Musical Trixstar is a £40 music trivia game, self-published by Mark Percival.

It has 400 questions designed around the ABRSM and Trinity Guildhalls exam syllabuses, and a lazy susan board center and some plastic music-themed pawns.

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26 is a word forming / math card game by Daniel Yovich, published by sggc Yovich Games.

Each card has number and letter. The object is to form both a word and an equation totaling 26, rummy style (each card can be used for one or the other). It plays exactly like Rummy.

Daniel is not a new designer, but you’d be forgiven if you don’t remember his last game, Krypto. He published it in 1963. It’s also an equation forming game. So is MathSuey, a puzzle game he co-created.

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In another move on the organized play front, Konami Digital Entertainment is sponsoring Yu-Gi-Oh! Duelist League events at hobby game stores for players 14 years of age or younger. Participation costs $5 and guarantees a prize. The structure is mostly open gaming, though for each game won a player is in better position to get the prize card of their choice.

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Here are the stats from National Gaming Day at Your Library:

Number of libraries registered to participate: 1,365
Number of libraries that submitted number of players for NGD activities: 549
Total number of players for NGD activities: 31,296

For comparison, here’s 2008:

Number of libraries registered to participate: 617
Number of libraries that submitted number of players for NGD activities: 557
Total number of players for NGD activities: 14,184

Source has many anecdotes from the day’s activities.

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“I believe God has given me the creative talent to make something like this,” Zoppi said. “I am still kind of amazed that I have gotten this far with my original idea. Ideally, I am hoping that some big game company comes along and makes me an offer. But if that doesn’t happen, I won’t be disappointed. I have gotten very far with this, and it really is a good game.”

ScoopIt is Casino, except you draw a new card every round, and some cards are worth as much as 25 points. And, naturally, she’s applied for a patent.

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Two elementary school students will be bringing their board game “Let’s Dance” to Dragon’s Den. (source) Good luck with that, kids.

Irish high-schoolers intend to enter their board game – an ecologically themed version of Snakes and Ladders – as a candidate in the National Student Enterprise Awards. (source) Good luck with that, kids.

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I won’t post every holiday gift guide, but here are some, with more to come after Thansgiving, undoubtedly. I only list the games:

The Washington Times pimps Number Knockout, Animalogic, and various flash card products. (source)

Wired pimps Star Wars Force Trainer and Beautiful Foosball. (source)

Cody Enterprise pimps games in general, including Scrabble and Canasta. (source)

The Toy Industry Association’s toys of the year include Bakugan 7 in 1 Maxus Dragonoid, Bop It, Mindflex, Scrabble Slam, UNO Moo, Bakugan Trap, Big Buck Hunter Pro, Sort It Out, and Pentago. (source)

Critical Gamers pimps Dominion, Small World, Warhammer: Chaos in the Old World, Pandemic: On the Brink, Power Grid, Warhammer: Invasion LCG, and Stone Age. (source)

The Canadian Toy Testing Council pimps Curious George Discovery Beach Game, Dr Seuss One Fish Two Fish Memory Game, Too Many Monkeys, and Yamslam. (source)

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I recently had time to sit down with Curtlin Toys and Games’ Xteme Takeover as Curtis Paul, the designer, was kind enough to send me a copy for review.

Let me start of by mentioning the box and board. The box is pretty big, but pretty empty.  Inside is a plastic board that is a bit smaller than the box, player pieces, a rulebook, and two dice. The reason the box had to be big is because the plastic board does not fold. It’s one solid piece full of holes for the player pieces to “wedge” into.

The cover of the game looks pretty exciting, but that’s where the visual appeal ends. The board itself is pretty plain. I can’t speak to the quality of the sticker that overlays on the plastic board, or the Xiacon (player pieces) themselves, because I have a production copy, and Curtis points out that these things have changed in the final version of the game.

How does it play? Not very well, in my opinion. There’s a lot of hype on the website and videos for the game, but the game itself unfortunately falls flat. It’s sort of a glorified football without a ball.  The goal is to get your Xiacons into the opposing player’s bunker.

You roll two dice to move, and you can take this number and move 1 or more Xiacons. You can move 1 Xiacon the total number of moves, or split the number of moves across multiple Xiacons. Xiacons can battle each other, but their fate is decided by a roll of the die plus a modifier based on the type of Xiacon in the battle. There are also certain “safe zones” on the board where a Xiacon can go and not be engaged in battle.

The whole game seemed VERY based on the die rolls.  There’s very little strategy in there, and I found that upgraded Xiacons rarely were defeated by lesser Xiacons in battle. The board is big enough where it’s even possible to avoid many battles and make your way to points at the end of the board that will blow the back of your opponent’s bunker wide open. It’s then easy to just march your pieces right in.

Who might this game actually appeal to? I really don’t know. Older children (maybe 8 – 10 year-olds) might get a kick out of the theme. Anyone who doesn’t mind endlessly rolling 2 dice over and over again may like it also.

The designer compares Xtreme Takeover to all sorts of other popular classic and mass market games, but I really don’t see it. Unfortunately I think the game just isn’t very good, and you’re probably better off spending your money on something better.

A copy of Xtreme Takeover was provided for free to review by Curtlin Toys and Games.

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