Cosmic Encounter

For a long time I'd written off board games. Though they kept me company for about eight years from birth, once the video game came into play there was little incentive to lure me back to the days of dice, counters and cards.

The closes I ever came to re-visiting the board game was my fleeting affair with the pen and paper RPG, which failed to take off in the end, mainly for logistical reasons. Today I discovered that I hadn't grown out of board games, it was merely that video games were the more efficient, more accessible of the two, and it's for that reason that I did away with the board game. Until today.

Today I finally sat down with two friends and played 'Cosmic Encounter' a game of intergalactic colonisation, in which you have to stake a claim of other players planets in which to win. There are an absolute ton of rules that I really can't be bothered writing out at half one in the morning, but regardless it's a game of allegiance, deception, strategy and all-out stabbing your friends in the back and being an absolute mercenary tosser.

This final point is what makes it so good. Cosmic Encounter is the sort of game that will have good friends screaming at each other by the end of it. You're constantly having to forge alliances, but at the same time keep your own goals as your main priority, and this causes no end of intensity, excitement, and more importantly; fun.

As it happened, today I was the victor. It didn't really matter, as we weren't exactly playing it right anyway, but it was enjoyable and the fact that the most incredible event took place just as the Mass Effect soundtrack (that we were using as background music) reached its final majestic crescendo, made it all the more spectacular.

This evening's experiences with Cosmic Encounter has made me realise that board games are actually brilliant, and as long as you have some similar minded friends (which I do, which is probably the best fucking part), then they can provide experiences just as fun as video games. Something which I pretty much thought I'd never say.

Hopefully this will lead to my discovery of more board games, and hopefully the guys I played with tonight will be up for far more of this sort of thing in the future. And hopefully next time, we won't discover half of the rules ten minutes from the end.