02BAE: Today's Kickstarter Board Game Arrivals

Metro Manila Community Quarantine - Day 934

So a bunch of my Kickstarter board games arrived today, and that's always exciting. As much as shipping costs have increased around the world, especially over the course of the pandemic, it is nice to note that global board game distribution has gotten a LOT better. Before our main option for getting Kickstarter board games was to ship them to a  US address and then have that forwarded over here. Now thanks to logistics services like VFI Asia have found a way to resolve last-mile delivery in the region.

So let's go through today's arrivals.

The real gem of the collection is Castles of Mad King Ludwig: Collector's Edition. I mean come on, we first learned to appreciate Ted Alspach's worth when we first learned how to play Suburbia. Then eventually we got Suburbia: Collector's Edition, and man it was a beautiful upgrade for a game that we already love. Some design choices were a little weird, sure, but it's still great. And so when they announced that Castles, another Alspach game that we enjoyed a lot, was going to get a collector's edition? Yeah, I was all over that. And now it's here and it's bonkers it's also somehow lighter than I expected it to be?

The other box of board games that arrived requires a bit more explanation.

When I first learned about the Kickstarter for Dice Theme Park, I had very mixed feelings. On the one hand, we're not the biggest fan of dice games since the randomness doesn't always make for a fun gaming experience. But on the other hand, it was a new take on an existing game, Dice Hospital, so it's a solid enough game engine as they made expansions for the first game and are now making a spin-off.

And more importantly...I do like games about theme parks and hospitals. To be more specific, I grew up as a fan of Bullfrog games - and their creations included the likes of (literally) Theme Park and Theme Hospital. So clearly, the people who made this game must share some geek DNA with me because why else would they create two games of a similar theme as those Bullfrog games I loved all those years ago?

So not only did I back the Kickstarter to get Dice Theme Park. Of course, I splurged for the pledge that allowed me to get Dice Hospital and all the expansions that had been released for that game as well. And this is because I'm a bit of a (obsessive?) completist and I invest heavily in game designers that I think are speaking directly to me. 

But the story didn't end with the Kickstarter campaign. I mean yes, I backed it and my card was charged at the end of the campaign, and then I just had to wait for the pledge manager to open up so I could confirm my shipping details and such. But the people at Alley Cat Games were evil and they sort of combined their pledge manager for both the Dice Theme Park Kickstarter and an entirely different project - Eternal Palace. So I went in thinking I just needed to resolve my shipping details and I "walked out" of that process with the Deluxe Edition of the game also added to my pledge manager commitment. I'm a sucker for a pretty game and wanting to shower these board game companies with love. 

So here we are with a LOT of new games to learn and figure out longer-term storage solutions for. But I'm a happy geek and I still think that all of these games are great additions to our collection. We just need to find the time to learn them and then start teaching others how to play them and then just keep the cycle going. It's a weird problem to have but it's still one we're happy to have even if the Sietch is mostly shelves now. 

It's a good thing we have several in-person game nights scheduled this weekend. Let's see if we can get some playtime for these new games.

P.S.

I also backed the Kickstarter for Autobahn by the same company that did all these dice games even before I had received any of them because...they also make Euro games?