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| Have I bought a game or given the Illuminati access to my computer? |
Talisman
United KingdomSLUG (developer); Games Workshop (publisher)
Released 1985 for ZX Spectrum
Date Ended: 7 April 2025
Total Hours: 2
Difficulty: Easy (2.0/5)
Final Rating: (to come later)
Ranking at time of posting: (to come later) Final Rating: (to come later)
I never feel like board games translated to computer games really work. Board games are typically a communal experience, and even when a computer game allows for multiple players, two people staring at a computer screen waiting for their turns is not quite the same thing as the same players around a board game table. The pieces of a board game are designed with the tactile experience in mind, the rules carefully calibrated to balance moments of suspense, agony, and triumph. The strengths of a computer are very different. We have noted many times that no computer RPG, however good, can authentically replicate a good tabletop RPG session. By the same token, no board game would be capable of adequately emulating, say, Tetris.
(Exception to this rule: When you've played a particular board game so many times that you can visualize it in your sleep, when its rules and terms are so ubiquitous they become cultural expressions, it can be fun to see them mimicked on the computer. Chess, checkers, blackjack, solitaire, and Monopoly can all work effectively as computer games because any board game version is already a variation on a classic model. These games are far more about their rules than any one physical or electronic interpretation of those rules.)
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| The Talisman game board. |
Talisman: The Magical Quest Game debuted in 1983, designed by Scotsman Robert J. Harris, later to enjoy some renown as a novelist. His web site offers a history of the game. Harris designed the first version as a joke while in primary school; players played teachers on a quest to make it to the center of the board, where they would become headmasters. Years later, while in college, Harris's future wife introduced him to Dungeons & Dragons, and he had the idea of merging it with his board game to create a fantasy RPG experience with easier rules and no need for a game master. (Such was hardly a unique reaction; we saw it with HeroQuest, Forest of the Long Shadows, and TSR's own Dungeon!, in addition to many physical games that never had computer counterparts.) His friends liked it enough that he was inspired to shop it to Games Workshop.
The tabletop game features a board with three concentric rings of squares and a final center square. The board offers instructions for what to do when landing on each square, which might include drawing adventure cards, finding items, and fighting battles. Many of these encounters require tests of strength or craft (combined with dice rolls), and each of the 10 character types has different levels of each. Characters gain additional points in those attributes, as well as money and equipment, from successful encounters. A player has to find the titular Talisman to enter the Valley of Fire at the center of the board and claim the Crown of Command. My favorite part of the game is that finding the crown does not automatically equal a win. Instead, the player with the crown has to use it round after round, stripping lives from his opponents, until they're all dead. It's possible for them to reach him in time, kill him, and claim the crown for themselves.
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| You technically select the space above the character you want and type your name there. It's a bit weird. |
The computer game plays basically the same way. As the game begins, you specify a number of players up to 4. You then indicate which characters will be used: elf, priest, assassin, warrior, thief, sorceress, wizard, ghoul, druid, and troll. For each, you type in a name and indicate whether the computer will be controlling the character. During the game, you take turns moving around and resolving encounters. An hourglass times the turn, but I think certain encounters end it automatically no matter how much time you have left.
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| My first turn begins with 4 strength, 4 craft, 4 lives, and 4 gold pieces. |
You move from square to square by moving the character icon off the edge of the screen. There's no game board or map, but the screens used a fixed layout
and I'm sure you could memorize it before long. I tried to map it, but
the problem is that when you exit the screen, if there's only one way to
go (north, south, east, or west), the game just automatically takes you
in that direction without telling you which direction it is.
The main screen has symbols indicating your strength, craft, lives, and money. The first two have a space between your original values and additions that you earned during the game. A separate character screen also shows inventory and followers who have agreed to join you. The manual lists them—guide, gremlin, maiden, princess, and so forth—but doesn't really tell what they do. I guess maybe you needed to play the board game.
Each screen might have objects, monsters, other characters, or encounters. You can just blast on through or use ENTER to stop and check out the encounter. If there's an item to pick up, a monster always appears to fight you for it. I don't really understand what's happening in combat. You and the monster enter what TV Tropes calls a "Big Ball of Violence." Sometimes a minute or so goes by before anything else happens. Then symbols start appearing next to your strength or craft, whichever is being called into play by the particular battle, as well as the enemy's. I guess maybe they represent the damage you're doing to the enemy. I guess victory is determined by a combination of your original values and the value earned randomly during combat?
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| Chester and a goblin fight in a ball of dust. |
Whatever the case, if you win, you may gain some attributes, and if you lose, you lose a life. If you lose all your lives, the game is over. If you encounter another player and want to attack, you can choose whether to attack with strength or craft.
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| A gorilla stands victorious over my corpse. I was fighting him for that shield and helmet. |
Encounters are varied, but they generally end with the player gaining or losing attributes, money, lives, items, spells, or game turns. Sometimes, you get teleported. The outcomes are typically random. Even when you have a choice of more than one thing, there's no particular logic or skill to it, at least not that I can tell.
Items include weapons (sword, axe), armor (helmet, shield), and magic items (holy lance, magic belt), all of which add to your combat chances. Spells are usable items and include "Healing," "Teleport," "Megastrength," and "Freeze."
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| My character sheet halfway through a game. I have the shield, axe, sword, and who knows what. I have the "Gold Divining" (gives you gold) and "Negate" (cancels enemy strength) spells. Some follower is with me, but I don't know who. |
Some examples of encounters:
- I come to the village of Dusuin. I can visit the mystic or healer. Each has a probability of doing something good, neutral, or bad. In at least one game, the mystic gave me a couple of spells.
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| "Ignored" is better than some things. |
- A graveyard is inhabited by evil creatures who steal one of my lives.
- Lives are restored at a chapel, after I choose to pray.
- At the City of Arnkh, I can visit an enchantress, alchemist, or doctor.
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| Is this the only CRPG in which a ghoul can cast spells? |
- A devil shows up and swats one of those lives away again. An angel shows up and gives it back.
- I get lost in the Forest of Fellafin and miss a turn.
- I meet a hermit, who chooses to give me the Talisman.
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| My enemy gets the Talisman first. A lot of good it does him. |
The Talisman might show up in a lot of these encounters or just be found on the ground. Once you have it, you can head for the endgame, which proceeds in a few steps:
- To transition between the outer ring and the inner ring, you either have to fight a sentinel or pay for a boat.
- To enter the central area, you have to test your strength or skill to open a Portal of Power.
- Some test determines whether you pass the Crypt of Capyal.
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| How? I don't even know how I passed the last test! |
- You meet the giant figure of Death on a landscape and have to defeat him in a random die roll. If you lose, you lose a life, but you can keep trying.
- You have to defeat a werewolf.
- You enter the Valley of Fire, where if you don't have the Talisman, you die instantly.
And then you automatically find the Crown of Command. The game then shows you a bunch of the game screens and draws various characters and monsters on each one, all under the command of the crown.
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| The world bows to my power! |
Each character has an alignment—good, neutral, or evil—and I don't really understand the role this plays in the game. I guess it affects the way some of the encounters go. Frankly, there's a lot I don't understand about the game, but that's par for the course for 1980s British ZX Spectrum games. American games of the period say things like, "Skeleton does 5 damage." British games say, "You need pie" and "Who guards knows."
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| How did this happen? Did I wish to lose a life? |
Despite my confusion, I won it twice without much trouble. It helps that there's no AI for computer-controlled characters. (Yes, I realize the system's resources didn't support anything that complex.) As best as I can figure, they act completely randomly during their turns. The random seeds don't seem to ever direct them towards the center of the map even when they have the Talisman. If I set all the characters to computer control, most just scurry around until they all run out of lives; maybe one gets so strong that he keeps winning every combat but still just messes around in the outer areas.
Some miscellaneous notes:
- The game lingers for about 5 minutes on the startup screen. No key causes anything to happen here, except SPACE, which causes it to crash. You have to be patient. Eventually, it goes to character creation.
- I don't know what the game wants me to do at the end of some encounters. It shows me the resolution of the encounter and then just sits there. The only way I can get the game to move on is to hit the SPACE bar and go to my character sheet and then hit C)ontinue. This is supposed to be how you skip your turn. But the hourglass shows I still have time left, so I shouldn't have to do that.
- The only sounds are shrill buzzes during some encounters. These are best muted.
While I've never played the board game, I have to believe it was more fun than this. My GIMLET adds up to only 16. A couple of contemporary magazines disagreed. The May 1985 Sinclair User gave it 8/10 along with this laughable line: "What the game does provide is a relatively complete translation of D&D motifs to computer." The May 1985 Crash! gave it 7/10 and thought it would be good for multiple players. The July 1985 Computer and Video Games rated it only 1/10 ("a bore to play"), though the reviewer, Paul Coppins, admits, "I have never liked these so-called 'arcade adventures' anyway." Was no one else available?
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| The box gives it a subtitle but the title screen does not. |
The computer game was programmed by SLUG, a Harlow-based group who had previously written Battlecars (1984), also based on a Games Workshop board game. The same year that the computer game came out, Games Workshop published a second edition of Talisman, followed by several expansion sets. A third edition came out in 1994 and a fourth in 2007. Fantasy Flight Games, a U.S. company, acquired the license to publish additional versions and released a fifth edition last year, plus a number of expansion packs in the 2010s.
There have been further computer versions, too, all from Cheshire-based Nomad Games: Talisman: Prologue (2012), Talisman: Digital Edition (2014), Talisman: Origins (2019), and an update of Talisman: Digital Edition to accompany the fifth edition of the board game (2024). The board game looks like a lot of fun, and I think I'll buy it for me and Irene. MobyGames tags some of the computer versions as RPGs, so we may see it again.
I’ve played many digital board game conversions and agree that most don’t work that well. The outstanding exception for me is “”Through the Ages”. I never played the board game version and from what I’ve read it is so complex it can be a slog. The digital version is fantastic - slick interface and very competent AI. It is the first and only game I have played online, for hundreds of matches. It isn’t an RPG though, more like Civilization with all the boring bits removed.
ReplyDeleteI play a lot of board games online and I think it usually works very well. You lose the haptic element and the being in the same room with your friends experience. Sometimes, for more complex games you're missing the good overview over everyone's board that you get when playing a physical game.
DeleteBut rules and graphics translate very well to the computer, and for games with a lot of setup and/or shuffling the online version can be quite convenient. I played Dominion online first and didn't like it as much when I played it offline, as it's much slower.
I absolutely loved Talisman (I had the 2nd edition) as a kid but when trying to replay it as an adult I realized it was a terrible luck-driven game, effectively a Game of Goose with choices and a better theme. The most important decision you'll play in the base game, which can be quite long, is "Am I ready to ascend to the Crown or should I accumulate some more power?"
DeleteThe expansions added a few more choices, a lot more bloat and destroys whatever little balance the game had - for instance in my group everyone knew you should beeline to become Archmage asap (you could change "class/race" in the City expansion) so much so we had to change the rules there. Anyone starting with the expansion characters usually had a decisive advantage.
I will still credit the game with teaching me English, and I dusted off my old box to play a narrative-driven version with my 4 years-old (she is alone on the board and I build stories based on the card), so the game was still a great long-term investment.
Agreed (MalcolmM), I've tried the digital conversion of 'Gloomhaven' to see what all the fuss is about, and it turns out to meticulously mimic a CRPG in the tabletop space, making every move needlessly complicated and tedious that I lost interest fast. I'd rather play it with friends around the table, or fire up a purebred CRPG (without a card pool for actions).
DeleteI also hate Gloomhaven for the same reason (needlessly complicated and thus slow) and I sold it. On the other hand, I found Mice & Mystics too basic to be really fun, so it's hard to fight the correct balance. However, I kept M&M to play it in the future with my daughters.
DeleteMy wife is a board game fanatic and through incidental exposure, it seems very much to me like boardgame designers have a REALLY hard time hitting that sweet spot where they are complex enough to stay interesting but don't become cumbersome and tedious. Admittedly, I have a lower threshhold than most avid gamers for such things.
DeleteAt first I was intrigued, but on further examination it looks like a Game of Goose isn't as exciting as it sounds.
Delete@Narwhal: So you are saying Talisman is a very Goose Game.
Delete[Leaves the stage before anyone decides to throw any objects.]
It is a TITLED goose game.
DeleteThe original board game is actually not a very good board game. It was popular at the time due to a combination of fantasy theming, the fact that no one else in the 80s knew how to make a good board game either, and Gary Chalk's magnificent artwork. The absence of the latter is particularly damning for this conversion - the screenshots in your review make me wince, knowing how good the board game looks.
ReplyDeleteTotally agree. It’s very much a roll and move with very little interesting choices to make. It’s just the theming and that there weren’t many better entry level games during the 80s which gave it its fame.
DeleteNowadays there’s so many better board games out there, that there’s very little reason to get talisman beyond nostalgia.
This is also a big issue I have with games workshop games. Most of them are so luck reliant with very little else going on. However they do all look nice.
"the fact that no one else in the 80s knew how to make a good board game either"
DeleteSid Jackson, Wolfgang Kramer come to my mind. Different kinds of games, but that statement struck me as too broad to let it stand.
But certainly, you didn't have such a broad and diverse choice of good board games back then.
There's also an opportunity to transfer to the middle area from the Tavern, depending on your roll.
ReplyDeleteAlignment plays into a lot of things and is why I like the Druid so much. Able to change alignment at will, the Druid can scam the Devil himself for more life or craft.
This is one of the earliest board games that offers expansion packs, which are generally a new area to explore ("The Dungeon" or "The Timescape") with a new deck of cards (that offer random encounters) and a few extra classes and/or spells.
ReplyDeleteThe upside of the boardgame is that there's so much variation that it'll never play out the same way twice; and that you can usually read the effect of a choice before making it (e.g. "you may roll a die and add craft, if you get 7 or more..."). A few of the choices might be called roleplaying.
The downside of the boardgame is that, due to its massive reliance on randomness, there's no real strategy involved in anything; it's fun factor relies and hanging with friends in "beer and pretzels" style. Accordingly, it gets only middling rates (6.4 out of 10) on Boardgamegeek.
Hey Chester, I've been reading your blog for a few years but never commented. I love Talisman, but I have also been playing it since I was a small child. I've played a lot of the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th editions of this game and still do semi-regularly. When I saw this pop up on my RSS feed my gut reaction was "Oh, he's going to hate it." Compared to what I expected, this review was extremely positive. As an RPG, no version of Talisman would ever score high on the GIMLET. As a board game, its in large part luck-based and it has a lot in common with the unpopular parts of Monopoly.
ReplyDeleteIn particular, I've never met anyone that wants to play out the crown of command sequence at the end of the game, which you highlighted as a special draw. Depending on the number of players, the edition you're playing and the expansions you're using by the time anyone gets to the center of the board you've all been there for between 3-6 hours. Maybe faster if you're using the EXP rules from 3rd edition, you have two players and/or you don't let people draw new characters after dying. Maybe slower if you're using some of the more involved ending replacement cards from 4th edition.
"In particular, I've never met anyone that wants to play out the crown of command sequence at the end of the game, which you highlighted as a special draw." I should have used better language there. I said it was my "favorite part" because I think it's hilarious, not because I think it's a good gameplay element.
DeleteAnd to clarify even further, the reason I think it's hilarious is that most games would be content to say that you got the crown, you win (like the computer version does). Making the winning condition "everyone else is dead" seems particularly sadistic. I wonder if the decision was influenced by Monopoly, where the only way to win is to bankrupt everyone else.
DeleteIn practice everyone would resign once you have the crown, except if someone is on the inner region track so a few turns from the Crown in the Dungeon, which can occasionally happen. Alternatively, the Dungeon has a shortcut to the Crown of Command, so that’s another location where you have a chance.
DeleteIt seems the game correctly follow the boardgame, without explaining any of the rules.
ReplyDeleteBased on my recollection of Talisman:
Combat is dice resolved: your Strengh/craft plus Dice versus enemy characteristic plus dice.
Encounter usually use 1D6 and give a random result based on it. Usually 3 good, 1 neutral, 2 bad.
Some encounter are alignment based. e.g: As evil you always lose life in the church.. and so on.
Some follower give bonus to characteristic, or some bonus encounter in certain place. Some work only if you are the correct alignment for them.
Item also could be alignment based, If I recall(not working on certain).
Some tabletop rpg player found exactly what they wanted in Talisman and liked it better than rpg, So I see why the review can be so good.
I would like to point out that Hero Quest and Dungeon! still needed a dungeon master of sorts to set up the individual scenarios and control the hidden movement of adversaries. Talisman stood out in that regard because it really didn't need any sort of dungeon master or facilitator at all, which made the game really stand out at the time. (Don't know about Forest of the Long Shadows, since I'm not familiar with that one).
ReplyDeleteI may be badly confused, but I don't remember anything in Dungeon! that would require a game master (or any alternate scenarios)--you just put down the cards and turn them over as you discover them, as I remember? And the adversaries don't move at all, hidden or not.
DeletePeople have been saying that Talisman is too long and luck-based--Dungeon! seems like a nice beer-and-pretzels alternative because, though it's even more luck-based, it's nice and zippy.
Being an avid board gamer, I can testify that Talisman looks much more fun than it is. It takes forever, it has almost no strategy, characters are horribly unbalanced. It works better as a social facilitator where the board game is more of a background noise to the gathering of friends.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I would like to draw some attention to the granddaddy of them all, namely Magic Realm (https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/22/magic-realm), the RPG-style boardgame so complex that it is indeed preferably played with computer support, i.e. Tabletop Simulator. And there is also Tainted Grail, a modern RPG campaign-style boardgame that has a computer version as well, but I haven't checked yet whether it is indeed a recreation of the boardgame or rather in independent product merely using the same IP.
Coming from the other direction, I hear "The Elder Scrolls: Betrayal of the Second Era" is apparently pretty good, but it seems to require so much material and table space to recreate the CRPG experience that I would rather prefer something simpler. There is only so much mindspace you can devote to keep boardgame systems in mind.
There is a modern relecture of Magic Realm named "Dragons Down", that I happen to own: takes less table space & simplifies token summoning/positioning a lot. Don't know if there is an AI somewhere to fully handle all its repetitive parts; still, makes for lots of fun.
DeleteConcur with most points listed. It's heavily rng, lending itself to few strategies. The main player interaction is when to gamble, when to think you're "strong enough" to face the trials. In that regard it shares with a roguelike. You random until you think you can push.
DeleteHowever there's just some spirit I like about Talisman. Something old and nostalgic. An RPG adjacent boardgame. I like it, but would often want more guided strategy
There's a Warhammer 40,000 themed version of Talisman too, called Relic, although the mysterious breakup between Games Workshop and Fantasy Flight means that it is out of print.
ReplyDeleteGW's relationship with the game is odd. The GW logo was on the 4th edition box (I haven't seen 5th in the wild), there is an orphaned Talisman page on the GW website that connects to nothing, and GW sells Talisman merchandise like clothing and mugs, but never acknowledges the game otherwise.
Still, that's more recognition than GW gives to Fury of Dracula.
Having copies of both Talisman and Relic boardgames, I can say that Relic keeps the basic gameplay of Talisman but improves on it in many ways - less random, characters have levels with attribute increases, team rules (eg 2 vs 1) and more. Talisman would play much better using Relics system.
DeleteI would say one difference between board games (typically multiplayer) and computer games (in the context of this blog, usually played solo) is that in board games you're more willing to accept harsh consequences from a single random event, such as a dice roll. When a die is rolled that could have dramatic consequences for the game, all players watch intently. A negative result can still give other players an advantage or simply amuse everyone. A dice roll carries more weight than in computer games, so to speak.
ReplyDeleteAnother nice aspect is the clarity of seeing the whole game and understanding the rules. It's unfortunate that this board game conversion doesn't display the entire board.
I think it would have been possible to implement better behavior for the AI characters on the Spectrum.
"Is this the only CRPG in which a ghoul can cast spells?"
ReplyDeleteBetter yet, is this the only CRPG in which you can play as a ghoul?
I'd be surprised if one of the Fallouts didn't have ghoul as a player option, although of course those are slightly different.
DeleteThere are ghoul player-characters in some Roguelikes, as you'd imagine, although I don't know if they are offered in any of the "main" games.
Now that I think of it, playing Clan Nosferatu in 'Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines' comes pretty close to being a ghoul.
DeleteThere's a somewhat modern RPG that lets you recruit a ghoul into your party (since I guess it's a minor spoiler: Funqbjeha Ubat Xbat). When you bring him along, you usually get into custom situations where you have to explain why you have a Ghoul in your party. (You could argue if your party members are player characters. You act for them but you don't speak as them.)
DeleteDepends on what you qualify as ghoul, since there's no distinct lore to them beyond someone pointing at some undead creature and saying, "ghoul". I think that Motelsoft monster RPG had one, Morrowind, SMT has them of course, and you could argue that games which allow you to play evil characters who consume human flesh count as ghouls. If you count mods, probably a lot more, I know Solid & Shade for Mount & Blade probably has something like that.
DeleteIn Slice & Dice you can play as a ghast can cast spells, and ghasts are pretty much ghouls. But Slice & Dice isn't really a cRPG but more of a Slay-the-Spirelike (or, blah, "roguelike deckbuilder") with dice instead of cards. (Even for a Spirelike it's far away from Chester's definitions of a cRPG, since it does away with the economy in favor of "every other fight you get an item.")
Delete"...as ghoul, since there's no distinct lore to them"
DeleteThat's not entirely true, Morpheus, we can trace back the origin of the word 'ghoul' back to Arabian legends where it's defined as an underground dweller feasting on corpses. It' wasn't a stretch to incorporate such kind of creature in all sorts of contemporary fantasy (e.g. H.P. Lovecraft).
Okay, in the legends yes, but how much media actually uses a creature as in the legends? A creature that lies in wait in graveyards tricking people into coming there to be consumed by them isn't something that most games have...except if one of the Deception games takes place in a graveyard.
DeleteThe game's description on its box / external backside of the tape inlay (see e.g. here at the MoCAGH) mentions as one of the potential encounters - besides orcs, wizards, trolls, elves, sentinels - also "landlords".
ReplyDeleteIt seems either Mr. Harris (if this already was in the original boardgame) or (one of) the programmer(s) of the computer game wasn't too happy with their rental relationship... or it's just British 80s humour.
A few trivia:
ReplyDelete- Games Workshop was initially founded as literally what its name says: a company that would sell you manually designed wooden boards and wooden pieces. Then, they start reselling D&D ordered from USA (only 6 initially). RPG were in the ADN of GW, hence the RPG-themed Talisman.
- GW managed to land exclusive distribution rights in UK for the cost of ... nothing. Their newsletter reached Brian Blum of TSR, who wanted someone to sell their new "D&D" product abroad and still did not know its value. If the newsletter had reached Blume a few months later, GW would have had a different story. Of course this is what fed GW's explosive growth.
- How did their newsletter reached Blume? Because Steve Jackson & Ian Livingstone had pilfered a maling-list of Diplomacy players to send their newsletter.
- GW's first foray in computer was short-lived: 1983-1985. GW considered this activity too capital-intensive (or rather "not the best use of their effort and capital"), and focused on their shops and that small thing they launched in 1983: Warhammer. I feel it required serious grit to go against the grain and NOT double-down on video games but rather on brick & mortar.
Self-promo: I covered early GW a lot as I covered their first video-game: Apocalypse. https://zeitgame.net/archives/14109
Ian Livingstone, at least, never lost interest in computer games. He's been deeply involved in the UK computer game industry until very recently.
DeleteTalisman has a fairly well-done modern digital adaptation—it looks to support all major modern platforms (https://nomadgames.co.uk/talisman-digital-edition). It's a much more obviously-direct implementation of the board game: rather than seeing just a single square at a time, you're looking at the whole board, and it's easy to see how all the squares relate to each other. The AI in it is, as one might expect, much improved (though still a long way from playing against a human). Unfortunately, due to the strong luck aspect, even if you pick a decent matchup as far as characters go, you've got basically 1 chance in however many "players" you've set up the game with to win.
ReplyDeleteI've played digital Talisman quite a bit and I think because of the super-fussiness (and expense!) of the pieces it is better than the physical one. There are hordes of expansions and some of them genuinely add enormously to the experience. (except now there's a brand new version of the digital game as of this year -- no comment on that one)
ReplyDeleteThe game is drastically different when the opponents are real, though. If the AI just moves randomly it sounds like it isn't really the game.
Videogame adaptations have gotten so much better over the years due to the internet for more players and more CPU horsepower for graphics and better AI. There are whole websites built around playing boardgames online like BoardGameArena which has many more modern boardgames better than Monopoly for instance. The quality of the adaptations have gotten so good that I can recommend Dune: Imperium, Terraforming Mars, Wingspan, Root, and Spirit Island because they're solid with good UI.
ReplyDelete"two people staring at a computer screen waiting for their turns is not quite the same thing as the same players around a board game table."
ReplyDeleteIf it's a dumb reroll of an already existing board game: agree. But if it's designed so from the ground up, there are good counter-examples in the gaming world: Heroes of Might & Magic, Masters of Magic...
This has me thinking about the fad in the 80s for board games that included an electronic component. A game that had the physicality of a board game with an electronic assistant to allow complex mechanics without becoming cumbersome could be a solid experience, especially if the game were designed from the ground up for it instead of a retrofit. Of course, such a thing would drive up costs prohibitively for the small publisher model that's more common with "advanced" boardgames.
DeleteMy wife's collection has some games that are meant to be played paired with a phone app. The most common designs are for complex timers or to use the phone app to manage the "hidden information" (imagine a version of Clue(do) where you can make an accusation without having to look inside the envelope). But that model puts you at risk of the game one day becoming unplayable when the manufacturer decides it's not worth maintaining the server.
I liked the games that where accompanied by a VHS to play =)
DeleteExperience bij, Captain Kavok!
DeleteTbh, that's not necessarily a video game adaptation thing. My bf takes ages to think through his turns at Clank! and it being a physical boardgame doesn't really help.
DeleteAs far as good boardgame to computer adaptations go, both Ticket to Ride and Carcassonne on IOS are great. I'm way more comfortable with the computers figuring out the score for Carcassonne, especially with all the expansions
ReplyDeleteNot sure about the tabletop games not working so well for computers for the reasons you explained - actually my main issue with tabletop games is the other players, the ultra competitive aspect of it that I always experience, where if you lose you are humiliated and if you don't really care about losing the other players get really angry at you for not being as involved. So I am super ok with computer games modelling that stuff.
ReplyDeleteThat weird nostalgia I have everytime I see a zx spectrum screen... weird because now I know I spent too much time just playing the same 2 or 3 screens of every game, doing a repetition of the same thing for years, just a total waste of my childhood. But on the other that aesthetic is so cool that it should have been used more often to not only indie platform games but i.e. point n click ones.
This reminds me to never ever start a Risk game unless I'm actually ready to commit for the hours that take to actually play it to the end.
DeleteNothing enrages people more than intentionally trying to throw your game even if it's clear you are going to lose.
And, while in theory I disagree in pratice I see their point and I'd rather call myself out than be a spoilersport and ruin someone else fun.
For some time given to play is very serious business.
That's why for games night I prefer quick and dirty games like Bang!
Dan Olson video "Why it's rude to suck at minecraft" tackles this very real phenomenon for mmorpgs and alikes.
The actual title of the video is "Why it's rude to suck at Warcraft" ...
DeleteSigh. I really need a take my time to do some poofreading before posting
I'm interested in the video, but it's 90 minutes long, so I don't know when I'll get to it. Is the title meant ironically, or do they actually make that case?
DeleteEither way, I suspect the themes of the video are why I've never been interested in MMOs. I don't want anyone else's experience to be affected by my own and vice versa.
The title is meant ironically as in the video is less about making the case (if at all) and more about analysing and chronicling how, since it's beginning, WoW userbase shaped itself, from its casual approach of the early days to being focused on metagaming as efficiently as possible while minmaxing to the extreme and how players who don't adhere to those unwritten rules are (more or less) pushed outside, as if, it was actually rude to suck at Warcraft.
DeleteIn my experience it's a good background video.
Yeah there is apoint where you just see yourself slowly losing, slowly dying, and just not enjoying it while the rest of the rest of the players are just pointing at you "HA HA!" and that is when I totally phase out of the game and think why am I there and not doing something more productive like washing the dishes.
DeleteCooperative boardgames exist.
DeleteAlso, many boardgames exist where the win condition is something like "first past the goal" or "most points after X turns", not "eliminate your other players one-by-one while they get to sit around unable to counteract".
DeleteRisk has a big nostalgia factor, but by nowadays standards it's not a good game. E.g. on Boardgamegeek it gets lacklustre scores, averaging 5.6 out of 10.
Those are even worse in my opinion. If I'm definitively eliminated from a game I can either just chat or get out my handheld console and occupy myself depending on how involved the game is for the remaining players, but if it's score based I'm forced to stay focused on the game and taking actions even when it's completely impossible to win, and I can't drop out because that would unbalance the game for the remaining players in a way a game without eliminations isn't designed to account for.
Delete@Radiant Risk in my experience is a strange case as for many 40yo is still THE boardgame. Getting them to play something else is almost impossible and often ends with people saying: that was fun but next time we play Risk.
DeleteReminds me way back whem for my friends Tekken 3 could as well be welded in my psone.
Never managed to get anybody to play anything else
Keeping playtimes (relatively) short and predictable, and keeping all players engaged in the game, not only by not having them drop out, but also by keeping games close, implementing catch-up mechanisms, and giving you something interesting to do even if you're clearly losing, is pretty much what defines the Eurogames genre, which a lot of modern boardgames fall into.
DeleteBut yes, not everybody favours this playstyle.
I was under the impression Eurogames were defined primarily by having little-to-no direct interaction, and to a lesser degree by being won based on score after a certain number of rounds.
DeleteI will say very little can give me a worse first impression of a board game than being told it's a eurogame. There are a few I like, but by and large they sap my will to engage like no other.
One of the genre codifiers for Eurogames is the Settlers Of Catan, which has a ton of direct interaction; so I think your impression is a little off.
DeleteI'd have to disagree with Catan being a codifier of the genre. It's a forerunner for certain, but the genre's developed and diverged significantly enough from Catan that I can't agree with being a part of codifying the genre today. And that is probably for the best; while Catan was a breath of fresh air compared to things like Monopoly, it's not actually a particularly good game now we have modern alternatives to compare it to.
DeleteI'm also not sure I'd actually agree that Catan has a lot of direct interaction, but that comes down to definitions mostly, and it's been such a long time since I last played Catan that I don't feel confident arguing the position.
In in interest of clarity, I do have to admit there's a lot of overlap in my head between eurogames and worker placement that's hard for me to separate from one another.
Having little direct interaction is more something that follows from keeping all players engaged, rather than something that primarily defines the genre. Eurogames can have a lot of interaction, though, and the lines what makes an interaction "direct" are not really well defined.
DeleteI'm not sure why Catan would not be considered a good game by todays standards. It's highly rated and still played a lot. I'd just say that it's not the most stereotypical "Euro" style game as players can get into a difficult situation where they are built in with no almost chance of winning.
I'm not so sure about that. Eurogame interaction tends to be less 'I play this card to steal that player's stone so they can't build their building' and more 'I hire all the masons and have them do something else so there's no stone in the stockpile so that player can't build their building'. It's more circumspect and has a more genteel veneer, but the end result is still player A has stopped player B from being able to take the action they wanted. (Actually typing that up got me wondering if that's the reason I don't like that sort of game; I'm the sort of person who always prefers blunt honesty over any sort of pretenses.)
DeleteI thought the general consensus about Settlers of Catan - and one that I agree with - was that while it's still a good bridge into modern board games for people used to more traditional ones, it's simultaneously too simplistic while also being too dependent on randomness with the dice rolls, leaving it in a position where it's not a very good option whether you want a mechanically complex game or a mechanically simple one with strategic depth.
Clarifying my afterthought to the first paragraph - maybe it's how the interactions are flavoured that puts me off more than the actual mechanics?
DeleteJust to clarify: you don't have to like Eurogames (though it's really a very broad category that goes well beyond worker placement - you might find something you like), the point was just that there exists a large and popular genre of competitive boardgames that address the very problems Risingson Carlos mentioned.
DeleteAs for Settlers (or rather, Catan): I'd call the robber (including card stealing), trading (and not doing so with the potential winner), and blocking a longest road with a knight direct interactions. The race for the longest road, the most knights, and 10 points are indirect interactions. Debatable would be directly blocking an opposing players intended actions by building roads and settlements, especially blocking off harbour access.
Some people don't like any kind of luck in strategy boardgames, but a lot of people don't mind. Likewise, there's a sizable audience for light-to-medium-weight strategy games that might be played with your family as well as with your boardgame friends (and you can always add the Cities & Knights expansion to move it towards a more heavy-weight strategy game). It's not my favourite, since a bad placement at the start plus some bad luck can give you the feeling of never being able to do anything through most of the game. But it's still very popular and I'd still play it now and then.
The biggest issue I have with (most) Eurogames is getting halfway through the rulebook without losing the will to live.
DeleteMost Eurogames have pretty short, concise rulebooks. But if you refer to the "the player who last saw a llama in a New York subway between 01:00 and 03:00a.m. starts the game" kind of rules that seem to start off all of the modern ones, I'd agree.
DeleteI think somewhere along the line I forgot that we were only actually disagreeing on the definition of a eurogame, which isn't something that I think is going to be resolved one way or another. All I can really say on that is that I'm pretty sure the board game society I was in back when I was at university, and also my current board game friends both use(d) a narrower definition than the fairly broad-strokes one you gave up there, so that's the one I know and what something being a eurogame means to me.
DeleteI've already said there's a few I like, so I don't really feel the need to try more. Castles of Burgundy being one in particular I enjoy even though I can't pin down at all why.
(I'd agree with robber and disagree with trading, but I don't remember knights being a thing at all - as I said previously I'm not confident arguing a position on Catan as it's been so long since I last played it.)
I don't think we're even disagreeing, I didn't try to give a definition, I was just saying what the absolute core of a Eurogame is. I think it's mostly an American term anyway.
DeleteI'm very fond of Castles of Burgundy myself, and Stefan Feld games in general. They are very tactical and I love dealing with constrained resources. In the Year of the Dragon feels like Gothic with a level 1 character.
My observations from someone who doesn't play many board games. Absolutely nobody I have ever known really likes Risk, it's just one of those games that seems to exist. They tried to rectify some of the problems with the spinoff games like the sci-fi one and Risk Legacy, but I don't think either of those sold too well. In either event, I find it amusing that people are glossing over it in a discussion about board games where you lose the will to live midway through.
DeleteIsn't the definition of Eurogame just something that primarily focuses on strategy over luck? I've heard the luck-based ones described as Ameritrash, because some nerds forgot that the idea is to not make people hate you when you try to trot out a substitute.
@Buck, it's not about length but about complexity. They're just very beginner-unfriendly, when you don't have an experienced player around to guide you through them. Too many moving parts to keep track of!
Delete@VK that's not my experience at all. The average Eurogame can be explained much faster than, say, Risk or Monopoly. Sure, there are a couple of exceptions, but in general their accessibility to newcomers is one of the major reasons why Eurogames are so popular.
DeleteAccessibility includes the fact that the win condition is not eliminating the others one-by-one. Gaming is a social activity, and being eliminated while everybody else keeps playing is very beginner-unfriendly.
I think there's been a trend towards more complex and heavyweight Euros (Terraforming Mars, Arc Nova, ...), so the term has shifted a bit. A game like Puerto Rico used to be at the top end of complexity, now it's more like middle-of-the-pack. VK might be referring to those.
DeleteBut classic Euros like Ticket to Ride oder Carcassonne are very simple.
CHESTER, 3 WEEKS AGO: "Shall I play or skip Talisman ?"
ReplyDeleteEVERYBODY: "Skip it ! Skip it !"
CHESTER, TODAY: "I played it !"
Years ago, Chester wrote that when he is told to do something, he cannot resist but do the opposite. QED.
Nevertheless, this post about Talisman is a good read.
Amusing as it is, your comment starts with an incorrect premise. I didn't ask 3 weeks ago "Should I play or Skip Talisman?" I had already announced my intention to play it. I invited people to comment on what I would experience when I did.
DeleteI probably did write that years ago, but it isn't really accurate. I'm not a child. When it seems like I'm doing "the opposite," it's probably just that I'm doing what I intended to do from the outset.
I apologize for my mistake, and for having been rude or childish. I meant to have a laugh with you, not at you.
Delete: Why did the chicken cross the road?
Delete: Amusing as it is, your question starts with an incorrect premise.
You very much behave like a prude american child sometimes, though.
DeleteIt is in my nature.
DeleteAbacos, I in turn apologize for making you think you needed to apologize. I wanted to clarify, but I wasn't bothered by your original comment.
DeleteTo get away from a bath?
DeleteTo stab someone on the other side?
Roads have no meaning to barbarians?
Your second answer is the closest.
DeleteIn written text and in a foreign (to me) language, sometimes it is difficult to be sure about the tone of an answer. Therefore, I say to myself: "when in doubt, apologize".
DeleteThis board game was so much of my childhood, essentially an RPG-lite experience, where you accumulated loads of cool cards with cool pictures before making a run to the middle of the table. :-)
ReplyDelete"Some follower is with me, but I don't know who."
ReplyDeleteHe looks like an angry elf, and probably because you forgot his name.
Some of these encounters are weird if you're playing as a ghoul. The undead and the devil hate you, yet angels and priests don't. I'm assuming that this is what your alignment might effect, yet I can't imagine a ghoul not being evil.
"British games say, 'You need pie'"
Wouldn't you want a slice after some of them?
As someone who enjoyed Talisman as a teenager but recognize that modern designs have greatly surpassed it: one modern boardgame to check out that hasn't been mentioned is Prophecy, by Vlaada Chvatil, the designer of Through the Ages. I like to call it Talisman redesigned by a master game designer. Luck is significantly reduced by making movement not subject to die rolls and gives the player more agency in determining where to go. If you'd like to scratch the Talisman itch, I recommend this route over the original game.
ReplyDeleteOh, it looks like Prophecy is out of print. Here's a review of it, though, it's pretty much Talisman improved. https://boardsandbees.wordpress.com/2023/04/24/1135/ At the end of the article, the reviewer points out it's unlikely to be reprinted as Chvatil's Mage Knight design is in the same genre and is superior. I can recommend that one for sure.
Delete"The game lingers for about 5 minutes on the startup screen. [...] You have to be patient."
ReplyDeleteI'll just mention this in case you didn't know, but most emulators have a "turbo" or "fast-forward" feature. You _don't_ have to be patient.