Video Game– Grant Theft Auto 5

Producer– Rockstar Games

Price– ~$50

TL;DR– Slight story issues, but a fun ride! 93%

Basics– Time to go back to the GTA universe again!  GTA5 is the newest game in the GTA series, and this one pulls out all the stops.  For the first time, players play as three different characters.  First players are introduced to Franklin, a black man trying to find success in a world against him.  Over the course of a repossession scheme, he meets Michael, a former bank robber who is living under the protection of the Federal Investigation Bureau.  Michael starts to mentor Franklin as Michael resents his retirement.  Together they piss off the local mob leading to Michael having to go back to his old bank robbing ways.  This tips off Trevor, Michael’s former bank robbing partner and all around sociopath, that Michael is alive.  Trevor begins to look for Michael causing all kinds of hell along the way.  Together these three are drawn into a web of the FIB, the agency, Chinese drug cartels, movie stars, and local hoods as they deal with success, money, and life.

Story- I wouldn’t call this game the story of the year, but it’s not just stupid shooting either.  The character have a life of their own are well executed.  Even Trevor, who kills someone in his opening cut scene, ends up somewhat likeable.  They all have their own, well-defined personalities.  You will have your favorite, but all of them are good additions to the story.  The story has some issues with purpose as the characters only motivation at some points is to deal with the world around them instead of their own goals.  I would put this more akin to Oceans 12 as it’s a heist story, but motivated by the villain instead of the characters.  Not bad, but not Oceans 11. 4/5

Mechanics and Play- Rockstar did an awesome job with this one.  It’s easy to get lost in the world.  There are several radio stations each with their own personalities.  There is a whole aspect of the stock market where characters can make millions.  Even the missions where its go to X and steal Y are not that boring as the missions have enough variety to make it interesting.  Speaking of missions, the game has bite size chunks of story in its missions, so if you just want to spend only an hour playing, you can!  Heck even the story is delivered via driving.  The game has cut scenes, but more often than not, two characters will drive through the country and talk.  You control the car, so it’s not a boring monolog between two characters.  It feels organic, and you feel involved.  In addition, you get to play in the air, on the land, and in the sea.  YOU GET TO SWIM! 5/5

Delivery and Execution- Again Rockstar hits a home run.  This game has so many small touches you will lose count.  Road sounds when you drift out of lane, the internet, the cell phones, the noises a car makes when you turn it off.  You feel like you’re in a different world.  Very little is left out when the crafted this world.  Heck, it’s even a multimedia experience as you can download a real app to your physical phone and train a dog!  The net result is the world and these characters feel like something you could be part of even after killing five people with a stolen car.  The newest part is heists.  In heists, you decide on two different ways to perform a robbery, choose the team, and then assemble the parts.  It’s a fun change from the go here, kill a guy/steal a thing, drive away formula.  I really enjoyed it! 5/5

Summary- I liked this one.  It might not be true love, but man is it fun.  I really enjoyed this game and its subtle world.  It’s got some deeper themes then you would expect from a game about killing people for money, but that’s part of its charm.  It’s a worthwhile way to spend your time even if it’s just to figure out how the stock market works! 93%

Product- Injecting the Weird

Producer- Monte Cook games

Price- ~$5 at drivethroughrpg.com

System- Numenera

TL;DR-  A Good product to make things fit into the ninth world. 90%

Basics-  Let’s get weird!  Injecting the weird is a source book for Numenera that focuses on adding strangeness to your Numenera game.  The book discusses what weird fiction is and how to add it to your game.  Then the book has lots of tables to give some different weird aspects to locations, the wild, or the people you meet in the ninth world.  The book even has some character options in its last few pages.

Story or Fluff-  For a book that is mostly tables, this is a pretty fluff heavy book.  The purpose of all the tables is to give more randomness and weirdness to your games.  And at that it succeeds.  The one line of strangeness in the tables really does give an impressive amount of options for what could be happening in your world.  I was surprised that this book had character options too.  5/5

Mechanics or Crunch- For a book that is full of tables, this isn’t a mechanics heavy book.  Since the purpose of this book is setting building, mechanics take a back seat to the theme.  There are sidebars for items which honestly surprised.  The character options also provide some new mechanics too.  But, going in to this, don’t expect some new way to play the game.  4/5

Execution- I liked the layout and art as they enforced the ideas of weird and make it a pleasure to read.  The price is ~ok.  I think it’s a bit high, but it’s in line with most other current RPG products.  Heck, there isn’t even the standard practice of the glimmers of reusing one piece of art a bunch.  This one is full of smaller art pictures.  One thing I did notice is a strange gap in one of the pages, but other than that, I liked the physical aspects of this product. 4.5/5

Summary- This is a good product.  It’s not one that every player needs, but having one of these around the table will make the game that much better.  I think helping GMs inject a bit more weird into their games will make things that much more numenera.  And, that will make the games that much better. 90%

Game- Terra Mystica

Producer-Z-Man Games

Price- ~$80

Set-up/Play/Clean-up- 45 minutes/player 2-5 players

tl;dr-  An awesome, deep, fantasy terrain-control game. 95%

Basics- Vie for dominance in a world of magic!  In Terra Mystica, players take the roles of different fantasy races each trying to control the world.  Players have to terraform each type of terrain to make it the proper type for their race so they can build on it with each terrain type costing different amount to terraforrm.  Players select an action, then the next player selects an action and so on.  Play continues until someone passes.  That person becomes the first player next round. And, each turn when someone passes, they select a round power for the next round.  Each turn, specific effects give the players new ways to score points for that round only.  On a player’s turn a selects one of several actions.  Building a dwelling on a hex provides more workers for the next turn.  Players can advance a shipping track to build further down rivers.  Players can develop more efficient ways to terraform.  Another option is to upgrade buildings.  Upgraded buildings can unlock race specific abilities, get money each turn or get cultist units/divine favors (one turn or many turn bonuses).  However upgrading building causes those building to go back to the building track on a player’s play mat covering and removing whatever resources that building used to provide each turn.  On a player’s turn a player can send cultist to the cult tracks.  Players can also use power to gain more resources, terreform, or change the board in other ways.  Power is represented by three circles on your player board filled with purple circles.  Players can spend power in the third circle which sends it to the first bowl.  When you gain power, you move power from the lowest bowl to the next bowl.  Thus, power builds up slowly and has to be managed carefully.  And as a final action, players may gain extra actions via game effects and they can take those actions.  After everyone passes, each turn a card shows extra resources each player gets based on how many cult points they have in a specific cult each turn.  After six rounds, the player with the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd largest connected area on the map gain points, and the players with the most, second most, and third most points in each of the four cults also gain points.  Player with the most points wins control of the world.

Mechanics- There is a lot going on in this game, but I really liked it.  This game is almost a point salad game as lots of actions gain you extra points, but not quite as the action that gains you points vary each turn.  This game also makes you think a lot about resources and your next turn.  Want to gain more money?  Build a trading house, but now you get fewer workers to use that money.  What priests?  Upgrade your trading house, but now you don’t get money or workers.  That level of resource management is amazing.  However, the game doesn’t have any way to punish the leaders.  If one player is really good at that kind of thinking, they will dominate the game.  Also, some players tend to think the cult tracks are a real drag or its just a pasted on mechanic for the game.  I didn’t feel that as I felt the four cults all brought different mechanics and theme to the game.  In terms of mechanics, this game isn’t perfect, but it is really close! 4.5/5

Theme-This game is a hardcore eurogame, so you would think there wouldn’t be much theme.  Now to be fair, this game has much less theme then say Arkham Horror, but there is a lot here.  Every player board has beautiful pictures showing your race, and the player board also has different mechanics to each race.  Some races don’t terriform like others.  Dwarves don’t use boats, but they can tunnel just like a dwarf should do.  I played the cultists, and my power was to get cult points when I helped others.  And honestly, I did feel like a cultist.  In the instructions, each race gets a nice section describing them with no mechanics at all.  That’s a nice detail.  It wasn’t perfect, but unlike some eurogames, it’s got loads of theme. 4.5/5

Instructions- This game has a thick book, but it’s well done.  It’s fairly well broken up, and has lots of examples.  Another great thing about this one is there are red text sections where specific rules are explained.  As hard and deep as this game was, I didn’t have to run to Board Game Geek for my play through to understand the rules.  That’s the mark of a 5/5.  5/5

Execution- This game is $80.  That’s a lot, but you get a lot in this game.  Every players gets loads of wooden pieces (what would a eurogame be without wooden cubes and houses!?).  I would have liked more details in the pieces, but each color goes with a double sided play board.  So, green can either be witches or Forest Women.  The cardboard is nice, chunky pieces.  I love that.  Honestly, this game is physically awesome. 5/5

Summary- This game isn’t perfect, but it is a lot of fun.  If you want an extremely deep strategy game that is deceptively simple, then this is your game.  I love what I saw.  I would like a mechanic to punish the leader so those who don’t have the strategy background can get ahead, but barring that, you will really enjoy this game! 95%