Game Summit 2011 - So Good!

I wanted to post this right after the Summit but life took a strange turn. I think it is important that I share a bit about the conference and how it worked so well for our family this year. As I mentioned before Sharon took the kids over on the Friday night while I DMed my regular D&D game. What I didn't expect was that Sharon would be stoked to go back the next morning. She had a great time. Saturday we all went over and played Kinder Bunnies, gave up on a pirate game and played a doodle game with Ken and Aeron. So much fun. Sharon and Chelsea left around 2PM so Elyssa and I ate hot dogs for lunch while playing giant chess! She found her groove painting minis - she is really good - and I played Alien Frontiers with some of my friends. Not a bad game, but a bit on the geeky side. They dug into a version of Powergrid after that but I wanted to do some shopping - both box sets of Killer Bunnies Ultimate Odyssey for $40 (that is six decks and goodies). Sharon came and picked us up a bit after 5PM so she could go snowboarding with our friend Cindy. BTW KB Ultimate Odyssey is not bad.

The next morning Sharon wanted to come again! But she had to work and it was better for her to rest up after a string of very busy days. I took off with the kids for a final day of gaming (and yes I did make my speaking engagement at Knox that night, I'll blog about that soon). The kids started out painting, Chelsea got cut off early as she is fast and not near as meticulous as Elyssa. I jumped into a demo of Small World - such an awesome game. At first the mechanics seem a bit Risk-like (I'm not a big fan of Risk) but way better. And the game is also somewhat friendlier - a person is going to get a new race anyway so it is not as bad when you go after their territories. I thought Elyssa might like this game and with Chelsea playing Carcassonne, Jenga and Guess Who? with a new friend, we had enough time to start a second game. The picture above is from that game. Sunday is also the garage sale, I bought Pipework which is a cute little card game - we have a tonne of these card games and they get a fair bit of play in our house - and Khronos which was $20. Haven't tried it yet, it is too geeky for Sharon.

Now I can't wait until next year. The only complaint I heard was the registration system on-site did not seem secure (credit cards). We had pre-paid so it didn't effect us but one of my tech savvy friends was a bit shocked. I would definitely encourage you to go next year - pre-register so you can pay in cash at the door (or better yer purchase you passes online before the event! Game Summit is definitely worth it. I can definitely see it outgrowing the Nepean Sportsplex.