The only point that I took away was the fact that out of a daunting 41-page document, only 19 pages of it are the game. The other pages are taken up either by the God's stat pages (which is fine and good), followed by 10 (!) pages of Greek names for your Champions. While I agree that finding names is important - it's not that important.
4) ESTIMATED EFFECTIVENESS IN PLAY (1-10): 6
Feedback: The economy of the game gets it in trouble in this category. First and foremost is the use of Determination chips. Determination chips are what the player has as a resource (the ONLY thing that they have as a resource) when they're playing their Champion character (as opposed to their God character). You start out with 3, and you can 'earn' another by adding a complication to your own narrative during play. As written, however, with the heavy weight of the game on the side of the support you gain from the gods, there's no reason *not* to earn the extra chip by throwing in an obstacle.
Determination chips determine the number of dice you roll, trying to get as high as base score as possible before the God-wrangling begins. Depending on how many dice the opposing God (i.e. the Guardian) gets to roll, you need as many dice as you can get your hands on. And since the end-result of the conflict will be almost completely weighted by the support your God gets, there's no reason not to take the chip. It's essentially free.
Second, there may be a problem with dogpiling in the game. Your Champion is to steal an artifact precious to one of the other gods. For each artifact stolen, the God's stat to which the artefact is tied is decreased by one, making them less effective. There's nothing in the rules to keep all of the gods from picking away at one god, neutralizing them.
5) SWING VOTE (1-10): 9
Final Feedback: Kick-ass game. I want Warren to publish it so I can buy it. The mechanics are smooth, the document is pretty and prettily written, and the subject matter is near and dear to my heart. The best entry that I've read so far.
TOTAL: 42. Average: 8.4