xfoley8 wrote:
MisterFurious wrote:
One complaint I've read about King of Tokyo was dice randomness. I've played Blood Bowl online on and off for a few years and I've grown to hate too much randomness in games.
If randomness is an issue for you, King of Tokyo will drive you crazy- it's all about the dice, and the card abilities players purchase can sometimes undo any kind of strategy you have going and give someone who was at the bottom of the heap an easy win.
Having said that, I think the game is a blast if you don't take it too seriously (as long as you play with 3 or more), and younger kids would probably love it.
As to co-op games, as long as you don't play with someone who wants to dominate and gets upset if he doesn't like other players' choices, they are a lot of fun (Pandemic and Forbidden Island, especially). Of course, there is constructive criticism, and "man, you're an idiot" criticism. All depends on the personalities you play with. If you play a lot with a younger nephew, Forbidden Island is a good place to start (and it's very cheap, comparatively speaking), although maybe a little dry if you prefer 'action' and goofy cartoony artwork in your games, like you get with KoT. I would say FI meets most, if not all, of your criteria- there is definitely strategy involved (but still some chance based on the tile layout and card shuffling), it plays fairly quickly (30 minutes or so with 2 or 3), has few small parts that could get lost (unlike Pandemic), and usually a good deal of tension, especially towards the end.
I don't mind randomness to an extent, it's just those games were it seems like none of your choices really matter, it's just the dice or your card draws that determine who wins or loses that irritate me. With the Yahtzee re-rolling mechanic, it seemed like King of Tokyo would have some randomness but not too much, but I don't know. It's a complaint I've seen a lot and one that makes me hesitant to just blindly purchase the game.
They played Forbidden Island on Table Top a couple of weeks ago and it looked very interesting. I don't know if it's a good game to play with my friends, but it looked like a really good game to play with my sister's kids and it's cheap enough that I can buy it for my nephew and not freak out too much if he loses half the cards or leaves the game at a friend's house or something. Pandemic looked really fun, too, but it's really pricey. I was heavily considering getting Forbidden Island for my nephew for his birthday and I think you've just convinced me to do so. I know he'd love playing Tokyo, but I can't trust him or his sister to not lose all of the energy cubes or take the cards to school and leave them there. Also, it would be nice to play a game were we're on the same team. I feel bad kicking his ass all the time in games. He takes it really well, but still. Somehow, my little niece usually wins when she plays, though! :D
I'm still not sure if I should get Tokyo for myself. I wish more board game companies would make online demos for their games so people could try them out. Even when they're really limited, it's nice for those of us that live in the boonies and can't go to a gaming store to try games out.