For the last three days, I’ve played Utu!
Thursday night is my local board game group, and Ryan (on the right) has been asking to play it for a few weeks. He was part of my original playtesting group, back when it was just a bunch of sticky notes on plain hexes. Now he wanted to see the “finished product”. Shaun and Kirra were playing for the first time, and when I pulled out the box Kirra was flabbergasted. “You designed this?” She said it looked like a professional game (hey, I am a professional!) and was pretty impressed.
Shaun squeaked out a victory over me, winning by the tiebreaker. Well done, sir.
Yesterday I met up with Brian, Marie, and Brandon for some pizza at Rosa’s. They’d been with us the night before, but couldn’t play Utu because it’s limited to four people. They asked if they could give it a go. Like Ryan, they’d been playtesters early on (also at Rosa’s, as it happened) so they were excited to see the final product. Board games are always better after a hearty helping of pizza.
In this one, Brandon crushed all of us with a massive final turn where he launched all kinds of boats and settled a gaggle of islands. It was a masterful victory.
And today I introduced it to Greta. Kyra already knew how to play, of course, and says of the games I’ve designed, this is her favorite. After a quick review of the rules, we got to work exploring the Pacific.
Greta’s typical beginner’s luck didn’t bring her a victory; I took the crown here.
Next up: we’re going to play again in the next few days to test the expansion I developed. Interestingly, I created the expansion from ideas that various people suggested after playing… but I’ve never actually played it! We’ll see how it goes. Even if it’s a failure, I’ve really enjoyed introducing Utu to so many people.