The NEW New Boardgames Thread

[Habbaku]

Twilight Struggle is definitely the better game, overall. I enjoyed Labyrinth, but haven't played in years and I think I've explored everything interesting about it.

TS, on the other hand, I still play regularly.

[Habbaku]

I wish a digital version of 1989 would come out. 

[Tamas]

I wish a digital version of 1989 would come out. 

I haven't actually played it, but the city control in Eastern Europe in the 1989 context makes absolutely zero sense.

[Habbaku]

It's not about city control. Those are just the names of some of the spaces. If you look more closely, you'll find the "Lutheran Church" and "Orthodox Church" spaces in some countries as well.

It's more about controlling influential factions (religious, political elites, workers, etc.) than cities.

[Tamas]

It's not about city control. Those are just the names of some of the spaces. If you look more closely, you'll find the "Lutheran Church" and "Orthodox Church" spaces in some countries as well.

It's more about controlling influential factions (religious, political elites, workers, etc.) than cities.

Still, I remember the Hungarian context on the spaces making zero sense, which didn't feel me with confidence about the rest of the map, either.

[Habbaku]

That still doesn't make any sense. The game isn't about geography in a strict sense. It's about ideological ties of each "space" to the others.

[Tamas]

That still doesn't make any sense. The game isn't about geography in a strict sense. It's about ideological ties of each "space" to the others.

Look at this:


I understand that different spaces have different "class" affiliations, but the geographic element is pointless. Controlling a country's whole worker population's opinion is one thing, but how much of that control was among workers in Brno and workers in Ostrava made no difference, of that I am quite certain.

A more realistic approach would have had separate spaces of each "class" per each country, but obviously, such a design could not have just copied the TS system's mechanics that stem from board position.

In which year the game starts BTW? Because by 1989 the conflict depicted has long since been decided.

[Tamas]

To be fair, a Hungarian-Canadian lady reviewed the game from my angle and seems to go straight against my assumption:
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/809681/historical-review-person-who-witnessed-some-events

[The Brain]

He who controls the Brno workers controls the Universe.

[Habbaku]

I understand that different spaces have different "class" affiliations, but the geographic element is pointless. Controlling a country's whole worker population's opinion is one thing, but how much of that control was among workers in Brno and workers in Ostrava made no difference, of that I am quite certain.

A more realistic approach would have had separate spaces of each "class" per each country, but obviously, such a design could not have just copied the TS system's mechanics that stem from board position.

In which year the game starts BTW? Because by 1989 the conflict depicted has long since been decided.

I think we both agree that there's nothing particularly important about controlling specific segments of workers in distinct geographic areas, but the board's just trying to break them up into relevant blocs. Calling the spaces "Workers A, Workers B, Workers C" would be even weirder, I think.

I'm not sure what you mean by the conflict being decided already. The game starts in and covers 1989. The conflicts of the year were hardly decided before 1989, unless you're talking in some sort of deterministic, collapse-of-the-Soviet-Empire sense, and even then I'm not sure I'd agree.

[Maladict]

To be fair, a Hungarian-Canadian lady reviewed the game from my angle and seems to go straight against my assumption:
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/809681/historical-review-person-who-witnessed-some-events

I think the map makes a fair amount of sense. In the screenshot you posted you can see the divide between the industrialized and agrarian regions. The church spaces seem to conform to the religious centres of the countries (Czestochowa in Poland, Esztergom in Hungary). The universities and writers are extensions of the cities (Krakow, Prague), the writers being harder to get to than the universities. I think a lot of thought went into this, actually.

[The Brain]

If you end up on a Catholic Church space, do you roll on the Trauma table?

[Tamas]

To be fair, a Hungarian-Canadian lady reviewed the game from my angle and seems to go straight against my assumption:
https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/809681/historical-review-person-who-witnessed-some-events

I think the map makes a fair amount of sense. In the screenshot you posted you can see the divide between the industrialized and agrarian regions. The church spaces seem to conform to the religious centres of the countries (Czestochowa in Poland, Esztergom in Hungary). The universities and writers are extensions of the cities (Krakow, Prague), the writers being harder to get to than the universities. I think a lot of thought went into this, actually.

Possibly, but for example, the only influence I'd say religious affiliations had on things in Hungary, is the extensive informant network the communist state operated in the different religious organisations.
Otherwise, the churches themselves had incredibly little impact on the population.

I do have a much less dim view on the game after reading that review, but I still find it way more abstract than TS is.

[Maladict]

Possibly, but for example, the only influence I'd say religious affiliations had on things in Hungary, is the extensive informant network the communist state operated in the different religious organisations.
Otherwise, the churches themselves had incredibly little impact on the population.

I do have a much less dim view on the game after reading that review, but I still find it way more abstract than TS is.

I've enjoyed playing it, but I'm not sold on the country scoring mini-game.

[Tamas]

It would seem Richard Berg has died.