Who Am I This Time? (a guide on role selection)

"All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players."

Shakespeare wasn't talking about "players" in the gaming sense (at least, I don't think he was--who knows the mind of the Bard?), but today's Guide to Gaming topic--role-selection--serves as a bridge between Shakespeare's players (actors) and the typical players we talk about on this site (gamers), though not in the full-on RPG sense.

Role-selection, especially in Euro games, is a little more abstract than that, but it does allow players within the game to identify as, influence, or otherwise gain the support of powerful personages (roles) to accomplish game tasks. Role-selection isn't the most popular gaming mechanism out there, but as you will see, for the games that use it well, it offers quite a lot of tense decisions and replay value.

My Year in Games

Apparently I played a lot of 7 Wonders this year...

I'm something of an archivist and always have been. I enjoy documenting and tracking both collections and the things I do. For several years I've kept a logbook of every book I've read throughout the year. Around April 2011, I began tracking my board game plays on Board Game Geek. Since that time, here are my "nickels and dimes," games I've played 5+ and 10+ times:

Gaming Weekends and First Impressions

Living as I do on the edge of civilization (or at least far away from the rest of my kin), I try to spend my birthday among family, and this year was no exception. I traveled to the exotic land of Nebraska to spend the weekend with my sister and brother-in-law, and true to Nebraska's landscape, there wasn't much to do except game. All told we fit in eleven plays of eight unique games (three of them mine, two already reviewed—El Grande and Eminent Domain—and our 7 Wonders review coming this week), four of which were first-time plays for me. I also got to try a new game I got for my birthday and attended open gaming at my local gamestore this past Saturday (I went with friends, so I didn't chicken out this time). Needless to say, this would be considered gaming overload for most, but I took it in stride, and now I'll give you my first impressions of all the new games I played.

(First plays of Midgard, Glen More, Puerto Rico, Resident Evil Deck-Building Game, Ra, and Stone Age)

Building the Glorious Empire! (A review of Eminent Domain)

I got my copy signed at GenCon. Woohoo!

[Editors note: The following is a Nemesis Review, featuring opinions from our in-house eurogamer, @Farmerlenny, and his deadly enemy the thematic space-loving @Futurewolfie. Make sure to read both opinions to get a better overall picture of the game!]

Eminent Domain from Tasty Minstrel Games, until just recently, was the largest board game success story on Kickstarter. It more than doubled its funding goal and attracted a lot of attention along the way. But lots of things can succeed in hype. The question remains: is the game itself any good? The short answer is yes, it is good. The long answer? Check out our detailed review below.

A Newbie's GenCon Wrap-Up

On Thursday night after work, @Futurewolfie and I and our friend Blake piled into the car and drove to Indianapolis for what is billed as "the best four days in gaming." This was my first time attending GenCon, and I didn't quite know what to expect. I can certainly tell you that I didn't expect to see as many costumes as I did, or steampunk outfits, or scantily clad anime lookalikes. I did, however, expect to see and play board games, and here GenCon 2011 did not disappoint.

I demoed several games, played even more with friends, and overall enjoyed the experience. Below is a list of the new games I tried and what I thought about them. (Keep in mind that these are general impressions—I only played some of them once!)