A Gaming Life
One of the best economic games for those players who don’t necessarily want to feel like they’re nothing but an accountant using spreadsheets is a game called Brass (now apparently renamed Brass: Lancashire for reasons I’ll get to in a moment).
The game, designed by esteemed board game designer Martin Wallace, is about the industrial revolution in England in the 19th century. Through the use of cards, you build cotton, oil, or iron industries, ship cotton to market, and basically try to make a lot of money and (of course!) earn victory points in the process.
It’s actually a really fun game for those (like me) who don’t want to sit down for 3 hours and crunch numbers. Don’t let the description or the name fool you, it’s not that dry of a game (ok, maybe a little dry, but really, do you want to be swamped with water all the time? Sometimes a little dryness can help).
One of the knocks against the game is the art design. It is kind of bland. It looked like it was made by a 19th century industrialist.
However, the big news is that Roxley Games is launching a Kickstarter on Monday, April 17, for a new edition of Brass, both an updated version of the original game and a new version called Brass: Birmingham (hence the title shift to Lancashire for the original game).
The news of this Kickstarter happening hit some people like a ton of bricks. When the cover was revealed (see above), much drooling occurred.
Then we saw some of the new board designs, and there was much rejoicing.
(Thanks to Roxley Games for allowing the use of these two photos and the cover image above)
Really, what we’ve seen so far for this update has been phenomenal. The only reason I’m not personally backing it is because my friend, the Brass fanatic, is jumping on it like it was a giant pile of gelato. There’s no need for two copies in our game group.
But I have to say I’m really impressed and can’t wait to play with the new version, both this and the Birmingham edition.
I will be following this with interest.
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