September 18, 2011: The Games We Played

Although most of our hours at PAX were spent running demos, a few of us did sneak off to play a game or two.

Jimmie played the demo of Wildstar, an MMO with an interesting take on catering to player types, and watched a tutorial of The Secret World, an MMO with a "secret conspiracy fights urban legends" theme. He also brought his copy of Quarriors, a "deck-building game with dice." It plays quite well at 2am . . .

I tinkered with two of the PAX 10 -- the ten indie games that Mike and Jerry feel are deserving of wider attention. Atom Zombie Smasher is a strategic game about controlling an outbreak of the undead. Vanessa Saint-Pierre Delacroix & Her Nightmare is . . . I don't know what it is. It's a puzzle game, and a platformer, and a brain-twister. All I know is that I'll be picking both up in the next week or two.

Andrew played a bit of Fiasco, which is neither new nor digital. He also encountered Cthulhu Gloom, which he liked, and a playtest game of unmentioned theme, which he can neither confirm nor deny is the Next Big Thing . . . NDAs, you know.

Sam brought his copy of The Bottle Imp to entertain the crew at the airport, and also picked up a copy of Monkeys with Knives and Guns. A dice game about monkeys with implements of destruction? Yes, yes, three times yes!

Ben checked out Relic Knights, an anime-influenced minis game with lots of fan-service, from Soda Pop Miniatures. Alex played Orcs Must Die!, a tower-defense-like game where you slaughter tons of orcs. Gabby sought out Gotham City Imposters and Monaco. He recommends taking a look at Monaco, as does Tycho.

-- Paul Chapman