I really miss gaming at the table with groups of my friends. COVID-19 has really impacted how many of us play games on the table top. While some of us have moved to online gaming venues, others have started more solo gaming, and others accept the risks and gather as they always have. I don’t know if there is a right answer, but I am fortunate that my wife Suzanne loves playing games. We spent our Halloween weekend of 2020 playing several board games while the kids trick or treated.
Here’s a list of the games we played in no specific order:
- Maracaibo
- Legendary Encounters: An Alien Deck Building Game (Aliens movie set up)
- Mansions of Madness: Second Edition (Shattered Bonds Scenario)
- Mysterium Park (2 Plays)
- Zombicide (With the TMNT Characters)
- Marvel Champions: The Card Game (Iron Man and Dr. Strange vs. Klaw – easy)
- Terraforming Mars (with Prelude and Turmoil Expansions)
Gaming Highlights
There are a few gaming highlights from the weekend that I thought I would highlight. Let’s start with the best. The most fun I had with the games this past weekend was spending the time with my wife. It was a great escape from all of the politics, COVID-19, and just what feels like negative energy that’s going around.
Of the games played, I think my favorite game we played was Mysterium Park. We usually play this back and back. It’s fairly quick with two players and works very well. We still haven’t won the game, but in both plays it certainly was close. I think the game’s early rounds will become easier with more players, but with just two I feel it captures everything I like about Mysterium but makes it a game that two players can actually play.
Another high point was our game of Mansions of Madness. It was our first time playing the Shattered Bonds scenario, but after a little bit it became clear what we needed to do to solve the mystery. Unfortunately, Suzanne’s character couldn’t avoid where the monsters were and wasn’t really built to tank the combats and went insane early and then ultimately we lost her character to damage. With one round to go my character wasn’t in position to be able to solve the mission and we lost. I don’t want to give too much away, but I actually look forward to playing this mission again. The story that was coming together was really cool and I want to see what happens when the investigators win!
The Low Point
Meanwhile, I think the biggest disappointment for the weekend was Zombicide. From the core set I have half of the zombies painted so the game looks really cool on the table and set up actually went pretty well. We hadn’t played with the TMNT characters and I will say those sculpts are pretty radical! We played the Small Town mission from Season 1 and were doing pretty well. Most of the Turtles had leveled to the yellow level, but as we were on the streets advancing to the buildings on the left hand side after clearing the right hand side of the board the Zombies advanced and then drew back to back Walkers activate. Since the Turtles are all close combat characters we were playing it a bit closer then we should have so the Zombies moved into our space and then double attacked killing all of the Ninja Turtles. It was a disheartening moment that we didn’t see coming and would have been hard to counter.
What a Weekend
What can I say, we had a lot of fun playing games this past Halloween 2020 weekend. Join in on the conversation about our Halloween gaming fun on our WiscoDice Facebook Group or send us an email to [email protected]
- What games did you play during Halloween weekend?
- Would you like to hear more about any of the games we played?
- What is your favorite spooky game that you just have to play for Halloween?
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.