Halloween is just over a week away, and rather than subject you yet again to our opinions on this occasion, we thought we’d present the recommendations of some friends for holiday-appropriate horror games—

Game designer and author, Jess Hartley suggests Betrayal at House on the Hill because it’s spooky and never the same twice. Also,

For a sillier (but still appropriate for Halloween) game, I love Give Me The Brain. I mean, come on – zombies in a fast food restaurant? Anyone who’s worked at a burger chain, especially on a late night shift, knows that Give Me The Brain is only unrealistic in that the crew in the game actually /has/ one brain between them. Most of our staff-shifts didn’t.

For a good scare, podcaster and aspiring media mogul, Don Dehm picks roleplaying games like Call of Cthulhu or Hunter. In the board game category, Don likes zombie-filled Last Night on Earth and the new Lovecraftian cooperative game, Witch of Salem.

From publisher North Star Games, owners Dominic Crapuchettes and Satish Pillalamarri go modern and recommend Pandemic. PR Director, Luke Warren, used to be a big fan of the RPG Chill.

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Fans of Hive have reason to rejoice today (if they have an iPhone, that is.)

Lotusland Studios has released Hive for the iPhone at $4.99, and it is available from the iTunes App Store right now.

From what I’ve seen, the interface looks pretty slick.  Granted there are a bunch of places you can play Hive online for free, but this makes it so much easier and portable if you don’t have any physical opponents to play with.

For those who aren’t familiar with Hive, it’s a two player tile laying game where the tiles make up the board as you play.  You have different bugs, each with different movement rules, and you must surround the other player’s queen bee to win the game.

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Seriously?  Come on now. Fully Baked Ideas even makes you validate your age before viewing their site for this one. We mentioned Stoner Fluxx very briefly last year when Yehuda made his feelings known about Fluxx.  Stoner Fluxx is exactly what you think it would be: marijuana themed Fluxx. Proceeds of all sales actually go to groups fighting to legalize the drug.

I can take Fluxx in very (read VERY) small doses.  I even think Zombie Fluxx is humorous.

Stoner Fluxx is going a bit far.  There’s even toking rules in the game with this message attached.

“WARNING: Doing what this card says is Illegal. Set it aside until after marijuana prohibition ends.”

Give me a break.  For those who are interested, Stoner Fluxx goes on sale November 13th, 2009.

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Khet

Laser Battle

Innovention Toys, publishers of the strategy game Khet with reflecting lasers, has won a patent infringement lawsuit against MGA Entertainment and their Laser Battle game.

Khet, from 2005, is based on a video game from 1987. MGA published Laser Battle, a nearly identical game, a year later in 2006. Khet’s patent on the game of movable pieces with lasers and with or without mirrors was filed Feb 13, 2006 and awarded September 4, 2007.

MGA’s defenses were a) not all of their pieces are meant to be moved, to which the judge ruled that, although they’re not all meant to be moved, they can be moved, so they’re still movable (which implies that if some of the pieces had actually been immobile, the suit would have lost?); and b) the patent is too obvious, since any layman could translate a video game to a board game, to which the judge ruled that this is not so for this game.

MGA plans to file a motion for reconsideration.

(source)

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A new family edition of Wits and Wagers is scheduled for release Feb 10, 2010 from Northstar Games. Wits And Wagers is a much lauded and successful party game where players first guess what they think the answer to a question is, and then place bets on which answer is closest to the correct one. Payoff is less for answers in the middle of the pack than for those on the extremes.

Says Dominick, CEO and designer:

No poker chips.  Players just win points for betting correctly.  No betting mat either.  You just arrange the guesses from lowest to highest and bet (using different sized meeples) on the answer you think is closest without going over.  If you bet correctly, you get one point for betting with the small meeple and two for betting with the larger meeple.  You get one point if your guess pays out.

The game loses the poker look and feel in order to appeal to more families, and includes some easier questions for ages 8-12.

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Claustrophobia is a board game coming from Croc, published by Asmodee. Croc has previously designed Hell Dorado and Age of Gods. Release date unknown, but some copies should be available at BGG.con .

The game is a two-player fantasy skirmishy game, humans versus demons. The humans have to accomplish some missions, and the demons try to stop them. From the site:

The Human begin with the initiative phase, throws a six-side die for each character that he controls. After that, he chooses a die to give to each of them. The die represents an action line with varied characteristics: movement, combat, defense, sox colors [?]. These characteristics change with each line, so the allocation of a die is tactical and very important…

Then, the Humans start the actions phase and activate all their characters: underground exploration, confrontations, actions and so on.

Then the Demon will start his menace phase. He rolls 3 dice, which the number can change under different conditions. He then places the rolled dice on the destiny board. Placing them activate on some effects that will help him. For example, if the Demon player chooses to place two odd dice on the ‘’supernatural speed’’, the troglodytes then gain +1 movement in the next action phase.

Once all the dice are allowed and the chosen effects are activated, the Demon plays his action phase. It’s almost the same as for the Human, except that the Troglodyte can’t explore the underground

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Foodle is a board game about nutrition from South African dietitian and accountant Eddie and Annalien Turner, respectively.

The game contains 300 questions and a board covered with pictures of food. Listen to their promo video if you’re a sucker for a South African accent.

The game costs around $46 USD plus shipping, and is available in English and Afrikaans.

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Both are CCGs from Topps, where Match Attax depicts English soccer – excuse me, “football” – players, and Topps Attax features American baseball players. The games are designed by Michael Elliott and Matt Robinson.

The games play like Top Trumps, which plays like War: select two cards, high card wins, repeat. But that’s not really the point. They were going to make the cards anyway, so why not throw a game onto them to give you something to do with the cards?

Topps is currently spending heavily on promoting the games. (source)

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Despite the recession, everyone and his grandpa are pimping board games as THE recession-proof buy for the holiday season. We’ve already covered a number of these, here are a few more, and expect many more to follow.

In Canada, the Montreal Gazzette (source), The Province (source), and CTV (source) are all citing Protégez-Vous’ holiday buying guide (source, more), which recommends the games Gobblet Gobblers (Blue Orange), Bisous Dodo (Djeco), Bla Bla Bla (Djeco), Finca (Rio Grande Games), and Shut-the-Box (traditional).

The Boston Globe pimps Phil Orbanes, author of Monopoly: The World’s Most Famous Game – And How It Got That Way, as well as other books. (source)

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Kids are never too young to play with surgically sharp razors, and that’s why this set of real razor-rimmed playing cards will be such a hoot to accessorize your two-year old’s Halloween Ninja costume. Bandages sold separately.

Five card flush for $30.

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