Last Night on Earth (Review)

From Flying Frog Productions

Last Night on Earth
a Flying Frog Production
by Jason C. Hill


Stats:
2-6 Players
Ages 12 and older
Game time- 1 to 1&1/2 hours
$49.95 from Flying Frog

Box Contents:
(from rulebook)
1 Full color Rulebook
1 Town Center Game Board
6 L-Shaped Outer Boards
8 Unique Hero Figures (grey)
14 Zombie Figures (7 green, 7 brown)
40 Card Hero Deck (Basic Game)
40 Card Zombie Deck (Basic Game)
20 Advanced Cards for the Hero Deck
20 Advanced Cards for the Zombie Deck
6 Reference Cards
8 Large Hero Character Sheets
5 Large Scenario Cards
2 Full Color sheets of Die Cut Counters
16 Dice
1 CD Soundtrack of Original Music

Summary:
Gameplay: It takes a couple rounds to get use to, but isn't overly difficult. The variety of goals and game set up keeps each play unique. 3 of 3 stars
Social Interaction: A fantastic balance of cooperation and competition that keeps everyone talking. 3 of 3 stars
Strategy: A little bit is good, but with zombies on the loose you can be much more reactive than proactive. 2 of 3 stars
Presentation: They left no detail to chance; honestly, it has a soundtrack. 3 of 3 stars

Overall Rating: Two thumbs way up, a cheesy grin and a crazy nod. (approximately 5 of 5 stars)

From Flying Frog Productions

Gameplay:
Game set-up is unique each turn. The game board has one center piece (with two sides) and six L-shaped pieces. One L-shaped piece goes around each corner of the square center board. The L-pieces have the different buildings which can affect your resources and zombie spawning points. Each character has different strengths and weaknesses so your abilities to resist zombie attacks or use different items will depend on who is in the game.

Depending on the number of players, there is either one or two zombie players and every one else is on the hero team. Each round of gameplay has a zombie turn and a hero turn. The zombies pretty much just move fight and spawn more zombies. Since their general goal is just destruction and brains, there is not much else that they need. Generally, each hero only do a few things per turn, but they have more options than the zombies. They can move, look for weapons (and other things), heal themselves or each other, and/or fight. Fights depend on a role of the dice, and items, abilities, and other assistance you can find depends on a shuffled card deck.

The hero's goals vary from game to game. They may need to kill as many zombies as possible, or round up the townsfolk and keep them alive until morning. The game comes with 5 scenarios. There are several expansions with new goals and there are currently 5 additional scenarios available as web content. The game setup provides a basic starter game to get use to the gameplay and rules. I recommend it, but I'm confident you'll have the full game structure figured out before that game ends.

Social Interaction:
The cooperative aspects of the hero team keeps everyone talking about the plan and the impending zombie fights. Having one of the players play the zombies also fosters some competitive banter. Just don't play the zombies if you're not prepared to be ganged up on.

Strategy:
The strategy varies from game to game since the goals and the resources are different each time. The zombies do not have a lot of strategy options. Appropriately, they are pretty mindless and they get their strength from numbers. As a hero, you can develop a strategy based on the game set up that you have, but your plans could be thwarted you buddy sitting across the table controlling the zombies (and listening to everything you say) or that other hero who refuses to leave the corner and will only shoot at zombies as they come through the door. I think the fun factor will be just as high if you grab a baseball bat and start swinging.

From Flying Frog Productions

Presentation:
As a former Disney cast member, I can assure you that I have extremely high standards for my theming. This game completely hits the mark. Every cliche you could want from a good or bad zombie movie is here. The characters include the preacher, the sheriff, the busty nurse and some angsty teenagers. You can fight zombies with a chainsaw, your favorite fire arm, or you can just start punching when things get desperate. The characters and the cards come with cheesy catch phrases. I find all of this wonderfully entertaining, but keep in mind there is some adult content. If you wouldn't let your child watch a move with this cover, then you will probably have similar reservations about the game.

Beyond just the creativity of the game, I feel that the quality of the components is fantastic as well.  The cards for the hero and zombie decks are much thicker than I am use to. At first I found it a little uncomfortable to shuffle, but I've since grown to like them. The miniatures are sturdy and clean. There is no left over molding plastic, and they came in reusable bags with air holes. I am also excited because I've heard that the game box will comfortably hold the two expansions that I've ordered.

All Fun and Games

From Drop Box

I am still recovering from my weekend full of fun. I think I am going to try to write up some game reviews in the future. Today, I am still trying to catch up on the world that happened while I was in Boston.  So today, I would like to hear from you.

What is your favorite game and when was the last time you played it? It doesn't have to be a board game.  Punch Bug and Angry Birds are great favorite games. Alternatively, you could tell me about a game you've been wanting to play, but haven't yet.  I really just want to hear from you about fun.

FO: Munchkin Bag

PAX East is just around the corner, and now I can excitedly say that I am completely prepared. It is also official that I am over dice bags for a while. This last bag is for a friend who we are tagging along to PAX with. He is my game buddy, and I owe him for so many late nights of endless laughing. One of the most hilarious things he has brought to my life is the game Munchkin from Steve Jackson Games. Some day I'll have to write a review for it, but for now, I will just say that it is full of adventure, cheating, jokes, and witty references to all of geekdom (and I am very excited about buying the new Munchkin Zombies next week before they hit shelves.)

The quirky art of the Munchkin games is done by John Kovalic. He has created this mascot for the game.

From John Kovalic

And this fella's silhouette is now adorning the game die and other accessories. Like this:

From Steve Jackson Games

Of course I decided that this would be the perfect image for the bag my friend needs for his Munchkin accessories. I charted:

From Drop Box

And I used the same front flap procedure as my last bag to make this:

The image is a little squatter than I was shooting for.  His neck is a bit too short and his nose a bit too Fraggle, but I think that anyone who knows what they are looking at, will see it just fine. With that, I am done with dice bags for the near future. If anyone is looking to play games that inspire giggle fits, I am up to the task though!

Blood Angel Bag Taking Shape

The charting has paid off, and now this back can officially be called a Blood Angel bag. Actually, I am not certain it can be called a bag yet. Since I am just putting one insignia on the bag, I decided to use a trick that I learned from making Cara Key's Alfonso the Monkey pattern. I've knit up a front panel with the emblem on it using intarsia to put on the emblem. Now that that section is done, it will wait until I knit up the rest of the bag. Then I'll rejoin the pieces and work on in the round.  Once the full bag is done, I will mattress stitch the open sides together. I hope this will make two indiscernible seams along the sides of the emblem.

Here is a better look at the rest of the the work I have to do.
I don't think it will take long at all, but I am realizing how much extra purling this method includes.

Charting

How do you feel about dice bags? I hope you like them, because they are going to be overtaking my attention for a little bit. Hubby's was not the end of the dice bag excitement. A friend requested a custom bag for his Warhammer random number generators (I admit 'dice' is getting pretty repetitive already). I couldn't resist  a request like that, so I've started prepping. He sent me a picture of his insignia so I used Knit Pro to make a chart.

From Drop Box

It is not quite perfect. I am going to have to do some refining with colored pencils, but what I'm really concerned about is the nice curved lines in the wings. They have already gotten a little blocky by putting it in the chart. Once I knit it up I will have to see what I think. Maybe I'll be able to devise a way to smooth them out.  Right now I'm thinking that if it is a problem, I could try some duplicate stitch or embroidery to fix it up.

With Love from Cthulhu

From what I understand Cthulhu prefers cultists to valentines, but this year, he is helping me share a little love with my hubby. I mentioned that I was working on a dice bag for his new game, and with out any stress I was able to complete it in time for our February fawning over each other.

I am still not completely happy with my color work. This time, I used a yarn stranding guide  for the two color section.  It was helpful in that I didn't have to drop and pick up the yarn each time I changed colors. This was great on the boarder rows that switched colors every other stitch, but I still had difficulties with the runners. The gauge of that band is still noticeably tighter and their are a couple places that pucker a bit from turning the corner on DPNs.

The color work section also went really slowly. Part of that is because I am still not comfortable with the technique. I will definitely need to do some more smaller pieces before I take on anything major. Another issue was my yarn. Hubby's game had a glow in the dark die so he wanted a glow in the dark bag. he bought me some glow in the dark yarn, and agreed that it sounded fantastic. Let this be your warning. If you want to knit anything glow in the dark, you better be committed. This 100% nylon yarn is scratchy, splicy, and miserable to work with.  There was no joy in it running through scraping across my fingers. There is no twist in the yarn, so the tiny little threads that make up its weight were not cohesive and I was constantly knitting right through the middle of a strand.  Just take a look at that i-cord draw string. Tiny little nylon loops are poking out everywhere making the whole thing a little itchy and sad.

With all of that said, I must also tell you. It does an awesome job at glowing in the dark. Despite hating working with it, I already have plans for the rest of my ball. I would not be surprised if I end up buying more.  I locked myself in our windowless bathroom to try and get you a picture of the awesome glowing.  Unfortunately, my camera does not have manual settings that allow me to leave the shutter open long enough to really capture the luminescent green. This is the best I got before I realized that trying to take and enhance photos of darkness is how I'm going to accidentally discover my toilet is haunted.



I cannot promise that we don't have any ghosts, but if you would like to come over to play, Hubby is ready to show off his new game.

Cthulhu Dice

From Steve Jackson Games

I have never read any H. P. Lovecraft. For the past year a friend has been exposing me to it via Steve Jackson Games. I still don't know anything about the lore, but now I fear Cthulhu and value my sanity.

If you are interested in losing a little bit of sanity, I recommend Cthulhu Dice. It is a quick, fun game. It will likely drive a little mad, but if you stay sane the longest, you win. The game play is simple. There is one die, and 18 sanity stones. Your dice rolls will determine what happens to the sanity. You could gain some sanity or steal some. You have to be careful though, Cthulhu could take everyone's sanity.

Hubby was given the game for Christmas, and we are both excited about taking it with us to PAX. Hubby was very jealous of our friend's dice bag, so I've set aside the secret knitting to make another one. This one is going to be extra special. Hubby's Chtulhu die is glow in the dark, so he bought me some matching yarn.

Weekend Adventures

As I mentioned earlier, the expansion to the video game that Hubby and I play was released on Thursday. Unsurprisingly, I didn't get much at all done as far as knitting is concerned. Saving a virtual world from evil creatures was much higher up on my priority list. Fortunately, I find this game absolutely beautiful. It is not the same kind of beauty as a skein of fantastic yarn, and my monitor certainly isn't as cuddly. I took some pictures of my adventures to share with you anyway. Here is what I did this weekend:

I defied gravity and surfed on a Harpoon across a river.I drugged a pirate and stole his money.I helped two walruses find love.I rode a giant turtle that reminded me of The Never Ending Story.I meditated at a mountain top shrine until I was cleansed of my inner turmoil.
I rescued some tadpoles from an evil giant lobster.
I went shark hunting.

All in all, it was a pretty exciting weekend, and I had a lot of fun.