I Want To Go To SPAAAAAAACE!

The Week I've Had

This has been a really weird week for me. My wife and kid were sick the last few weeks with a really nasty cold, but I had managed to ride out the sick train without catching what they had. I thought that I had managed to make it through without catching what either of them had, but inevitably, the sickness made it's way to me. I was laid out on Monday and slept most of the day away, shivering from chills that only seemed to radiate around my torso, whilst feeling both far too hot and sweaty and too cold all at the same time. It was such a weird experience.

If you'll allow me a brief moment of digression, I find it so interesting how the mind often just goes blank when we are feeling sick. I know that the brain (especially in an adult human body) can take up to 20% of the body's energy, even in a resting state. When we are up and about, the brain requires additional energy to process through the many inputs that the body sends to it. With that estimation of 20% of the body's energy going to the brain at rest, I believe that it would be an even higher percentage when we are awake and actively using our brain's input.

When we are feeling sick, the body then has to take much of the additional energy that would be sent to the brain to fight off the infection that is currently invading the body. Because that energy has been redirected from the major processing center of the body, we then find that our mental capacity is significantly reduced because of the lack of energy. It helps explain why we tend to go into "hibernation" mode when we are feeling sick and spend much of the time sleeping.

I don't know why I had never really put two and two together to really understand that fact, but I think it was learning this last week that the human brain takes 20% of the body's energy that really made me think about what happens to us while we are sick. Especially since I had been sick on Monday and attempted to play games, which I found to be much harder to do than originally anticipated.

Parking in Space

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Box Cover Art

As I had reviewed various games that were available to play on Tabletopia under the "Solo" genre on Monday, I came across PARKS. I saw that it was published by Keymaster Games, which had also designed and published the excellent Space Park. Intrigued by two games that shared similar names, I thought that Space Park would have a similar feel and style to PARKS. I really enjoyed the latter game and would absolutely include it on my top 20 games list.

As I watched the video provided by Keystone on how to play Space Park I realized that the game, while made by the same publishers and retaining much of the beautiful theming and art style that PARKS also contained, was going to be much more simple than its more earth-based counterpart. After confirming that Space Park was released before PARKS, I began to understand that the latter seemed to pull much of its ideas from the former.

The gameplay for Space Park was easy to understand and the video provided by Keystone Games on how to play it did an excellent job of helping me understand the core concepts of the game. Players took turns, each choosing one of the three rockets on three of the seven destinations to take a crystal (or two), obtain a badge, take control of a robot companion, pay for a badge (getting XP and potentially another benefit), or exchange a crystal for XP (the game's victory point system). When a rocket was used, it moved to the next open location in a clockwise manner, ensuring that there was always a rotating mix of available locations.

Players could utilize badges that they had earned to not only earn XP (first player to 17 XP wins), but also potentially earn additional crystals in a light engine-building mechanic. Scout, the robot companion, could be placed on any of the other six locations and earn the player an extra crystal when that location was visited by another player. A few more additional gameplay mechanics were also included, but for the sake of being brief, I'll say that it was not too difficult to learn how to play the game.

With a modular setup, each location will be randomized each game.

The game itself oozed theming and felt very retrofuturistic with it's feel. Each of the six locations hearkened back to the time of travel posters and had each name boldly printed over a beautiful landscape backdrop, drawing the players into each of the locations that were advertised on the cards. Even the rockets themselves had a wonderful 1950's aesthetic to them, with rounded edges and soft curves that often was depicted in that era. It was a treat for the eyes, but I had to wonder if it was a treat for the brain as well.

The solo mode was slightly different in that the player played against Scout and didn't get to utilize the functionality of the robot companion. Each turn, he would draw a badge and move to the respective location listed on the badge as indicated by small iconography. The Player could visit the same location that Scout occupied, but would either have to use the controller (which would normally be used to control Scout), or sacrifice a crystal. The goal was to get 20 XP before the card pile ran out, which proved to be a bit of a challenge.

In my initial game, I found that I had failed to get the necessary 20 XP, and lost with 17 total. I was one turn away from winning, but found that I had run out of time. After my initial play, I was not terribly impressed as I'm generally not a fan of solo modes that play by the slow reduction of resources until the game inevitably ends. It was a beautiful looking game, but the solo mode hadn't done much to convince me to play more. I did want to give the game a little bit of grace since I was feeling awful on Monday and attempted it again on Wednesday this week.

Upon a second play of the game, I did appreciate it a bit more, but found it still a bit too light for my tastes. The artwork of the game is incredible and really pulled me into it, but I found that the gameplay itself was not what I generally looked for in a solo mode. While I had yet to play the game with more than one person, my personal thoughts on the game are this: I will probably not go out looking to purchase the game, but if it were available to purchase second-hand, I would think about getting it if the price was right. Overall, I'd give the game a solid 7, not turning down a game if offered, but also not choosing to play it instead of something else if available. It was a decent game and the theme is what sticks so well in my mind.

To Be Eaten, or To Eat...

Box Cover Art

Feeling in a very "spacey" mood on Monday (both literally and figuratively), I also found that Tabletopia had a copy of So, You've Been Eaten available to play. I love tongue-in-cheek humor and everything that I had read about So, You've Been Eaten pointed to a very clever and funny dig at corporate culture and their committal to the "bottom line." I saw that it allowed for a solo mode and interestingly enough, there were two ways to play the game solo, and even a way to have the game play itself!

I pulled up a "How to Play" video and watched the walkthrough on how to both setup and play the game for both the Miner and Monster games and was impressed with how the game could be played from either the monster perspective or the miner perspective. A two player game (the game only plays up to two players) would see one person take control of the monster, while the other player took control of the miner. With asymmetric goals, it was a very clever game that even included a 0 player game where the monster and miner automa would play the game for whomever was pulling cards for it.

Intrigued, I decided to play the solo version as the miner against the sleeping monster and attempted to play through the game on Tabletopia. The game itself has a dice rolling mechanic that allows players to assign dice to actions, or upgrade those actions. Players attempt to manage the bacterial levels of the monster's internal gut, all the while attempting to mine 8 crystals (triggering the end game), or survive long enough to come out the *cough* other... end... of the monster. It's a really clever implementation and players can get rid of cards, shift cards and perform other actions based on what the dice rolls allow for. After players completed their turn, the monster automa would then add new immune responses, increase bacteria levels, and provide additional challenge to my poor stranded worker.

The board is double sided for the solo player to play man or monster.

Upon completing the game (I barely managed to make it out alive and managed to get five of seven crystals), I appreciated what the game was attempting to do, especially while utilizing dice rolling mechanics to keep track of what was going on. I didn't play the monster side of the board as I didn't have the mental bandwidth to attempt another game and I was feeling exhausted.

Nevertheless, I did appreciate what the game devs had created with So You've Been Eaten and enjoyed my time playing the game enough that I would like to go back and attempt another run at the solo miner mode, and also attempt to fight against a robot AI miner as the monster. It's a really intriguing premise and I think that I would like to attempt the game as a physical version to see if I prefer the tactile feel of the cards versus attempting to play virtually. The idea of having a game that can be played with 0-2 players is amusing to me and I'm curious to see how it "plays" with no players.

Overall, while I would have preferred a bit more depth to the gameplay, I did enjoy So You've Been Eaten enough that I think that I would like to play again, especially against a human opponent. The push and pull feel of the game seems to lend itself towards players that prefer lighter games and it does an excellent job with both it's theme and artwork. The game earns a solid 7.5 in my book and as noted earlier, I hope to be able to replay it a few more times to get a better feel for what it has to offer before I pass final judgement on it.

Final Thoughts

With these Friday posts, I've tried to bring a few games to light that I've had the opportunity to play over the previous week. This week was a bit of an odd one since I was sick early in the week, but I still wanted to get a few plays in. While both games that I wrote about this week weren't necessarily the best of the best, sometimes it's nice to be able to try some games that are new to me.

I'll be interspersing some reviews here and there in my Friday blog posts as well with new (to me) games that I've played to mix things up once in a while. Feel free to share your thoughts on the games that I play this week, if you've played them, and I'd be curious to hear your thoughts on the idea of a game that plays itself (a la So You've Been Eaten that has two AI bots that can play against one another). The idea is intriguing, but I'm not certain if it would really hold any long-term benefit aside from being a novel idea for a few "plays."

As always, thank you so much for your contributions here on this blog and I appreciate the ongoing engagement here on these posts. I hope you have a wonderful weekend and keep on playing those games!

~Josiah - "LinkToDarkness"

*originally posted on BoardGameGeek 22/3/2024*