TempleCon 2016
Crowne Plaza Providence-Warwick Hotel
Warwick, RI
August 25-28, 2016

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The TempleCon event is an amazing gaming experience.  There are vintage arcade machines, retro video games, live music, costumes, and more.  This years event was at the Crowne Plaza, in Warwick, RI.  It spanned through banquet rooms, hotel floors, and the outdoor tent.

The vendors were impressive, though not vast.  Most items were based around the steampunk theme that the convention was based around.  There were items like hand-made masks,  etched glassware, dice, hand-drawn themed ponies and board games.

We passed by a dimly lit room on our way to the vendors, so I peeked my head in.  There were 2 giant screens and tents set up.  The woman in charge of the room told me they were playing, Starship Horizons.  Starship Horizons is a bridge simulator game, where you and a team of 4 others are in charge of a ship. The gameplay experience is designed around players commanding their own starship, becoming the bridge officers in the roles of Captain, Flight, Tactical, Science, Operations, and Engineering.  As a team, players can venture into the galaxy in a campaign setting, or play any number of missions designed for a shorter experience.  The game takes between 30-45 minutes to play and they had sign ups to you could come back at a later time, so you did not have to hang around.

We continued on our way to the outdoor vendor tent. My favorite part of the vendor area were the game demos. There were a few new games that were trying to get off the ground and they were using this event to help sell it.

TEO-TempleConBoardGames-3The first game we played was called Student Bodies, made by Angry Duck Games.  A zombie game that didn’t use weapons of mass destruction to win sounded like something I needed to try out.  I have a 9 year old that I play games with, so I try to keep things a little PG.  There were many rules and throughout the explanation I became known as “Captain Distracto” because, well, I got distracted easily.

Once we got through the rules, we began to play.  My breakdown is this, I have a character who is slowly turning into a zombie, and I am trying to make it down the high school hallways towards the antidote. Using only weapons they have found in school (which you will chose blindly from a pile), you fight through swarms of zombies dodging and pushing through attacks.  First one to get the antidote, half wins.  You still have to make it down the hallway and out of the school. Alive.  There are twists and turns though the game, and each game is different depending on how the board was set up.  We only played till we got the antidote, which I found first.  Change “Captain Distracto” to “Captain Winner”, please.  This game is great for 4 or 5 players, and ones that may enjoy turning on you.  Friendly banter is one of my favorite things, and this game certainly leaves that door wide open.  At some point you will get to spawn a zombie, and put it almost anywhere you want.  Who do you want to be bitten next?!

 

That game was available to buy that day (you can also buy it HERE) but others were still in “Kickstarter” mode.  By that I mean, they had a Kickstarter going to fund it.  One of the creators of Complicated Board Game (The Card Game) was there to raise awareness of his new game.  It is a little bit like Catan, with a side of Uno and a estimated play time of 15 minutes (perfect for Captain Distracto!)

cbgThe run down of this amazing game is really simple.  There are square cards, they have items on them, like sheep, castles, hats, etc.  Then there are rule cards that can change the rules of the game. During your turn, you have 2 points, use them accordingly. Unless you have a card that can change the rules.  The item cards are laid down in a certain pattern, and can only connect to certain ones. Unless you have a card that can change the rules.  The person to use all their item cards first wins.  Captain Distracto lost this round to game co-creator Pat Brennan. It was still a lot of fun though, and I would highly recommend checking out their Kickstarter page HERE… We just backed it ourselves!

The downside to the vendor tent was the lighting was terrible, as the sunset, it grew very dim, and everyone started to close up shop.  We worked our way back into the main part of the hotel and headed to the board game library.  I have never seen so many board games in one place.  There were lists of the games sorted alphabetically, by age, by how many players could play, and by how long a game would take to play.  You can check out the game and play, just don’t leave the room with it, or any pieces.  We spent a while just looking at the boxes, trying to decide what or if we wanted to play anything.  We decided we would keep looking around to see what was going on.  Captain Distracto was weaving through tables checking out what other were playing, some games and I knew, most I had never heard of.

There was a gentleman in a bright orange suit playing Moon Quake Escape.  We took a picture as we walked by and then came back later for a demonstration.  He promised me it was only 3 1/2 minutes, and that I would still have time to make the body painting show.

Jeff Johnston, the creator and demonstrator was passionate about his game. Calling it is midlife crisis, he spoke quickly and excitedly about his game. Not aware that I was Captain Distracto, he had to repeat most of it to me again.  The board was made of different pieces, that went with the background story of the game.  Aliens are in prison, and they are trying to escape out of the rocket on the top. There are alien guards who are trying to stop you.  The board moves in circles, you get cards that help you get to the top, and in the end, if you find your opponents’ Alien, they lose and hopefully you have made it to the spaceship to win! It’s not available for sale as of yet, but if you like aliens and helping them escape and using a spinner. This game is for you! Moon Pie is not included.

We made our way out of the board game area, and wandered through the miniatures room. Those games are beyond my understanding, neat looking, but I just don’t understand them.  Then we headed up to the body painting suite.

There were many events and stores in the actual hotel rooms.  I was a little iffy about that.  I understood that some vendors wanted to lock up their items, so this made sense. The rooms were small though, and I felt really uncomfortable walking in, knowing that there was a big chance I would not be purchasing anything.  I figured the body painting event might be crowded enough that I could walk in and out without feeling awkward.  I didn’t have to worry about it, because when I got to the 6th floor, we found out it was cancelled.  Back downstairs we went.

One of the areas that was outside of the gaming area was the rotunda was where most of the night time events were going on.  From dancers, to comedians, to lip synchers, this was the place to be.  We popped in and out of it, meeting cosplayers and Deadpool along the way.

While everyone was busy in the rotunda, we took advantage of empty arcade and retro gaming machines. I felt like a kid again! There was every system I ever wanted to play, from Atari to NES to PS2, and everything in-between.  The graphics have gotten better over the years, but my playing skills have not.  The arcade room had some games on which that the detail and artwork on the cabinet that were better than the games itself.  Tron looked like it stepped right out of the movie, the Star Wars game let you step into the movie.  Tapper had Budweiser beer handles as the controls. The classics were all there, and all for free!

We had never been to TempleCon before, in fact, we had never heard of it! I am really glad we got the opportunity to see all that there was. Next year I will grab a few friends and spend some time in the board game library!

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