Friday Night Shots – Games & Changed Opinions

Can I really go a month combining drinking and posting?

Yes, I can!

It’s been a month of posts, and thankfully you’ve managed to find your way back to the bar each week, even though historically I’ve been having trouble meeting this quota.

That says a lot about you as a customer.

Yes, it’s another Friday night, with comfortable drinks (both alcoholic and non-alcoholic) and lots of great conversation!

Because obviously I don’t have any other customers to deal with.

One would wonder how this bar stays open when you’re the only customer.

I always enjoy these boardgame conversations with you, especially when we’re spared from the jukebox that spews endless Free Bird because it appears to be broken yet again.

I’ll just unplug it.

Have a seat and let’s talk about games that maybe you’ve changed your opinion about, and why that might be?

Because I have a few.

This week has been a Dire Wolf Digital week here at the Dude Take Your Turn bar.

Between the new Dune: Imperium app expansion announcement to my review of Clank: Sunken Treasures, I’ve been talking about them a lot.

This brought to mind my review of the Clank app as well as Sunken Treasures and my reaction when I played Clank on the table.

Clank in Space is one of my favourite games. It’s in my Top 50.

When I first played Clank on the table, it was like “it’s ok, it’s fun, but nothing on Space.”

But then I played it on the app, and I loved it.

It’s relatively quick (the only knock against Clank in Space is how long it can take), and with a couple of exceptions it has most of what makes Clank in Space so amazing.

It’s still prone to the “get something cheap and get out” mechanic, but maybe not as much as I had thought before?

After playing many asynchronous games of Clank on the app, and now even more with Sunken Treasures, I really do like this game.

Maybe it’s not Top 50 worthy, but it’s still much higher in my estimation than it was initially.

That’s one way that a game can rise up higher than it started in your estimation: plays in different (and maybe more convenient) formats that show you just how good a game can be.

If I had shelf space, I might buy this game for our lunchtime games at the office, because it could be done in an hour.

Especially considering not only the two expansions, but the numerous map pack expansions that just might make the game even better.

But there are also other ways to have a game rise up in your opinion than when you first played it.

I love playing asynchronous online games on Boardgame Arena (and to a lesser extent, Yucata, where I have been really enjoying games of Grand Austria Hotel).

There are so many games on there now!

Sometimes a friend suggests playing a game that I haven’t played before, and I try to learn it while I play asynchronously.

Depending on how complicated the game is, that can be either good or very, very bad.

Sometimes I bounce hard off of a game trying to learn it that way, and then I play it on the table and I suddenly feel like I understand it a lot more.

That happened with many games, but the most notable example is Russian Railroads.

I tried to learn this game on BGA and it just didn’t click at all.

I had no idea what I was doing.

Finally, a friend brought it to our game day so I could play it on the table and have an actual teach of the game.

And I really enjoyed it!

Russian Railroads is kind of a worker-placement game, in the sense that you there are spaces to do actions that others can play to and thus lock you out of that round.

You’re trying to extend your three railroad tracks to get extra bonuses and try to score points (wow, a game that wants you to score points? What a concept!)

Once I learned it on the table, the game finally kind of clicked. I actually did pretty well in my initial table game, and I was up for more BGA games now that I understood it.

I don’t think it will ever be in my “must-play” group of games, or even close to my Top 50.

But after playing it on the table, my opinion of the game went way up compared to how I felt about it after trying numerous times on BGA to understand the game.

Some games are easy to learn on BGA, mostly fillers or quick games or whatever.

The more complicated games?

I think I need a table teach, so I don’t even try anymore.

Another game where my opinion really jumped up from my initial impression, and I think I’ve mentioned this a few times on this blog, is Terraforming Mars.

When the game first came out, it was the new hotness that a couple people in my game group had and brought to our Sundays.

I kind of shied away from playing it. It seemed overly hyped and the description of the game didn’t engage me.

When I finally played it, I did enjoy it, but it was kind of a “eh, it’s fine” feeling.

But then I played it again…and again…and again…and I ended up loving it.

It’s currently in my Top 50 and was in my Top 10 for quite a while.

I love this game!

Yes, it’s long, depending on the players (I’ve had some shorter than usual games and some that just dragged on forever).

But for what it is, I truly do love this game.

Especially with some of the expansions (though I can do without the Turmoil expansion).

This is just a basic example of more plays showing me how good a game is when my initial impressions were kind of negative.

I haven’t had any major downgrades of opinion, where I initially really liked a game and then decided it’s “eh.”

I guess the major example of that would be Combat Commander: Pacific, where it fell from my Top 5 to somewhere in the Top 30.

That was mainly due to a few scenarios in a row where major luck swings just kind of soured me on it.

And when I say “soured,” I mean made it from one of the best games ever to just a game that’s really really good.

Most changes of opinions on games just bring games from “terrible” to “okay” or “awesome” to “pretty good.”

But sometimes your opinion on a game takes a radical turn and you just have to wonder what happened.

Maybe it just finally clicked for you, when before it was this opaque mess that made you wonder why you were playing it?

Sometimes it’s playing it in a new format that brings this epiphany.

And sometimes it’s just playing it again a couple of times.

That’s why I try not to write off a game after one play, unless it has elements that I know I hate, like real-time tile placement or dexterity or what have you.

If I bounce off a game but it’s not terrible, or if I can see that a game is good even though I have trouble with it on the first play, I like to try it again.

Sometimes you might just find a hidden gem.

And sometimes you might find a new favourite game.

Have you had any experience with this? With what game(s)?

Let me know in the comments.