The thing I love most about the hobby industry is that you can find friends anywhere you go, no matter what hobby you’re into. Finding those friends and fellow hobbyists are what makes your hobby fun. I also love finding out that I have something in common with a friend of mine that I never knew before.

I was fortunate in college to participate in activities that allowed me to meet students from universities all over the United States. Most of them I met at various conventions and only saw once a year; I only knew them in relation to the one thing we had in common, but over the years, I’ve learned more and more about those friends as we shared information back and forth on platforms like Facebook.

I recently posted a project that I had worked on about gaming (the Ticket to Ride review) to my Facebook profile. We had bought the game at HobbyTown, so I had included that in my post.

Within minutes, there was a comment from a friend of mine that I met at a convention. He wrote: “I love HobbyTown! They were my board gaming connection back in Sioux Falls. AND I see you wrote the board game article! You officially just became even more awesome.” It was nice to get such a compliment (who knew I was awesome?!).

We continued talking about how much my friend Joe loved visiting the Sioux Falls, SD store before he went off to college and how much he liked gaming. We started talking about the game I'm going to review, turns out Joe is quite familiar with it. I learned about what the term “Munchkin” means in the gaming world and I learned something new about a friend of mine. Who knew a comment on Facebook could teach me so much about a part of my job?

My conversation with Joe was a friendly reminder to me about why I love being in the hobby industry. You never know when or where you’re going to meet a fellow hobbyist, but you always have something to chat about when you do. It’s a little thing that makes me smile and appreciate hobbyists everywhere.

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Hey Hobzobbers!

We know it's been a while since we've had a contest, we thought we'd let you recharge your competitive batteries a bit.

September's contest is a fun one though! All you have to do is write a couple of paragraphs about why you love your hobby, how you got into your hobby and how you share your hobby with the people around you. Once you write your paragraphs, you can post them in the "September Contest 2010" forum on the official Hobzob Contest Group page.

Go here: http://www.ho..._contest_2010 to paste your stories.

You have from now until September 30, 2010 to post your stories and we'd love to read them! Plus all that time means writer's block shouldn't be a problem! At the end of the month, we'll choose the top 3-5 stories to send to Hobby Outlook--an online ezine published by HobbyTown USA. Feel free to include any pictures you'd like.

You can see Hobby Outlook here: http://tinyurl.com/249w2ho

So start sharing your stories and post them in the forum for your chance to be part of Hobby Outlook!

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“From the craggy hillsides of Edinburgh to the sunlit docks of Constantinople, from the dusty alley of Pamlona to a windswept station in Berlin, Ticket to Ride Europe takes you on a new train adventure through the great cities of turn-of-the-century Europe.
Will you risk a trip through the dark tunnels of Switzerland? Venture aboard a ferry on the Black sea? Or erect lavish train stations in the great capitals of the old empires? Your next move might just make you Europe’s greatest train magnate!”

In the corner of a cubicle in our office, there is a stack of games that have never been opened or played. In an effort to bring you more information, Andrew and I decided to crack one open, learn it and bring you the verdict. The game we chose was Ticket to Ride Europe and much like the description, each turn is an adventure.

The box contains: one board map of European train routes, 240 colored train cars, 15 colored train stations, 110 train car cards, 46 destination tickets, 5 wooden scoring markers, 1 rules booklet, 1 Days of Wonder Online Access Number.
We read the rule book (something we’ve been told most gamers don’t usually do) and got started. The rules said whoever had been to the most European countries was to go first, it was a draw between Andrew and I, so being a good sport I let him go first (even though it didn’t matter because I still ended up beating him). After an hour of set-up/rule reading and an hour of play, here’s our verdict:

Ratings
Clarity of Instructions: 4 of 5
Overall, the instructions were great, but like any first-attempt game, we had to refer back to different parts throughout the game for clarification. Other than that, no issues were found.

Set-Up: 3.5 of 5
We’re probably a little harsh on this one. The one issue we had was finding the one Express card out of a large stack of Draw cards. I personally don’t think it needs to be in there, as there is a points legend on the board.

Game Play: 4 of 5
We rated this category on tempo of the game and entertainment. Once the gears started churning and the play of the game became clearer, the tempo increased. The fact that there were a variety of different moves a player could make in any given turn made every play more interesting and fun. In a popular game like scrabble, you are forced to make a play (or pass). What made this game entertaining is that you can either draw cards to build your hand, play cards to build your route, or build a train station to secure your future moves—but you can only choose one per turn.

Strategy: 3.5 of 5
The strategy of this game evolves as the game progress. I can see how a beginning strategy can easily be shot down and forced into adjustment. We also understand that the game can exponentially more difficult with addition of players (up to 5). Where we see a fault is pretty universal in many strategy games. The box has an age range of 8+. Although we think an eight-year-old would enjoy this game, in order to fully grasp the concept of strategy, I it would be best suitable for a little older generation. A little harsh on the grading, we know.

Overall: 4 of 5
This is a good themed strategy game. You don’t have to be a history buff to appreciate it and, with relative ease, it was easy to pick up from scratch and go. It doesn’t elevate the overall concept of a strategy game, but it doesn’t disappoint. Game on.


So here was my strategy:

At first, I was one of those people the rules referred to as “a card hoarder,” but I didn’t care, it’s my nature to save things and make a decision when I have a lot of collateral to invest with. I only made my first move after Andrew told me I had to do something besides draw cards on my turn. What I had in mind was to collect as many routes as possible before starting to claim them—I didn’t want to give away what route I was working for early in the game, which would allow Andrew to block me and play some defense. I claimed one major route early in the game, but due to rule misunderstandings, I quickly gave away where I was headed (now that we’ve played one game though, I’m confident my strategy would work well). This allowed Andrew to block all of my “easy” routes, forcing me to make riskier moves than I otherwise would have. I adjusted my strategy and went back to my original plan—I hoarded cards.

Once I had most of my entire route, I was able to claim pieces of it on each turn, leaving Andrew little time to collect enough cards for defense. I started out with two longer routes and chose not to draw any new routes to complete during the game. In retrospect, I should’ve kept one long and one short route. A shorter route would’ve allowed me a quicker completion for more points and the confidence to draw another route that I knew I could complete.

Highs: Once you get the hang of the game, it’s fun and engaging. You don’t have to love strategy games or trains to play. Once you know what all the symbols on the board mean, it’s smooth sailing—and it goes fast.

Lows: It takes a decent amount of time to figure out the rules and to get the hang of it (unless you’re one of those people that doesn’t mind slow progression in a game).

Final Call: Ticket to Ride Europe is fun and a good family game. It might not be the best for younger kids who can’t see the bigger strategy of the game, but it’s definitely worth the investment.

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Owners of Flames of War and Gale Force Nine are raising prices on the the entire Flames of War line of Models, books and accesories as of August 1st. Blisters will increase from $11 retail to $12.50. boxes and books will also be going up.
The smart thing for all of us to do is buy as much as you can for now before the increase, both consumers and retailers.
Battlefront has wisely, or diabolically depending on your point of view, implemented the increase right before the highly anticipated Early War release shcedule which begins late August.
So break open the piggy banks and get that army you have been thinking about for a while as it will cost you 10 to 15% more in the next 2 weeks!!!

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I'm not a big gamer myself, but I have a lot of friends who are. They're especially big into RPG games and I often hear about the games through them. I was searching for some gaming news and I found this:

http://psp.ig...100819p1.html

It looks like Atlus is releasing Knights in the Nightmare for PSP in October.

My question is: while video games sometimes blend RPG with shooter elements, is RPG better in person or on a video game? Is there a distinct difference in what people prefer? Post your thoughts.

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Did you love Dungeons and Dragons when you were young, but just don't have the time to play it now? Check out this new version that will change all that for you and hopefully get you rolling the dice again according to Wizards of the Coast:

http://www.cn...agons/?hpt=C2

Check it out, it's pretty interesting!

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You think you know the whole to this picture? Post the link in the comments section and we'll be the judge of that!

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You think you know games? We'll be the judge of that! Post the link to the complete photo in the comments section if you think you've got it.

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For all you Warhammer players out there, check out this blog straight from Games Workshop about the incoming edition of the Warhammer game scheduled to appear in July:

http://www.ga...estid=2420138

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Thanks to everyone who participated in the Hobzob Hunt this month! We'd also like to thank Horizon Hobby for donating the Losi Mini-Rock Crawler for our prize this month.

We know those of you that entered have been waiting to know who closed the case and we'd like to congratulate:

Jose Huerta aka Sheriff on his win!

Sheriff was the winner of our drawing to win the mini-rock crawler!

Thanks to everyone who participates in our contests every month, we appreciate all of you!

We've got an awesome contest for May that will make you famous (well sort of)... you'll at least end up in R/C Car Magazine in our Hobzob ad--we'd like to give major props to Kuppler for giving us the idea for the next contest--it's going to be one of the coolest contests yet!

Thanks again Hobzobbers!

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