Board Game Review - Tokyo Highway

Tokyo Highway is a fun multiplayer game which is also incredibly aesthetically pleasing. It's simple and easy to learn, but can have different layers of difficulty each time and will always be random in the way that the roads are laid out.

Each player has a certain amount of roads, columns, cars and intersections, which are placed each turn. The game ends when one player completely runs out of cars. Of course, it's a little more complicated than just laying down a road, placing a car and moving on - each road must either be higher or lower by one column than the ones placed last round (you can ignore this rule by using an intersection piece) and you can only place a car if it's the first road to go above or below another road. Each column can only have two roads on it, and they have to be placed a certain way or it counts as an illegal move, but intersections (as the name suggests) can have more than two roads attached to them, allowing you to move your highway closer to other roads that haven't been crossed over / under. There are also buildings, which are obstacles for you to build around and are randomly placed after everyone has put their first road section down.

I really enjoy Tokyo Highway, and everyone that I've played the game with has enjoyed it too, plus it's quite a nice looking game, both whilst in progress and when finished!

Is it worth my money?

At about £30 I'd say that Tokyo Highway is a must buy - it's great for 'hardcore' boardgamers, people just getting into board games and everyone in between!

Board Game Review - Bad Bones

This was another game we played at MCM Comic Con, and it's a change from what I normally play. The closest game I own to Bad Bones would be Castle Panic and the only real similarity is that they're both tower defence games. Bad Bones, however, is not co-operative, it's a game you only win because someone else loses.

You start off Bad Bones with a tower that is four high, a Hero, four villages, six traps and a graveyard that is empty (but not for long). The aim of the game is to survive the onslaught of skeletons for as long as possible, and outlive your opponents.

Each turn has four stages - move your Hero, place / remove traps, move skeletons and spawn new skeletons (you always grab three more skeletons from the bag, and also place any from the graveyard onto the board as well). The Hero will destroy any skeletons he lands on / that bump into him, so he is arguably your best weapon against the ever-growing hoarde, but he can only move one square at a time. The traps at your disposal are: two Walls, which act like a mirror reflecting light and move the skeletons in a different direction; two Catapults, which fling skeletons over to the graveyard of an opponent of your choice; a Dragon, who scares away the skeletons in the direction you choose; and Treasure, which lures the skeletons to it, and they then continue to move in that direction. Each trap (apart from the Treasure) will break after two uses, so using the trap step to take a trap away can sometimes be more useful than using it to place a new trap.

We played the basic version, where you have normal skeletons that are constantly attacking you, but there is also an advanced version of the game if you don't find an endless onslaught of skeletons tasking enough - this includes a market, scarier skeletons, weapons and new traps.

You can, if you want, play the game solo, or cooperatively too! Plus, the game comes with six player boards, so it's a game you can crack out on a gaming night with friends without having to worry too much about someone sitting out (unless you have more than five friends, I guess!)

Is it worth my money?

With prices ranging from £33-45, Bad Bones may not be everyone's cup of tea, but if you and your friends want to play something a little different, go for it!

Board Game Review - Magic Maze

I visited MCM Expo over the weekend, and they have an ever-growing board game presence there, so it was nice to be able to sit down with my friends and play some new things!

One of the games that we played was Magic Maze, a co-operative board game in which you control a party of four adventurers who have to steal their equipment from a store (the guy demoing it said this is because they have no money, apparently the rules read that it's because they have been stripped of all their weapons etc) and then get out of the store before you run out of time!

The game would, however, be far too easy if it was as simple as moving the pawns around the shop in whatever direction you want and being able to speak to the people that you're playing with, so of course that isn't how the game is played at all! You get to control a set amount of directions (we played three player, with one of us controlling left and teleporters;one of us controlling down, escalators and the pile of cards; and the other controlling right and up) and are not able to speak to the people you're playing with, instead using the big red piece to bang on the table to get the attention of the people that control the directions the pawns need to be moved in.

The game is actually fairly simple in premise - move yellow to yellow things, green to green things, purple to purple things and orange to orange things - but the execution of the game and the randomness (as well as the variety of scenarios) mean that you're unlikely to get bored any time soon, plus the game has a bunch of expansions you can use to spice up playing!

Is it worth my money?

As the base game is around £15-20 I'd say yes, especially if you're looking for a fun, quick game to break up board gaming nights!

EGX Rezzed 2019

So yesterday I went to EGX Rezzed. I haven't been to Rezzed before, and it was a really different experience. Usually I go to MCM Expo in London, which is huge and spread out but very busy.

Above is a map of this year's Rezzed! There was a lot of stuff there, and some of the games are really new in terms of their development but others are either out or very nearly out.

Primetime Detective, one of the games on show at the UK Games Fund area.

There were groups of games such as the above Primetime Detective in an area funded by the UK Games Fund. These games were all in differing states of development, and I enjoyed all of them. Primetime Detective, Growbot and Billie Bust-Up were all great games to play, my favourite was Billy Bust-Up where I got to be a goat and a fox! Holo Fist is also a really good game which I was watching be played, it has a really cool concept and the main character is adorable!

Muse Games were there (you know, the people that made Guns of Icarus) with 2 of their new games; Hamsterdam and Embr. Hamsterdam is a cute little fighting game with an adorable art style and it'll be coming out on many platforms (including the Nintendo Switch, Steam and iOS) and Embr was advertised as "like a ride sharing service for the emergency services" where you are contracted to save people from fires!

Coatsink were also there, with PHOGS and Cake bash. PHOGS is a 2 player game where one of you controls one half of a sausage dog, and the other player controls the other half. It's very puzzle based, and possibly one of the cutest games (they had plushies set up around a dog bed and it was all very soft). Cake bash is an up to 4 player multiplayer game where you play as a choice of different cakes who have to make themselves irresistable, or throw fruit into a tart which gives you points!

I also got to play Sunless Skies, Inops, Songbird Symphony, Gato Roboto and Close To The Sun, all of which were pretty awesome. There was a board game area too, where I finally got to play Tokyo Highway which is a super cool dexterity game!

Switch Preview- Arms

With Nintendo's latest console due to come out at the end of the week, I figured a review of one of its cooler games was due!

I got the opportunity to play Arms at the Switch event in London, and it was definitely one of the better games I've been able to play in a while.

Arms is one of the best games on the Switch in terms of multiplayer right now, with the only drawback being that both players need 2 Joycons for the game to work (there was no official news re online multiplayer at the time I played the game, but this could easily rectify the issue).

If you're into multiplayer fighting games with diverse characters, maps and a fun art style, Arms is definitely something worth taking the time to play. It uses the Joycon's rumble feature to make it really feel like you and your opponent are punching, grabbing and blocking each other. One of the features I love is that each character has their own selection of arms to choose from, and you can try to play a sort of rock-paper-scissors game with matching the arms of your opponent's character.

Arms is a game I'm looking forward to being released, and I'm keeping my ear to the ground for further updates as I cannot wait for the release date to be announced!

Project Cars

The last car-based game I played was Burnout, but before that it was Driv3r so it's safe to say that Project Cars is the most modern racing game I've played- this is mainly down to a lack of a PS4 rather than a dislike of the genre.

So, when I was given the opportunity to try out Project Cars for myself, I picked up a Dualshock 4 controller and began a race. Or, I would have if it weren't for the excruciatingly long loading times.

The first thing I noticed was that you have literally zero control over the car as you exit the pit, which I feel could have been a good area in which to get the player familiar with the controls. As soon as the AI was no longer controlling the car, I came to a grinding halt as I tried to figure out the controls. Once I had worked out the controls, I drove along the straight part of the track but the car seemed to want to veer to the right. I continued around the track and kept crashing, because the car handled like a cow. So, I reset all the settings and chose a different car but seemed to have the same problem. In the interest of fairness to the game, I switched to a different PS4 and reset all the settings and managed to do a handbrake turn by accelerating and not using the analogue stick at all.

I like racing games, but I also like being able to actually race in them, So although Project Cars is pretty and has a wide selection of cars to choose from, it won't be on the list of "games I need when I get around to acquiring a PS4". (Nor will I be buying it on Steam)

Samsung Galaxy S7

I got me a shiny new phone. In fact, that is what I'm typing this on!

Camera

The main reason I got the s7 was for a better camera. I previously had an s6 so it wasn't a massive leap in technology. The camera is good, but I definitely need to adjust some settings because it seems a bit overexposed but that could just be the lighting in life.

Features

It's an android phone. Not a lot has changed since my 1st android way back when they first became a thing, but the s7 has brought back the clock on sleep which I actually find kinda annoying. They've also brought back the ability to expand the 16gb of storage with a micro sd, which may be something I use or it may be something I completely forget about.

Ergonomics

In width and height, the s7 is identical to its predecessor. It's ever so slightly deeper, but the back has been curved a little more so it actually sits in your hand (or hands, if you're like me and have toddler hands) quite nicely without feeling uncomfortable.

Would I have upgraded if I hadn't broken my s6?

The second reason I upgraded from the s6 was that the top speaker had blown. There was minimal sound coming from it even when I had it turned wayyyy up. The s7 top speaker is possibly the loudest thing in the known universe, so I definitely no longer have the same issue but the real question is: would I have got this phone if my s6 was fully functional.

The answer is yes. I mean, had I been able to have my perfectly functioning s6 I may not have thought about upgrading so soon, but I have been considering upgrading for a little while because I like to have nice things and I guess the speaker blowing out just gave me an excuse to do so!

So overall, I like the s7. If you're looking to upgrade then go for it!

Pokemon Go: One month later

I know, I know. Everyone's just about sick of hearing about Pokemon Go. "It's buggy"- yes "It's a waste of time"- No, no it is not. You see, although Pokemon Go is by no means the perfect app, it certainly has a lot going for it. I mean, it's Pokemon but in real life and, as with actual Pokemon, it doesn't like to behave well.

 Do you remember the episode of Pokemon where Ash couldn't even catch a Pidgey? Because I sure do! Pokemon Go is a combination of nostalgia and modernity- and I honestly cannot think of an IP that Nintendo could have used to make a mobile game that isn't Pokemon. Let's get reviewing!

In the beginning

The hype was real. Everyone was downloading the APK for the game (at least, everyone outside of those countries deemed worthy enough to possess Pokemon Go) and playing. People who had previously had little to no interest in the Pokemon series started playing, taking over gyms, spinning Pokestops and catching Pokemon. Then they picked teams- Mystic, Valor or Instinct. These teams were given personality.

Then the servers crashed because too many people were playing the game.

The servers came back, people played more. The sales of external battery packs for mobile phones tripled (probably). The tracking system was working, people were going outside. Some guy quit his job to go find Pokemon (no, really). Everyone was having fun.

Then the servers were hacked. When they came up, the tracking system was broken. But still, people played. People of all ages, all backgrounds, all levels of nerdiness- no matter who they were, they were playing Pokemon Go.

And now

People are still playing, even though it's kinda broken. It is a good mobile game that encourages people to go outside!

My actual and literal thoughts

So I like Pokemon Go, but I think it needs a few tweaks. I don't think Niantic thought it would be as popular as it has been and that's probably why it has had a few teething issues. But, once it's back to tip top shape (or, y'know, the PokeTracker is working again) then I'd certainly give it a shot.

Plus it's FREE (with microtransactions)

Check out my "look at" here:

Bioshock infinite

https://youtu.be/HIKeATcKo-4

Let's Look at: Pokemon Go