Movie Review - Pitch Perfect

  • Subscribe to our RSS feed.
  • Twitter
  • StumbleUpon
  • Reddit
  • Facebook
  • Digg

Wednesday, 23 November 2011

Board Game Review - Neuroshima Hex

Posted on 19:52 by Unknown

Experts will tell you that a nuclear war will result in the near-complete decimation of the human race, with survivors slowing starving and dying of radiation sickness. But those of us who know better have a different scenario in mind. Namely, people will mutate into totally kick-ass monsters, probably with green skin, and have giant battles against evil robots in dune buggies. At least, that outcome would be a lot more interesting, and maybe even make it worth having a nuclear war just to see the sentient plants.

And if you play Neuroshima, the RPG about life after the end of the world as we know it, you can see all that stuff. You can fight mutants and robots and evil plants, and scavenge for supplies, and blow up monsters with plasma guns.

But if you play Neuroshima Hex, you won't do any of that stuff at all. You'll just put out hexes with arrows and symbols on them and try to point the right direction so you can win. It's almost a shame to see an exciting post-nuke fantasy turned into a game this abstract - or it would be, if the abstract game in question were not blatantly awesome.

There are rules in the book for playing with three or four, but the game was really designed to play head-to-head. You take turns putting out your soldiers, who do stuff like shoot or stab or throw nets. Then a battle breaks out, and you figure out who is smart and who is dead. The overall goal is to damage your opponent's base, but this can be a lot harder to do than you might imagine, especially if you're playing somebody who knows what they're doing.

When you place your fighters, you'll have the best intentions. You'll have a straight shot on the path from your sniper to the enemy base, but then the other guy will put a really fast stabby guy right behind your sniper, and since your sniper is slow, he'll die before he ever gets to shoot. But you've still got a chance, because if you can throw a net on that mutant bug with the finger claws before he cuts your assassin into tiny cheese cubes, you can bust out that killer shot and put a hole right where you need it. Of course, right after you do that, your opponent will throw a grenade at your netter and you're back to square one.

Before you're ever really happy with the layout of your fighters, one of you will end up playing a hex with an explosion on it, and then all that maneuvering is resolved. You'll start with the fast guys and start killing things, and if you planned well (and didn't get totally hosed somewhere along the way), you'll be able to do more damage to the other base than he can do to you. Once you run out of hexes, you get one more big melee, and then whichever player has a healthier base wins the game.

If you just look at the description of Neuroshima Hex, it might seem like a kind of fighting game or simulation of a battle. But it's really not. It's more like hexagonal chess. Every move has a counter move, but some moves are devastating while some are lame. The theme is there, and makes itself felt through the special abilities of the hexes you place, but this really doesn't feel like a fighting game. If you want a simulation, there are tons of games you can play, but this won't be one of them.

On the other hand, if you want a very smart, painfully vindictive game with abstract rules, Neuroshima Hex is brilliant. As the game progresses, you'll find yourself reenacting chains of actions in your head. Your internal dialog will sound something like this:

"So I'll play this guy here, and he'll make that guy fast enough to kill that dude, which will keep this guy alive to snipe at the net guy, but the net guy is holding a fast guy who won’t get to go, so then this original guy will be killed before he ever existed, which will result in a time paradox that will destroy the universe and bring us face-to-face with Gene Roddenberry."

In other words, there's a lot of thinking in Neuroshima Hex. You're not running and gunning and grabbing cover, you're placing and blocking and planning and analyzing. And then for good measure, you're analyzing a little more. This is not a game for people who want to recreate epic battles. It is, however, a game for people who like highly-abstracted games that make your brain sweat, and that still have bodies piling up all over the place.

So you won’t get to reenact nuclear frostbite if you play Neuroshima Hex, but you will get to exploit special abilities, plan five steps ahead, consider far-reaching ramifications and be totally mud-stomped when your opponent plays something you hadn’t considered. And that makes it good in my book.

Summary

2-4 players (but really, 2)

Pros:
Super-cool setting with groovy art
Lots of planning and thinking
Challenging and smart
Four different factions to play, and they all play different

Cons:
Theme seems a little bait-and-switch

Neuroshima Hex is an older game, and it can be tough to track down a copy - unless you shop at Noble Knight Games:
MOLOCH AWAITS
Email ThisBlogThis!Share to XShare to FacebookShare to Pinterest
Posted in | No comments
Newer Post Older Post Home

0 comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)

Popular Posts

  • Board Game Review - Panzer General: Russian Assault
    About six months ago, I reviewed a game called Panzer General: Allied Assault . I have to spell out the whole name, because even though it...
  • Event Review - Fixing the Fence
    I was going to write a review of To Kill A Mockingbird tonight. I took my kids to see a remastered version of the 1967 classic last week. Th...
  • Card Game Review - The Valkyrie Incident
    In 1984, on a secret military base in Gun Barrel City, Texas, a crack team of scientists stumbled across a psychotically insane death's-...
  • Updated Game Review - Glory to Rome
    Cambridge Games Factory is kind of an interesting little game company. For a publisher with such a small library, they have some surprisingl...
  • Card Game Review - Revolver
    I think timewaster games are a sad commentary on society. When you can put a game on your phone whose sole purpose is to distract you from t...
  • Event Review - Botanical Gardens
    Want to know a good way to feel older? Celebrate a 14th birthday... for your daughter. I can't decide whether to buy a shotgun or a case...
  • Russian Game Review - Potion-Making Practice
    Russian Game Week is coming to a close, and I saved the best of the batch for last. I need a big drum roll and maybe a man dressed up as a d...
  • Board Game Review - Quebec
    If I were a history teacher, I would have a bunch of different ways to teach history. There would be all manner of interactive lessons, them...
  • Movie Review - Hit and Run
    I have a total man-crush on Dax Shepard. I also have a regular crush on Kristen Bell. I would really love to be friends with both of them so...
  • Sorry, We're Out Of The Cod
    So headaches and earwigs and dead rats. It's been a miserable week. I haven't played anything new, and I haven't slept, and I th...

Blog Archive

  • ►  2013 (67)
    • ►  June (7)
    • ►  May (12)
    • ►  April (12)
    • ►  March (13)
    • ►  February (11)
    • ►  January (12)
  • ►  2012 (152)
    • ►  December (14)
    • ►  November (12)
    • ►  October (13)
    • ►  September (12)
    • ►  August (13)
    • ►  July (13)
    • ►  June (12)
    • ►  May (13)
    • ►  April (13)
    • ►  March (13)
    • ►  February (12)
    • ►  January (12)
  • ▼  2011 (156)
    • ►  December (14)
    • ▼  November (12)
      • Expansion Review - Babel 13
      • Expansion Review - Omen: Shattered Aegis
      • Board Game Review - Neuroshima Hex
      • Board Game Review - Star Wars : Epic Duels
      • Expansion Review - Blood Country for Nightfall
      • Expansion Review - Leaders for 7 Wonders
      • Card Game Review - Kamakura
      • Board Game Travesty Review - Terrax Warriors
      • Event Review - Surgery
      • Card Game Review - Hemloch
      • Card Game Review - Expedition Altiplano
      • Board Game Review - Super Dungeon Explore
    • ►  October (12)
    • ►  September (10)
    • ►  August (15)
    • ►  July (13)
    • ►  June (13)
    • ►  May (13)
    • ►  April (14)
    • ►  March (14)
    • ►  February (12)
    • ►  January (14)
  • ►  2010 (125)
    • ►  December (15)
    • ►  November (13)
    • ►  October (12)
    • ►  September (12)
    • ►  August (12)
    • ►  July (12)
    • ►  June (10)
    • ►  May (14)
    • ►  April (11)
    • ►  March (14)
Powered by Blogger.

About Me

Unknown
View my complete profile