The latest in the Empire Builder series is Martian Rails from Mayfair Games. Because when you’re a railfan, there’s nothing that can’t be improved with the addition of trains.

Oh, and the details. Two to six players, crayon-rails system (for the uninitiated, that means it’s up to you where to build the track), 3-D in the sense that you can go off one end of the board and on to the other end, and incorporates many elements from the long history of science fiction literature about Mars.

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In the remaining 5 months of 2009, Konami Digital Entertainment will be releasing eight “collectible tins,” including four “limited distribution exclusive tins,” for the Yu-Gi-Oh! card game. The first two, available now, feature Power Tool Dragon and Ancient Fairy Dragon and come with two booster packs of Crimson Crisis, one pack of Raging Battle, two sneak-peak packs from the upcoming set Ancient Prophecy, a Secret Rare variant monster card, and a package of branded card sleeves. All for only 20 bucks—because I’m sure you’ll buy just one.

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Speaking of ex-cons, the site Con-nections offers a program for ex-cons to help them plan a better life after prison.

Along with guides and videos, they offer the board game Penitentiary: Master of the Game. The game “reinforces the lessons learned” from the other material. No additional info is available on the site or elsewhere.

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Tee & Cue is a golf game for a billiards table. Or rather, it’s sold as a standalone table with the golf game on one side and a standard pool table on the other (optional table tennis top, too).

It is the brainchild of Clyde Beasley, a rather colorful character who spent 11 years in jail for dealing drugs. While within, he vowed to find a way to make money by going straight.

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Any game aimed at training corporate suits is going to be expensive, because it’s marketed at a business tool. To be fair, the game often comes with extensive literature and access to online resources or even facilitation (although that’s usually extra).

Project Risk is a risk-management board game from Successful Projects. It costs $60. Eight possible bad events can happen after each roll of the dice. For six of them, you can decide to spend chips to counteract them (or enhance their positive benefit) before starting the game. The two hidden ones can’t be planned for. After that, it appears to be a simple dice-roller, however each space is marked with a project management “term” so that someone who knows what project management is can interrupt the game and give a speech about it.

PM Learning lists three more interesting looking games, teaching project management and risk assessment, including Portfolio Power (more a market simulation than a game), Ultimate Route, a path building game with lots of financial and management aspects, and Challenge of Egypt, an ancient-Egypt themed game where you have to build the Pyramid of Cheops. Prices not listed. The games each last 1-2 days.

Leaders in Action from Learn to Lead teaches leadership competency. Price not listed. LtL also has several other games.

Action Center Training also lists several games which are just games, but they note the learning outcomes of each of the games. You can buy the games on other sites cheaper.

There are also numerous examples of games created by students within university settings for a course.

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I’ll let the ad copy speak for itself (capitalization is theirs):

Carry the Cross is finally HERE!!!!! PRAISE JESUS.

God is great and his purpose must be fulfilled. This game was born to propagate the gospel and to bring revival to those in need.

The game may be played by two or more players and you are never too young or too old to learn about the word of GOD. You acquire CROSSES for correct answers given. For incorrect answers you must carry out TASKS…….HA HA.

How well do you think you know the word of GOD? The AIM of the GAME is to FINISH THE GAME with the MOST NUMBER OF CROSSES. IT DOESN’T MATTER WHEN YOU FINISH BUT HOW YOU FINISH.

The Game Costs R150. This is an extremely excellent investment.

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I’m trying to decide if the Swinxs really is more annoying than the noisy toys I had to annoy my parents: the hand-held football games, the noisy electronic driving game, Gnip Gnop, and the buzzing top. I don’t think it is. Time clouds the judgment, however.

If you don’t have a handy eight-year old girl around to make the rules for your game and tell you whose turn it is, or maybe you need someone to time you in a race, you’re all alone, and under ten years old, this $150 talking doodad ( plus $15 for 3 Wristbands with RFID chips) might do the trick. They claim it’s for indoor and outdoor play and show it sitting on a sandy beach, so it must be durable, at least.

It comes with an assortment of tag games; and more games are free to download. But when you get bored of those, you can also buy a $29 pack of RFID Cards and play match the animal to the sound and other games like that.

(more info)

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