Lucky you - I’ve heard it is a bit more difficult with more players, we finally beat Year 7 with 4 players after a LOT of attempts. Perhaps we just kept having bad draws… I just picked up the expansion and looking forward to the new challenges there!! (and then on to a completely new campaign game perhaps!!)
I for one keep hearing about Pandemic. But the theme just doesn’t pull me in, and it’s a hard sell to the family. I think they would much rather kill creatures than save the world.
(and just caught up with the rest of the thread… a lot of echoing what I’ve mentioned regarding the theme of Pandemic — and the fact that the initial request nixed card games - aside from that factor, I think the subject matter doesn’t cater to a young audience - any age could take on Hogwarts Battle, if they like deck builder Co-op games)
Really? All my kids were playing Pandemic before or around 10. It’s abstract and it’s about diseases you try to eradicate, not people. They had great fun working together to try and contain outbreaks. I find very little that’s not younger audience friendly in it.
Also, having cards doesn’t make it a card game, IMO. While Hogwarts Battle definitely is one. Although that’s an interesting side discussion in itself. What role do the cards have to play for the game to be a card game? Is Clank a card game? It’s a deck builder, but the board and decisions taken there make me hesitate.
I don’t know why I have this vibe about Pandemic – Like as if it is about disease, death, and then throw in some zombies… I have no clue why I think there are zombies in it too… (as it doesn’t right? just me, throwing in the zombies…) I really bet my family would have a blast with pandemic legacy if I can force them to sit down and get behind the idea of 'saving the world"
Clank’s right up there on my games to get list (and if I can find some cheap ways to organize Gloomhaven, I really think we could have a ton of fun with that one) I was actually thinking of that new LotR game, but after watching NPI last night I’m really quite lukewarm towards it)
I have no idea if the Legacy game has zombies, but the normal version of Pandemic doesn’t. For what it’s worth, I find it a very easy to learn “gateway game” for families.
HA!! and even Zombies aren’t bad… I just have this idea that fighting a disease sounds boring. One of these days I’ll play the stand alone game and see what it’s like for myself!
How is there not a kids version of Pandemic yet? Something like My First Measles Outbreak would work well these days.
ducker, if your family is more into fighting critters, maybe check out Defenders of the Realm, which I believe is regarded as a fantasy-themed Pandemic. I haven’t played it but would like to try it some day.
Fighting a disease could be quite interesting. That’s not the experience vanilla Pandemic brings to the table. It’s basically just set collection with a bit of board position and (metaphorical) fire fighting. The theme might as well not be there.
I feel like it would be hard to explain the outbreak rules and the character abilities without the theme. I think your description is a bit reductive. The game is abstracted out to a world map, and the rules are deliberately not very complicated, but there’s plenty of theme there.
Pandemic has plenty of thematic elements: medicine/research/logistics specialists, surprise outbreaks, sample collection, government shuttles and emergency evacuations.
Abstraction is part of the language of board games. It’s also a tool for accessibility, which is a factor for Pandemic. But I would never call Pandemic an abstract game. I think for a Euro-inspired family game it’s quite evocative! I have a friend whose son (age 9 maybe?) couldn’t sleep for a week after playing Pandemic because he was thinking about the germs spreading…
I have not heard much about it. Due to the theme, I peeked around a bit to see what I could find but the set-up makes me think it’s more battle and mini driven than I would like. It looks pretty though.
For Spirit Island, they way I learned it was to watch a play through and then the rulebook almost seemed unnecessary (but I still read it). There’s quite a few of them out there, but I’d recommend One Stop Co-op Shop’s playthrough. It fully walks through the setup and has a good pace.
