GMS Magazine Podcast - RPGs, Board Games reviews, interviews, advice. Mostly Asian and Indie games.

Dungeon Fighter was launched by Cranio Creations to much

acclaim for being fiendishly difficult and a ton of fun to play. And silly. It’s

very, very silly.

This game sees you rolling dice on a strangely shaped board

in order to determine if you’ve succeeded to attack monsters that inhabit… yes,

you guessed, dungeons. But the way you roll is dictated by different icons that

come from decks of cards during the game.

I tell you, rolling dice onto a surface when you have to

launch them using your elbow, or your nose, or from under the table… That is

*not* easy!

There’s also an expansion called Fire at Will that was

released recently and we thought we’d have a go and find out how it plays and

if it adds anything new or worthy to the game.

In this episode is our verdict!

Hope you enjoy the show!

The Mistborn Adventure Game, published by Crafty Games, took the

world created by Brandon Sanderson and turned it into an excellent game. And I

mean really, really excellent.

Now they’ve come out with a new supplement for the game that explores and

expands on the canon of the world and cities for the world.

To find out more about this book and what it contains, I spoke to writers

Alex Flagg and Logan Boner for a while to find out more.

Hope you enjoy the show!

Relic Runners was released at Spiel 2013 by Days of Wonder and I was super

keen to take a proper look.

Designed by Matthew Dunstan, Relic Runner puts the players in the roles of

intrepid treasure hunters who will have to search for treasure and uncover the

secrets they need to obtain the relics needed to win the game.

A light game with simple mechanics and great components (you wan see the

unboxing video here) it’s meant to provide with an entry level game for all the

family. Quick and fun too!

Michael, Max and myself put this game to its paces and we had a good game and

in this episode we tell you all about it!

Hope u enjoy the show!

Braggart is what happens when Michael goes Christmas shopping. He gets games for

his friends. In this case for Max, who gleefully and expectantly opened this

game with tears in his eyes at the thought of what wonderful time we were going

to have playing this cute looking card game.

After all Braggart is a very cute looking game and who doesn’t like the idea

of bragging about the many adventures and mighty deeds you’ve performed in the

name of fame, fortune and glory?

And who doesn’t like to mess with your friends and turn their stories into

hilarious parodies that’ll ridicule them in front of other adventurers?

Exactly.

So we sat down and had a go at this game.

Hope you enjoy the show!

Once again we’re Jim and I are back ready to talk RPGs to our hearts content

and, hopefully to your heart’s satisfaction.

Firstly Jim talks about systems that don’t manage to match the rules and the

setting. We discuss how to go about choosing a set of rules for your game and

when it’s more appropriate to create one’s rules and when choosing an existing

set of rules.

We talk about my game, Deimonorum and how I’m using the ORE system to get a cinematic

setting that an reflect how dangerous everything is and make it flexible enough

so people can decide how much risk to add to their actions. 

We talk about Wild Talents 2 and The One

Ring too!

Another topic we tackle is FATE. I (Paco) am having difficulties getting to

understand how it’s applied and how it plays with a specific setting, so Jim and

I discussed how abstraction in rules can be difficult to get to grips with

sometimes.

Lastly, Jim decides to have a go at the Marvel RPG game.

Slavery has played a horrific role in the history of many countries for a very,

very long time. Far from being a thing of the past, slavery is still very

present in modern day and efforts to eradicate it continue.

Learning from history is probably the best way to understand where we come

from and where we’re going. Freedom – The Underground Railroad does exactly

that. Taking a massive risk, Academy Games has created a game that explores the

efforts to free slaves.

The players take on the role of historical Abolitionists who will try to save

as many slaves a possible between the 1800’s and the Civil War. A careful

balance between raising funds for the cause and moving the slaves from location

to location will be the key to save enough slaves and win the game. However

every time the slaves are moved, the slave catchers will be alerted and will

capture the slaves to send them back into slavery.

The game has received a great deal of praise and we were very curious to find

out how it worked and if it really is as good as it sounds. This is keeping in

mind that we have a certain Max Murray in our team who doesn’t really like

cooperative games!

Hope you enjoy the show!

I have been looking forward to seeing Mindjammer for a long time. The Space

Opera game that will probably set a new precedent for future sci-fi games is

finally almost here and I am seriously looking forward to seeing what Sarah

Newton is going to bless our gaming shelves with.

I came accross Mindjammer years ago when Sarah Newton published her first

novel. I read it in a lot less time than I was expecting and it already gave me

all I needed. Great characters, great technology, believable settings in an

incredible way… the formula was there.

I never looked into the first edition of the game, Mindjammer, the only

reason that the second one was coming and, knowing Sarah, it was bound to be a

lot better than the first.

Now that the game is in pre-order, I had to interview the author and

find out even more about this fantastic setting. But before we talked about

Mindjammer, we also talked about Monsters & Magic, a new take on the Old School type of

games that truly and genuinely take the old rules and make something fantastic

and new with them.

As you can imagine, she didn’t disappoint!

Mage Company, the guys behind Wrong Chemistry and 12 Realms, have now gone to

Kickstarter to fund their latest game, Hoyuk, a game in which you take on the

role of a human 10,000 years ago trying to erect a village.

Although Hoyuk was released in 2006 as a print and play, the game has been

reworked to be produced as a physical product and bring it onto the table.

As always, I was very curious about how they’re doing this and what plans

they have for the game, so I got together with our friends from Mage Company to

ask them lots of questions about the game, the new features they’ve brought into

the system, the production values they’re aiming for and a lot more.

Hope you enjoy the show!

Published in 2012 by AEG,

Dominare is part of the Tempest series of boardgame that the prolific company

has released and that includes Mercante and others.

In Dominare you try to gain control of the city of Tempest by spreading your

influence through the city and developing a network to control the different

areas of the city.

Designed by Jim Pinto and with gorgeous artwork by Andrew Hepworth and Jeff

Mimmelman, this game is a very promising edition to the series.

Michael, Cesare and Max sat down at the table and had a first play at this

game.

Considering they like deep games with tons of options that make you think

time and time again, will this game satisfy the intellectual demand of our

intrepid players?

Let’s find out!

Doctor Reddy, Paco and Kara mingle a bit to bring you some reviews and conversation on the world of boardgaming.00:00:00 Introduction00:03:30 What games have Paco and Dr Mike been playing including Ghost Blitz and Duko00:06:15 What Paco and Dr Mike got for Christmas including Ligretto, Lego

Heroica and Pandemic and a chance to win Dungeon Roll00:16:28 UK Games Expo Guests and Workshops including Chris Barry and and a chance to win some Red Dwarf paraphernalia, and X-Wing discussion00:30:10 What games have we been playing (again) including Firefly: the boardgame, Council of Verona, Cornish Smuggler, Fleet, Pandante, Aquarius and Lego Heroica00:47:09 Our hopes for 2014, including:Firefly: the RPG, Salute, UK Games Expo, Emperor's New Clothes, You are the Hero: the history of Fighting Fantasy books, Torn Armour, Cthulhu Wars, 3D printers00:50:30 X-Wing speculation, includingQuick Snitch, Counters the Board Game Cafe00:57:57 Torn Armour update00:59:12 Discussion with Kara about the Leisure Games Game Redesign Competition of Wilderness01:09:01 What Kara has been playing, including:Ivor, Cheaty Mages01:11:06 Round up of Essen and hopes for UK Games Expo01:14:45 What Dr Mike has been playing, including Cha Cha Chicken and Hanabi, and some more Essen discussion01:22:55 X-Wing tournament woes, including the short-lived World Hall of Fame01:31:59 X-Wing vs Attack Wing, including a comparison of Coup vs Maskerade01:43:25 X-Wing Tournament update01:49:25 Goodbye from Kara, Paco and Dr Mike