Last night's GNN meet-up unusually had no Martin at it, as he was away in the US. There was also the rare and welcome sight of Steve, giving the room a slight 2013 kind of vibe. But before he, Adam H and Joe all turned up, at 7.30 there was just Katy, Ian and myself (Sam). And after comparing our weeks - they'd both been to gigs; Katy had crowdsurfed - we played Zombie Kidz Evolution.
This is a couldn't-be-simpler co-op game of trying to padlock all four school gates before you are overrun by zombies. On your turn, you roll a die and a zombie (probably) arrives in the school. You can move one spot (or stay where you are) and eliminate one or two zombies in the room you stop in. Padlocking the gates is an automatic action, but the catch is there must be two of you present to do it, and if a room ever gathers more than two zombies you can do nothing about it. If you're asked to add more zombies and you've run out, you lose! Which was exactly what happened to us on our first attempt - each game takes about 5-10 minutes - before triumphantly applying padlocks on our second try.
The game has legacy aspects too: win or lose, after X amount of games there are envelopes to be opened that will change it fractionally. Katy however was more excited by the stickers that get applied to the back of the rulebook, heralding victory or defeat.
A freshly-shorn Joe arrived. He too had had an interesting week, removing his beard for the sole purpose of a fancy-dress party. One has to admire his commitment to character. With Adam and Steve not here yet, I thought we could bash through a quick play of Coral, as I (erroneously (obviously)) thought I remembered the rules.
This is another speedy game, but rather less co-operative. Each player wants to have the most visible coral (-the colours) from a bird's eye perspective at the end of the game (height being only a tie-breaker). On a turn you can either add a block adjacent to your coral piece, or move your piece: it can travel as far as it likes along the colour it currently occupies (ignoring height differences) or you can remove it entirely, to be returned on your next go. This option is a kind of hedge-betting; holding back your pieces to see what develops. But it can bite you on the bum if nobody else is doing it, as when someone runs out of blocks turns continue, but if you still have blocks after placing one you discard another. I'm not sure who won; it was either me or Joe, but Joe knocked the tower over at the finale and then Katy dove in and scattered the remains across the table - in delight or fury, I'm not sure.
By this time Adam and Steve had arrived and Adam was pointing out we were playing something wrong. I forget what now - there was a flurry of snack bowls on the table and I think I was tripping on sugar and salt.
We split into groups of three, delighting in our opportunities to play euros without Martin making desultory comments from the sidelines. And indeed, he may have to hold back a gag reflex as he sees we covered the table in big, detailed and chaotically garish boards. Ian talked Steve and Adam through Terra Nova, as I explained Rajas of the Ganges to Joe and Katy.
Despite some minor options-overwhelm, Joe seemed to begin strongly, scrutinising the board, asking for one or two rules clarifications and discovering we'd been playing something (erroneously (obviously)) incorrectly about activating markets. I deflected blame by saying someone else taught me it. Joe was going the market route, pretty much ignoring the glorious buildings, whilst Katy and I did the opposite. Katy's early-game progress stalled, though, and she bemoaned her lack of dice, seemingly spending them the moment they arrived.
In Terra Nova, things were marginally less boisterous, and Adam noted that it sounded like we were having more fun.
"I'm not" Katy clarified.
Perhaps she was dreaming of better times; being carried aloft by a crowd.
Joe meanwhile continued to scrutinise, but his early momentum was lost as well - Rajas is a game of surges and lulls, I think - and as we entered the final stages, Katy's love of buildings surged her past Joe. I triggered the end of the game as we all built like deranged constructionists.
Katy's markers passed each other as well, but not quite enough to catch me. Joe's markers halted within touching distance of each other, making him slightly sad, even though he said he liked the game. But I managed to successfully navigate my way past explainer's curse to claim a win, albeit aided by a familiarity my opponents weren't equipped with.
Ian wasn't so lucky. However it happened, the winner was the most-likely when they sat down to play it:
Adam 74
Steve 68
Ian 50
We'd squeezed out a quick game of Zombie Kidz while they wrapped up (and won! more stickers) but now Katy went home, perhaps with her interview in mind, and most of us agreed that So Clover was the next logical step. I'm not sure if Steve agreed or not: he said he wanted something fun. We were all immediately stumped by our words, except Joe, who finished in no time at all and started a side-game of competitive number-drawing. I was a bit slower, and less accomplished.
I didn't get a picture of Joe's as at the time I was trying to make sense of my words.
Steve's Hare for March/Jelly was nice and I was impressed the group got Young/Berry from my clue of Virile. We overcame our collective pessimism to score a faintly remarkable 28/30. Excellent work! But now Adam and Steve left us as well, and the remaining trio played a vintage GNN game in the form of Love Letter.
I warned Joe as we established our 3-3-0 lead over Ian that he has form for coming back from the dead, and even reminded Ian when he complained about zero points that he'd recovered from worse. And so it was! I tried ejecting Joe with a Baron and got my just desserts, then Ian won two rounds in a row with a spy to claim victory!
I didn't take many pictures, sorry. But a very fun night, thanks all.
