Category: Multi-player

Games for 3 or more people

Wait… What? Are You Phrazy?

Are You Phrazy is a fast-paced conversation game. In it, you are racing to get rid of all of your cards by interrupting people. You can interrupt if you have the same card as the last one played or if you are the person clockwise of the previous player.Are You Phrazy?

It is hilarious because everyone reads their card off as they play it, and the conversation is so random it makes no sense. “Hello, how are you?” “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up!” “Hubba, hubba!” “I know you are, but what am I?” “Can the chatter!”

If you do not like fast-paced games, do not play this. It is very fast moving, as well as strategic. Finding the cards in your hand can be a challenge, choosing when to play a “stop” card is strategy that has to be carefully done, and you have to do it all before someone else.

On the other hand, fast-paced makes it good for points when you may need to leave anytime, like when you are waiting for a ride to pick you up.

 

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Garden Gnomis

Gnomi is a cute game about compost, gnomes and mushrooms. As we all know mushrooms have a high magical content when dealing with fairies and gnomes. Or, if you didn’t know, now you do (“What can I say except you’re welcome…”). Gnomi is kind of like Spy in the fact that the cards always remain in your hand.Gnomi

You have two types of cards: gnomes and mushrooms. You start with four mushrooms and three gnomes. Mushrooms can be used as follows: use one mushroom to ask for one mushroom of that color or use two mushrooms to get any mushroom regardless of color. “Using” a mushroom means you flip it upside down, which is called “composting”.

The gnomes have special abilities that allow them to steal mushrooms, grow mushrooms from the compost (flip the mushroom back to usable), and wake other gnomes. “Waking” a gnome happens because when you use the gnome, it gets flipped over to say that it is “asleep” and not usable.

The game ends when only one person has good mushrooms or awake gnomes left.

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Time to go Gold Digging!

Gold Digger is an Out of the Box game in which you are prospectors (sort of). There are 6 mines, up to three of which you may own later in the game. You put gold (and fool’s gold) in the mines and place people there to mine it.Gold Digger

This game is pretty simple to get the hang of, making it ideal for time constraints. This also adds to making it so fun.

Unfortunately, the company is closed. This makes it a little harder to buy. I’m sure you can still find it around, if you look, though.

The puns are awful! I love this. For instance, one of the Explorers is “Sackapotatoes”. This is a play on Sacajawea. It’s quite amusing.

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It’s Time to Sow!

Alright, I figured since it was the beginning of spring I would celebrate with a game about flowers! Sow is a Mancala-like game where you are trying to collect a certain color of flowers. Failing that, you are trying to collect flowers.Sow

I love the flowers. They are actually kind of comical, since some are red and blue, or yellow and blue, both of which look really odd. There was one with a red center and white petals that I called the “Japan flower”, since it looked like the Japanese flag.

It takes a while to understand, as the rules are very wordy. That, however, can be overlooked – I just had Mom read them. It also complicates Mancala a little with color-coded point values and the Windmill, Watering Can and Groundhog. I would know, since we have played Mancala occasionally in Social Studies.

It is a great strategy game since you are trying to figure out the “favorite color” of the other player. The “favorite color” is the color that determines the point value for each flower to that given player. If the color is in the center, three points, if it is the petals, two points, and if it isn’t present, the flower is still worth one point.

Happy Spring!!!

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Come make a country!

NationStates is an online game where you make and govern your own country. You can join regions, role-play and form your country through Issues. Your answers will alter the statistics on your nation.NationStates

I think this game is  creative and fun, as it makes a way to role-play while creating a nation that can represent what you believe, what a friend believes, or just something that comes into your mind!

It is not a fast-paced game. Role-plays and other social interactions can only take place when people are online, so it spans over quite a while. Issues have a timer for how often a new one comes in, so if you aren’t in any role-plays and you’ve just finished all your issues there isn’t much left to do.

I do like the statistics, though. You can see percentages for government expenditure, how most people die and the ownership of the industry. You can click on other peoples’ home pages and hit “Challenge”, where it compares random statistics with theirs to see who has a higher number on it. This is where having low numbers isn’t always good. For instance, I have a rubbish low crime rate, which is actually quite good, but it means I almost always lose if the selected statistic is crime.

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Do you have what it takes for Wizard School?

Come find out! Wizard School is a cooperative school-style game where you fight monsters, take tests, skip classes and generally attempt to survive high school. It is quite the challenge and not the game for the faint of heart or easily deterred.Wizard School

I like the level of school and the level of geekiness. I think it connects to the magic, the fandom, and the actual challenges of school. For instance, one of the Tests was “Finding All Your Classes”. Another was “Flying License”. Some of the monsters were “PsyRen” and “Parakeet of Paralysis’, “Its piercing call can shatter your ear drums. It may also wake a beast you didn’t know was right under your feet.” (There is a thought bubble coming from the Parakeet: “Also, I can kill you with my brain.” Go Firefly!)

It does not include counters or markers, which would be useful for showing what you have achieved and what you have yet to complete. It also does not provide a coin, despite the many “Flip-a-coin” cards. It also says “Pass the Wand” for symbolizing the end of your turn and the beginning of another. It had no wand.  (Luckily, we have several wands.)

On the other hand, if you are willing to take the time to play, it is remarkably amusing and great for practicing communication and group strategy.

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Batman- the Dice Game!

Batman Dice is similar to Zombie Dice. The biggest difference is that in Batman Dice, you have a special character. That character is a Batman villain. They each have a super power, like Catwoman, who gets two points instead of one with blue cash.Batman Dice Game

There are three die rolls: Cash, Bat Signal, and the Doorbell. The Cash is like the brains in Zombie Dice, you want it. The Bat Signal is the shotguns, if you get three then all the cash you collected goes away. The Doorbell is like the footsteps, you just re-roll them.

I like the portability of this game. It is small, confined, and very fun. It comes in a round container that you also use as a dice cup. Just like Zombie Dice and Dino Hunt Dice, it uses the three normal symbols, granting that Zombie Dice also has a Christmas edition with some tweaks.

It is easier to pack for close spaces than to play in them. The dice make it hard to play without a given surface and a very controlled roll. I would not take this on an airplane, as there would be too much risk of losing the dice.

I also enjoy that they put in characters. This creates some diversity, which is a good contrast to Zombie Dice, where there are no special tweaks per player.

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Don’t commit Zombicide!

Zombicide is a very strategic, gee, zombie game. Big surprise, right? Uh-huh. Anyway. You pick characters, and get one random piece of equipment. You also get a special bonus depending on the character. My character, Phil, started with a pistol. My random piece of equipment? A pistol. This was actually convenient for me, as on the equipment card it says you can use them as dual weapons, meaning I could shoot with both using just one action. Phil got the pistol at the beginning because Phil is a cop.Zombicide

In the scenario we played, we started in the middle of the board. Our job was to grab 5 objective tokens, spread all around the board, and search rooms to find canned food, rice, and water. Once we found/collected all of the objects, we had to get all 3 required objects (food, rice, water) to the exit.

There is a catch to killing every zombie you can see. For each zombie you kill, you get an experience point. In this game, experience points are actually a bad thing. There are levels for experience points. When any one player reaches the next level, you start spawning the next level’s number of zombies. In other words, the more zombies you kill, the more zombies will spawn.

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This would have been a +1 to rating +1 to rating+1 to rating+1 mto rating+1 to rating game, but it was just too long. We started playing at 5:30. We handed over the board to the people that were hosting (they owned the game) so that we could go home around 9:00. Nobody even died until around 8:00!

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Do you want Codenames?

Your answer should be yes. Codenames is a fun strategy game that can play with two or more players. If you have two or three players, you are on the same team; it is a cooperative race against the clock to have your teammates guess the locations of your team’s Secret Agents.Codenames

If you are playing more than three players, you split into two teams. One person on each team is the Spymaster (just like in 2-3 player). They pick a key card at random, placing it between both Spymasters. It shows placements in the array of random cards that are the names they need you to guess correctly.

As Spymaster, you give a 1-word clue and a number of your team’s Codenames that it applies to. They can guess that many Codenames, one at a time, plus one extra (to make up for ones they couldn’t find on previous turns), until they either run out of guesses or find a Codename that doesn’t belong to their team.

There are four teams that you could find a Codename for.

Your team: place one of your team’s tiles on top of the Codename card.

Other team: place one of their team’s tiles on top of the Codename card. This acts as a point for their team.

Innocent Bystander: place an Innocent Bystander tile on top of the Codename card. This does nothing, it simply shows that the Codename has been guessed.

Assassin: Whichever team found the assassin automatically loses. Game over.

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Are you going to Ninja Camp?

In Ninja Camp, you are all students, going through the training course and collecting points. Avoid walls and traps while earning points and messing up the other players!Ninja Camp

When you can’t find any legitimate moves to make, you must Pass, at which point you are out of the game. Even though you are out, you leave your pieces on the board, right where you last had them. Now that you are out, these pieces serve as obstacles. Count up how many points you have by counting the point  value on each card in your discard and hand.

It doesn’t matter who is the last one standing. Whoever has the most points wins! They get personal training from the Sensei!

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