Episode 21 - Competition in Gaming and Cosmic Encounter

We're talking about competition! How competitive are we and is there such a thing as too competitive? We give you those answers before moving on to our listener-chosen review, Cosmic Encounter!

We mentioned these DnDeeples in the episode. They are awesome! The large ones count as five of the smaller pieces. Head over here to take a look at Danny's work: BGG DnDeeples. Send him a Geekmail if you'd like to pimp out your Lords of Waterdeep. 

And now, for our review this week...Cosmic Encounter!

The setup for a three player game. Doesn't look all that complicated, right?

Each player will get one of these fifty aliens. Every alien has a very different power, leading to very different games.

An example of some of the aliens included in the base game.

These are your ships. The "stacking UFO" design really looks good and works functionally. 

The Destiny deck. You will draw one of these cards on your turn to determine which player you are attacking. This actually takes away some of the harshness of the game, "I didn't want to attack you, the card made me!"

These are some of the cards found in the Cosmic Deck. Attack cards and Negotiate cards are at the heart of combat, while special cards like Cosmic Zap can complicate negotiations and fights.

Some of these flair cards will be shuffled into the cosmic deck depending on the aliens in the game. Whoever draws one will be able to use a special ability. But if you manage to draw the flair card corresponding to your own alien, you will be able to use the Super part of the card. 

Episode 20 - Starting a Game Group and Letters From Whitechapel

Hello everyone! In this episode, we talk about our experience starting a game group. We also offer some vague advice on how to go about starting your own. We follow up with our review of the deduction game Letters From Whitechapel. Enjoy!

Letters from Whitechapel is a one-vs-all deduction game which pits Jack the Ripper against a team of London investigators.

The game board is an old-timey map of the Whitechapel district. Look at this board and tell me you don't feel like twirling a moustache. 

A close-up of the board. Jack will be moving from number-to-number while the police move dot-to-dot.

These are some of the pawns you will be using in the game. Notice the top-hatted Jack pieces, the white Wretched pawns and the colored policemen.

Jack will keep track of his movement on this pad behind a shield. Note the map of the boards drawn on the inside of the shield. This allows Jack to plan his move without staring directly at the board.

Setup of the game. The white tokens are placed by Jack and mark possible locations of the Wretched pawns. Black tokens are placed by the Head of Investigation and mark the possible starting locations of the police.

The board after the murder has been committed. The red token up in the top right marks the scene of the crime. The police pawns are placed on the board, and the hunt begins!

If the police do a good job, they will uncover Jack's trail. Yellow tokens mark spaces that the investigators have examined which Jack has been on at some point during the night.

Jack will use these special movement tokens to get the upper hand. The carriage allows Jack to move two spaces while the lantern allows him to move through a neighborhood. The tokens are placed on the time track to remind the investigators that they were used.

Fantasy Flight's trademark production values means that we get these tokens which are only used to randomly decide who will be head of investigation this round.

Episode 19 - Genre Spotlight: Deckbuilding and Time's Up: Title Recall

Oh Boy! In this episode of the Start Space Podcast, we give you the low-down on deckbuilding. What's it all about and what are some ones we like? We answer those questions before moving on to the hilarious party game, Time's Up: Title Recall. 

This version of Time's Up! features only titles of books, movies, television shows, etc... This makes it a bit more forgiving than the original Time's Up, which includes names of people that can be difficult to act out.

An example of a couple cards. Players will choose before the game begins whether they will use the blue or yellow side of the cards.

Everything included in the box. The simple nature of the game is what really makes it shine. 432 double-sided cards ensure that you'll never play the same game twice.