Friday, January 4, 2019

More New Purchases

I obtained a number of old school games made by Parker Brothers and Waddingtons recently.

These games were designed by masters of the form, usually complex enough to hold the attention of an adult while being easy enough to play to allow for children to join in (or possibly the adults post Christmas Dinner c/w copious quantities of alcohol). Waddingtons' Formula One was a purchase that was voted a damn good waste of time at my local friendly game store three months ago, and I just picked up copies of Waddingtons' Blast Off, a Space Race game I had played in the early 1970s which was in excellent condition, and Parker Brothers' Masterpiece which is an art collector game where the object is to collect works of art that are highly prized while dumping your acquired forgeries on the other players. Each artwork card is a reproduction of an actual painting, and gets assigned a random value known only to the owner as it is drawn. A very clever mechanic and a game I've wanted to play since I was an older kid. Never knew anyone who had it though.

I also picked up a copy of Waddingtons' Spy Ring, which I had played at university in the mid-1970s but it turns out there are two different iterations of the game. The one I had played was the original. The one I bought turned out to have a different game-play and objective while using many of the same pieces. Sadly, the one I want to play is the other one. Oh well.

Can't wait to get a crowd together for some old-school gaming.