Ogre in Kosovo

[sir-talen]

So a few days after I got the ODE, I ended up dropping off my copy of the pocket edition with the wife of Douglas Muir, before she went back to join him and the rest of her family in Kosovo (he's a lawyer specializing in evaluating emerging nations' justice systems). Here's his report on playing the game for the first time in about thirty years. :)

* * *

So, OGRE, the board game. Royce Day, bless his heart, drove two hours to deliver a copy of this to Claudia, and I've played one game each with Alan (11) and David (10).
They like it a lot and we have a date to play a three-cornered game (two OGRE Mark IIIs attacking my well-defended command post).

Playing it again is very, very strange. If you're not a gamer, here's the background: OGRE was a "Microgame" that fit in a small plastic sleeve, sold by Steve Jackson for $2.95 back in 1977. It became sort of a cult classic (for a game) and has survived, in various forms, until today. Its basic premise is that one side plays an OGRE -- a gigantic robot tank, a Terminator with treads and tactical nuclear weapons. The other side has an army (represented by dozens of tiny little cardboard counters) composed of tanks, artillery and infantry. The game is set up so that it's an even match. It's a fairly simple game that can be played in forty five minutes or less.

The actual *experience* of playing the game was very, very strange. On one hand, the tactile memory was immediate and intense -- I played these games in high school and college, way back in the late 1970s and 1980s, and it brought back a lot of memories. On the other... man, game design has moved on since then. OGRE is still a solid game, no question. But a turn-based war game played with cardboard counters on a hexagonal grid, using a single six-side die, a Combat Results Table, and stacking rules? Maaaaan. That's so, so Carter Administration. The last time I played a game of this sort was... maybe 1986? Not much later than that, I don't think. (Yes, some people do still games of this sort. But it's become a tiny niche market.

But anyway: the boys like OGRE just fine. (They're pestering me about playing it again, which is a good sign.) So, sometime later this week we'll fire up our tactical nuclear weapons and cybernetic death machines, and have a proper father-son three-way battle to the death. Thank you, Royce.

[mtngrown]

Originally Posted by sir-talen

The actual *experience* of playing the game was very, very strange. On one hand, the tactile memory was immediate and intense -- I played these games in high school and college, way back in the late 1970s and 1980s, and it brought back a lot of memories. On the other... man, game design has moved on since then. OGRE is still a solid game, no question. But a turn-based war game played with cardboard counters on a hexagonal grid, using a single six-side die, a Combat Results Table, and stacking rules? Maaaaan. That's so, so Carter Administration.

Probably to my benefit, in this case, that I haven't played ANY board games at all since the Carter Administration...

Which is probably why I'm enjoying my solo excursion through Situations #1-#12 with the $9-copy-from-eBay PanzerBlitz I picked up a few weeks ago. Original slip case and everything, all errata intact. Nice!

[mearrin69]

Nice to see stories like this!

$9 Panzer Blitz? That's cheap. I still have Panzer Leader and Blitz. Cool games.
M

[Failure16]

That is awesome. Where in Kosovo is your friend? I spent a bit under a year in Gnjilane and did a fair bit of working alongside the Kosovo Police Service.

Pretty area, but back then there were some problems that had to be worked through. Still are, but that's life I suppose.

[KhyberJoe]

What we need is someone to travel to Ogre, Latvia and get photos of The Box in the town square - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ogre,_Latvia. If I could afford it, I would have been there already.

Joe