Masters of the Night

I really love the visual design of this game, and the Universal Head involvement is a big plus. The subject is a favorite of mine, so this is veering into auto-buy territory. However, the Ares Games brand gives me pause. And thematically, the co-op aspect doesn't feel right. Reading through the rules, certain aspects remind me of my original design for Vampire: Prince of the City that got heavily altered to become Vampire: Dark Influences. Other aspects of Masters of the Night remind me of Arkham Horror. While Arkham Horror is a good match for a co-op approach, most games about multiple vampires presume selfish, competitive, or even hostile interaction between vampires. Furthermore, there doesn't seem to be any mechanism to prevent the dreaded Alpha Player problem that threatens most co-op games.

I kicked in for the game since the art direction is striking and 49 bones for when looks to be a decent solo game is a chance I'm willing to take.

I’m with Shellhead on this, Ares Games is a big red flag. Never played a game of theirs that wasn’t clunky and made even worse by a indecipherable rulebook. I’m staying waaaaay away from this.

Really? What are the bad games/rule books? My experience, while limited, has been pretty smooth with War of the Ring, Hunt for the Ring, and Sword and Sorcery.

I’ve wanted to try Last Friday — should I skip it?

To clarify, they occasionally make good to great games. I still find them to be clunky (War of the Ring, Sword & Sorcery, Galaxy Defenders) with subpar rulebooks (all the games you mentioned and then some). I just got Hunt For the Ring, which I know I like, but going to that rulebook was hard.

Last Friday is a good game but the rulebook has more than a few rules buried in it.

As far as bad games go...they don’t have many, but Marvel Heroes is definitely one. Age of Conan is debatable, and even though I like it, I’ll admit this it’s kind of terrible. Battle For Five Armies is okay but pointless. Master of the Galaxy is mediocre and has a vague rulebook. I’m not too fond of Galaxy Defenders, and that rulebook sucks.

I was rather hoping that the involvement of Universal Head to the project would improve any rulebook give what that person has brought to many games on BGG. Assuming it's the same person.

That may be true, but I’d still need to see a rulebook before agreeing to even playing it. Rulebooks aren’t the only problem Ares has, it’s also clunky designs that are more work than they’re worth.

There is a rulebook pdf that you can download from the kickstarter page. It doesn't look bad, but I haven't taken the time to read through it carefully.

Shellhead wrote: There is a rulebook pdf that you can download from the kickstarter page. It doesn't look bad, but I haven't taken the time to read through it carefully.

I don’t want to sound like I’m looking for any excuse to not play this game, but it also just does not interest me. As much as I’m into horror, the goth-kid sympathetic vampire scene is not my thing. If it was more Near Dark, might be a different story. But it’s co-op. It’s just not for me.

Josh Look wrote: To clarify, they occasionally make good to great games. I still find them to be clunky (War of the Ring, Sword & Sorcery, Galaxy Defenders) with subpar rulebooks (all the games you mentioned and then some). I just got Hunt For the Ring, which I know I like, but going to that rulebook was hard.

Last Friday is a good game but the rulebook has more than a few rules buried in it.

As far as bad games go...they don’t have many, but Marvel Heroes is definitely one. Age of Conan is debatable, and even though I like it, I’ll admit this it’s kind of terrible. Battle For Five Armies is okay but pointless. Master of the Galaxy is mediocre and has a vague rulebook. I’m not too fond of Galaxy Defenders, and that rulebook sucks.

I haven't played Galaxy Defenders, but I don't think of War of the Ring as clunky (especially given that it was released in 2004) even though it lacks the more modern streamlining. That being said, I agree that their recent offerings indicate that they haven't "grown" with the rest of the hobby (see Battle of Five Armies being basically the same thing as War of the Ring). I thought that War of the Ring's rulebook is better than Hunt for the Ring -- but both were fine; a poor rulebook doesn't make a good game bad like a good rule book doesn't make a bad game good.

For me, Marvel Heroes falls in the bad rulebook decent game category.

Josh Look wrote:

Shellhead wrote: There is a rulebook pdf that you can download from the kickstarter page. It doesn't look bad, but I haven't taken the time to read through it carefully.

I don’t want to sound like I’m looking for any excuse to not play this game, but it also just does not interest me. As much as I’m into horror, the goth-kid sympathetic vampire scene is not my thing. If it was more Near Dark, might be a different story. But it’s co-op. It’s just not for me.

Fair enough. I'm not usually into that type of vampire either; however, the designer being an expert in folklore has me intrigued.

But, it's like Sanctum in the other thread, if a game isn't for you it isn't for me. But, thanks to your podcast, I might be convinced otherwise....it's happened before as our tastes seem to line up fairly well.