Quoridor is a 2 or 4 player game in which players have to race each other to the opposite side of the board. All along the way, players can put down barricades to make their opponents life miserable. Quoridor is very simple but the strategy to reach the end is very complex. That fact that the mechanics of this game are easy yet the objective is so hard to reach is exactly what the designers were going for, and they did a good job. I found myself getting frustrated once I was almost at the end, but somehow my Asian opponent set up a perfectly executed trap and ruined my chances of winning. Because I played one versus one, it was easy to become upset with my lack of skill or strategy as I watched my opponent pound me with every turn. I will admit, I rage quit once. I used to play Call of Duty and I would always quit in the middle if I was being beaten into a pulp. However, this was my favorite game, and the satisfaction of winning made everything bearable. That is how I feel about Quoridor. If I would have been able to pull off a win, I would have been damn proud to do it. For this reason, there is great replay value. This game reminds me of military tactics, so I think it would be fitting if there was a theme attached with war and outsmarting the enemy. A concrete theme would most likely attract more players because I thought the game was boring outside of the mechanics. If a third mechanic was installed into the game via an expansion, the raw experience of playing this game would be tainted. This game is meant to be so easy that you overthink everything and still lose to an Asian player.
Hive
Hive is a 2 player game in which the goal is to surround the opponent’s queen bee with creatures. Each creature has a particular skillset which can be advantageous or detrimental. In my case, I could have used my creatures to help me more than they ended up hurting me. There is so much strategy in this game and my tiny brain cannot comprehend a solid strategy to even come close to winning. I understand the objective but it seemed that every move I made to come closer only made me further from winning. At one point I had all but one creature around my opponent’s queen, yet he had me stuck and I could only move my queen back and forth. I give this player props. I tend to rely on the offensive rather than defensive, and they should both be taken seriously if you want to win. The theme of creatures taking over the queen bee along with the name hive all works together very well. However, this hive theme could be changed to anything else, and as long as the mechanics stay the same, the game would stay the same. Hive is also highly portable in real life. Its portability is weird to me because the game is physically small yet it takes so much effort, time, and thought into one game. Expansions are available to add more tiles an even more possible moves, isn’t there already enough? Although I wish there was an expansion that included a bird that would automatically consume the queen bee. That’s the only way I would win unless I was playing a complete noob, like Rob. Overall, I can appreciate the complexity of this game but I did not have fun playing it. It must take many more games to really get a hang of this one.
Hive
Hive is a 2 player game in which the goal is to surround the opponent’s queen bee with creatures. Each creature has a particular skillset which can be advantageous or detrimental. In my case, I could have used my creatures to help me more than they ended up hurting me. There is so much strategy in this game and my tiny brain cannot comprehend a solid strategy to even come close to winning. I understand the objective but it seemed that every move I made to come closer only made me further from winning. At one point I had all but one creature around my opponent’s queen, yet he had me stuck and I could only move my queen back and forth. I give this player props. I tend to rely on the offensive rather than defensive, and they should both be taken seriously if you want to win. The theme of creatures taking over the queen bee along with the name hive all works together very well. However, this hive theme could be changed to anything else, and as long as the mechanics stay the same, the game would stay the same. Hive is also highly portable in real life. Its portability is weird to me because the game is physically small yet it takes so much effort, time, and thought into one game. Expansions are available to add more tiles an even more possible moves, isn’t there already enough? Although I wish there was an expansion that included a bird that would automatically consume the queen bee. That’s the only way I would win unless I was playing a complete noob, like Rob. Overall, I can appreciate the complexity of this game but I did not have fun playing it. It must take many more games to really get a hang of this one.