Games I would love to see again...

[javelin98]

I'm not knocking on Hasbro, but it seems like everytime they acquire another company they immediately kill most of its niche products, keeping only a small handful of the acquisition's best sellers around. I find this especially sad in the case of Milton-Bradley, which had so many great games out once upon a time. So here's a list of OOP games (and not necessarily M-B's) I'd love to see Hasbro actually pay attention to:

* Dark Tower. This game was fantastic, and still colors my memories of childhood today. I think that re-releasing this game would be simple, since technology has advanced to the point where the Tower itself could be programmed using the equivalent of a $5 digital watch, or one of those Tamagotchi things. And we all know that Hasbro would have no trouble pumping out the plastic pieces needed, since so many other games they produce are so piece-heavy.

* Fortress America. Despite its foibles, this was still a great game that had a great "Red Dawn" feel to it. Probably not as marketable outside the US, but still a great game that could be even better with some minor rules tweaks.

* Broadsides and Boarding Parties. This game, while frustrating in some aspects (shooting, for example) was just cool because of the sheer mass of plastic you had to push around. Anyone who loves Horatio Hornblower would like this game, or at least I liked it when I was twelve.

* Conspiracy. I just liked the little briefcase, but the game played decently well, too.

* Dragonmaster. Another game from the Golden Age of Milton-Bradley. The artwork in this card game was great, although I was too young to play it very well. I'll include this one just for nostalgia's sake.

* King Oil. Does anyone else remember pushing the little oil derrick into the holes on the board to see if there was black gold down thar? This game could be done today without that brick-thick board using simple electronics, and still allow for the great gameplay present in the original. Let's lay some pipeline!

* What a Mountain! This game, another from my youth, featured a clever 3D board with pretty entertaining gameplay, but it was also definitely for kids, having something of a Candyland feel to it. The mountain-board, however, was extremely cool.

* Thunder Road. What could be cooler to a kid than steering a flotilla of cars at breakneck speed through a canyon? This game was great, but it seemed to disappear rather quickly, and I've never seen it on eBay or anywhere else.

So there's my beginning wishlist (more to follow). Sadly, except for a few great AH titles (such as Risk 2210), Hasbro seems to disfavor games that aren't direct tie-ins to This Summer's Smash-Hit Blockbuster Movie or The Animated Classic Your Family Will Enjoy Again and Again; I think it has to do with risk-aversion and the high upfront costs of launching a new game (or re-launching an old one). Hopefully someone in the biz-dev department at Hasbro will actually take notice of what some of these games go for on eBay and think about putting some of these great games back on the shelves.

[ May 17, 2004, 09:37 AM: Message edited by: javelin98 ]

[Carlo]

The little fish get eaten by the bigger fish.
Anyway, it would be great to see these old games revised. It could be a chance to see these old glories in old Europe.

[javelin98]

Yeah, but I actually have to get a copy of FA first. I had started negotiating with GetStrafed to buy one of his, but he never got back to me. Hopefully I'll close the deal on a copy this week with this guy from Boardgamegeek. Then I'm back in action!

[Lobo]

Republic of Rome

[Moderator Sinister]

Originally posted by lobo:
Republic of RomeOh man, we used to play this game all the time. We called the game "die scum" because of all the assinations we perfomed. Great Game!!!

[twixter]

I'm not knocking on Hasbro, but it seems like everytime they acquire another company they immediately kill most of its niche products, keeping only a small handful of the acquisition's best sellers around. I find this especially sad in the case of Milton-Bradley, which had so many great games out once upon a time. So here's a list of OOP games (and not necessarily M-B's) I'd love to see Hasbro actually pay attention to:


...
As an abstract games fanatic, I would love to see the return of more of the old 3M bookshelf games, particularly TwixT (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/game/949). There has been an upsurge of interest in this game lately, or so it seems to me. People tell me they used to enjoy playing the game long ago, and now they want to buy a set again.

I hear three complaints about Twixt:


"The first player has an unfair advantage." 3M and AH left out the pie rule. After the first peg is placed, the 2nd player has the option to swap sides if desired. This makes the game much more balanced and interesting.
"Once you get behind, you have no hope." It is true that mistakes are usually punished very quickly in Twixt; one player called it a "knife fight in a phone booth." But as you learn the game, you will find ways to make confusing moves which may tempt your opponent to make a mistake and let you back into the game. In order to learn these tricks and traps, however, you may have to lose a lot of games, so it's a sort of Catch-22 situation. One possible workaround to this is to allow row handicapping: the weaker player moves first and has less distance to cross. For example, 6 rows plus move (an 18x24 board) provides a good challenge for a newcomer versus an experienced player.

"The game is uninteresting because it is over too quickly." Most beginners do play this way against each other, with a battle in one portion of the board only. But experienced players use the whole board. Just because you put some pieces down, does not mean you have to use them in your winning chain. It may seem counter-intuitive to abandon a group just to gain a tempo elsewhere on the board, but sometimes that is the best way to play. You have the entire board at your disposal; why not use it?
Does anyone else here agree with me? Thanks for your attention.

http://twixtplayer.ifitsa.com/povray/TwixtPoVsmall.png

[msjells]

I agree that Twixt was a great game. Too many people never really got beyond the beginner stage (not that I was an expert). There were quite a few things that you could do if you got behind - the trick was to recognize it and act quickly. Once you've been outmaneuvered, you're better off to start a new track far away. You are now in effect the "first player" on that section of the board, and you have the advantage there.

Many of the old 3M games are kind of like early versions of euros - lots of strategy, fairly simple rules and plenty of player interaction. It's too bad so few of them are still available.