Monopoly Killer: Perfect German Board Game Redefines Genre
Argh. I'm just not a fan of Catan. There are such better board games out there -- see http://boardgamegeek.com/ for examples. Factually, however, the Wired article is very good. Several things:
Board game enthusiasts disparagingly call this a "roll your dice, move your mice" format.
Actually, it's more often "roll-and-move."
You can't get ahead by rustling your opponents' sheep or torching their cute wooden houses.
My cousin Isak wants to house-rule this.
The end result, however, is every bit as mathematically intricate as those of his colleagues[, Reiner Knizia and Wolfgang Kramer].
Hah. Teuber has a hit with Catan, but comparing him to Knizia makes this article seem like PR.
"But Settlers can still take over an hour to play, and it has a lot of rules." -- Michael Gray, Hasbro
Last I checked, Hasbro owned Wizards of the Coast, who does Magic: The Gathering and Dungeons and Dragons. It's just wrong for the company that produces these games to complain about play time and the number of rules in a game -- I run a regular game of D&D that lasts three hours, and I'm always getting Magic: The Gathering rules questions.
