2nd Nov 2023 - Automobile
by Robin. Fri, 3 Nov (Updated at Fri, 3 Nov)Autobahn last week, Automobile this week... Azul and Barrage to look forward to soon, perhaps. At this rate it will take me a while to loop back around for a go at Apiary, which John brought in this week. Having made it through the inevitable swarm of bee-themed WhatsApps, when he got the game to the table it looked very nice - hopefully it was worth it 🙂.
In fact it was a week for interesting new games, with East India Companies also making an appearance. For all its newness, this has a lot of familiar-looking bits to it - the age of sail, the trading and investing and exploiting. And then there was Septima, with a set of very posh kickstartery-looking components, and a nice seasonal Halloween theme of witchcraft.
Which left only two older games being played: Automobile and another of my all-time favourites, Great Western Trail. Would have loved another go at that, but it was already fully-subscribed by the time I looked at the website. Fortunately David put up Automobile too.
As it was when David used to do these reviews, so it remains: the reviewer has certain games they really like, so they keep reappearing here. Automobile, like Merchants & Marauders, is still on that list. So if you don't like Automobile - you're crazy!!! - but no, I meant: don't worry, I don't have too much to say about it this time.
Basically Automobile is a game of brown cars, silver cars and gold cars. Steve started with the silver cars, which left the rest of us fighting over the brown cars. David and I spent the first half of the game trying to scare each other out of the brown car market, which sent Andy and Dan into the gold car market, which they duly flooded with a surplus of Cadillacs. Then David and I barged into the silver car market and resumed our game of chicken there, culminating in a lot of losses all round. We all sold lots of cars, though not as many as we hoped to, and we all made lots of money. Though some of us made more money than others. And that's Automobile.
This will probably be my last week for some time, due to an imminent family growth action. Who knows: maybe someone with a different set of favourite games will write a couple of reviews in the meantime. Finally you might get to read something non-sarcastic about Castles Of Burgundy? We can only hope. But if this was my last week, Automobile gave me a great send-off. Like so many evenings at the club: a great game, great banter and a welcoming group of players. Thanks everyone!