Of Grognards and Heroscape

Nate Combs posted an entry on Terra Nova about Grognards, a term for folks playing traditional board games as opposed to modern video games. In the comments that followed, Thomas Malaby over at Wisconsin mentioned his 12 year old nephew was heavily into Heroscape from Milton Bradley. Intrigued, I bought the master set yesterday, and my kids and I started playing it this morning.

One intriguing thing was the potential for everybody to play together, a characteristic common to just about any board game or cards, etc. With World of Warcraft, we’re usually limited to two or at most three players without seeing the Internet connection take a serious drop. We have played together with friends at a distance, of course, which solves the problem but we lose some of the benefits of proximity. Then there’s the issue of paying for multiple accounts…

Heroscape is sort of an advanced form of chess. First, the players lay out the board, which is divided into hexagonal pieces. The board may consist of hills, mountains, water, etc. Play pieces are detailed figurines, and they include a wide variety from the pantheon of board games past. There are Vikings, a dragon, a dinosaur-mounted warrior, American GI types from WWII, robots, samurais, etc. Each character has different moves and abilities, which are helpfully spelled out on accompanying battle cards.

Players take turns moving their pieces about the board and attacking/defending opposing pieces. Battles are decided by dice. Some pieces have higher attack or lower defense capabilities, and strategy and planning is involved throughout. Expansion packs are all the rage, and we have our eyes on the Marvel expansion pack, with figurines from the comics including ones for Spiderman and the Incredible Hulk.

Educational value seems typical to strategy games. There is a little math involved, but not much. Primarily, the value lies in thinking things out and in planning ahead. Think chess on steroids. The box says the game is appropriate for ages 8 and higher, and the set comes with basic rules which can be played for simpler games. Andy Havens posted on Terra Nova that his five year old likes playing around with the board and pieces, although he has not yet graduated to more advanced, rule-governed play.

Board games have their share of research interest as well. Matthew Kirschenbaum pointed out his blog, Zone of Influence, which is focused on game studies. Matt has a nice wrap up on the Terra Nova comments here. He has a chapter in the upcoming Third Person, the second follow up to First Person: New Media as Story, Performance, and Game, edited by Noah Wardrip-Fruin and Pat Harrigan.

All told, Heroscape was well worth the price I paid, about the same as a typical video game.