Monthly Archives: December 2015

News

Its All About Star Wars

For the Star Wars gamer and fan this has been and continues to be epic time, it really does not get any better than this. Whether you’re just a fan of the movies, board games, PC games, role-playing games or just like collectibles there is something for everyone Star Wars related. I thought it would be fun to do a little break down of all the awesomeness that is here and coming our way in the near future.

Star Wars: The Force Awakens

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The new Star Wars movies has everyone hoping for a revival given the generally accepted disappointment of the Old Republic era movies.

Naturally the best place to start is with the upcoming movie hitting movie theaters on December 16th. Brought to you for the first time by someone other than George Lucas, the Disney fueled J.J Abrams infused film continues the saga of one of the greatest science-fiction sagas ever made. The director who is often dubbed the reboot king has brought back franchise from extinction like Mission Impossible and Star Trek, not to mention some of the more interesting TV series like Almost Human and Revolution. I love this guy’s stuff, but Star Wars The Force Awakens is less a reboot and more a continuation of a story most of us nerds grew up with. The Force Awakens is more than just a movie to gamers however as it represents a new expanded place for some of our favorite games to draw materials for and its already begun.

Star Wars X-Wing: Force Awakens

Cleverly the new core set managed to add new and improved X-Wings and Tie-Fighters without making the old core set obsolete. A welcomed addition to X-Wing.
Cleverly the new core set managed to add new and improved X-Wings and Tie-Fighters without making the old core set obsolete. A welcomed addition to X-Wing.

We have already gained access to the new X-Wing Core set that features X-Wings and Tie-Fighters from the new movies, with more on the way. As part of the next Wave for X-Wing we are going to glimpse a little closer into Force Awakens with new X-Wing and Tie-Fighter expansions as part of the set that will show case a number of interesting new pilots presumably from the movies. Without question you can expect in future waves to see more of the Force Awakens universe to join Star Wars X-Wing, but the important thing here is that X-Wing has plenty of new room to grow into thanks to the movies.

The most exciting element of the upcoming wave however is that epic play is going to grow. We recently got the Imperial Raider which opened up Epic play in a big way but perhaps the most exciting upcoming release is the Imperial Assault Carrier that not only features a new epic ship but a number of awesome Tie-Fighters too boot! It’s an exciting time to be an X-Wing player!

Star Wars Armada

A much needed expansion to Armada has rounded out the game but we are yet to see anything for Force Awakens!
A much needed expansion to Armada has rounded out the game but we are yet to see anything for Force Awakens!

While we are still waiting to see/hear announcement of Force Awakens ships for Armada wave 2 is no slouch in bringing us much needed content for this epic game of capital ship battles. Joining the ranks is not only a new Squadron set that includes some of the most iconic ships in the Star Wars universe like the Han Solo’s Millennium Falcon and Boba Fett’s FireSpray just to name a couple but we are getting some of the most iconic ships from one of the biggest fleet battles in Star Wars movie history (Return Of The Jedi). Ships included are the Home One, MC30 Frigate and The Imperial Class Star Destroyer, not to mention the Imperial Raider.

For Star Wars Armada fans wave 2 has a completion effect, rounding the game out to its destination of 400 points and bringing much needed diversity to list building. What will Force Awakens bring to the table? Well you can bet your bottom dollar that Fantasy Flight Games knows how to milk it and its not much of a prediction to proclaim that the next wave will include Force Awakens capital ships, the thing is, we don’t really know much right now about what that will be. Fortunately we won’t have to wait too much longer as it’s only 2 days as of this writing before the movie premiers!

The Star Wars Role-Playing Game

Edge of the Empire kicked things of and immediately made all previous Star Wars RPG games obsolete. Its nearly perfect!
Edge of the Empire kicked things of and immediately made all previous Star Wars RPG games obsolete. Its nearly perfect!

Whether you are a fan of Edge of the Empire, Age of Rebellion or Force and Destiny (or all three) Fantasy Flight Games has been producing material for the game at a maddening pace. Dozens of books have been pushed out this year not to mention countless variety of supplements and expanded material with many more the horizon and now there is the question of how Force Awakens plays into all this. It’s a safe bet that we can expect a new core rulebook simply called Force Awakens kick starting a new era for the role-playing game and I’m sure I speak for many role-playing fans out there that the anticipation of the expected announcements is exciting. The prospect of playing in the new era may come sooner than we think thanks largely to the fact that FFG has already secured the rights to Force Awakens. Not enough excitement for you? Think about the possibility of linking all three games with Force Awakens and playing out the entire saga of Star Wars from the perspective of a single character of your own creation…. Ok that should do it!

Star Wars Rebellion

Rebellion is the unquestionable king of surprises this year, before we have even had a chance to get excited the game is already on the calendar for release early in Quarter 1!
Rebellion is the unquestionable king of surprises this year, before we have even had a chance to get excited the game is already on the calendar for release early in Quarter 1!

The recent announcement of Star Wars Rebellion was perhaps one of the best surprises of the year. With virtually no knowledge that a Star Wars boardgame was even in the works, Fantasy Flight presented Rebellion, a game that lets you play out the original Star Wars conflict from A to Z, Death Stars Included. In the style of War of the Rings (quite possibly one of the greatest board games ever made) you and a friend will battle it out with the famous people, ships, planets and story of the Star Wars universe. The best part? The game is ALREADY AT THE PRINTER which means you will be playing it first quarter of 2016! Can I get a fuck yeah!

How does Force Awakens fit into it… well duh, EXPNASION! With the game already done and printing there is no doubt FFG will wait and see to ensure the game is well regarded and accepted, but assuming it is as awesome as it looks, A Force Awakens expansion in 2016 is practically assured!

Star Wars Imperial Assault

The familiar Descent-esque system brings the Star Wars universe to the cooperative dungeon crawler genre, but it boasts an impressive competitive skirmish mode that has gained a tremendous amount of popularity overshadowing the cooperative elements.
The familiar Descent-esque system brings the Star Wars universe to the cooperative dungeon crawler genre, but it boasts an impressive competitive skirmish mode that has gained a tremendous amount of popularity overshadowing the cooperative elements.

For the cooperative gamer, in particular if you were a fan of Descent, Star Wars Imperial Assault is an easy pick as it may quite possibly one of the best cooperative games ever made. Fantasy Flight Games isn’t pussy footing around with this franchise either. With countless mini expansions and two major expansions (Twin Shadows – At the Printers & Return to Hot – On the Boat) we already have enough content for Imperial Assault to last us through 2016 but at this point the games popularity is so huge a Force Awakens expansion is not only a guarantee it’s a shocker that they haven’t already announced it. If I had to guess, I would say they are timing it for the release of the films because you know, they are evil!

Star Wars RISK

Easy to overlook thanks largely to its poor title and association with RISK, this little nugget is actually a really great remake of Star Wars Queens Gambit set in the Return of the Jedi era!
Easy to overlook thanks largely to its poor title and association with RISK, this little nugget is actually a really great remake of Star Wars Queens Gambit set in the Return of the Jedi era!

Ok, bad title, very bad title and probably one of the reasons you probably didn’t give this one a second look. Look a little deeper under the covers however and you will discover that Star Wars RISK is actually a new edition of Star Wars: A Queens Gambit, a rare collectable and extremely well made game based on one of the worse Star Wars movies ever made (A Phantom Menace). This time however instead forcing us to play with Gungan miniatures Hasbro back tracked and created the epic battle over the second Death Star from Return of the Jedi. It’s called Star Wars RISK but has virtually nothing to do with the classic Yahtzee style dice roller. Instead Hasbro pulled out a miracle and actually created a great game that looks amazing managing to hit on some of the more distinguished top board game lists on the internet.

Now if I know Hasbro Star Wars Force Awakens: RISK is an inevitable follow up and while I’m not holding my breath they do have a good system to base a game on, the only question is, will the story support the 3 prong battle setup needed to re-create Star Wars: RISK? Here’s hoping that it does!

You wanted Excitement and as you can see from this list there is plenty for everyone here. Let’s just bloody hope the movie is as awesome as we all know it should be!