06/21/15

GrogHeads Reviews Quartermaster General

Euro wargame?  Card-driven Diplomacy?  The first fun game of logistics?  Michael reveals all.

Review by Michael Eckenfels, 20 June 2015

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Quartermaster General is a board game focused on World War II. “Oh great,” you’re probably thinking, “another World War II board game.” The issue with thinking like that, though, is that you might think that for just about any game coming out about World War II, especially one named “Quartermaster General.” It’s not exactly a name that inspires fascination or even interest. For me, the title itself might be somewhat uninspired, but this is precisely why it caught my eye.

QMG-un001

The name alone indicates there’s much more to this game than what its title is letting on to. It sounds like it’s more a game about supply and logistics, which is not something that’s covered solely in any board game I’ve ever heard of (feel free, though, to correct me in the forum’s Feedback page for this review, as I’d love to learn more about them). To me, though, the idea of a game solely revolving around logistics sounds incomprehensibly boring, compared with pushing minis or cardboard counters about a map in a struggle for supremacy!

And that’s precisely what this game says it is about, though – supply. As a player in this game, you are one (or more) of six countries involved in the planet-engulfing conflict that was World War II, and the game’s system revolves around spreading your control via Armies and Navies and trying to keep intact lines of supply to keep them operating. The six countries are divided evenly between the Axis and Allies – Germany, Italy, and Japan on one side, and the United States, United Kingdom, and Soviet Union on the other. The game is for two to six players, with players doubling up on countries if there’s less than six.

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06/13/15

Grogheads Reviews YAAH! magazine issue #1

Flying Pig’s new magazine is out there.  We’ve already interviewed the editor.  Now see what Vance thinks about the finished product.

Vance Strickland, 13 June 2015

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I usually don’t read magazines. Not sure why, but the format to me seems to never have enough information on any particular story contain therein. Books are great and for fast information I usually prefer the interwebs or radio or TV. Wargame magazines are different however. I love to pick one up and devour the articles about games that I might be interested in or have never even heard of.

When I heard that Mark Walker’s new company, Flying Pig Games, was putting out a new magazine as well,  I had to pick it up. mark stated early on that the magazine was not going to be a mouth piece for his game company and that it would be about more than just “war games”.

YAAH! comes with a right bold cover and in a very large ziplock bag
YAAH! comes with a right bold cover and in a very large ziplock bag

Just inside the front cover Tom Russell introduces himself as the editor. Now I had never heard of Tom before this moment, but it appears that he is an accomplished writer and creator of board games. In the EZOC, Editor’s Zone of Control, he lays out that YAAH! is striving to be a magazine about all type of conflict based game not just war games in the traditional sense. This, to me, is great because it will expose me to a variety of new games that I normally might miss because of my usual narrow focus on traditional hex and counter “War Games”.

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06/12/15

GrogHeads Advanced Research on Projects Advisory #70

After a hiatus, GARPA is back, and has some great new pre-orders for you to totally cave into your game lust with.

 

Urban Operations (Nuts! Publishing)
€59.00 preorder (MSRP €75.00)

The long-awaited modern urban warfare game from the artistic geniuses over in France, the guys at Nuts! have finally put Urban Operations up on preorder. A combination of blocks and cards, with over a dozen scenarios to keep you challenged, Urban Operations is looking to fill that modern tactical niche that ranges from Cold-War-goes-hot through the 90s world of “peacekeeping” up to today’s counter-terror operations. Why are you still reading? Go order it already.

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06/10/15

Star Wars Imperial Assault – First Look!

Michael Eckenfels, 10 June 2015

So the shrink-wrap is cracked and pieces are out.  Is it Jar-Jar Binks, or Boba Fett?

It was with GREAT anticipation that I received a copy of Star Wars Imperial Assault by Fantasy Flight Games. This and Star Wars: Armada are two of three games I’ve really wanted for the last year or so (Fortune and Glory being the third), and when the heavy box arrived from Amazon, it felt like Christmas morning. Don’t get me wrong – I love getting games, and goodness knows I get lots of them in the course of the reviews and AARs I write, but this is Star Wars, man.

ImpAs001

The box, in all its shrink-wrapped glory. It is almost six inches thick and weighs a ton, which just testifies to the goodies loaded inside.

 

ImpAs002

The back of the box. Hard to believe that there used to be a time where this backside of a box was pretty much your only source of knowledge when you came across a game on a shelf somewhere.

 

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06/3/15

LNLP’s Dawn’s Early Light and Rommel at Gazala – First Look!

Brant Guillory, 3 June 2015

Lock’n’Load is pushing out reprints and new editions from their new digs in Colorado.  What’s in the new boxes?  Let’s take a look.

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First up, the new edition of Jim Werbaneth’s Rommel at Gazala, which got a significant graphic upgrade.

Inside the new Rommel at Gazala, with the box in the upper left of the photo.
Inside the new Rommel at Gazala, with the box in the upper left of the photo.

 

Player aid cards.
Rommel at Gazala – Player aid cards.

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